“Buddha. I bow and pray not to be at war with the world.”
This is #100 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).
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98. 부처님. 저는 맑고 밝은 마음 가지도록 발원하며 절합니다.
“Buddha. I bow and pray to bear a clear and bright heart.”
99. 부처님. 저는 모든 생명이 평화롭기를 발원하며 절합니다.
“Buddha. I bow and pray to exist harmoniously with all life.”
100. 부처님. 저는이 세상에 전쟁이 없기를 발원하며 절합니다.
I would read this one hundredth affirmation as: “Buddha. I bow and pray not to be at war with the world.”
I’m not sure if this is supposed to be “not to be at war with the world” or “that there is no war in the world.” There is a pronoun with both a topic and and subject marker, and then the strange verb 없다 [eops-da = not to have] (which essentially slots two subjects, grammatically, with I as one subject and war as the other). So it means “I don’t have war” or “War doesn’t have me” or “Around me there is no war” or “Around war I am not.” Or something like that. Translating it clearly is challenging, given my limited understanding. I suppose from a pragmatic standpoint, all of these are roughly similar.
All of which is relevant in the context of Qaddafi’s death yesterday, which leaves me queasy despite his possibly deserving to have died – did he die fighting, or was he summarily executed? I’m guessing the latter, and that makes me uncomfortable, just as it did with Osama bin Laden. When did summary execution once again become the norm? I thought sometime during the 20th century we decided, at a globally collective level perhaps – but most certainly at the level of “Civilization” – that such things as summary executions were uncivilized.
It’s so pleasing that the future Space Emperor signed off on this Libyan project. Um. Not. Then again, the quote from Lincoln (at link) is the right sort of foreshadowing – Mr Lincoln wasn’t exactly a pacifist, was he?
