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"Foolish Bombu"
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Foolish Bombu



, United Kingdom
Joined: Jan 2013

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TFS Journal
Memo's from the Pure Land
September 02, 2014 @ 07:47:25 am

Today is Oxfam day. It is where I contribute to Dave Cameron's (the beloved PM of the UK) "Big Society"......or putting it another way, I save public expenditure by volunteering to work for nothing, thus keeping the taxes down on the "wealth creators", thus their wealth will trickle down to enrich us all. Well, apparently such is the theory, though I have heard of such things as tax havens, where wealth in fact stampedes abroad rather than trickling down where it might do some good.

Anyway, whatever the grander scale of such things, I love it at Oxfam. I serve in the Music Section, which is upstairs and mostly uninterupted by customers. We sell DVD's, CD's and vinyl records, plus old guitars and sheet music. There is a hole in the roof that lets in rain, so we have a bucket for that........it will be "fixed soon". There is also a step halfway along the floor where the unsuspecting have been known to trip. It is highlighted by bright yellow tape but we still get the occasional idiot who stumbles, and actually had a case of a broken leg just before I started there.

I am able to play whatever music I like and take in my own CD's. I also take my Kindle Fire HDX.

Every so often a customer will annoy me, but apart from that it is a little Pure Land.

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Erimitus

New Post! September 02, 2014 @ 12:36:12 pm
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The way that I see it wealth trickles up.


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Foolish Bombu

New Post! September 03, 2014 @ 07:39:03 am
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Monetary wealth certainly seemed to trickle up in pre-revolutionary France. It seems that 80/90 percent of the people paid for the living standards of the rest. Those at the bottom of the pile, the so called Third Estate, worked so that others could enjoy the fruits of their labours. Many today, at least in the UK, would see these as "the good old days"...... So there was Marie Antoinette who according to some accounts had 150 new dresses a year made by the finest dress makers of Europe, while some children ran naked in the streets of Paris. Maybe she wore one of them in the tumbril on the way to the scaffold?

Anyway, enough of that. The Buddhist symbol of enlightenment is the Lotus Flower, which grows from the mud and slime. Alas, some seek to create a pot of diamonds, a hopeless task - nothing could grow from it anyway. As I see it, true wealth trickles neither up nor down. It is known and found in the mud and slime itself. Shinran saw this.


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Foolish Bombu

New Post! September 05, 2014 @ 10:44:32 am
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Here is another memo.

Making good headway with the "Flower Ornament Scripture". Well on my way through the first chapter, which lists all the various Bodhisattva's who grace Reality with their presence. They have such beautiful names such as "Celestial King Banner of Miraculous Displays", "Delightful Universal Illumination" and "Sound of the Polar Mountain".

So we are surrounded by such. And they all wish us well, and work for our well being.

Others may well prefer to think themselves the target of Satan, let loose by the Sky God to taunt, test and trick us, this because the Sky God "wills that all be saved". Hey? Possiby they prefer the drama of it all.

Anyway, just thought I would post this update.

Why do I read ANY scripture at all? Possible I am eccentric. But whatever, I prefer it to pumping iron in the Gym.


Electric_Banana

New Post! September 05, 2014 @ 11:22:28 am
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Pure Land: Athena's currently screwed up classroom. Just a slight bit nicer than Ares at the moment.


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Foolish Bombu

New Post! September 05, 2014 @ 12:00:05 pm
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@Electric_Banana Said

Pure Land: Athena's currently screwed up classroom. Just a slight bit nicer than Ares at the moment.


ha ho.......screwed up, nice, all grist to the mill in the Pure Land.



Jennifer1984

Returner and proud

New Post! July 28, 2020 @ 04:58:25 pm
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" In protecting oneself one protects others
In protecting others one protects oneself" (Theravada Text)

Providing one and all play by the same rules.


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Foolish Bombu

New Post! July 28, 2020 @ 06:07:08 pm
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The Theravada context of the text quoted can be found here..... Nyanaponika Thera


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Foolish Bombu

New Post! July 28, 2020 @ 07:14:27 pm
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Just to say that my own perspective/context, is Pure Land, not Theravada. From that perspective just what rules others may or may not play by is not part of any calculation.


Darkman666

New Post! July 28, 2020 @ 07:47:18 pm
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Ulysses in the story - ulysses was to get back his wife and kids and rule his country. of course, his brother or uncle ( i forgot who ). his odyssey took 20 years to get back.

i not into buddism , what have the is topic to with him?


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Foolish Bombu

New Post! July 28, 2020 @ 08:06:30 pm
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Illustrated Blog now published Memo from the Pure Land .....


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Foolish Bombu

New Post! July 28, 2020 @ 08:21:31 pm
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Hi Darkman, I'm referring to the novel "Ulysses" by James Joyce.

This novel is in fact loosely based around episodes from Homer's Odyssey. Which as you say is based upon the return home of the "hero" (I thought 10 years)

Joyce was in fact using a great mythic theme common to many cultures, of the return home, of seeking the "true father" - in Homer's epic Telemachus seeks to be reunited with his father.

I related this theme to Buddhism in my post.


Darkman666

New Post! July 28, 2020 @ 08:22:27 pm
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read some the blog

keeping thinking like " there is no place ", because where you grow upas a child. " home - where the heart is " you are safe. " you can't go home again ! " because you have grown out of the reason to feel safe to be at home. you call it: maturity.


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Foolish Bombu

New Post! July 28, 2020 @ 08:24:37 pm
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Yes, "home" more a journey than a place. There can be no going back.

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