Why does a man need to pacify his mind and heart?
Isn't that a very easy question to answer? Has man not long outgrown the realm of the animal when he began to use tools? It is quite funny to imagine how someone can call you an unpeaceful being and you approach your seat neighbor in a train in such a way that you sniff at him or growl at him when his smell doesn't suit you. It would be legitimate to bite. And then to engage in a fight in which blood flows or even death occurs. Nobody would care about that and it wouldn't need a pacified human mind. But then nobody would be sitting in a moving train.
If you were a beast, you might not mind that someone hit you yesterday. In your impulsive and instinctive way of life, you would be looking for food again today and would be satisfied with everything. You would keep nothing edible for a long time or preserve it artfully, you would constantly be in danger of death in winter because you could freeze to death, for example.
We ourselves are conscious people and what becomes a beast in us is the fear of death in danger, of pain and violence. That is why it is necessary to pacify the heart and the spirit. Because we have long since gone beyond the stage of instinct beings. People who feel safe go about their daily work every day, researching, calculating, reading and spending their time on cultural and social matters. Which wolf sits at a Bach concert or which horse practices waltz dancing?
But we have also exaggerated and narrowed down our longing to live out our physicality. The time of maturity of girls and boys, in which instincts stand out the most, we do not guide them well. The time of the birth of babies and the time of death. These are all very physical matters that trigger strong emotional currents in the human being. They should not be suppressed, cramped and marginalized.
But I find it even easier to answer your question in this form: Because it works. I can either derail my excited mind or train it to choose serenity in exciting situations.
If you felt raged towards your daughter as a father: How did you feel when you let the beast out? And how did it feel if you didn't do this?
I found my own answer every time I didn't keep the beast in the fence.
For none of us is everything the same at the same time. These universal principles are there for the reason that we always have some that violate them in their beastly moments. Because we do not always follow them ourselves. As spiritually conscious beings we need wise orientation. It is like you say: if there were an absolute balance, then we would be close to death.
We will never reach perfection. But since you and I know that this equilibrium will never occur, we should strive for the principles for ourselves, because enough others do not. At the time of my death, I want to go in peace and not let my fear win, which will inevitably and without me being able to do anything against it, kick in. Death is the moment when I will face my greatest fear. I want to be prepared as best I can. In the same way it's important for me to accompany the death of the ones I will witness. They need a human who sits calm at their side and that is what I mean with pacifying the mind. Nobody who is going to die or lays sick wants someone next to him who panics or wishes himself to be somewhere else. Even some of the animals mourn their deceived or care for them.
Sleeping and eating: this is something completely different from what happens between these very activities. I can decide whether to lie to someone or not. I can decide whether or not to harm someone's reputation. Whether I kill or leave alive.
But I cannot decide whether I want to sleep or not. Sooner or later sleep comes over me, there is nothing I can do about it. That is why I do not need instructions. It's the same with food: I can't decide not to eat, because otherwise I'll starve some day. Unless I want to die. Just like some old people do who don't want to live anymore. They stop eating. As far as mating is concerned: I can decide that too. I therefore need an orientation as to what I can and cannot do sexually in my beginner mating time. I must not force anyone to have sex or force myself on someone else. I can't just penetrate someone just because I feel like it. I need a suitable opportunity, intimacy and trust. When I see fear or rejection in a person's eyes, this principle of not hurting requires me to let go of my urge. That's universal, no? Why should it be otherwise?
Instructions and commandments are provided because such concepts are foreign to those, to whom such instructions are given.
Yes, of course they are foreign to those to whom they are given. But long before your time and mine this was adopted into the civilizing habit of people - it's under constant change, though - we do our parts to be of this change, though we will not see our full impacts. After all, we are not beasts. The fact that I do not want myself to be subject to a vicious nature should already be regarded as valuable, because I am interested in an active peaceableness of my heart and mind.
Thank you for engaging with me and thank you for wishing me peace of Christ for me and my family. I do wish you the same.