Buddhism in Action Is Unconditional Compassion, Wise and Merciful

Helena Petrovna Blavatsky · Buddhas and Initiates Series · 11 pages

From Lucifer of July 1889, and reprinted in the Collected Writings under the title World-Improvement or World-Deliverance — which states the question better than anything else could. Wilhelm Hubbe-Schleiden, the German theosophist, had written to the editor about a paragraph in the Revue Theosophique, and the exchange that follows is annotated throughout by Blavatsky in her capacity as editor.

The disagreement is about whether the proper object is to improve the world or to be delivered from it, and the answer the title gives is that in action the two are the same thing: Buddhism in practice is unconditional compassion, wise and merciful. The epigraphs are chosen to press the opposite case first, and are worth the download on their own — you yourself must make an effort, the Tathagatas are only preachers; if a man find no prudent companion, let him walk alone like a king who has left his conquered country behind; let him commit no sin, with few wishes, like a rhinoceros in the forest. Setting those beside a doctrine of unconditional compassion is the work the document does.

Read the full text (PDF, 0.4 MB, 11 pages)