Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Five Precepts Blues; #1.4 - When one is not free from passion

1965:  American blues musician Mississippi John Hurt (1893-1966) plays guitar in Washington Square Park, New York City.  (Photo by Bernard Gotfryd/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)Mississippi John Hurt • Frankie


Frankie shot ol' Albert, and she shot him three or four times.
Says, "Stroll back, out smokin' my gun. Let me see is Albert dyin'.
He's my man, and he done me wrong."


There's no shortage of old blues songs about murder. Most of them involve drinking, harsh words, thievery, and sexual misconduct on top of it. Maybe it's encouraging that there isn't a whole lot of killing just for the sake of killing... Here is one about a crime of passion, when Frankie "spied Albert in Alice's arms."

I didn't come up with any results for the term "crime of passion" in the Buddha's teachings but the concept probably wasn't absent in his time.

When reviewing the Buddha's teachings with a group of monks, here is a part of what Ven. Sariputta had to say;

When one is not free from passion, desire, love, thirst, fever, & craving for form, then from any change & alteration in that form, there arises sorrow, lamentation, pain, grief, & despair. When one is not free from passion... for feeling... for perception... for fabrications... When one is not free from passion, desire, love, thirst, fever, & craving for consciousness, then from any change & alteration in that consciousness, there arise sorrow, lamentation, pain, grief, & despair.


When one is free from passion, desire, love, thirst, fever, & craving for form, then with any change & alteration in that form, there does not arise any sorrow, lamentation, pain, grief, or despair. When one is free from passion... for feeling... for perception... for fabrications... When one is free from passion, desire, love, thirst, fever, & craving for consciousness, then with any change & alteration in that consciousness, there does not arise any sorrow, lamentation, pain, grief, or despair.

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