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“Bowatte Indarathana was protesting against the slaughter of cattle and the alleged conversion of Buddhists by the country’s minority faiths.” - BBC[/size]
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Nothing of my faith requires suicide.
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Which god do you worship?
…or which philosophy do you follow?
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“If you have nothing to die for, you have nothing to live for”
~ Moroccan Proverb ~
“I submit to you that if a man has not discovered something that he will die for, he isn’t fit to live.”
Speech in Detroit, Michigan, 1963
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.It’s what one should die for that matters. A friend? Yes. Cattle? No.
Some Buddhist monks set themselves on fire during the Viet Nam war. What did they accomplish? Dead monks!
Suicide is declaring that you have nothing left to give to others. Dying for a cause in the MLK sense is being murdered for your beliefs.
Not being Muslim, I don’t see how being a suicide bomber will get me sex in heaven. It’s just suicide!
I’m not so sure that it was his beliefs that he was willing to die for, ierrelus, but for his people…or better to say for humanity.
Ier - hope I’m not offending, but how do you know what they accomplished?
It was probably a symbolic affort at singular belief in within a brotherhood. They may have not even been looking for an effect, only a placation.
To the Chinese this meant nothing. Only us Westerners, used to the dramatics of Madame Butterfly, do we look for some reason, effect, or cause.
I’m pretty sure most human beings look for reasons, effects, and causes.
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From Wikipedia:
Jan Yun-Hua explains the medieval Chinese Buddhist precedents for self-immolation.
Relying exclusively on authoritative Chinese Buddhist texts and, through the use of these texts, interpreting such acts exclusively in terms of doctrines and beliefs (e.g., self-immolation, much like an extreme renunciant might abstain from food until dying, [b]could be an example of disdain for the body in favor of the life of the mind and wisdom[/b]) rather than in terms of their socio-political and historical context, the article allows its readers to interpret these deaths as acts that refer only to a distinct set of beliefs that happen to be foreign to the non-Buddhist.
Also from Wikipedia:
…A wave of self-immolation protests occurred in conjunction with the Arab Spring protests in the Middle East and North Africa, with at least 14 recorded incidents. These actions helped inspire the Arab Spring, including the 2010–2011 Tunisian revolution, the main catalyst of which was the self-immolation of Mohamed Bouazizi, the 2011 Algerian protests (including many self-immolations in Algeria), and the 2011 Egyptian revolution. There have also been self-immolation protests in Saudi Arabia, Mauritania, and Syria.[/size]
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Interpretive through textual, yes, singularly expressive, I doubt it.
duplicate
No offense taken. I should have appended IMHO to the declarative statement. I see these suicides as accomplishimg nothing but death for monks. Dead monks did not prevent the Chinese from intervening in Viet Nam. Neither did this stop China from taking over Tibet.
I agree with you Ierrellus, though I know from another thread that there are a few here that see benefit in this.
What it might just do is give an example for others to do the same…especially those who are really impressionable and fanatical.
But who knows? Perhaps some might see a higher purpose in it, giving them the faith and the incentive to do battle (figurately speaking).
What purpose is really served? Best to live your life - to teach by example in that way, and in order to find solutions.
Martin Luther King lived, breathed and worked tirelessly to achieve equality, equal rights between African Americans and caucasions, aside from which he raised awareness in both.
His Dream did not consist of self-immolating expecting that that would turn the tides of human history.
Arc,
Few would agree with your agreeing with me or with my take on the topic?
Que?!
What I wrote was …
I meant that there ARE a few who would see benefit in this - who DO see benefit in self-immolation, that is.
Aside from that, I can’t actually really know how many would agree or understand it without taking a poll.
All I said was that our thinking was similar. Am I wrong?
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I suppose that we all act according to our “beliefs”. I almost hate that word “beliefs”. 
And who really knows what lurks unconsciously beneath the mind of a monk who decides to self-immolate.
For me, it makes more sense to live for one’s faith, rather than to die for it. But that’s just me.
If one value’s one’s faith, the object of which cannot really be proven right or wrong, doesn’t it make more sense to live for it in order to show its true value in one’s life.
We can die to protect lives, to protect the freedom of countries, but to die for one’s faith - what does one accomplish there?
After having come to realize that something is, in reality, unjust or an injustice, yes I agree with that. Injustice is also a virus.
Arc,
Thanks for your explanation. I’m dense these days and require clarification. I think it would be interesting to ask if MLK accomplished more as a martyr than he could have had he lived on.
St. Teresa of Avila set the standard for self immolation for Western Christians.
I would give up my life to save family or friends. But giving up my life for my faith simply stops me from doing any good I might have done for anybody.