Isaiah 58:3 · World English Bible
‘Why have we fasted,’ they say, ‘and you don’t see? Why have we afflicted our soul, and you don’t notice?’ “Behold, in the day of your fast you find pleasure, and oppress all your laborers.
The complaint gives the whole enterprise away. A man who starves his body and then asks why the account has not been settled was never seeking truth; he was buying it, and the price he offered was his own suffering.
From the Indian Guru reading below.
The same verse, read by one tradition.
AWARENESS
The complaint gives the whole enterprise away. A man who starves his body and then asks why the account has not been settled was never seeking truth; he was buying it, and the price he offered was his own suffering. The ego loves such a bargain, since austerity feeds it a new food, the pride of belonging to the few who deny themselves.
Torture changes nothing in the one doing the torturing, which is why the same man can go hungry all day and still squeeze his laborers by evening. The body is innocent, and punishing it leaves the mind exactly as it was, only more certain of its own virtue. Watching transforms, and watching gives the ego nothing to display.
Indian Guru lens
Am I going without something, or collecting a receipt for it?
The Buddha spent years starving himself and found it brought him nothing but a weaker body and a prouder mind. He ate a meal, sat down, and only then did it open.
Straining after virtue produces the appearance of virtue and nothing else. The one who stops pushing arrives where the pusher never could.
Do not go around telling people you drink only water. If you are thirsty, drink water quietly, and keep the hardship from becoming a costume.
Free · No account needed
Lensightful opens every verse of the Bible through the traditions you choose. Save readings, ask a follow-up question, and get one verse a day.
Get Lensightful on the App Store
Indian Guru