Carnival Day
March 19, 2007 | 3 Comments
The past few postings have been a run-up to the Easter Weekend! Today as you have noticed the above picture, is the Carnival of The Redeemed, hosted by Cass on her blog-site Midlife Musings. Lots of interesting topics and not all are religious! A great place to share minds and learn of others. Do check it out at Cass.
Chinese Keystrokes 5
March 19, 2007 | 2 Comments
It was Pastor Yim who explained to me the above Confucian Teaching on living a perfect life; “Ren Yi Dao De”. To-date I have not met anyone who dares claimed that he has arrived and live up to these Four Principles. Not surprising because it is humanly impossible to attain by mere human strength and effort.
What strikes me most in these Four Principles lies in the order of the words! The starting point to live a perfect life as deemed by God Almighty, centers on the person of Jesus Christ! With Jesus Christ the Sacrificial Lamb who takes away the sin of the world and if we submit to Him, then we stand righteous before God. After which, we follow Jesus Christ as our Leader, proceeding to spreading the Good-news and doing good-works, wholeheartedly, and to the four corners of the earth!
It brings out a whole new meaning to me in this great teaching of Confucius! Is it a coincidence that the Salvation Message of God lies hidden in the ancient Confucian teachings which was hundreds of years apart from Christ.
Chinese Keystrokes 4
March 17, 2007 | Leave a Comment
The fourth and ending word in the famous Confucius Teaching is “De” or in Cantonese “Tak”.
By far this word contains the most elements and gives the meaning of “Good Works”.
It comprises of a left element, depicting “Multitudes” of people.
A top right elements are the letters “Ten” and “Four”. Ten in Chinese signifies “Perfection” or “Completion” and the letter “Four” describes the four directions like north, south, east and west. Literally meaning all over the world.
Lastly, two lower right elements are the letters “One” and “Heart” respectively and this simply means wholeheartedly.
This word “De” implies that a group of people wholeheartedly doing good deeds over the four corners of the world.
Chinese Keystrokes 3
March 17, 2007 | Leave a Comment
Remembered at one time, Former US President Nixon was asked about the World Leadership at that time and Nixon said that during his time as President, there were small events in the world but with great leaders, now big world events but with small leaders. I thought that was well said. Leadership was not too impressive at all during Clinton’s tenure as President of the US.The world is forever searching for Leaders towards whom, people can turn to for direction and guidance. It is even more acute now with the world in such chaos, politically speaking. This brings up the third word for today. Pronounced as ‘Dao’.
This word means “Direction” or “The Way”. The structure is again a left and a right element. The Left element denotes “To Follow”.
The right element denotes a leader used in the sense of a person.
Referring again to the Bible where it mentioned in the Gospel of John 14:8 where it says “I am the Way, the Truth and the Life, no one comes to the Father but by Me.” Knowing our direction in life is very important, for it gives us purpose.
Chinese Keystrokes 2
March 16, 2007 | 2 Comments
This is the second word ” Yi” means “Righteousness”. A virtue held highly in Confucian Teaching. Among the Chinese Triads, members can be killed for not upholding this, although its meaning was totally misconstrued. Many Chinese Sword-Fighting movies depicted this value in their story lines. In its original intention, it was understood as a standing in the eyes of society.
There are two elements in this word. The top element is the word “Lamb”.
The lower element is the word “Myself”.
How on earth did the ancient Chinese used these two elements to form the word “Righteousness” beats me. Moreover why not arrange the elements as side by side instead of a top and bottom arrangement? It has the connotation that righteousness is having a lamb over me; some sort of covering.
In the Bible in 2 Corinthians 5:21 it says that ‘For He has made Him who knew no sin, to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.’
So it implies that for one to be deemed righteous, one needed the covering of ‘The Lamb’ and Jesus Christ is called The Lamb of God! Coincidence again?
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