In English translations of the Buddha's discourses, we see the words "good" and "evil." We can understand these to mean actions of body, speech, and mind that are beneficial, versus those that are harmful, but these words are translated from a language separated from those of us in the early 21st century Americas by two and a half millennia and the mass of an entire planet.
Great post! I always like thinking of Dhamma as a sort of quasi-aesthetic practice, an art form that unfolds in body, speech, and mind. I can't remember which sutta it is, but the Buddha says that the best reason for giving is to make it an ornament of the mind.
There is also an interesting parallel here when it comes to the field analogy. In Christianity (or at least mystic traditions of it), God is viewed as fecund and bounteous. Not quite a direct parallel as I don't think the description bears the same meaning, but interesting nonetheless.
Great post! I always like thinking of Dhamma as a sort of quasi-aesthetic practice, an art form that unfolds in body, speech, and mind. I can't remember which sutta it is, but the Buddha says that the best reason for giving is to make it an ornament of the mind.
There is also an interesting parallel here when it comes to the field analogy. In Christianity (or at least mystic traditions of it), God is viewed as fecund and bounteous. Not quite a direct parallel as I don't think the description bears the same meaning, but interesting nonetheless.