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General Buddhism => General Buddhism => Topic started by: DS Star on September 18, 2013, 12:54:38 AM
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Are you able to forgive the person who killed your loved one?
These brave mother and father can:
http://youtu.be/ExfG9K-Scto (http://youtu.be/ExfG9K-Scto)
http://youtu.be/qBPqqzQfxzk (http://youtu.be/qBPqqzQfxzk)
Perhaps it is much easier to forgive when the person is doing a mistake like driving when drunk...
What about a real murderer who murdered your daughter brutally?
Gary Leon Ridgway, an American serial killer in the 80s was known as the Green River Killer killing women and girls in Washington state. He was convicted in court of 48 murders, and he later confessed to nearly twice that number.
The father of one of his victims Linda Jane Rule (she was only 16 years old during murder) actually forgave the so-called 'monster'...
http://youtu.be/EIkywrKVWAo (http://youtu.be/EIkywrKVWAo)
Do you have what it takes to forgive a serial killer?
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WOW. Very powerful videos indeed. How amazing it is to forgive. How empowering it is to forgive. How compassionate it is to forgive. What is the point of holding on to hate when the act has already passed. What we create in the moment is what we can take with us. Hence to forgive not only helps us but helps the culprit to.
We all need forgiveness and the only way to receive it is to give it. Very powerful message. Thank you DS Star!
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Forgiveness is the only way forward in this case. Otherwise we can only hate. Since hate is an emotion, it would act as a seed for future repercussion and on a day to day basis we will be bitter, and that will affect everyone around us especially our love ones. To forgive is to let go of this hate, and the moment this is done, we will feel lighter like a big boulder is lifted off our shoulders.
On a day to day basis, we are always confronted with situation that can cause us to hate someone or something. We need to practice forgiveness at least, so that this feeling do not fester and habituate ourselves with the seed of hatred. We all know how negative this can be.
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To forgive the person who murdered your child or any loved one is definitely a very difficult thing to do. Your own child is an attachment very hard to let go whether dead or alive. When the child is brutally murdered how does one get the strength to forgive and move on ?
In Dharma, its the child's karma, in past life or this life that resulted in such a tragedy taking place. Similarly, the parent's karma to have to endure the tremendous pain of losing a child. To reduce or eliminate this suffering one has to be able to let go and move on. Forgiveness is the best method. Contemplate with compassion on how sick this muderer is; what horrible karma he would have accumulated killing almost 100 humans. He will surely suffer in hell. Om mani padme hung.
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It is crucial to remember that forgiveness can't be put off,but must be selfless and from the heart.Opening up does help us to feel better though we have to be at the right moment in our life.Do not worry about the guilt.
Have to work these feelings out or they will end up doing more harm.Take time to grow and change to feel better.forgiveness does heal and overtime the manifestation of healing is evident.
So do you believe forgiveness heals?
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Everyone would have some things/feelings which they don't want to let go. Some people cannot let go of hatred, some people cannot let go of comfort zone, some people cannot let go of feeling of having their children around...
We all know, based on Buddhist teachings, we need to let go all of these. It is these feelings which cause us to be in samsara... that's why we need to study, keep up with our practice and learn to have the teachings become part of our wisdom. When we do this, it will be easier for us to let go...
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Buddhists believe that to not forgive gives rise to suffering. It is taught that those who cannot let go of a real or imagined wrong against them are unable to free themselves from hate and that they will suffer because of this. Hatred can, in turn, lead to more widespread suffering, and in turn, more hatred. According to the Dhammapada, “Those who attempt to conquer hatred by hatred are like warriors who take weapons to overcome others who bear arms. This does not end hatred, but gives it room to grow."
Buddhists believe that atonement, as well as forgiving others as well as ourselves, is an important step on the path towards a better life and towards enlightenment.
To forgive is to let go. How much you can forgive is how much you can let go.
It's definitely hard but if we can't get through it, we will be tied down by our anger we will be unhappy for life.
Giving up hatred and forgiving the harm done to us by others allows us to move on and to achieve peace of mind.
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Giving up hatred and forgiving the harm done to us by others allows us to move on and to achieve peace of mind.
I makes sense, even in a collective and historical way. For instance, the same people who are forever grudging and revengeful about supposed crimes commited against them are those most active inciting wars, genocides and holocausts around the world.
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To forgive the person who murdered your child or any loved one is definitely a very difficult thing to do. Your own child is an attachment very hard to let go whether dead or alive. When the child is brutally murdered how does one get the strength to forgive and move on ?
In Dharma, its the child's karma, in past life or this life that resulted in such a tragedy taking place. Similarly, the parent's karma to have to endure the tremendous pain of losing a child. To reduce or eliminate this suffering one has to be able to let go and move on. Forgiveness is the best method. Contemplate with compassion on how sick this muderer is; what horrible karma he would have accumulated killing almost 100 humans. He will surely suffer in hell. Om mani padme hung.
Hi Cookie,
Yes, forgiveness is helpful and is really much easier if we think of the truth of suffering and the cycle of suffering; we suffer, the murderer suffers, we need to pray for him as he has not yet experienced the terrible reprocussions of his actions. It is possible that if he meets the dharma and purifies that he wouldn't necessarily have all the bad karmas ripen on him, as they would be purified first. Even if he is another religion, if he has the power of regret and the power of the promise not to do it again, this helps to reduce the karma.
I think it is really important for us to remember that most big karmas that ripen are from past lives; sometimes really good people have bad karmas ripen from long ago; likewise there are some people who committed heinous acts that manage to live a long time (like some of the S.S. officers who went into hiding to avoid persecution for war crimes). Whenever we have something happening to someone, even though it is a result of past actions, of course we feel compassion. Likewise, we feel compassion if someone has committed something heinous and hasn't had the results ripen yet. I tend to do Vajrasattva for both parties, because the cycle will never end if we don't stop the heinous actions. This is why it is very very important for Buddhists to advocate against the death penalty; we may think that someone won't commit more negative actions if they are dead, but of course, if they are alive and kept from harming others, then they have time to generate the power of regret.
I notice in the west the tendency of people to say, oh what that guy is doing must be good, so he got instant karma and everything is working out for him, or vice-versa. Actually the instant karma idea is not traditional in Buddhism; if someone is doing a practice we don't like or something, we should remember that we are not judge and jury to their karma; this is to do with their view intention and motivation.
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I find the strongest type of forgiveness, the one that brings a sense of complete forgiveness, is wisdom realizing emptiness. Not just as a passing thought, but a genuine and prolonged concentration on it!
When we apply the teachings of the vast path as many here have explained, it softens out the edges. Having done that, we have enough mental space and power to destroy the roots of our suffering temporarily, and eventually permanently by concentrating on the Profound.
In my communications with many people over the years, and reading in forums, I've noticed that the subject of wisdom realizing emptiness, which is actually the only final solution to every problem, is rarely mentioned. That is particularly odd on a website devoted to the Wisdom Buddha. It would be wonderful to see more use of the subject here. It is so healing!
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Forgiving, when it comes to something as grave and difficult as forgiving someone who has brutally raped and killed your loved one, is obviously very difficult and painful . Nonetheless, if we have the wisdom and insight to place this act in the broad context of the working of the ineluctable Law of Cause and Effect(karma), and our innumerable past lives, our present life and our innumerable future lives, we will be able to correctly view this grossly atrocious act as being the ripening of karma of the victim, however close that victim is to us. "What goes out from us will come back to us". That's how karma works. Karma has returned to the earlier perpetrator of a similar act done to the current perpetrator.
Hence, forgiveness is very necessary to stop the vicious cycle of Cause and Effect which will continue to operate if we continue to give to way to our deluded need for retaliation.
Forgiveness starts the road to inner healing. Inner healing is the healing of the inner disease of hate, anger and the like, which are the root cause of suffering. If one can let go and forgive, one has already begun to show compassion. One grows inner peace. Inner peace and compassion are counters and antidotes to our poisons of hate and anger.However, it is the wisdom of realizing the law of Cause and Effect(Karma) that directly serves as an antidote to our ignorance and delusions, and which sets us on the path of forgiveness and breaking the vicious cycle and downward spiral of retaliation and revenge and suffering.
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It is not easy to forgive someone who killed your child or loved ones but to hold onto resentment and anger, to seek retribution is even more difficult as it creates a painful mental state. So even for our own sake we ought to let go, forgive and move on no matter how long it takes and however difficult it may seem, eventually we have to let go of our bitterness and resentment, and forgive.
To forgive is to let go of feeling hurt, to give up our grudges. To forgive means to extend goodwill to those that we feel are opposed to us, those who have offended us, those who have hurt/harm us, those who don't like us, even those we regard as enemies. Forgiveness is truly an act of self-transformation. When we forgive we transform a negative mental state of resentment and anger into a positive mental state of goodwill. To forgive does not necessarily mean to forget. We are responsible for our mental state, and we can choose to let go of it and be forgiving.
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This couple chose to forgive because they know that if they dont do so ,the hurt and wounds can leave them with lasting feelings of anger ,bitterness and even vengence.Unless we let go and realize that the situation is over we cannot move forward.According to the insight of Buddha,if we hurt others we hurt ourselves.If others harm us they thereby harm themselves.If we help others we help ourselves .
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Wow! How wonderful! It is always easier said than done to some people. Those brave and kind people show us how easy it is when we choose to forgive and move on. Holding on to the hurt and sadness will only make it worse for our mind in the long run. As we will tend to think of revenge, be depressed and be unhappy. I wish them love and kindness always...
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??? As Buddhists, of which I am one, we believe that everything that happens is karmic and it has a strong, if not direct connection with our past lives. But to truly forgive, in my humble opinion we have to stop operating from past karma. Once we are able to cut ties with the past, that we are not driven by the seeds of sufferings that we planted in the past, we sincerely forgive and through this forgiveness we no longer create a future karma, be it positive or negative. This type of forgiveness does not need justification such as the child did this and the serial killer did that or I raped the killer in the past so he came back to avenge his tragic death etc. The drama stops because Dharma arises. In short, drama gives rise to karma, Dharma dissolves karma. ;D FYI, I am still quite a Drama Queen... hee hee :-X
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Buddha taught that inner peace can be reached only when we practice forgiveness. It's an essential ingredient to peace of mind.
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Something we can learn from the video. It's not easy to forgive someone who has taken away the most precious things in our lives. It takes a lot of courage to even face the murderer what more to forgive him.
But to forgive is to forget the pain one has gone through for so long. It is easier to forgive and let go than to hold on to the anger.
What's done is done. There's no turning back, so why hold on?
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There's a saying forgive and forget but we often hear another saying "forgiven but not forgotten". Our memory is as such that we usually either find it extremely hard to forget a traumatic event or out of some reflex protection mechanism we suppress such memories so deep we don't remember them at all.
Can we truly forgive without forgetting. By our memory latching on to a particular event, does it also mean that deep down somewhere inside us, we have not truly forgiven? I don't doubt the human capacity to "forgive", but I do think they are different level of forgiveness. To not be vengeful in my opinion is the basic form of forgiveness. To be able to forget and never reach into our memory to bring up such incidents in heated moments of anger or despair is a deeper form of forgiveness.
Forgiveness is a powerful healing element but I think in any form of forgiveness, the person also have to forgive oneself as well and that it is okay to let go and forgive whatever bad things are done to our loved ones. That our loved ones do not require us to hold a vengeance against the other person.
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Amazing and it takes a lot of courage to do so and especially someone brutally murdered your daughter with cautiousness. Logically it will be better if we could forgive someone and move on with life but it is much easy to say than done. Nevertheless is much better and healthier for a person if we can not to have vengeance to be instil in our lives and be burden by whatever we are not happy about.
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It is always very easy to say so... To perform it is another question all together. To heal, we have to let go and forgive. We have to do it or else it will still embedded in our minds and it can affect our future rebirth if it is not addressed properly. To forget and let go is classic in the sense that it frees us from being chained by anger and hatred. By practising Tsongkhapa will be the best medicine for this. :)
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Forgiveness is a universal quality. For the parents of the victim to forgive the serial killer, they must have realised that only an insane person could have committed such a crime.
From a Buddhist perspective, by not hating the killer, one is acting according to the dharma. The Buddha said that, "Evil-doers are not wicked by nature. They do evil because they are ignorant". In this case, the evil-doer is suffering from the sickness of insanity. We can also look at the case from the point of view of karma. If we accept the law of cause and effect, it will be easier to accept the fate that the victims of the killer suffered in this life. If we believe in karma, it is easier to let go of hatred and the need for revenge.
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Nothing is more poignant than this example of forgiveness. You must click on the link and watch the video.
Gripping images: Mother of #Iran murder victim stops public execution at last minute.
The emotional scene was captured by a local news photographer. The BBC's Roja Assadi talks us through the images.
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10153275522502588&set=vb.59145437587&type=2&theater (https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10153275522502588&set=vb.59145437587&type=2&theater)
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To forgive the person who murdered your child or any loved one is definitely a very difficult thing to do. Your own child is an attachment very hard to let go whether dead or alive. When the child is brutally murdered how does one get the strength to forgive and move on ?
In Dharma, its the child's karma, in past life or this life that resulted in such a tragedy taking place. Similarly, the parent's karma to have to endure the tremendous pain of losing a child. To reduce or eliminate this suffering one has to be able to let go and move on. Forgiveness is the best method. Contemplate with compassion on how sick this muderer is; what horrible karma he would have accumulated killing almost 100 humans. He will surely suffer in hell. Om mani padme hung.
I agree with Cookie. Everything that happens is a result of our karma. Because of our lack of dharma practise, we cannot turn against the tide of our karma. No matter how difficult it is NOT to blame, we have no other choice but to let go and forgive. Otherwise, the karma will continue to future lives.
Now that our mind is clear and undisturbed, it is very important to take some time to contemplate on karma. The more we understand karma, the easier it is for us to let go and forgive.
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Had the murdered not committed a similar act in their past lives, they would not had been killed by the murderer in this life. It is due to ignorance that one commits the negative action of killing. A person who consume meat daily is no different from the murderer in this case. Both are committing the act of killing! The parents of the victims who had expressed their anguish and wished for the murderer to die in hell are no better than the murderer! Because the mental action is strengthened by their anger, there will be repercussion too! Hatred begets hatred. One who had killed gets killed. Such is the workings of Karma. If sentient beings failed to understand and accept Karma, this vicious cycle of killing continues and sentient beings continue to suffer endlessly. Once we understand why killing had occurred, naturally compassion will arise to want to end the suffering of the murderers, the victims and those who are ignorant about creating the causes of killing.
Not everyone is able to forgive murderers or someone who had caused the death of a loved one. In this case some of the parents couldn't forgive because they are separated from what they loved and attached to. Attachment to their loved ones is the true cause of their suffering. And for the parents of these victims who had forgiven the perpetrators, they had acted out of wisdom and great compassion. It is truly courageous and kind of these parents!
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The video on "An Unforgettable Act of Forgiveness in Court - by the Father of a Murder Victim", sent very strong messages to us :
1. Those that cannot forgive, they have anger and hatred towards the murderer. They cursed him. By holding on to this, they will not have a peaceful life. Their negative thought can lead to more negative karma and suffering.
2. Whereas the father of the victim forgive the murderer and he looks more calm and peace and he is doing what GOD want him to do, to forgive.
To forgive is not easy, but once you are able to do it, we are being kind to ourself. Forgiveness is the most beautiful act.
As a Buddhist, we should understand all things that happened to us are due to action fr our past lives. Karma is a very fair law, what you do now, the effect will bounced back to you in the future. There is no escape. Therefore, we need to be mindful with our action now. We plant apple seed, to get apple tree, we will not get strawberry.
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“Forgive and forget those what has hurt you in the past but never forget what it has taught you”
As a Buddhist, we were always taught and reminded pertaining to the cause and effect of karma . Rejoice for the mother who has forgive the man who has murdered her daughter because she knew that if she insisted in pursuing the prosecution against the murderer , there is no way to turn back the clock and her daughter will not be back to life . Thus, it’s even very difficult for her to move on and cope with the coming days if the hatred and revengeful thoughts instilled in her. Therefore, with a proper understanding of how the karma works, one will be able to be less attached and be able to let go easily.
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Wow! Powerful message here being demonstrated by this brave mother! Forgiving is equal to letting go. Letting go of the emotional trauma that festered inside of us, it is only through ourselves that when we truly and sincerely wish to heal from these emotional pains. Seeing that another man being hang for the crime that he committed does not bring back the son she lost. By forgiving, we are letting the pain inside to come out so that it has no place to hide, then only the true healing process could start.
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What is more powerful than forgiveness. We are overwhelm by this example, because the murder of a loved one is involved; but with due respect, the same person that can forgive the a murderer of a loved one can easily not forgive a simpler act of say some hurtful speech by a friend. My point is that forgiveness can be practice by everyone as renunciation on a daily basic, 24/7, 365 days a year as a powerful practice to enlightenment and lasting happiness. Hence, we can forgive everything sundry or great with the motivation that others are more important than us and that ultimately we are the one happier and benefit more in these acts of forgiveness.
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Forgiveness is the only way for us to heal and move on in life. It is touch when watching the video of the father forgive the murderer of his child. It is not easy as the father also suffer or painful for the lost of his child. Incident has happended and it cannot be reversed. If the father choose to be angry and revenge, the karma will be created and may affect next life.
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WOW. Very powerful videos indeed. How amazing it is to forgive. How empowering it is to forgive. How compassionate it is to forgive. What is the point of holding on to hate when the act has already passed. What we create in the moment is what we can take with us. Hence to forgive not only helps us but helps the culprit to.
We all need forgiveness and the only way to receive it is to give it. Very powerful message. Thank you DS Star!
Yes it is empowering. Forgiveness is one of those hardest things to do. The father is giving positive reinforcement to this serial killer that by the confession of his guilt that it is a virtue, the right thing to do although it doesn't he isn't free of his punishment. I think all the people in the court that day also receive a very strong lesson on compassion that forgives.