[Buddha-l] Stanford scholar Tenzin Tethong could be the nextprimeminister of Tibet

[Franz Metcalf]

Hi all,

I've been having my own back-and-forth about this, on facebook (of all  
places, though Buddhist studies professonals are involved). It's been  
reminding me of the jataka in which the bodhisattva kills some would- 
be murderers who were going to kill 500 persons destined to become  
arahants. Of course the bodhisattva does this out of compassion for  
them (to prevent them incurring the terrible karma for the murders). I  
can't say I reckon Obama and the soldiers who chose and executed this  
assassination acted with parallel compassion. I found HHDL's words  
surprising and I'd love to hear more from you, Dan, along the lines of

> For the record, his HHDL is not suddenly saying something he hasn't  
> been
> saying, consistently, for many decades. That people are still  
> surprised and
> "confounded" by it shows they listen with their ears closed and  
> minds only
> hearing what they want to hear.


I have, no doubt, been listening quite selectively to His Holiness. On  
the other hand, my eyes are open and I thought the USC cap looked  
quite fetching with his robes.

For the record, the Times quotes HHDL as saying " "Forgiveness doesn't  
mean forget what happened. . If something is serious and it is  
necessary to take counter-measures, you have to take counter-measures."

I can't read that other than implying what Richard Nixon once called  
"preemptive retaliation," in this case, murder.

Franz