We Are Not Evil

Posted on June 21, 2019 by heaventruth

People are often are offended when I talk about the evil mind; and when I bring up the possibility that we all may have an evil mind.  They think about the evil mind that would kill or hurt others. But that would be the extreme progression of our evil thoughts. In the Ofudesaki, evil is referred to as the thoughts of greed, arrogance, miserliness, covetousness, and self-love. These are thoughts that we all may have in our lifetime. Of course some may have accumulated more of these thoughts. Are these evil thoughts harmless, and where did they come from?

In the Ofudesaki, God tells us there are paths of the mistaken mind. These paths lead to sufferings, temptations, and obstacles to us.  Therefore we have to act on our evil thoughts to bring upon harm to ourselves. What happens when we act on our evil thoughts?  This action usually brings upon suffering to others, but it also duplicates more evil thoughts in our minds. Therefore our actions on our evil thoughts produce more evil thoughts, increasing our chances of acting on them and causing more suffering to others.

Some may wonder how acting on our mistaken minds may cause suffering or punishment to us if we do not get caught. Enter the debatable subject of the soul or heart. God tells us that it is the soul that collects our demerits (negative energies) produced from acting on our evil thoughts; and our soul eventually releases these dust or demerits back to us as sufferings, temptations or obstacles in this life or our next lives.  For example, that angry co-worker or defiant spouse may be the messenger of your soul.

How do we remove these evil thoughts that are ready to be acted upon by any stimulus or events that are manufactured by our souls? God tells us to ponder and not act upon our evil thoughts when obstacles from the soul are delivered to us. Do not try to take revenge on the angry co-worker, or do not get angry with your spouse for his/her disagreeable actions. One can say that your soul is testing you for what you have done before; but if we do not act on our evil thoughts, our evil thoughts are gradually eliminated from our minds and our souls become purified, releasing only joy back to us.

Yes we all may all have evil thoughts in our minds. Some may have much more evil thoughts in their minds and may need more time to eliminate these dusts or demerits that surround their souls. But there is hope for everyone because God tells us:

Among all mankind, there is no one who is evil.

It is only a bit of dust stuck on.

We must remove our evil thoughts of greed, arrogance, self-love, miserliness and covetousness.  Ponder and do not act on these evil thoughts

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How Do We Spread Our Religions

Posted on June 20, 2019 by heaventruth

How do we spread religion? While cutting the grass yesterday, I saw a few people dressed in formal attire, knocking on doors and leaving pamphlets. I am not too sure on how many people they were able to talk to. I can only presume that they were not very successful as they were more often seen outside walking; but I am often affected emotionally by their courage in their attempt to bring people into their places of worship.

Of course there are the Sunday services that we are familiar with, where the success of attendance is often associated with the charisma of the pastor or reverend of the church. There are also the television evangelist that reach millions of people. Are they successful  in bringing people to their religion?

In our religion of Tenrikyo, God gives us instructions on how to save ourselves first, and how to save the world. These instruction are written in the Ofudesaki. I place world in bold because God promises that everyone will be saved. I have summarized the instructions in our sacred book below in a flow chart. For a comprehensive explanation, please visit heaventruth.com and click Ofudesaki in the menu bar.

 

 

 

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God’s Justice

Posted on June 19, 2019 by heaventruth

I have noticed that there are more scams that are occurring each day, whether it is by phone, e-mails or text messages. These scams appear to be authentic and attempt to take advantage of our elderly population who has the most to lose. Many people who participate in this kind of evil believe that this type of crime is business as usual, and is not really a crime as long as they are not caught. For many of these people they continue to evade our law, and appear not to suffer any consequences from their evil actions.

In the Osashizu, God calls these evil actions “The path of the world”, where you can do whatever you want and get away with it, so long as no one sees you do it. But God calls this the path of the mistaken mind.  God’s path is the” Path of the heart/soul”where everything you do, it all comes to bear on yourself.

It is our souls/hearts that helps us monitor our minds by collecting our merits and demerits that come from the action of our thoughts. It is the soul that eventually releases these merits or demerits back to us as joy or suffering. We eventually reap what we sow. These people who are taking the path of the mistaken mind, they see suffering and joy in this world and they see evil and good behaviors, but they do not understand the relationship between cause and effect. They cannot see the relationships because of the lapse of time that the soul takes to manifest the effects of our actions.

Beware to those who believe that they have escaped justice because God’s justice is always served by our own hearts/souls! Please understand the soul.

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Saving Ourselves First/ 2nd revision

Posted on June 19, 2019 by heaventruth

Sorry for the repetition of my blog; but my second revision was not corrected when I published it.

I have often heard that in our religion that we need to save others to save ourselves. Yes this makes sense; but could this be true?  I don’t fly often now, but I was often intrigued when the stewardess or steward would take the microphone and make the preflight precautions on the oxygen mask that would fall in front of us in case of any emergency. They would advise us to place the oxygen mask on ourselves first before placing it on our children.  I am pretty certain that my wife would of attempted to place them on our children first.  I do understand why these warnings exist because placing the airbags on minors first may risk both the parent and child’s lives.  Have you ever tried placing a seatbelt on an uncooperative toddler?

I believe it is the same with religion. We must purify our minds and save ourselves first before attempting to save others.  I often hear complaints from church leaders that they cannot bring new members to their churches despite years of salvation work.  Could this be that they need to purify their minds and save themselves first?

It our sacred book, the Ofudesaki, God wants us to purify our minds by taking the broad path.  This is a path, where we understand the soul, and begin to purify our minds of greed, arrogance, self-love, covetousness, and miserliness. This sometime is a difficult path because of the negative energy or dust surrounding our souls. Some would describe this as our fate.  God tells to calm our minds and not act upon our negative thoughts when the soul delivers these obstacles in our lives. This is how we purify our minds and bring upon our salvation.

When our minds are purified, then God tells us to save others. This is often called the narrow path where God tells us that we will have no difficulties.  This makes sense that we first purify our minds first.  If we attempted to spread the teachings without purifying our minds first, we will often encounter uncooperative and sometimes hostile people, just like the uncooperative child we may attempt to place the oxygen mask.  We may then unwillingly act upon our own evil thoughts, making the encounter very difficult. This is why God tells us to purify our minds first.

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Saving Ourselves first /revision

Posted on June 18, 2019 by heaventruth

Sorry about the revision. In my haste to publish, I have made a few mistakes.

I have often heard that in our religion that we need to save others to save ourselves. Yes this makes sense; but could this be true?  I don’t fly often now, but I was often intrigued when the stewardess or steward would take the microphone and make the preflight precautions on the airbags that would fall in front of us in case of any emergency. They would advise us to place the airbags on ourselves first before placing it on our children.  I am pretty certain that my wife would of attempted to place them on our children first.  I do understand why these warnings exist because placing the airbags on minors first may risk both the parent and child’s lives.  Have you ever tried placing a seat belt on an uncooperative child?

I believe it is the same with religion. We must purify our minds and save ourselves first before attempting to save others.  I often hear complaints from church leaders that they cannot bring new members to their churches despite years of salvation work.  Could it be that they need to purify their minds and save themselves first?

It our sacred book, the Ofudesaki, God wants us to purify our minds by taking the broad path.  This is a path, where we understand the soul, and begin to purify our minds of greed, arrogance, self-love, covetousness, and miserliness. This sometime is a difficult path because of the negative energy or dust surrounding our souls. Some would describe this as our fate.  God tells us not to calm our minds and not act upon our negative thoughts when the soul delivers these obstacles in our lives. This is how we purify our minds and bring upon our salvation.

When our minds are purified, then God tells us to save others. This is often called the narrow path where God tells us that we will have no difficulties.  This makes sense that we first purify our minds first.  If we attempted to spread the teachings without purifying our minds first, we will often encounter uncooperative and sometimes hostile people, just like the uncooperative child we may attempt to place the airbag.  We may then unwillingly act upon our own evil thoughts, making the encounter very difficult. This is why God tells us to purify our minds first.

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Saving Ourselves First

Posted on June 18, 2019 by heaventruth

I have often heard that in our religion that we need to save others to save ourselves. Yes this makes sense; but could this be true?  I don’t fly often now, but I was often intrigued when the stewardess or steward would take the microphone and make the pre-flight precautions on the oxygen masks that would fall in front of us in case of any emergency. They would advise us to place the airbags on ourselves first before placing it on our children.  I am pretty certain that my wife would of attempted to place them on our children first.  I do understand why these warnings exist because placing the oxygen masks on minors first may risk both the parent and child’s lives.  Have you ever tried placing a seatbelt on an uncooperative child?

I believe it is the same with religion. We must purify our minds and save ourselves first before attempting to save others.  I often hear complaints from church leaders that they cannot bring new members to their churches despite years of salvation work.  Could it be that they need to purify their minds and save themselves first?

It our sacred book, the Ofudesaki, God wants us to purify our minds by taking the broad path.  This is a path, where we understand the soul, and begin to purify our minds of greed, arrogance, self-love, covetousness, and miserliness. This sometime is a difficult path because of the negative energy or dust surrounding our souls. Some would describe this as our fate.  God tells us to calm our minds and not act upon our negative thoughts when the soul delivers these obstacles in our lives. This is how we purify our minds and bring upon our salvation.

When our minds are purified, then God tells us to save others. This is often called the narrow path where God tells us that we will have no difficulties.  This makes sense that we first purify our minds first.  If we attempted to spread the teachings without purifying our minds first, we will often encounter uncooperative and sometimes hostile people, just like the uncooperative child we may attempt to place the airbag.  We may then unwillingly act upon our own evil thoughts, making the encounter very difficult. This is why God tells us to purify our minds first.

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The Path to Joy

Posted on June 17, 2019 by heaventruth

The following chart represents a summary of the Ofudesaki, concerning the broad path and narrow path.

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Understanding the Soul to have Joy

Posted on June 16, 2019 by heaventruth

I truly believe that by understanding the soul, we can have joy in this world. In the Ofudesaki, God tells us that we do not understand the soul. God tells us that we must ponder what comes forth from our hearts/souls. To many, this will not make sense because they do not understand the soul. I have attached a step by step illustration of what the soul does.

 

1. Conception and the formation of the body

2. The soul enters the developing body. The soul contains our thoughts and our fate.

3. Birth of the baby

4. The soul restores our thoughts (evil and good)  from our previous life. We have control over our thoughts.

5. Fate surrounding the soul brings upon suffering, obstacles, and    temptations.

6. Acting upon our evil thoughts when these obstacles occur.

7. This results in the fabrication of more negative fate (suffering) around the soul.

8. It also results in more negative thoughts in the mind.

9.  But if we understand the soul, we understand our negative fate as an aide to purify our minds

10. We then ponder what negative thoughts are in our minds, and not act upon them when suffering, temptations and obstacles manifested by the soul occurs. This results in causing no suffering to others, but also does not produce any negative fate or negative thoughts to oneself.

11. death

12. The body decays and turn into ash

 13. The soul leave the body after death with all our thoughts and our fate. In this example, the soul has less evil thoughts and negative fate then when it entered the body (see 2). The soul then enters another body, and the cycle continues to purify our minds and our souls.

In summary, it is our souls that bring upon suffering. But we can use these obstacles to purify our minds, by not acting upon these evil thoughts that are agitated or turned on by these inconveniences.

References: Ofudesaki

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Purpose of Life and the Soul

Posted on June 15, 2019 by heaventruth

What is the purpose of life?  Many will agree it is to find happiness. But where do we find happiness? Many of us think it comes from physical possessions, our intelligence, our place in society, or even from our physical makeup.  But we all know that these things do not bring upon everlasting joy.  We could have all the possessions and power and yet be miserable, or struck by misfortunes in life.  There is a quote in one of our religious books that tell us that we should not adorn our bodies which are temporal; instead we should put our efforts into adorning our hearts/souls which exist for eternity.  What does this mean?

It does not mean that we should not pursue our desires to excel in our professions or interests. It is through these efforts, that we encounter opportunities to improve our minds and souls.  These opportunities that we encounter are manifested by are own souls. It is our own soul that brings upon co-workers that irritate you, a spouse that angers you, a misdirected middle finger on our streets and highways, or an illness that doctors cannot cure. These are all messengers of our souls that help us purify our own minds.  If we ponder and do not act on our existing evil thoughts when these obstacles occur, then our evil thoughts gradually are eliminated.  

What is the soul? We all know that our human bodies die and decay, but our souls exist forever.  We could debate all day if our souls go to an afterlife for eternity, or return back to earth to be reincarnated. It is our souls that carry our essence, or who we are. The soul carries our disposition of thoughts, like greed, arrogance, miserliness, covetousness, and self-love from one lifetime to another. It also carries our fate, which were created by acting upon these same evil thoughts.  The soul collects our merits and demerits, and eventually releases them back to us as joy or sorrow in the afterlife, or in our next life if we believe in reincarnation. You can say that the soul is like Santa Claus; it knows when we are good or bad; and metes out our appropriate rewards.

It is these evil thoughts that we must remove from our minds to purify our souls. The purified soul will bring upon only joy.  It is this purified mind that will make our minds spirited.  This condition of joy becomes possible only if we understand the function of the soul.  If we acknowledge that everything that happens is a manifestation of our soul, then we are able to improve our own minds, instead of placing blame on others.  It is this mind that leads to a purified soul, and eventually to a life of only joy.  It is this life of joy that God wants to share with the world. The following illustration summarizes the function of our souls.

Path of the Heart/Soul

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Purpose of Life

Posted on June 15, 2019 by heaventruth

What is the purpose of life?  Many will agree it is to find happiness. But where do we find happiness? Many of us think it comes from physical possessions, our intelligence, our place in society, or even from our physical makeup.  But we all know that these things do not bring upon everlasting joy.  We could have all the physical possessions and power and yet be miserable, or struck by misfortunes in life.  There is a quote in one of our religious documents that tell us that we should not adorn our bodies, which are temporary; instead we should put our efforts into adorning our hearts/souls, which exist for eternity.  What does this mean?

It does not mean that we should not pursue our desires to excel in our professions or interests. It is through these efforts, that we encounter opportunities to improve our minds and souls.  These opportunities that we encounter are manifested by are own souls. It is our own soul that brings upon co-workers that irritate you, a spouse that anger you, a misdirected middle finger on the highway, or an illness that doctors cannot cure. These are all messengers of our souls that help us purify our own minds.  If we ponder and do not act on our existing evil thoughts when these obstacles occur, then our evil thoughts gradually are eliminated.  

What is the soul? We all know that our human bodies die and decay, but our souls exist forever.  We could debate all day if our souls go to an afterlife for eternity, or return back to earth to be reincarnated. It is our souls that carry our essence, or who we are. It carries our disposition of thoughts, like greed, arrogance, miserliness, covetousness, and self-love from one lifetime to another. It also carries our fate, which were created by acting upon these same evil thoughts.  The soul collects our merits and demerits, and eventually releases them back to us as joy or sorrow in the afterlife, or in our next life if we believe in reincarnation.  You can say that the soul is like Santa Claus; it knows when we are good or bad.

It is these evil thoughts that we must remove from our minds to purify our souls. The purified soul will bring upon only joy, irrespective of our physical possessions or status.  It is this purified mind that will make our minds spirited.  This condition of joy becomes possible only if we understand the function of the soul.  If we acknowledge that everything that happens is a manifestation of our soul, then we are able to improve our own minds, instead of placing blame on others.  It is this mind that leads to a purified soul, and eventually to a life of only joy.  It is this life of joy that God wants to share with the world.

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