Dhammapada

I'm rereading the Dhammapada. Flowers and The Path are my favorite parts. ....I probably shouldn't have typed them all out: they're kind of long, I don't actually like any of the parts in their entirety, and it's probably against some copyright. That's okay though. Flowers, I think is fairly illustrative of how one should act. And The Path is the path. Eh, it seemed worth writing all of it. In any case, there are tabs in there, but I cannot for the life of me figure out how to make them show up; sorry about that.

The Path

The best of paths is the Eightfold [Path];
The best of truths, the Four [Noble Truths].
The best of qualities is dispassion;
And the best among gods and humans
Is the one with eyes to see.

This is the path
For purifying one's vision; there is no other.
Follow it,
You'll bewilder Māra.
Follow it,
You'll put an end to suffering.
This is the path I have proclaimed,
Having pulled out the arrows.

It is up to you to make strong effort;
Tathāgatas merely tell you how.
Following the path, those absorbed in meditation
Will be freed from Māra's bonds.

"All created things are impermanent."
Seeing this with insight,
One becomes disenchanted with suffering.
This is the path to purity.

"All things are suffering."
Seeing this with insight,
One becomes disenchanted withs suffering.
This is the path to purity.

"All things are not-self."
Seeing this with insight,
One becomes disenchanted with suffering.
This is the path to purity.

Inactive when one should be active.
Lazy [though] young and strong,
Disheartened with one's resolves,
Such an indolent, lethargic person
Doesn't find the path of insight.

Watchful in speech and well-restrained in mind,
Do nothing unskillful with your body.
Purify these three courses of action;
Fulfill the path taught by the sages.

Wisdom arises from [spiritual] practice;
Without practice it decays.
Knowing this two-way path for gain and loss,
Conduct yourself so that wisdom grows.

Cut down the forest [of desire], not [real] trees.
From the forest [of desire], fear is born.
Having cut down both the forest and the underbrush,
Monks, be deforested [of desire].

As long as even the slightest underbrush of desire
Between man and woman is not cut away,
For that long, the mind is bound
Like a suckling calf to its mother.

Destroy attachment to self
As you could an autumn lily in your fist.
Cultivate the path to peace,
The Nirvana taught by the Well-Gone-One.

"Here I'll live during the rainy season,
And here during the winter and summer."
So the fool ponders,
Unaware of danger.
Intoxicated by children and cattle,
That addict
Is swept away by Death,
As a sleeping village is by a great flood.

Children, parents, and relatives
Are not a protection;
For someone seized by Death,
Relatives are no protection.
Knowing this,
The wise person, restrained by virtue,
Should quickly clear the path
To Nirvana.

Flowers

Who will master this world
And the realms of Yama and the gods?
Who will select a well-taught Dharma teaching,
As a skilled person selects a flower?

One in training will master this world
And the realms of Yama and the gods.
One in training will select
A well-taught Dharma teaching,
As a skilled person selects a flower.

Knowing this body is like foam,
Fully awake to its mirage-like nature,
Cutting off Māra's flowers,
One goes unseen by the King of Death.

Death sweeps away
The person obsessed
With gathering flowers,
As a great flood sweeps away a sleeping village.

The person obsessed
With gathering flowers,
Insatiable for sense pleasures,
Is under the sway of Death.

As a bee gathers nectar
And moves on without harming
The flower, its color, or its fragrance,
Just so should a sage walk through a village.

Do not consider the faults of others
Or what they have or haven't done.
Consider rather
What you have or haven't done.*

Like a beautiful flower,
Brightly colored but lacking scent,
So are well-spoken words
Fruitless when not carried out.

Like a beautiful flower,
Brightly colored and with scent,
So are well-spoken words
Fruitful when carried out.

Just as from a heap of flowers
Many garlands can be made,
So, you, with your mortal life,
Should do many skillful things.

The scent of flowers
--sandalwood, jasmine, and rosebay--
Doesn't go against the wind.
But the scent of a virtuous person
Does travel against the wind;
It spreads in all directions.

The scent of virtue
Is unsurpassed
Even by sandalwood, rosebay,
Water lily, and jasmine.

Slight
Is the scent of rosebay or sandalwood,
But the scent of the virtuous person is supreme,
Drifting even to the gods.

Māra does not find the path
Of those endowed with virtue,
Living with vigilance,
and freed by right understanding.

As a sweet-smelling lotus
Pleasing to the heart
May grow in a heap of rubbish
Discarded along the highway,
So a disciple of the Fully Awakened One
Shines with wisdom
Amid the rubbish heap
Of blind, common people.

---------------------

*This reminds me of The Confiteor...

I confess to you almighty God,
and to you, my brothers
and sisters, that I have
sinned through my own
fault, in my thoughts
and in my words, in
what I have done, and in
what I have failed to do;
and I asked blessed Mary,
ever Virgin, all the
angels and saints,
and you, my brothers
and sisters,
to pray for me to the
Lord our God.

Art

When one looks at art as a means of communication, then much of the beauty inherent in the most common definition of art is eliminated. Much of the time art is simply a thing to look at, and not a great deal more. However, when an artist tries to put a meaning into his artwork, it changes the intent behind the art (i.e. the art is no longer just “for pretty,” it’s now also as much a medium of communication as is an essay). While everything is still “art,” there are different angles from which it can be viewed and different ideas can be formed about the intent of the artist when he made the piece of art; regardless of what his real purpose was.

An aspect of seeing art is alluded to by Schopenhauer when he says, “Thus we no longer consider the where, the when, the why, and the whither in things, but simply and solely the what.” Basically that if one is to remove oneself from the pedestal he has put himself on, then he will see things as they truly are and not only as they are in relation to him. If he can push his mind past his initial perception of ugliness or beauty or the definition of the object as nothing more than a means to an end, then he can cease to relate the object to himself and see it as art, or at the very least he can see it as it is and not as what it’s used for.

An example of something which is almost always seen as a tool to get to an end is a chair. It doesn’t occur to many people that, while a chair can be seen as something to sit on, it can also be seen simply as a chair and no more. A chair can be a magnificent work of art; not because of anything particularly beautiful about it, but simply because one has succeeded in removing himself from the equation and now can see the chair as it is, and not merely as something to sit on.

As Tolstoy writes, “…Beauty is understood as something mystical and very exalted, but unfortunately very indefinite and, therefore, inclusive of philosophy, religion, and life itself.” One can have no set definition of beauty, and therefore art also has no set definition. He later defines his own concept of art as “…A means of communion among people.” In general art has, at the very least, an intention of being aesthetically pleasing or depicting a story, and other times there is a much deeper meaning hidden within the superficial meaning of a piece of art.

A type of art that very often has several meanings is the artwork found in churches. It is always to “glorify God,” and therefore is always beautiful; many times with bright colors and gold, and is made by someone with exceptional skills with the medium of which it is made. However, while it does have the simple aesthetic appeal, it always has an allegorical meaning as well. The figures in ecclesiastical art are always depicting scenes from the Bible, and typically the scenes come from those stories which have lessons within them. The message was first conveyed to the art by the artist, and then from the art to the viewer. In fact, this was the original purpose of this particular art; to transmit the stories from the Bible to those who were illiterate or unable for some reason to understand the written text. In this way a story is told to he who sees the art, albeit in an indirect way.

A perfect illustration of a piece of art which has an entirely different original meaning behind it is the kaleidoscope. Sir David Brewster invented it in 1816 with the purpose of teaching people about reflection. He put four mirrors in a tube with brightly colored glass beads at one end, and used it to show everyone an example of symmetry. Unfortunately someone else patented the idea first, and he never made any money from his invention, but it was, nonetheless, a work of art with a hidden meaning that was strictly to communicate a lesson to another person (or people, as the case may be) –exactly as Tolstoy defines it.

Setting aside the most basic meanings inherent in art (the pleasing colors or the easily understood story), one can safely say that it is ludicrous to assume that there is a deeper meaning behind each and every piece of art. The person who assumed that there was would not only spend his days vainly trying to understand something that wasn’t there, but he would, in addition, be deemed idiotic by society simply because everyone else understood what the art was there for, and he did not. Most art is of this nature, and, while some people will inevitably wrench a meaning out of it, it is generally understood that there is no reason to contemplate it further than to see its aesthetic value.

Something which exhibits this lack of ‘deepness’ is a piece of clothing that a child would wear—if a girl wears a pink shirt with a blue dinosaur on it, one can come to the conclusion that the shirt signifies that the child with live to an old age and that she will have male children, but this idea is obviously absurd, and will no doubt be disregarded by the vast majority of people. In cases such as this, seeing the piece of art simply as it is, is immensely better than arguing for a preposterous concept.

While there is some merit in looking at things as one believes the artist intended for people to see it, and as the artist himself saw his own art, many times there isn’t any intention beyond what is blatantly obvious. However, on the other occasions, one has the option of appreciating the art for its aesthetic value, or to see the art as the message the artist was trying to communicate through the work of art. A last option is to view the entire world around one as art and remove any preconceived notions one may have had about an object to see it as it truly is. While there is no set definition of art, there is art and how one sees it depends purely on how one chooses to see it.