Fear and violence

 In the Sutta-Nipata (Attandanda Sutta) the Buddha said that “fear (bhayam) comes (jâtam) from violence (attandanda)” which could be expanded to suggest that fear aries (jâtam) from the threat or suggestion of violence such as a man carrying a stick (attandanda).  I should add, the term “attandanda” is not easy to render into English, clearly.  Depending on the translator, it is sometimes translated as violence, misery, seized a stick, arming oneself, etc.  

If asked to imagine fearful events, most of us can conjure up plenty of them.  Depending on the intensity of my own fears, as an example, I might decide to buy a handgun foreseeing the possibility that I might be assaulted one night without any means of defense.  If we multiply this, it is easy to imagine everyone running out and buying a handgun or several.  

Everyone's afraid of being assaulted or having some horrible violence done to them.  Others are just afraid for no reason; who see the potential for violence all around them.  This is especially the case in many areas of the U.S. which are unsafe. Depending where you live in the U.S., violence is a very real factor.  But violence also happens to children on almost a daily basis from physical violence to verbal threats of future punishment.  Children often live in terror.

For the Buddha this is no way to live, being trapped in a world of fear which is born from all kinds of threats (attandanda), both real or imaginary.  At a deeper level, the natural world is also a threat to us: it is always changing and unsafe.  It is a cause of fear as is this temporal body of ours which is fragile and short-lived. 

Looking at this world with its violence, the Buddha said “there is nothing in this world that...is changeless.”  Only in nirvana is the changeless and the calm to be found which is free from all violence.  But are we ready for this?  Why of course not—not the huge majority who in some way cling to attandanda.  The Buddha said they are like so many fish struggling and writhing in shallow water with hatred against one another.  The only escape for us is to turn away from the world these struggling fish are hankering after.

Comments

[Sally Strange]

This picture alone sums up the ignorance of your invalid position on self-defense

http://www.attan.com/crazypics/129173999771433423.jpg

[Sally Strange]

Congrats, you just used the "cowards fallacy"

which encompasses the heretical notion that those who pack a gun etc. for self defense "live in fear, are debased by potential scum/demons who may attack/kill them".

This faulty and liberaldouchebag logic would also reckon that house and car insurance are equally worthless products which one has out of fear.

By this bullocks pseudologic of yours and other cowards, a condom is no different than a handgun since both are used to "keep bad things from happnin'".

Thanks for illuminating the cowards fallacy.

Next time you buckle you seat belt in Atlanta, in that Taurus of yours, try your logic in differentiating a seat belt (protection device) from a handgun (protection device). Because there is no fundamental difference.

The big head has spoken.