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The Final Commitment
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abstain.17 One knows further that violence excites hatred, 18 but that respect for all beings is the essence of wisdom,19 for the sage is conscious of the evil, the terrible pain caused by violence and he turns away from it, 20 he realises that equanimity towards both friends and foes and abstention from all harmful activity are very difficult to achieve, but that therein lies his chosen path.21 He must maintain towards all that benevolence that causes him to identify himself with them, to the point of considering each to be as himself:
Bad karman has no hold on him who identifies himself with all beings, who regards each one with the same look, who has
stopped the karmic flow and masters his senses.22 The verse which follows this passage explains that knowledge comes first and compassion flows from it.23 Here a process is discernible: 'the fact of respecting all beings, of "considering the six categories of living beings as himself"24 is the sign of non-assumption of possession of these beings, of mastery of the passions, whence comes the stoppage of the flow of karmic matter, which in turn presupposes knowledge. Everything holds together, one cannot isolate ahimsă from the rest of the doctrine and thus from praxis, nor make of it an absolute; however, it is in fact given a primordial importance.
17 Cf. AS I, 2, 3, 4; DS VI, 10; SkrS I, 7, 19; 11,9; US VI, 6.
18 Cf. SkrS I, 1, 1, 3.
19 Ibid., I, 11, 10.
20 lbid., 1 10,21.
21 Cf. US XIX, 25.
22 savvabhuy'appabhūyassa sammam bhūyāim päsao
pihiyāsavassa damtassa pāvam kammam na bardhai. DS IV, 23, 9.
23 padhamaṁ nāņam tao dayā evaṁ citthai savvasamjae...DS IV, 23, 10.
24 ...attasame mannejja chappi kae. . DS X, 5.
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