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  1. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    Unfortunately they don't provide the names of the translators. I did find one translation by Harischandra Kaviratna, which uses the word non-hate instead of love, however I haven't found any information about the qualifications of this translator.
  2. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    I will. Please provide a link to an English translation by a scholar as respected as Muller. The link should have the name of the translator(s) so I may verify they are authorities I should trust.
  3. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    Well, the translator of the text Friedrich Max Muller was a renown German scholar of the religions of India. He is considered one of the founders of the science of religion. Are you saying we should not trust this scholar's skill to accurately translate the text...
  4. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    Yes, the translation here by one scholar doesn't have the word only: https://archive.org/stream/thedhammapada00unknuoft/thedhammapada00unknuoft_djvu.txt Instead, it translates the text this way: "5. For hatred does not cease by hatred at any time. Hatred ceases by love. This is an old rule."...
  5. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    Please translate the entire text I quoted so I might see what you mean.
  6. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    I mean, if forgiveness is sometimes an act of compassion and sometimes not, then we are discussing apples and oranges. Rather than carefully considering one forgiveness, we are confusing the two forgivenesses! It would be wise to do our best to differentiate between the two. Otherwise we will...
  7. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    Perhaps. That remains to be determined, I suppose.
  8. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    EDIT: I corrected the typo for (2) below. I would define a purely selfish act as that which benefits no one but the one acting. I would define a purely selfless act as that which benefits only the one acted upon and not the one acting. If these definitions are accurate, then I'd say (1) if my...
  9. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    What do Buddha's words, "but only by love" mean? Or are you saying the English translation I found is incorrect?
  10. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    Then is the answer is still, "Yes, forgiveness is an act of compassion"?
  11. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    Yeah, I'll have to check it out. I suspect, though that I'll still prefer science fiction. When done well, it has the ability to help me understand different points of view. For example, before watching BSG, I thought of terrorism as a kind of evil and insanity. After watching an episode where...
  12. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    So from the Christian perspective that Heaven exists, I see possibilities for compassion to remain: • While there would be no suffering in Heaven, there would be a desire to enhance the lives of those one knows there, through relationships, et. al. • While there would be no suffering in...
  13. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    Oops. Yeah. Star Wars. Forgive my mixing sci-fi metaphors .
  14. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    Yeah, I'm re-watching BSG on Hulu. Never watched 24. I should give it a go. I've binge-watched every episode of each Star Trek series but DS9. I should give it a try.
  15. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    I think I see. So are you saying it's a kind of chicken or egg question? What came first forgiveness or love? * * * I appreciate the Battlestar Galactica reference, by the way. The SyFy channel's version of it is arguably one of the best science-fiction television shows ever produced. It did...
  16. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    Well, Crossfire and I were thinking that compassion is what one feels (empathy, for example) and what one desires (to reduce suffering, for example). Acting on these feelings and desires are what we call the effects of, or acts of compassion. So looking at compassion that way (as a feeling and...
  17. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    Yes, I think you might be right. At the very least, it seems, it's an act of loving oneself. For seeing how harmful hate is to me and how much pain it brings me, I might desire to alleviate such suffering. So out of a desire to help myself, I might do whatever it takes to stop feeling anger...
  18. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    But then again, I still have my doubts. For I just read these words of Buddha: "Hatred does not cease by hatred, but only by love; this is the eternal rule." Gautama Buddha (The Dhammapada: The Sayings of the Buddha) Since the eternal rule is that love and only love causes hatred to cease...
  19. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    So the path we've taken in our journey today was prompted by your answer to my question. Is it an act of compassion to forgive oneself? Your answer was yes, so the inference I drew was that forgiveness is a compassionate act. For if the answer to the question is yes, then forgiving is an action...
  20. Spockrates

    Wondering About Forgiveness

    It seems logical to me that Buddha advocated compassion, rather than apathy. Rather than merely an absence of hate, which is apathy, he desired that we have the opposite of hate, which is compassion. Or did he not want us to become like himself?
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