Ethics and responsibility: when teachers behave ‘badly’. Extract. Frankfurt, 1995

James Low

6 page extract from teachings on “The Two Truths” given by James Low in Frankfurt on the 11th March 1995
Transcribed by Liz Fox and lightly edited by Barbara Terris
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The view of emptiness is that all things are empty, nothing is real and this is also the view of wisdom.
The view of compassion is that although nothing is real in itself, sentient beings, due to ignorance, are attached to their own bodies, their reputation and possessions.
Now, very often people do things in the world that disturb us. We have our ideas about what is good and appropriate behaviour. There are many stories about the behaviour of Buddhist teachers.  A teacher does somethings and the student  wonders, “Why is the teacher doing that?  That is not a very good thing to do. I don’t like that. I don’t think a teacher should do that.”