[Buddha-l] Re: {Buddha-l] Being in Love ... "& its only end is loss"

[Gad Horowitz]

Why am I receiving nothing from the list?  Is everything all right?  I am
suffering withdrawal symptoms.  I guess it's actually possible to be
addicted to blah blah about the Truth.


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Franz Metcalf" <franz at mind2mind.net>
To: "Buddhist discussion forum" <buddha-l at mailman.swcp.com>
Sent: Sunday, February 24, 2008 6:51 PM
Subject: [Buddha-l] Re: {Buddha-l] Being in Love ... "& its only end is
loss"


> Robert et al.,
>
> Thank you Robert Leverant for the moving and terrible words of the
> Buddha Judah Halevi or Emanuel of Rome. There's no hiding from his
> wisdom. And yet, I cannot help myself. Aware of this I intuit why
> others cry out, as Martin Luther may have done, "Hier stehe ich, ich
> kann nichts anders. Gott helfe mir. Amen!"
>
> Let me in turn add the words of another Buddha, Kohelet the Preacher,
> also known as Ecclesiastes, as found in the Tanakh.
>
> Franz
>
> =====
>
> The truth of impermanence haunted me,
> and I soured on life.
> the suffering of life overwhelmed me,
> and I sought refuge in depression.
>
> But I could not escape the truth of what I had seen:
> all our doing is in quest of sanctuary from impermanence.
> We seek to think our way to certainty;
> to buy our way to security;
> to pleasure ourselves to eternity.
> But nothing brings us the permanence we crave.
> Thought is only opinion;
> wealth is only a burden;
> pleasure is only a prelude to pain.
> and in this there is no joy.
> We desire not what we have but what does not exist:
> permanence, an eternity of self in a world designed by selfishness.
> It is not wisdom, wealth, or pleasure that brings us pain,
> but the mistaking of these for something they are not.
> Our quest for permanence is the root of our suffering.
>       (The Book of Kohelet, 2:17, in the translation of Rami Shapiro)
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