"The world is not just mad. It is mad and rational as well." – sociologist Theodor Adorno (in a 1956 conversation, presumably translated from German).
"Ce qu’il y a de certain c’est que moi, je ne suis pas Marxiste." – Karl Marx (in original French, to Lafargue) [If anything is certain, it is that I myself am not a Marxist].
“Buddha. I bow and pray not to withdraw from a functioning mind.”
This is #105 out of a series of 108 daily Buddhist affirmations that I am attempting to translate with my hands tied behind my back (well not really that, but I’m deliberately not seeking out translations on the internet, using only dictionary and grammar).
…
103. 부처님. 저는 보살행을 실천하며 살아가기를 발원하며 절합니다.
“Buddha. I bow and pray to live and practice toward becoming a bodhisattva.”
104. 부처님. 저는 반야 지혜가 자라기를 발원하며 절합니다.
“Buddha. I bow and pray to grow in wisdom.”
105. 부처님. 저는 수행하는 마음이 물러나지 않기를 발원하며 절합니다.
I would read this one hundred fifth affirmation as: “Buddha. I bow and pray not to withdraw from a functioning mind.”
Or… functioning heart. Or heart that functions. Mind and heart: 마음. It’s not so much linked to a specific organ in the body, as the western terms are, as to the function of feeling, I think.
I like this affirmation. It seems to be saying: trust your feelings. Follow them. Maybe I’m wrong. I don’t know.
I’m running out of affirmations. I can’t decide what I’m going to replace this amazingly regular blog-feature with, when I run out. Any suggestions, O universe? I guess I’ll just follow my heart.
Not at all related, and maybe even somewhat inappropriate… what I’m listening to right now.
Eisbrecher (a German goth/industrial rock group), “Schwarze witwe” (black widow). The song seems to be about vampiric sex, or something like that. I’m not so good at understanding German – but I never let a failure to understand a language interfere with my ability to enjoy it. So I have a lot of music in various languages that I barely understand in rotation among my mp3 files – German, Japanese, Portuguese, Korean, etc.
