The Man of Understanding Will Regulate His Bodily Habit

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Foundation Day Is Now

Cheon Seong Gyeong 821

The family that perfects the four great realms of heart and three great kingships is the ideal family. The grandparents stand as God, the parents as the king of the families of this world, and you as the children are the future kings and queens who will inherit the kingship in the spiritual and physical worlds. You become the kings and queens who inherit all of this. The ideal family is the place where the three great kingships should bear fruit. (239-185, 1992.11.24)

Cheon Seong Gyeong 799

    This universe is a museum of love. Human beings must become the owners of this museum. The mineral world and plant world multiply centering on relationships of love. Without love, history would end. History can continue because there is reproduction. Consequently, man and woman should marry and give birth to children. Without doing so, they cannot find their place in the spirit world. When a baby is born, you should come before God and offer that baby as a gift to Him. Without this gift, you cannot hold your head up proudly.
    When you go back to your hometown, what is it you will be most proud of and want to show your parents? You will take pride in how well you raised your children. It is the same in the spirit world. When you go before God, there is no greater gift than bringing God’s children, the people of heaven, whom you have raised on this earth. Money, power, and knowledge are not important. (229-15, 1992.4.9)

Self-Control

2. Self-Discipline: Training the Unruly Beast Within

Be not like a horse or a mule, without understanding, which must be curbed with bit and bridle, else it will not keep with you.
    Psalm 32.9
 
Man makes a harness for his beast; all the more should he make one for the beast within himself, his evil desire.
    Jerusalem Talmud, Sanhedrin 10.1 (Judaism)
 
Excellent are trained mules, so are thoroughbred horses of Sindh and noble tusked elephants; but far better is he who has trained himself.
 
Formerly this mind went wandering where it liked, as it wished and as it listed. Today with attentiveness I shall completely hold it in check, as a mahout controls an elephant in must.
    Dhammapada 322, 326 (Buddhism)
 
Know that the Self is the rider, and the body the chariot; that the intellect is the charioteer, and the mind the reins. The senses, say the wise, are the horses; the roads they travel are the mazes of desire…
 
When a man lacks discrimination and his mind is uncontrolled, his senses are unmanageable, like the restive horses of a charioteer. But when a man has discrimination and his mind is controlled, his senses, like the well-broken horses of a charioteer, lightly obey the rein.
    Katha Upanishad 1.3.3-6 (Hinduism)
 
The man of understanding… will regulate his bodily habit and training. Not yielding to brutal and irrational pleasures, he will regard even health as quite a secondary matter. His first aim will be not to be fair or strong or well, unless he is likely to gain temperance thereby, but to temper the body so as to preserve the harmony of the soul.
    Plato, The Republic (Hellenism)
 
Irrigators lead the waters. Fletchers bend the shafts. Carpenters bend wood. The virtuous control themselves.
    Dhammapada 80 (Buddhism)
 
It is true that the mind is restless and difficult to control. But it can be conquered, Arjuna, through regular practice and detachment. Those who lack self-control will find it difficult to progress in meditation; but those who are self-controlled, striving earnestly through the right means, will attain the goal.
    Bhagavad-Gita 6.35-36 (Hinduism)
 
What is meant by saying that cultivation of the personal life depends on the rectification of the mind is that when one is affected by wrath to any extent, his mind will not be correct. When one is affected by fear to any extent, his mind will not be correct. When he is affected by fondness to any extent, his mind will not be correct. When he is affected by worries and anxieties, his mind will not be correct. When the mind is not present, we look but do not see, listen but do not hear, and eat but do not know the taste of food. This is what is meant by saying that the cultivation of the personal life depends on the rectification of the mind.
    Great Learning 7 (Confucianism)
 
That man is disciplined and happy
who can prevail over the turmoil
That springs from desire and anger,
here on earth, before he leaves his body.
    Bhagavad-Gita 5.23 (Hinduism)
 
 
 
 
 

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