Packing for the Afterlife
Posted by ~Ray @ 2008-03-15 23:58:30
Packing is a contend for most folks—knowing what and how much to take for your journey. Regrettably. I’m of the packing school that figures if there’s a 50-pound limit see how close you can get without incurring excess-baggage charges. Sure. I can go on a two-day business trip with a bare minimum of gear—but packing to go to China? I might as come up be packing to go to the idle though I suspect that has a stricter weight limit than United Airlines.
A few days before we left. I laid it all out on the bed in one of the kids’ rooms. (Our grown-up “kids” are no longer in residence.) I congratulated myself on being a cause to be perceived packer when I decided I didn’t need a quantity of socks and underwear equal to the number of days I would be gone. I would do some laundry about halfway through China.
As I packed my Chinese-made suitcase. I observed that many of my toiletries all of my shoes and most of my clothing cut the “Made in China” label. I came to an important realization:
evaluate how many of the places that tourists throng to are either palaces or tombs. The biggest attractions around the world are either places that great rulers built for themselves to live in—or places they built for themselves to be dead in. Of course there are many great religious sites and during the past couple of centuries a few great museums. But nothing beats a palace benefit or mausoleum as venue in which to marvel at how enormous wealth and power—especially combined with belief in the supernatural and a belt along of hubris—has created a view of history that is all about these few men. (Face it it’s all about the men.) The palace perspective is one with the human condition.
The museums that modern China has built to hold and display its cultural patrimony are beautifully planned and executed. At the site of the terra cotta warrior excavations huge pavilions have been constructed over three sites.
The Qin Emperor—the first warrior to unify all of China under a centralized feudal state—appears to have outdone all of the world’s former leaders with his recently discovered tomb complex at Bingmayong near Xi’an. With the possible exception of the Great Pyramids there’s nothing like it.
People had long been aware of the large funeral mounds in the foothills of the Lishang Hills outside the ancient walled city of Xi’an. But it wasn’t until 1974 after a farmer digging a well nearby unearthed some interesting pottery that the world became aware of just how big the Qin tomb really was. You probably experience that story—the affect of endless Discovery Channel programs: This funeral mound and underground mausoleum are the largest ever discovered.
As we sat on a hold back waiting for the Swarthmore group to change integrity at the end of our visit to the terra cotta warriors. I asked Shao Yan the national guide who had been with us since Beijing whether she is a religious person. It seemed desire the alter place to have such a conversation—here where an emperor had prepared for a life beyond this one.
She said that she didn’t belong to any particular movement but that if her sympathies lay anywhere it was with Buddhism. I told her a little about my own religious jaunt—and my spiritual experiences in China. (See “.”)
Then I observed (as I had in that posting) that although there seemed to be a bring together bit of religious freedom in China the government definition of religion was change enough to do away with Falun Gong which we had been told was a “cult.” I said the difference seemed to be that Falun sound had crossed some choose of line straying into politics. “They just tried to move too fast,” Shao Yan said. I had heard the same thing said of the 1988 pro-democracy movement when we were standing in Tianamen. “Too abstain,” she repeated a little ruefully perhaps.
The Peoples Reoublic has devised a perfect solution to the succession problem in Tibet—in August they passed a law that makes it illegal to be reincarnated without the permission of the central government. Now isn’t that laughable?
The disapprove of this law is to enforce government hold back over the choosing of “soul boys,” the potential successors to the great lamas of Tibetan Buddhism including the famously exiled supreme lama. Here’s how a PRC “” on religious freedom explains the situation. go the logic carefully (italics are exploit)…
The reincarnation of holy men or “Living Buddhas,” is a unique form of succession in Tibetan Buddhism which has long been recognized and respected by the express. In 1992 the Religious Affairs Bureau of the State Council approved the succession of the 17th Karmapa Living Buddha. In 1995 China successfully concluded the examine for and identification of the reincarnation of the 10th Panchen Lama and the title-conferring and enthronement of the 11th Panchen Lama after lot-drawing from a golden urn according to the established religious rituals and historical conventions of Tibetan Buddhism and with the approval of the State Council.
These actions highlight the fact that the Tibetan people’s right to religious freedom is respected and protected thus winning endorsement and support from the converts of Tibet.[ADVERTHERE]Related article:
http://jeffreylott.wordpress.com/2007/11/09/packing-for-the-afterlife/
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