From: Erin N. (enoonan@kent.edu)
Date: Sun Dec 08 2002 - 18:00:09 GMT
>Dear Davor,
>
>I more or less agree with your 10 statements (29 Nov 2002 02:30:51 -0800).
>(Except nr. 4, which is an unanswerable question and not a statement.)
>
>It's not clear to me what's the issue, so I don't know what to say more.
>
>Why do you smoke if you consider it a degenerate activity?
>
>With friendly greetings,
>
>Wim
I think I know the issue for me.
Degenerate activity loses its 'degeneracy' connation
when it looked in the framework of a paradox.
Overdoing the dynamic thread's conclusion
did not seem balanced in this way.
What about overdoing the static?
I first became familiar with this story through Joseph Campbell’s dialogue
with Bill Moyers, The Power of Myth. Campbell understands the meaning of this
myth to say, "Life lives on life…"[66] In this sense, Kirtimukha is another
version of the sacred uroborus, the tail eating snake. We may not like to look
at it this way, but life depends on destroying other life, whether your a
veggin, a vegetarian, or a meat eater! One life form is sustained through the
destruction of another. This truth is hard on the human psyche which often
experiences guilt and denial because of it. We refer to our meats as beef,
poultry and pork, rather than as cows, chickens and pigs. This is denial. Some
people, who eat only fruits and vegetables, do so because they feel guilty
eating animals, as if they have the right to determine the value of one life
form over another, the value of animals over plants. But Shiva, whose cosmic
dance becomes a balancing act between life and death, reminds us we must bow
to Kirtimukha, the Face of Glory, who further reminds us we are all raging
monsters, hungry for life. We’re all vampires draining the life out of others.
And if death is merely an illusion, then, at the very least, we must admit we
selfishly cling to and maintain our particular forms by consuming other life
forms, taking their force as our own.
If we want to understand creation, Shiva’s dance, we must first acknowledge
Kirtimukha, the truth that life lives on life.
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