First Precept - Do not kill

[Aloka]

Soto Zen teacher Brad Warner talks about the first precept (approx. 11minutes)

Any comments?

[philg]

Wow. There's a lot to unpick here as it covers some important matters for anyone serious about their practice. The one about Do Not Kill shows how easy it is to reduce it to absurd levels, such as the ony way not to kill is to die. Killing is part of being a living creature, so the idea is to become a bit philosophical about it. Ever done any work on game theory? Such as, is it right to kill one person if it saves the lives of ten others? How about if it saes a hundred, or a thousand, or a million, or everyone on Earth? There are no answers of course, but the journey through such questions is important.

Just Sitting is a really powerful practice, simple but capable of bringing about changes without any form of guidence or planned outcome. On the other hand, I don't agree with the idea that enlightenment experiences don't exist. There really is just this moment, but it takes certain breakthroughs to really understand that with every fibre of your being. You can't experience the everything? I beg to differ. It is in the aftermath of experiencing everything in an instance that you can 'live in the moment' as an expression of eternity. Deep ideas indeed.