The Story of Setaketu (Bodhisat)

"The Great Chronicle of The Buddhas" (Maha Buddhavamsa), Tipitakadhara Mingun Sayadaw, edited and translated by U Ko Lay and U Tin Lwi; further intensive editing Wisdom Quarterly

Setaketu (Santusita) in Tusita world

The deva Setaketu, the future Buddha, enjoyed the supreme deva bliss in the [space] abode of Tusita for 4,000 years according to deva-time reckoning (which is equivalent to 576,000,000 years in the human world).

 

Then 1,000 human years before the end of his life-span in the Tusita world, divinities (brahmas) of the Pure Abodes (suddhavasa) proclaimed:

"Friends, 1,000 years from today there will appear in the human world an omniscient buddha!"
 

Because of this proclamation from the vault of the deva world, the uproar (buddha kolahala) announcing the appearance of a buddha, "An omniscient buddha will be appearing! An omniscient buddha will be appearing!" reverberated across the entire human world 1,000 years ahead of the event [Note 1].

The Devas' Request

On hearing the uproar announcing the advent of a buddha, the deva kings of the 10,000 world-systems -- such as the Four Great Sky Kings (near earth orbit rulers), Sakka, Suyama, Santusita (6th Heaven, Para-nimmita-vasavatti), Sunimmita, Vasavatti, and all Great-Brahmas congregated in a certain [galaxy or world-system] to hold a discussion on the Bodhisat (Bodhisattva) whose deva life-span had only seven days remaining, by human reckoning, and whose approaching end of life had become manifest through five predictive signs. 

 

Then they all approached the deva Setaketu with their hands joined in adoration and made this request:

 

"O deva Bodhisat [Buddha-to-be], you have completely fulfilled the Ten Perfections, not with the desire to gain the bliss of Sakka [Michael or Thor, Lord of Lords (of Tavatimsa) and King of Kings (in the Realm of the Four Great Kings], of Mara (in Brahma's Retinue or 7th Heaven), of Brahma (in the Maha Brahma deva loka), or of a Universal Monarch (on Earth). You have fulfilled these perfections aspiring for all-knowing buddhahood in order to acquire for yourself freedom from the three worlds (spheres) as well as to liberate the multitudes of humans, devas ["shining ones"], and brahmas ["creative divinities," supremos].
 
"O deva Bodhisat, this is the most propitious time for you to become an omniscient awakened teacher! This is truly the right moment to become an omniscient awakened teacher! Therefore, take conception in the womb of the human world. And after attaining the supreme enlightenment of a teacher, liberate humans, devas, and brahmas from the round of suffering/rebirth (samsara) by teaching the Dharma of deathlessness: nirvana."

The Five Great Investigations

The deva Bodhisat Setaketu did not hastily consent to the supplication of the devas and brahmas who had come together from the 10,000 world-systems. Instead, in line with the tradition of previous bodhisattas, he made five great investigations:

(1) Is it the appropriate time for the appearance of a buddha?

(2) Is there an appropriate world (dipa, island, continent, planet, light) for the appearance of a buddha?

(3) Is there an appropriate land for the appearance of a buddha?

(4) Is there an appropriate family into which to be reborn (in a final existence)?

(5) Is it the appropriate span of life of a bodhisatta's mother. More

NOTE: With reference to the name of the Buddha-to-be as a deva, it was Santusita according to the chapter on Ratanasankama, Buddhavamsa which in Pali reads: Yada'ham tusite kaye santusito nama'ham tada. Also in the commentary to the Buddhavamsa and Jinalankara Tika the same name is mentioned. But in the exposition of the Pubbenivasa-katha, Veranja-kanda of the Parajika commentary, and in the exposition of the Bhayabherava Sutra of the Mulapanasa commentary, his name is given as Setaketu ["White Banner"]. Moreover, successive authors of Burmese chronicles or Buddhavamsas such as the Tathagata-Udana Dipani, Malalankara Vatthu, Jinatthapakasani, etc., give Setaketu as the name of the deva. Therefore, it has been explained by various teachers that Santusita was a common name derived from Tusita -- the name of the celestial abode (space world) -- whereas Setaketu was the proper name that specifically refers to the deva who would become Prince Siddhartha the Buddha Gautama.

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News of the Day: Spiritual movies (video)

Seven, Pat Macpherson, Irma Quintero, Wisdom Quarterly, News of the Day, Nov. 2012

Calming prints on the streets of Chiang Mai, Thailand's second city (WeGoTwo/flickr.com)

• Obama drops in on Cambodian dictator Hun Sen after visit with Burma's rulers
• 10,000 Days of Hun Sen: “I not only weaken the opposition, I’m going to make them dead...and if anyone is strong enough to try to hold a demonstration, I will beat all those dogs and put them in a cage.” 
• WalMart and others kill Bangladeshi workers

Happiness
Happiness in Teen Years linked to Higher Income later

Happy Samurai Girl (imdb.com)

(HuffPo) Gloomy teens, take heed -- your more happy-go-lucky classmates will likely earn more than you, according to new research. Researchers followed more than 10,000 U.S. adolescents over a decade and found that happiness during the teen years and young adulthood was linked with income at age 29.

Life Lessons I Learned from my Baby
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Happiness first for youths

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Led Zeppelin movie released: "Celebration Day"

Jimi Hendrix NEW album: "People, Hell, and Angels"

WATCH: Soundgarden plays live concert

Hundreds attend happiness panel

(Yale Daily News) Hundreds of students flooded into LC 101 last night to hear a panel of professors discuss happiness. The talk, hosted by Vita Bella ["Good Life"]... 

Study: Happiness in workplace is key to employee productivity

To complement this study, The Wall Street Journal examined the role that happiness has in workplace productivity, and how both employees... 

Workers now happiest they have been in ages, finds study

(Herald Sun, Nov. 25, 2012) Workers now happiest they have been in ages, finds study... Happiness among their workers also is up by 40 per cent as they too enjoy better... 

"Female PORN STARS are happier"

(MSN NZ News, Nov. 26, 2012) A study claiming porn actresses are happier in their sexuality and self-image than other women has been discredited by an Australian expert.

  
"Travelers and Magicians"

In Bhutan, the last Himalayan Buddhist kingdom, dreaming of coming to Buddhist America

  
A Bhutanese fable [available for DVD rental] about lives in transition will be shown Monday at Real Art Ways, 56 Arbor St., Hartford. "Travelers and Magicians" tells the story about Dondup, who wants to leave Bhutan for America, and a monk who tries to talk him out of it. To do this, the monk tells the story of another man restless and dissatisfied, whose story does not end well. It is the first movie shot entirely in Bhutan, and is in the Bhutanese language, Dzonghka, with subtitles. More

Bollywood's Sherlyn Chopra to star in Kama Sutra in 3D
Kashmir: Canada and India's new relationship
LA Yoga: Ayurveda and Health (Magazine)

Kindle eBook: India Was One

iJAN helps FREE Palestine: The WorldSocial Forum Free Palestine (WSF FP) is approaching. More than 10,000 Palestinian and solidarity activists from 36 countries will converge on Porto Alegre to learn from each other and together organize to build a strong movement to confront Israel and Zionism and the broader injustices they represent and support. The International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network and activists in the US, Canada, and around the world are building a joint struggleframework to the WSF FP.  More

Filling US prisons with "modern slaves" for profit
The North America Bigfoot Search (Paulides)
UFO sightings warm up on Australia's Gold Coast
Research in Open and Distance Learning  (Journal)
China dissident Ai Weiwei basks in his relative liberty
PHOTO GALLERY: Buddhist beauty in China (wow)
PHOTOS: TraceLUX's trip to Tibet
Bhutan gives cold shoulder to Nepal
Rooftop news: The Himalayan Times 
English eBooks (Tusita Hermitage)

"Life of Pi"

(LINK) Director Ang Lee ("Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon") recruits an actual trained Bengal tiger to create a groundbreaking movie about a young man who survives a tragic disaster at sea. He is hurtled on an epic journey of adventure and discovery. While marooned on a lifeboat, he forms an amazing and unexpected connection with the ship's only other survivor, the tiger. WARNING: Many viewers say the movie tries to inspire wonder and awe and a belief in GOD.

 

"Cloud Atlas"

 (LINK) The most "Buddhist" movie of the year?

 

This Wachowski film features handsome Halle Berry and America's very own sweetheart Tom Hanks with Buddhist themes reminiscent of "Looper." Except this is without a time-travel conceit to make the karmic connection perfectly clear. "Cloud Atlas" is an exploration of how the actions (karma) of individual lives impact one another. This happens in the past, present, and future. One living being, in the course of becoming, is shaped from a killer into a hero. And a single act of kindness ripples across centuries to inspire a revolution.
  
Not since Hanks nearly ruined "Cast Away" have we been so torn between wanting to watch a film for thematic reasons and being kept away by its male lead. In that epic adventure, Hanks' character is adrift on a raft ("Life of Pi"-style) with no one to talk to but a soccer ball. He draws eyes on it, places a wig atop it, and constantly whines: "Wilson, will I ever get home? Wilson, does my wife still love me? Wilson, what are we going to do?!!" Later in a hallucination, the ball answers him: "My name is Voit, dumb@ss!" Wait, that pay-off only came much later in a "Family Guy" cutaway:

"Cloud Atlas" might be bearable with the help of co-stars Susan Sarandon, Zhou Xun, Hugo Weaving, Doona Rae, Jim Sturgess, James D'Arcy, Hugh Grant, Ben Whishaw, Jim Broadbent, Keith David, David Mitchell, David Gyasi... because if the worst thing one has to say about a prospective film is that Tom Hanks is in it, that is probably one great film.

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Obama in Buddhist Asia

Editors, Wisdom Quarterly (ANALYSIS)

Barry bathes the Buddha with sky-deva looking on and Hillary nosing in (Reuters).

 

The Dalai Obama

While the rest of America was in line to re-watch K-Stew out vamp T-Laut and R-Patz and some blended chimera kid, fearless leader President B-SOb (Barry Soetoro Obama, or B.S. Obama) was in Buddhist Burma, the most Orwellian police state in the world.  It was George Orwell's inspiration for Nineteen Eighty-Four.

He worked for England's Indian Imperial Police in Burma, having been born in colonial India, now Buddhist Bihar state, the site of the Buddha's great enlightenment. B-SOb continues his epic tour through Thailand and the formerly devastated "killing fields" of Cambodia.

• Rupert Murdoch apologizes for tweet criticizing "Jewish owned press" coverage of Israel's war crimes in Gaza
• American-Palestinians's emotional roller coaster watching Israel's violence toward Gaza

B-SOb with parinirvana Buddha

These Theravada Buddhist countries welcomed the future leader of the planet, groomed by the MIC's clandestine services to assume the position post-disclosure. He will be a great speaker, the Great Communicator (scoot over, actor Ron Reagan), but he will wield no more actual power than anyone. That's what happens when you're just a hired teleprompter reader, as Zaphod Beeblebrox found out in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series. (He's "just some guy, y'know?") This is the way the MIC has been running the world for decades since at least the time of a short man with a neat mustache wowed the crowds. And it goes to show, on a positive note, that in the decision between a Brave New World and an Orwellian New World Order, the powers that be seem to be leaning toward the former.

• Pres. Obama on a historic visit to Burma (Myanmar)
• Partying in a Police State 
• Police state? Who said anything about a police state?

President Barack Beeblebrox

Inside the Total Perspective Vortex

Like Barack or Barry, as he went by growing up, Zaphod is the renegade president of the galaxy. This sounds good, but it is a role that involves no power whatsoever. It merely requires the incumbent to attract attention so that no one asks, Who's really in charge?

 

This is a role for which Zaphod is perfectly suited. He is the only person to have survived the mind warping Total Perspective Vortex. The TPV is a machine that derives its hideous power from any material inserted into one end, say a slice of angel's food cake. It takes the holographic information contained in that material and reveals a boundless multiverse. 

  

When a person is inserted into the business end of the machine, s/he sees what that arrow is pointing at -- an infinitesimally small speck on an infinitesimally small speck in this vast spectacle of space. A sign attached to the arrow contains the confidence-destroying, reality-warping message, "You are here."

  

How did Zaphod survive the revelation? In the original BBC radio series, it was established that he survived because he was in an Electronically Synthesized Universe within the multiverse. It was created especially for him, making him the "most important being in that universe." He was thus uniquely equipped to survive that version of the vortex. 

  

His brain-care specialist (psychiatrist) Gag Halfrunt, constantly explains to anyone who will listen, "Vell, Zaphod's just zis guy, you know?"

  

The Lady Aung San Suu Kyi with Pres. Obama

President Zaphod used his position as President of the Galaxy to steal the Heart of Gold, a craft capable of taking advantage of Infinite Improbability Drive at its unveiling.  This is quite like the shocking but true reports of a young Barry Obama traveling to the surface Mars via an "elevator" (transporter room) in El Segundo, California. Believe it. Why? Because life and this universe is much, much stranger than fiction. And one thing is sure here: Like Zaphod, Barry is really, really cool. So all salute our handpicked (by the NSA, NSC, CIA, or MIC) leader!

We love him (as a person). We just can't stand those he represents, which are the same secretive behind-the-scenes movers-and-shakers Dick Cheney and the Bush Dynasty represented.

• White House denies Obama was ever TELEPORTED to Mars

Nice Words are Easy  

Presidents Obama and Thein Sein during historic visit (zimbio)

(Reuters) "For too long, the people of this [Burmese] state, including ethnic Rakhine, have faced crushing poverty and persecution. But there's no excuse for violence against innocent people," Obama told a packed audience for a speech at Yangon University.

"The Rohingya...hold within themselves the same dignity as you do, and I do. National reconciliation will take time, but for the sake of our common humanity, and for the sake of this country's future, it's necessary to stop incitement and to stop violence."

Thein Sein, in a letter to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon last week, promised to tackle the root causes of the problem, and Obama said he welcomed "the government's commitment to address the issues of injustice, and accountability, and humanitarian access and citizenship."

PRISONERS RELEASED?
Some human rights groups objected to the Burma visit, saying Obama was rewarding the government of the former pariah state for a job that was incomplete. Speaking in Thailand on the eve of his visit, Obama denied he was going to offer his "endorsement" or that his trip was premature. More

• Burma Dictator Watch

Letter from a soldier to Burmese people

Dictators hold fake elections (sjpaderborn)

(Original post in Burmese, Niknayman) I am a Burmese Army engineer from Division 905. Our captain, Ye Win Aung, from my division is forcing everyone in our division to recruit new soldiers. If we are not successful in our recruitment, he threatens to re-deploy us from well-paid positions at the base camp to other places. On top of that, he also demands that we must recruit at least one new soldier per month. We have also been given strict orders to recruit even underage kids, beggars, or homeless people by either offering them money or capturing them by force. Hence, everyone in the division is feeling miserable about having to carry out such orders. Army personnel close to obtaining pensions are especially worried that they might be punished if they do not carry out the orders.

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Burma's secret Muslim genocide (video)

Al Jazeera English (Special Report); Press TV; EncryptedReality4; Wisdom Quarterly

Rohingya have been persecuted and discriminated against for decades, but few can even pronounce their name let alone know their plight. The UN describes them as one of the most persecuted minorities, yet their suffering increases. So are the world's democracies ignoring them? Guests: Justin Wintle, Brad Adams, Mohamed Nour, Dina Madani.

Ethnic cleansing of Muslims in Burma (Orwellian police state Myanmar) is being carried out by nominally "Buddhist" police state troops. Meanwhile, Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi is "criminally silent" about it.
 
A prominent political analyst says that Burma's president's proposal to expel Rohingya Muslims from the country is an "ethnic cleansing."
 
"This is ethnic cleansing... the government and even this Nobel prize winner, the Lady [Aung San Suu Kyi] is so criminally silent about the problems of this minority in Myanmar," Professor Ghulam Taqi Bangash at the Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto Institute of Science and Technology (SZABIST) told Press TV.

  

The remarks come after Burma's President Thein Sein said that Rohingya Muslims must be expelled from the country and sent to refugee camps run by the United Nations.
  
The government refuses to recognize nearly-one-million-strong Rohingya Muslims community, which the UN calls one of the world's most persecuted people.

Burma claims the Rohingya are not native and classify them as illegal migrants although they have lived in the country for generations. Burma's opposition National League for Democracy party (NLD) leader Aung San Suu Kyi was elected to parliament after she was released from house arrest earlier this year.

  

However, many people are disappointed at the way she has been avoiding the issue.
 
Last month at a press conference in Geneva, Suu Kyi said she "didn't know" if Rohingya Muslims were Burmese citizens.
 
The Stream (Al Jazeera English) "The Plight of the Rohingya"

  

Bangash said Washington is also criminally silent over the issue as the US tries to coax the countries in this region of Southeast Asia to stop them from having better relations with the People's Republic of China.
  
"Southeast Asia is becoming much more inconspicuous on the economic map for the United States of America," he added.
 
"They should rather strengthen the sanctions against Myanmar until this problem should be solved, but they are not doing that," Bangash added.

Burma's current government is run by military figures, which have been accused of rights abuse.

Over a dozen Muslims were killed on June 3 when a mob of ethnic Rakhines, who are mostly Buddhist, attacked a passenger bus [in retaliation for an alleged rape of a Buddhist girl] in the Rakhine state in the west of the country that borders Bangladesh [slaughtering 10 innocent Muslims simply for being Muslims].

Over the past two years, throngs of ethnic Muslims have attempted to flee [Burma to go to Bangladesh] by boats in the face of systematic oppression by the [Burmese] government.

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Suu Kyi on democracy-friendly growth (video)

ILOTV, June 14, 2012 Burma Need Democracy-Friendly Growth

Aung San Suu Kyi called for international aid and investment to promote economic progress in Burma (Myanmar) and in particular focused attention on the problem of youth unemployment. Highlighting the potential of her country both in terms of its natural and human resources she noted, "It is not so much joblessness as hopelessness that threatens our future." The Nobel Laureate made her landmark address to a packed Assembly Hall at the 101st session of the International Labor Conference in Geneva, Switzerland. More

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Speaking Freely in the New Burma (audio)

TheWorld.org (PRI, Public Radio International); Wisdom Quarterly

This summer, [The Lady] Aung San Suu Kyi will be stepping out onto an international stage.

  

She will finally be picking up her 1991 Nobel Peace Prize and speaking her mind in various European capitals.

   

It will be a far cry from the 15 years she spent under house arrest, unable to participate in elections or speak to her Burmese compatriots. 

  

Suu Kyi, now a member of the Burmese parliament, recently completed her first trip out of Myanmar [Burma as renamed by its military dictatorships after their coup] in 24 years.

  

In a speech in Thailand, she praised President Thein Sein’s efforts to bring democracy to the country. But she didn’t shy away from criticizing more entrenched [authoritarian] forces that are less open to change, in particular the military which she called a “force to be reckoned with.”

Buddhist monastics rose up protesting police state dictators during the Saffron Revolution.

   
Next, Suu Kyi heads to Paris, Oslo, London, and elsewhere for a series of high profile appearances.

   

Her words will be closely analyzed back home -- by those who love her and those who fear her. It’s clear that the government of Myanmar is giving Suu Kyi freedoms that it previously denied her... More

• LISTEN
  

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U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton Visits Burma.

Every minute of every day, while we sit in the relative comfort of our homes, Buddhist monks in Burma are being tortured in prisons. And when they aren't being beaten, they are huddled in dirty, dark and disease ridden cells. All this they endure because they wouldn't sit by and watch the people of Burma be treated like garbage by the dictatorial regime. Their courage was driven, in part, by the deep compassion developed from practicing the Dharma. They are the conscience of the world standing up and saying, "enough!!"

The monks have gotten the most attention in the international news, but a lesser known campaign of ethnic cleansing is occurring in remote, ethnic areas. The remoteness of some of these regions is a curse for some ethnic minorities because less people know they are even there, let alone being killed, tortured and raped. If revered monks in Burma aren't treated well, then no one is safe. But, thanks to concerned citizens around the world, attention continues to grow about the plight of Burma (Myanmar).

The U.S. Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, is currently visiting Burma, so it is vital that we keep up the pressure to be the voice of the voiceless in a country with a proud, Buddhist tradition. Please, take a few minutes and send an email to Secretary Clinton's blog about your support for Burma, it's people and their revered monks (click on this sentence to be redirect to her page). You might not feel that one person's email can make a difference but I have been involved in the Burma issue for several years now and I've seen a change.

At first, most people had no idea where Burma or Myanmar was on the globe, and the U.S. government showed little interest in the affairs in the Southeast Asian country. Today, after years of awareness and relentless calls for action, one of America's highest ranking leaders is in Burma to spread the message of concerned citizens to the military dictatorship, loud and clear. So, please, let your conscience be heard!! Click on this sentence to reach the secretary's email form and thank her for her action. Let her know that you are following the issue and urge her to keep up the pressure!! We would all hope our fellow humans would do the same for us if we were in a time of need, so let us stand up for our brothers and sisters in Burma

~I bow to the Buddha within all things~

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The Shifting Sands of Change.

(PHOTO CREDIT: Shifting Sands in the Maowusu Desert in China, by Michael Reynolds/EPA).

I was contemplating today about the release of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi in Burma and how quickly change can occur. Day after day, month after month and year after year it seemed that Suu Kyi would be frozen in her house arrest for the rest of her life. Then, over-night the seemingly impossible occurred--she was released into the arms of her joyful supporters. It still remains to be seen what effect this will have on the greater politics of Burma, but for now it is a powerful reminder of impermanence.

The leaders of countries put on a great show of power, strength and dominance with their armies, imposing uniforms and intimidating rhetoric, but the truth is that they are just as subject to change as anyone else. I found a great example of this online. It's a presentation (below) that someone put together showing the futility of clinging to power, or anything for that matter. It shows how many times borders changed hands in Europe over the last 10 centuries.

It is compressed into 5 minutes, which shows how the mind is often tricked into thinking that time seems to drag on when one is enduring a lot of suffering. However, that time passes faster than the speed of light when measured against the life-span of the universe. Dictators come and go but the Dharma will concur all.

~Peace to all beings~

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Daw Aung San Suu Kyi Released from House Arrest!!

(PHOTO CREDIT: REUTERS)

YANGON, Myanmar — Myanmar's military government freed its archrival, democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, on Saturday after her latest term of detention expired. Several thousand jubilant supporters streamed to her residence. Suu Kyi has been jailed or under house arrest for more than 15 of the last 21 years.

James: You would think that after all the abuse Aung San Suu Kyi has endured at the hands of the military dictatorship in Burma, that she'd be a broken spirit. Yet, she has weathered house arrest extremely well. She even went so far as to say that she has no ill feeling toward those who detained her. How could that be possible? As it turns out she has credited Buddhism with helping her survive house arrest. It seems likely that she was able to put into practice the Buddhist teaching of "no-self" which teaches that there is no unchanging, permanent "self" that exists separate from everything else. We don't have to travel through samsara alone because we are interconnected and interdependent with all people, things and phenomena. Nothing ever exists independent of all other things.

A tree exists because the sun exists. Suu Kyi was only imprisoned materially but since there is no "self" to imprison, she was always connected with her supporters as long as she remained aware of that essence. She could travel above those confining walls in concentrating upon the unbreakable connection with family, friends, teachers and fellow citizens. Thus, rather than sinking into feelings of loneliness and bitterness, Aung San Suu Kyi probably rested secure in being aware that she was never alone. She was interconnected with all Burmese (and the world) and therefore could weather the storm of personal imprisonment with greater ease. Because she understood these teachings it is very likely that she survived her imprisonment better than the junta leaders.

But, you might say, "How are the junta leaders imprisoned?" They are imprisoned by clinging to the delusion of "self." If one believes that there is a permanent "self" that is separate from everything else then anything that maintains the delusion of that "self" is "good" and anything that doesn't is "bad." This creates suffering when the "good" isn't around because the self is attached to the "good" in order for it to feel important. And it creates suffering when the "bad" is around because the drug-addicted self isn't being given what "it" thinks is necessary for happiness.

But it isn't lasting happiness because a dictatorship is based on the delusion that there is a "self" that is perceived to be better than everyone else. But, in order to keep that delusion inflated the "self" must constantly be on alert for threats to its fragile existence. Therefore, in order to keep this elaborate charade going the dictator (self) worries and ruminates with paranoia about losing this delusional sense of "specialness." This creates a lot of suffering inside. The dictators may not show it but they're not happy inside. A person who is at peace doesn't need to go around and control, manipulate, oppress and murder people as the Burmese junta is doing.

So, if Aung San Suu Kyi was able to over-come the quagmire of the the "self" then she was free to be at peace with her situation regardless of the house arrest. Because her sense of worth and happiness wouldn't be dependent upon if the "self" was happy, or even if it existed at all. And, while the dictators remain physically free, emotionally they are in one of the darkest, deepest prisons known to existence in samsara (self-importance). Maintaining that heavy burden of self-importance means wherever you go, your prison travels with you. Yet, Suu Kyi will always be free no matter where you try to lock-away her body. Her example helps us to remember that if she can survive decade after decade of imprisonment by dictators, then surely we can survive our daily lives. May her freedom spark a softening of relations between the junta and the strong and noble people of beautiful Burma.

~Peace to all beings~

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Growing Pressure on European Union for a United Nations Investigation of Burmese Regime.

From the U.S. Campaign for Burma:

Pressure on the European Union (EU) to support an UN investigation into crimes against humanity in Burma is growing. This week three prominent dissident groups in Burma, the All Burma Monks Alliance, the 88 Generation Students and the All Burma Federation of Student Union sent an open letter to the EU asking for their support. The pressure is working--just this week Hungary announced it supports the establishment of a Commission of Inquiry into crimes against humanity in Burma!

Right now, the EU is drafting a resolution on Burma that it will introduce at the UN General Assembly meeting (UNGA) which will begin on the 3rd week of September. We need your help to make sure this resolution calls for the establishment of a Commission of Inquiry into Crimes Against Humanity in Burma. We need you to call the ambassadors again as soon as possible.

This is long over due. There have already been 19 UN General Assembly resolutions on Burma since 1991, but none have mentioned the Commission of Inquiry and none have taken serious action. Following UN Special Rapporteur Tomas Quintana's call for the investigation this March, some of the UN's most powerful players, including the US and UK, have endorsed his recommendation. Support for the Commission of Inquiry is the highest it has even been. But this is not enough, we need the EU, a major sponsor of the draft resolution on Burma, to include the call for the Commission of Inquiry in this UNGA resolution.

Below, we have included instructions on how to call or email.

Myra Dahgaypaw

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Burma Building Nukes.

A new investigation has revealed that Burma has begun a nuclear weapons program with the help of North Korea. A documentary made by the Norway-based group Democratic Voice of Burma says evidence has come from top-secret material smuggled out of the country over several years. The investigation found the south-east Asian country was a long way from producing a nuclear weapon, but had gone to great lengths to acquire the technology and expertise to do so. Read the full report: Click on this sentence.

The most important agreement that Burma must satisfy is its agreement with the IAEA. It signed an agreement with the IAEA in 1995 that it would not pursue nuclear weapons under a carefully defined standard international legal agreement. Burma has certified that it has no nuclear facilities, has minimal nuclear materials, and has no plans to change this situation. The information brought by Sai suggests that Burma is mining uranium, converting it to uranium compounds for reactors and bombs, and is trying to build a reactor and or an enrichment plant that could only be useful for a bomb. There is no chance that these activities are directed at a reactor to produce electricity in Burma.

James: As we say here in America, "Arms are for hugging, not killing." The Burmese are starving and impoverished, yet the dictatorship would rather spend money on trying to acquire nuclear weapons. Burma is a good reminder of why politics often falls short because by nature it is based on power, which is an extension of greed--one of the three poisons in Buddhism.

~Peace to all beings~

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Obama Calls for Aung San Suu Kyi to be Released.

Pro-Burmese Democracy leader and Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi (right) with her former spiritual adviser, The Venerable Buddhist monk Thamanya Sayadaw who is now deceased).

By VIJAY JOSHI, Associated Press Writer Vijay Joshi, Associated Press Writer – Sun Nov 15, 9:11 am ET

SINGAPORE – President Barack Obama on Sunday told Myanmar's junta to free pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi during an unusual face-to-face interaction with a top leader of the ruling military. Obama delivered the strong message during his summit with leaders of 10 Southeast Asian nations, which included Myanmar Prime Minister Gen. Thein Sein. White House press secretary Robert Gibbs told reporters that Obama called on Myanmar to free his fellow Nobel Peace laureate Suu Kyi and other political prisoners, and end oppression of minorities.

A joint statement issued after the summit — the first ever between a U.S. president and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations — devoted a paragraph on Myanmar, a major irritant in relations between the two sides. But the statement did not call for the release of political prisoners, including Suu Kyi, who has spent 14 of the last 20 years under detention by the military regime. It only urged Myanmar to ensure that the elections it intends to hold in 2010 are "conducted in a free, fair, inclusive and transparent manner."

However, a direct appeal from Obama carries more weight as he is the most powerful leader to have conveyed the message directly to a top Myanmar official.

James: It's easy to feel compassion for the Burmese when we know that we are an extension of them, however, we must all be careful not to have pity toward them. Compassion is selfless in that it places the needs of others at the same level as our own and motivates us to give freely of our time, talents and resources to help ease that suffering a bit. Pity is feeling sorrow for someone's situation but then doing nothing about it. Or helping someone out of a feeling of obligation, which is based on your needs rather than those suffering. You're helping them to make yourself feel better because you silently judge them for being in the position that they are in. And when I say "you" I mean me as well. It is empty compassion. Pity comes from a place of believing that if the object of our pity were only like us then they wouldn't be suffering. As if we don't have a lot of suffering to deal with in our own regard!! Money and freedom aren't necessarily recipes for happiness and freedom from suffering.

True compassion should be extended toward the junta as well because true compassion is unbiased regardless of a person's actions. It's easy to pity the generals but not have genuine compassion because we've made the judgment that they are undeserving of relief from suffering. Yet who amongst us is free from delusion and unskilllful actions? We all have a lot of karmic rocks in our samsara backpack to carry around. We know that using violence, oppression and fear does not bring those leaders happiness. They are clearly suffering and true compassion seeks to ease suffering -- period. It has no prerequisites, no qualifiers, no judgments and no selectivity. There is a saying in America, "You can catch more flies with honey than you can with vinegar." Another saying goes, "A rising tide lifts all boats." In other words when we show compassion to all sides out of motivation to help all beings be free from suffering we realize that it helps all sides.

~Peace to all beings~

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Urgent! Help! Bat Nha Monastery Emergency Happening in Vietnam.

Dear Friends,

Please pray for the monastic brothers and sisters at Bat Nha Monastery in Vietnam right now Sept.27,2009. They are being physically forced to vacate the monastery. Please intervene in anyway that you can!

LIVE REPORT:
WWW.PHUSAONLINE is giving updated information on the situation at BatNha.

9:45 a.m. (VN time, September 27, 09):
*We are on the telephone with Bat Nha Monastery. The situation at the monastery is quite urgent and life threatening to the monastics.
*At the start of this current crisis, attackers gathered at 9:30am then began to destroy properties to this moment.
*Police in civilian clothes have been present the whole time, but they do nothing to intervene. It seems that they are there to direct the attack, and the attackers have been hired to do so?
*The monks are doing sitting meditation on the 3rd floor of their building, sending energy to the people who are blinded by ignorance, praying to the Bodhisatva of Deep Listening to cool the fire of ignorance in their hearts with the nectar of her compassion.
*We are hearing very loud banging sounds over the phone line.
*They are throwing meditation cushions outside the building.
*There are about 150 people attacking and destroying properties up to the second floor of the monks’ residence.

10:30 a.m. (VN time, September 27, 09):
Our communication is having difficulties, but we know that right now:
*The attacking mob has told the Monastic community that they have to leave the monastery within 2 days.
*The monks have been forced to go outside of their dormitories; they stand outside, chanting in the corridor.
*Two monks are in their ceremonial robes doing sitting meditation in front of their room.
*All community and personal belongings of the monks have been thrown outside.

10:50 a.m. (VN time, September 27, 09):
*The police have dragged Brothers Phap Hoi and Phap Tu outside (2 elder monks of the monastic community); they are dragging the monks by force like they would to animals.
*One Buddhist lay woman is being chased by the police; she is running and crying, calling out “We are in danger, dear teacher!”

11:06 a.m. ((VN time, September 27, 09):
*It’s raining in Bat Nha. The monks have to sit under the cold rain.
*The police is calling for large trucks to come and transport the monks away.
*All roads to the monastery are monitored. Lay friends try to come to help, but they are turned around from afar.
*The number of policemen present has increased. They have occupied all the monastic rooms; gathered all the monks to the field outside.
*The police has forced the monks to carry their backpacks outside and wait for trucks to come transport them away. Don’t know where they will be going.
*It’s still calm in the nuns’ hamlets.

11:23 a.m. ((VN time, September 27, 09):
*A large construction truck is heading towards the monks’ building named, “the Beginner’s Mind.”
*The monks are sitting together in circles under the cold rain.
*The attacking mob continues to curse and yell without stopping.
*Bells, Sutra books, clothings, personal belongings… are in disordered piles under the rain.

12:02 pm (VN time, september 27, 09):
*The monks are still being forced to sit outside in the rain, nothing to cover them. It’s still raining and very cold.
*Traffic police (in uniform) are controlling all the roads leading to Bat Nha Monastery. Police in civilian clothes are also on the scene to observe.

12:20 p.m. (VN time, September 27, 09):
*they are breaking all the doors and trying to get all the sisters to outside of the building. It continues to rain here.
*Sisters lock themselves inside.
*The mob, led by the police, are moving towards the sisters’ hamlet “May Dau Nui” (Clouds on the Mountain).
*4 taxi are going towards the main gate; can’t tell who’s inside.

James: Please forward this information to any and all practitioners of Thay, fellow Buddhists, non-Buddhists and anyone who might be in a position to help. We need immediate assistance from the international community, international media, the United Nations, Amnesty International and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations or ASA. I emailed ASEAN/ASA via the email for the Political and Security Directorate at: ps.dir@asean.org If you are apart of any of these groups or a non-governmental organization (NGO) please help in anyway that you can think of. I'm worried that a Burma-like purge of the monasteries associated with Thay in Vietnam is coming and the best way to prevent that is to shine the media light upon this emergency.

So as soon as I finish this I am going to fire off emails to as many organizations as possible. We also need to mail the media--CNN, NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN and FOX news or whatever news agencies you know about in your country. The focused attention of the world is powerful and even if we can't stop these crimes from happening we need to be as loud of a witness as possible. Some of these monks and nuns are mere teen-agers but all of the monastics are innocent, peace-loving people who are devoted to bettering the lives of everyone. Yet they are being treated like criminals and animals for doing nothing more than practicing their non-confrontational religion.

The Communist government has been trying to remove the monks for two months now claiming tension between the abbot and the monastics. However, the monastics say there is no such tension. They say the Communist government is trying to evict them because they are associated with the Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh who recently called for religious controls to end and the religious police be disbanned in that country. This at a time when the U.S. has decided to remove Vietnam from the list of Countries of Particular Concern (CPC) regarding religious freedom!! We need everyone to urge the U.S. to change that status and put more pressure on the repressive government. You can email the U.S. President at www.whitehous.gov. If you'd like to sign a petition on this emergency please click here.

My guess is that the government is concerned with their growing popularity inside Vietnam and thus see them as a threat to their strangle-hold on the people just like the sangha in Burma and Tibet. Please, spread the word so that we can bolster our brave monastics and take up their cause as they are further and further restricted from doing so themselves. As we meditate please take a moment to concentrate upon the freedom that allows you to practice the Dharma. This incident in Vietnam is a timely reminder that our freedoms, joys, sorrows and overall lives in this moment are but a candleflame in the wind that will snuff out just as easily as it ignited.

~Peace to all beings~

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