Maitridatta

But we hold that in all disaster (And faith, we have found it true!) If only you stand by your master, The Gods will stand by you!

Sectarian pride is delusion. The Bodhisattva honors all teachers who walk sincerely.

Each compassionate act dismantles the self-clinging that binds you.

To liberate others is to liberate yourself.

"For the sake of even one sentient being, I will endure aeons in hell" Shantideva

if a marauder charges into a temple with an AK, and I do nothing, do I not make a choice? That choice allows suffering to ripen fully upon innocent monks. Is inaction karmically neutral? In Abhidharma, karma is measured not only by deed, but by intention, object, effort, and result. If my act is free from hatred, greed, or delusion, motivated only to protect life, does it carry the same weight as killing in anger? Consider this: the Buddha allowed exceptions for lesser precepts when life or severe harm was at stake — monks could use medicinal alcohol, or speak untruths to prevent catastrophe. Standing by while innocents die is not neutral, its a volitional choice, a karmic act in itself. The Buddha taught compassion as the highest quality. If adherence to formality ensures the slaughter of innocents, is the precept truly upheld? Or has its spirit been betrayed? A bodhisattva accepts the karmic consequences fully. But to act in calm, compassionate resolve may prevent greater suffering. Is it not better to bear the weight consciously than to allow many beings to fall? But in that weight, one serves the Buddha’s intent. Not by clinging to purity, but by upholding life itself. The ultimate measure is intent and liberation, not the outer form of action. If an act of killing arises solely from compassion for sentient beings, free from hatred or greed, it does not bind the mind in samsara as killing born of anger does. Consider the wrathful deities: they wield fierce weapons to protect beings, not out of malice, but out of enlightened compassion. They transgress convention to save countless lives. Are we to say that enlightened action cannot take forms thar are conventionally called ‘impure’? From the ultimate standpoint, the distinction between life and death is a display of karma. Ending a marauder’s life at the precise karmic moment may be the vehicle for both their ripening and the protection of many. The Theravada attachment to purity is dualistic — it clings to form rather than spirit. The Buddha taught skillful means. If adherence to the rule ensures suffering, the act of transgressing with pure intent is itself an expression of compassion, a vehicle for liberation.

Once again this comes back at me, which I answer with: If you stand by while innocents are harmed, you are not ‘neutral’ — you are making a volitional choice to let harm occur. Is this choice not also planting karmic seeds? Then we must ask: which seed is heavier — to stop the harm with fierce compassion, or to allow the harm while guarding your own purity? If compassion is the highest quality of the Tathāgata, then should it not take precedence over formality? Is a precept truly upheld if its observance leads directly to mass suffering? A bodhisattva under said circumstance would say: I accept that it is a breach. I will bear the karmic weight willingly, because letting others die when I could have stopped it is a heavier weight.

Killing is never skillful. When asked if there was anything whose killing he approved of, the Buddha answered that there was only one thing: anger. In no recorded instance did he approve of killing any living being at all. When one of his monks went to an executioner and told the man to kill his victims compassionately, with one blow, rather than torturing them, the Buddha expelled the monk from the Sangha, on the grounds that even the recommendation to kill compassionately is still a recommendation to kill—something he would never condone. If a monk was physically attacked, the Buddha allowed him to strike back in self-defense, but never with the intention to kill. - Ajahn Thanissaro (Purity of Heart)

The purity of the precepts is irrelevant if by them, be it by inaction or otherwise, the follower of Buddha allows innocent sentient beings to suffer. The precepts are means, not ends. If I cling to their outer form while letting beings suffer, I’ve betrayed their spirit. A precept that leads to more suffering when followed blindly has become a shackle, not a path. If a horse has no owner and is to be sold for slaughter, and I know that claiming it as mine will save its life, I will say ‘It is my horse.’ Yes, this is a lie under the letter of the precepts — but in truth, it is the Dharma in action. The Buddha did not teach us to worship rules; he taught us to relieve suffering. In that moment, the purity of my mind outweighs the purity of my record.

In the same way: If a fire threatens a library, do we refuse to carry water because the bucket is made of impure metal?

When annihilation is imminent, refusing to act violently is not harmless neutrality but an abandonment of compassionate duty. The karmic cost of killing one aggressor can be outweighed by the karmic catastrophe of letting many die and the Dharma perish.

"The Dharma should be proclaimed far and wide, like the roar of a lion. One who teaches the Dharma without fear saves countless beings from suffering."

"To propagate the Dharma is the supreme offering to the Buddhas. It is the supreme benefit for sentient beings. It is the supreme act of compassion." Avatamsaka Sutra

If you call others to take refuge as you would call passersby into a safe building you’re acting from compassion, and that act itself brings innumerable merit

"in order to carry [Buddhist] compassion and filial obedience through to perfection it is necessary to assist good and punish evil... failing to kill an evil man … would be to betray compassion"

I am so terribly aware of each of my obscurations that the light cannot pass unnoticed.

Me when they ask me when I'll get a legal tax-paying job

"Death to me is nothing more than a joke. And when my time comes I will leap into hell and kill the devil." Anonymous Pirate, attributed to Blackbeard.

"Those who live by the sword, die by the sword" What could be more exquisite than to die in the same current in which you swam your entire life? What could be more faithful to the marrow of your being than to meet death as the final verse of your own poem, written in the steel you carried every day? It is only the urbanite soul, counting coins and years, that imagines a long life of compromise as a victory. . The sword is no mere tool; it is the axis of a life aligned with its own dharma. Where the peasant sees punishment the warrior sees the final embrace of destiny. It is the joy of dying without betrayal of one’s path, without the slow rot of living as something else. Death by the sword is not the sword’s revenge:it's the reward. The peasant dies in his bed, stinking of fear; the warrior dies with his chest open to the world, tasting the air of battle, his blood indistinguishable from the rain. To live by the sword, to die by it that is no curse. That is the only life in which death is not an exile, but a homecoming.