Good morning!
We have now a cool summer Sunday after our sittings. We had Independence Day on
July 4. We will have Tanabata (七夕) on July 7, which celebrates the once a year
meeting of Orihime (織姫, Weaver Girl, Vega) and Kengyū (牽牛, Cowboy, Altair)
across Ama-no-gawa (天の川, Heaven River, Milky Way). Taking this opportune
occasion, people express their wishes by writing on paper slips and hanging them on
bamboo trees planted near the entrance to their houses (originally the wishes were to
become skillful at weaving, then at any skill, and now anything).
The Declaration of Independence proclaims people’s independence from a colonial
power, asserting the rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness arbitrarily
confiscated by feudal lords. Rights must accompany responsibilities, but often they
are claimed arbitrarily, with disregard for the latter. Thus, they become limited, ego-
centric life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness in the triple poisons of greed, anger,
and delusion, resulting in a fight for the triple maladies of materialism, militarism,
and mammonism.
The triple poisons and maladies come from karmas. The fundamental solution lies in
stopping karmas with the triple learnings of sīla (morality), samādhi
(concentration), and prajñā (prognosis), and the holiness (wholly wholesomeness) of
harmony, health, and happiness. Sitting and stopping karmas leads to samādhi,
which embraces sīla and prajñā, enabling one to attain unconditioned peace
(nirvana) and unsurpassed awakening (bodhi), and to settle in and serve for holy
harmony, health, and happiness.
We wish the Awakened Way of cultivation and verification of the triple learnings and
holiness with amrita, ambrosia, immortality, not only on the day of Tanabata, but
every day, everywhere, not only for us, but also for all. We weave with skillful means
beautiful tapestries of all beings in limitless life, liberation, love, and light, not
egoism, ego-nomy, and ego-logy, but eco-ism, eco-nomy, and eco-logy with holy
truth, beauty, goodness, and peace, all the time, at all places.
7/6/14
