A Brief Discussion on Morality and Law in Chinese History and about Buddhism

 

Author: Tao Qing Hsu  (Hsu, Tao-qing) 

I remember I chose a law course at university because I wanted to explore whether I was capable or interested in studying law. One of the chapters talks about ethics and law. This chapter really impressed me. Why?

 

As we know, some people violate the law because they do not know the law. However, what makes us surprise is that those understand the law but violate the law, especially the lawyer or the Judge, or those who have graduated from the law school, such as president or the officer.

 

In traditional China and in the history of China, the morality is more stressed than the law. However, in the modern time, the law is more stressed than the morality. Law is the last line of defense to the morality. But, in my opinion, the law might be misused today. In some country, the law might be not corresponding to the morality or the human right.

 

The religion is concern about the morality. Buddhism is also concern about it. But, Buddhism is not the law, and is also not used to restrain the human behavior. So, Buddhism is never used to be the country law in the history of China. However, the emperor and the officer are deeply influenced by the Buddhism, Taoism and Confucius theory, because the concept of that the heaven and the human beings are combined to be the one is the supreme realm in rule.

 

In other words, the emperor and the officer request themselves to be mercy, compassion, like the Buddha, Bodhisattva, or the god, so to love the people in the country.

 

They also expect that the people in the country could be enlightened and have the mercy and compassionate like the Buddha, Bodhisattva, or the god, so the emperor or the officer support and promote the Buddhism, Taoism and Confucius theory in the country.

 

In other words, there is the concept that if everyone from the emperor to the ordinary people could be mercy and compassionate, and could control and correct their self-behavior automatically, such as no greedy heart, no hatred heart, no stealing and no killing, then the world and the society are naturally peaceful.

 

In Buddhism, there is the concept that if everyone does the evils, they themselves would be retributive back by their own evils. It may be not necessary to use the law to punish the evil persons.

 

In a word, that is the concept of no-doing but governing. That is also why the concept of law is not general in China of history. But, I think that the ancient people, the founder of the country, such as the emperor and the officer, are very wise.

 

The concept of law is to regulate others. The concept of law is quite different from the concept of Buddhism, Taoism and Confucius theory, because the concept of Buddhism, Taoism and Confucius theory is self-discipline, self-regulatory. Such concept is also different from the other religion. That is why other country might use the Christian or Islam as their country law, but not Buddhism. And that is also why the law is developed well in western country, but not in China of history.

 

Extending the concept, we might have another view why the foreign countries invade China. From my research on the history of China, I have found that the China is rarely to invade foreign countries, except for the civil war and resisting the foreign invasion.

 

You might find that the culture of traditional China is focus on the morality and self-regulatory. Even today, it is not easy to do so. The early law of Taiwan is in reference from the law of German and Japan. But, do you have found that these two countries had ever invaded China and the other countries? Why they want to invade other countries? Think about it. The dispute of law in Taiwan is always exist and changing all the time. Honestly, it is really not perfect.

Blessed people do not need to take advantage of others to profit.

Author:Tao Qing Hsu

In observing numerous numerology, it is found that some people have insufficient luck, and their lives seem to be blessed, but in fact they have insufficient luck. The reason is that the desire is deep. In the "Miaohua Lianhua Sutra", the Buddha once stated: "Greedness is the source of suffering." The Buddha also mentioned that all beings take pleasure in greed and do not know that greed is suffering. This observation of human nature can allow us to perceive the motives of these actors, and even observe their future destiny. The destiny trend mentioned here is not only this life, but also the afterlife.

There are thousands of human desires, which are covered in various sounding reasons and arguments, and even use ridiculous and ridiculous legislation in an attempt to "legalize" their selfish desires and unwholesome motives. Maitreya Bodhisattva has a famous saying: "A big belly can tolerate things that are hard to bear in the world; when you open your mouth, you laugh and laugh at people who are ridiculous." But these uncomfortable things and ridiculous people happen every day. What's interesting is that these happen not only to ordinary people, but also to those who are rich and powerful.

Whatever the reasons for seeming to be rationalized, we will find that in fact, the motivation behind these attempts to rationalize their actors is nothing more than the desire to obtain personal benefits by taking advantage of others. And this behavior will even be done in the form of groups or political parties. Therefore, when we learn Buddhism, in addition to perceiving our inner greed from self-examination, and being cautious about what our greed is doing, based on this, and thus observing the behaviors of greed of all beings, we can naturally raise wisdom to help them and lead them towards the good side.

We observe that those who try to obtain personal benefits by taking advantage of people may achieve their temporary purpose, but when we look at them in the long run, we will find that these people's ending will be very tragic. Unfortunately, those who are miserable in the end are those who have no introspection and vigilance. If these people have such self-examination and vigilance, they will know that they have been reformed, and will automatically become good after repentance, so they will not go to a tragic life situation.

It seems that justice or legislation can safeguard justice and human right for the world. However, justice or legislation is artificial, it may be misused and distorted. It may even be misused by wicked people, using justice or legislation as a tool for authoritarian dictatorship and controlling the public for personal gain. Unfortunately, this happened in the current world.

The Buddha once mentioned that some of the beings on our planet are controlled by the devil, thereby deliberately destroying the goodness and justice of mankind. These demons are also a kind of celestial beings. They have some supernatural powers. They can control the human will through the power of supernatural powers to disrupt human civilization. And who is most easily controlled by these demons? Those who are greedy.

There is a civilized world 100 times higher than human civilization in this world, living in the same space as our human beings. Western scientists have recently stated that they have discovered at least 38 highly intelligent civilization worlds, and the wisdom and civilization of all beings in these worlds surpass humans.

The Buddha has revealed in the past that there are many different worlds in this universe of thousands of worlds. Many of the sentient beings living in these worlds have been verified as Bodhisattva fruit positions, and they are all highly intelligent sentient beings. At the same time, these highly intelligent beings can move in different worlds. How long does it take to move? It is the time for the forearm to stretch, which is one second, which is just an instant.

Therefore, the earth is just a small world in the universe, and in this small world, there live good and good beings who are just and can give others benefits, and greedy and vicious beings who take pleasure in encroaching on the interests of others. Interestingly, the highly civilized and intelligent beings of other worlds are actually not very involved in the human things on earth, but in fact, it does not mean that they do not intervene and assist. There are many kind-hearted beings on earth who often pray for world peace from God or Bodhisattvas. If the majority of people tend to be kind, they will help. If the human heart tends to be evil, they will persuade all beings to be good. However, if most people's hearts are evil, they will let humans eat the fruits of their own evil.

In addition to affecting the blessings of mankind, the good and evil of mankind will also affect the lifespan of mankind. In the Buddhist scriptures, the Buddha revealed that the human heart is pure and the life span of human beings can reach ten thousand years, which existed hundreds of millions of years ago. It is a pity that this does not exist in the five thousand years since mankind began to have historical records. Because people's hearts are becoming evil, their lifespan is gradually decreasing. At present, in the five thousand years of human history, human life span is only 100 years, which is the longest possible human life span. In fact, more than half of human life spans are less than 50 years.

It can be seen that most sentient beings are not blessed, so they infringe on the rights and interests of others to gain their own interests, not only to hurt others, but also to let themselves eat the fruits of their own evil. Some organizations and political parties even use lies, fraud, concealment, shirk their responsibilities, label others, arbitrarily convict people, intimidate, violence or kill people, and even let others commit suicide to achieve their personal interests. Such evil in the human heart is also a cause of shortened life expectancy.

The Buddha said that humans on this earth are living in a world of five turbidity and evil. There are very few good people who can learn the Dharma and learn from the Buddha. Unless it is the blessings accumulated over the ages and the long-cherished wishes of the world, human beings cannot encounter the cause of learning Buddha in this life, nor have they had the opportunity to meet the Buddha and Bodhisattva to teach the Dharma in person. Blessed people have many patron saints who personally come to support their daily needs. These blessed people do not need to encroach on the rights and interests of others and take advantage of others to make profits for individuals. This is not something ordinary people can understand. If we understand it, we know how grant our blessings are, so grant that we can share them with all beings. Therefore, instead of being a person lacking fortune and hurting all beings, it is better to expect to be a blessed person and benefit the world.