"In a crazy world, you can live more happily without having any ‘hope’."
- Hiro Sachiya (b. 1936 – d. April 7, 2022) was a Japanese buddhist scholar and a popular contemporary writer of Buddhism.
"The big lie of “making the world a better place”
The world has never been a ‘good place' for its inhabitants. Regardless of the era, the world is always a‘bad place'.
'The three realms are not at ease, they are still like a house on fire', says the Lotus Sutra. The three realms (Ref) are the worlds of greed, colour and colourlessness in which human beings reincarnate through repeated births and deaths. You could think of it as the world we live in.
The Lotus Sutra says that there is no security in this world, that it is full of anxiety, like a house engulfed in flames and burning. What is required now is to learn from this Lotus Sutra and recognise that the world is a house on fire. Politicians are trying to plant the wrong perception in the minds of the people with their nonsense. Thus we must not fall for such tricks to deceive people and must first face up to the fact that the world is always a house on fire.
That is to clarify, therefore to give up.
And you have to take a hard look at the state of the burning house in our time. People who work and have a decent income are all in debt hell. That is the state of a house on fire today.
“Let's admit that the world is on fire. If we live in an age of debt, which is on fire, then don't we need to make more efforts to extinguish the flames?” There are probably people who think this way. However, Buddhism strictly warns against the short-sighted idea that if a fire is raging, it is natural to put it out.
“Get out of the burning house immediately.”
In other words, Buddhism teaches that one should not stay in a house on fire to extinguish it. It teaches that you should leave the fire immediately.
To think "let's make the world a better place" or "let's get rid of debt hell" is, on the contrary, to be attached to this rotten world. The modern way of reading this phrase is, “Don't do that, just leave the world as it is.”
Banks are surviving comfortably, while individuals are exhausted with debt. Look at this current situation. If you stay in the fire forever, the harder you try, the worse the situation gets.
When I say 'don't work hard, don't work hard', some people argue that they bought the flat for their family and cannot afford not to work hard to pay back the loan. The conversation ends there when I say, "Then why don't you just not buy a flat?"
If you remember the basics of living within your income, you don't have to work hard and you won't be taken in by the burning house called the world. The landscape of our times is that everyone has forgotten these basics and as a result is groaning.