Rage

i am a person of faith.
i am a buddhist.
born an episcopalian, grew up a mahayanist.
non-violence is a explicit principle of buddhism.
all bodhisattvas are dedicated to relieving the suffering of all sentient beings.
the dharma directs every buddhist to help lessen the suffering of others.

(and every compassionate religion teaches these lessons.)

i am a buddhist.
our government takes our tax dollars and tortures people in our name.

this makes me enraged.
it makes me feel very un-buddhist.
my enrage picks a fight with my outrage.
my dogma gets run over by my karma.
i risk losing my religion.

cheneyBu$h have brought the shame of the world upon my country,
the shame of the cosmos
And besmeared my soldiers' reputations with their torture and their senseless wars.

the rage that this has set off in me fights my buddhist faith.

the bodhisattvas have both beneficent and wrathful aspects.
they are both saints and warriors.
their wrathful aspects are used to protect the dharma
and to fight delusion and ignorance.


this is Yamataka,
Yamataka is a wrathful aspect of Manjushri, the Bodhisattva of Wisdom.
Yamataka is The Defeater of Death.

May Manjushri in His Wisdom use Yamataka to rescue those who are being tortured from their suffering.

May Manjushri's Wisdom help guide my heart to ease me from my hatred of those who order the torture of others: Let me let Yamataka, in the clear light of Manjushri's Wisdom,
deal with them.
Let their karma be realized in a single lifetime that Yamataka might liberate them.
may my heart trust in the wisdom of the bodhisattvas to care for these things that i have Not the power nor wisdom to make better.

May all sentient beings' suffering lessen.

Om Ah Ra Pa Tsa Na Dhi
i shall entrust my rage to Yamtaka's care that my energy may be made benign.
Om Ah Ra Pa Tsa Na Dhi