2007-6-20 13:45:00
Good comments on the immigration issue. Let me add a few things.
My first point is that it is a mistake to take the ideal of spiritual equality on the soul level and extend it to apply to imperfect conditions on the physical plane.
Jesus himself illustrated this in several parables he taught. The most obvious is the parable of the ten virgins. Five were wise and five were foolish. They were to meet their bridegroom when the call came and they would need sufficient oil in their lamps to light the way when he appeared.
When the call came five had enough oil and five did not. Those who did not have enough oil asked for oil from the five who had sufficient. But the wise answered no because if they shared their oil then none of the virgins would have enough. The wise virgins told the foolish ones to go "buy from them that sell."
The five wise virgins thus used their oil to successfully journey to the bridegroom and the five foolish completely missed out for the bridegroom was no longer available because of their delay.
Now let us apply this analogy to countries. Some countries have enough wealth and others do not. If the countries that have just give their wealth to those who have not then none will have enough. This giving away of wealth does not work in the best conditions but is further complicated 95 percent of the time by corrupt governments that cause poverty.
We send a lot of food, for instance, to North Korea and what do they do with it? They use it to feed their military and the common people who do without are eating the bark off of trees. We thus wind up feeding the people who are committed to destroy us.
The solution given by Jesus also applies to the have-nots: "Go to the marketers and get some wealth for yourself." Numerous Moslem countries have done this by going to the wealthy nations and selling their assets such as oil.
Mexico has more natural assets for its size than the United States yet they rarely offer them to other nations but seek to develop them themselves. Because of government bureaucracy they have not been very successful and have remained poor. If they partnered more with The United States they could funnel much more money to their country through oil and other resources. I'm sure most Americans would much rather give our oil money to Mexico than those who hate us in the Middle East.
Another parable is called the Laborers in the Vineyard.
The master of the vineyard hired laborers at different times of the day and offered them all a penny for their work for the day. It turned out that some worked twelve hours while those who came on board late worked as little as one.
When they all got paid those who worked many hours saw the ones who worked only one hour for a penny thought maybe they would get a bonus since they had worked as much as twelve hours. But when the payment was given they all received a penny.
Those who worked 8, 10 and 12 hours grumbled to the master. "Hey, we worked through the heat of the day and it is unfair that we get the same pay as these new guys who worked only one hour."
The Master answered, "It is not unfair at all. I promised you a penny for your day's work and I fulfilled that promise by giving you exactly what we bargained for. I needed these new guys to complete my harvest and it was worth it to me to pay them a day's wages for that last hour. I have the freedom to pay whoever I want whatever they agree to."
By extension this parable teaches a number of things. A person, group or nation has the right to set the parameters of what they are willing to extend to others. Even if the situation or payment is not that which is desired, if it is nevertheless accepted then the master is without blame as long as he lives up to his side of the agreement. True, if he pays more than he has to he gets some good will and good karma but he is justified in only paying the agreed amount.
This parable also illustrates how totally equality will never be achieved on the physical plane. In the parable all employees were treated equally in that they were all given the same wage for the day, but they were unequal in that they received a much different wage per hour.
Even so, the ideal of equality will be dangled before seekers for thousands of years to come. The first step is to achieve equal opportunity for all. The second step is to cultivate the giving nature that exists in general humanity so, through free will, all eventually have their basic needs fulfilled.
We will be much closer to equality on the physical level in the future golden age, but even here there will still be many differences in possessions according to the labor of the people. The only result from forcing equality is that eventually all become equally poor.
To be continued...
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