3. Duality Operates by Giving and Receiving Religious scriptures Not a handful of rain descends from above without the earth sending up two handfuls of moisture to meet it. Genesis Rabbah 13.13 (Judaism) Love works in a circle, for the beloved moves the lover by stamping a likeness, and the lover then goes out to hold the beloved in reality. Who first was the beginning now becomes the end of motion. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica13 (Christianity) Verily in the creation of heaven and earth and the alternation of night and the day are signs for people of understanding. Qur’an 3.190 Observe how all God’s creations borrow from each other: day borrows from night and night from day, but they do not go to law one with another as mortals do… The moon borrows from the stars and the stars from the moon… the sky borrows from the earth and the earth from the sky… All God’s creatures borrow from the other, yet make peace with one another without lawsuits; but if man borrows from his friend, he seeks to swallow him up with usury and robbery. Exodus Rabbah 31.15 (Judaism) When the sun goes, the moon comes; when the moon goes, the sun comes. Sun and moon alternate; thus light comes into existence. When cold goes, heat comes; when heat goes, cold comes. Cold and heat alternate, and thus the year completes itself. The past contracts. The future expands. Contraction and expansion act upon each other; hereby arises that which furthers. The measuring worm draws itself together when it wants to stretch out. Dragons and snakes hibernate in order to preserve life. Thus the penetration of germinal thought into the mind promotes the workings of the mind. When this working furthers and brings peace to life, it elevates a man’s nature. I Ching, Great Commentary 2.5.2-3 (Confucianism) Difficult and easy complete one another. Long and short test one another; High and low determine one another. Pitch and mode give harmony to one another, Front and back give sequence to one another. Tao Te Ching 2 (Taoism) For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; a time to seek, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; a time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; a time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for peace. Ecclesiastes 3.1-8 Heaven and earth come together, and all things take shape and find form. Male and female mix their seed, and all creatures take shape and are born.” In the Changes it is said, “When three people journey together, their number decreases by one. When one man journeys alone, he finds a companion. I Ching, Great Commentary 2.4.13 (Confucianism) Heaven is high, the earth is low; thus the Creative and the Receptive are determined. In correspondence with this difference between low and high, inferior and superior places are established. Movement and rest have their definite laws; according to these, firm and yielding lines [of the hexagrams] are differentiated. Events follow definite trends, each according to its nature. Things are distinguished from one another in definite classes. In this way good fortune and misfortune come about. In the heavens phenomena take form; on earth shapes take form. In this way change and transformation become manifest. Therefore the eight trigrams succeed one another by turns, as the firm and the yielding displace each other. Things are aroused by thunder and lightning; they are fertilized by wind and rain. Sun and moon follow their courses and it is now hot, now cold. The way of the Creative brings about the male; the way of the Receptive brings about the female. The Creative knows the great beginnings; the Receptive completes the finished things. I Ching, Great Commentary 1.1.1-5 (Confucianism) Thirty spokes share one hub to make a wheel. Through its not-being (wu), There being (yu) the use of the carriage. Mold clay into a vessel. Through its not-being, There being the use of the vessel. Cut out doors and windows to make a house. Through its not-being There being the use of the house. Therefore in the being of a thing, There lies the benefit; In the not-being of a thing, There lies its use. Tao Te Ching 11 (Taoism) Teachings of Sun Myung Moon What is the heavenly law of the universe? What is the law of existence? It is giving and receiving. (157:266, April 10, 1967) For an action to be structured, there must be a subject-object relationship. For the action to continue, the subject and object partners must share a common purpose that is beneficial to both. Under conditions that are less than this, the action will not happen. This is an ironclad rule and a law of the universe’s existence. (56:134-35, May 14, 1972) Personally, would you rather receive or give? This is a serious question. In the Divine Principle’s concept of give-and-take action, does “give” come first, or “take?” Giving comes first. Do parents give for the sake of their children, or children for their parents? Parents give first. Then it is logical that the act of giving began with the Origin of all existence, and through the links of the chain of existence it has been passed down to us. (239:59, November 23, 1992) Everything is in motion. How does the motion start, by giving or taking? You all want to receive, don’t you? You desire to pull in some money. To see whether this is right or wrong, we have to analyze the principle of the universe. If it is the Principle, not even God can deny it. When God created, did He begin with a pulling force that sought to receive, or a force that sought to give? It was a giving force. He invested energy. Ladies, when you knead dough, what happens? You press it down again and again, in order that it may expand. (239:223, November 25, 1992) What happens when there is no difference between what is given and what is received? The action goes on and on… But if there are impurities, then complete give and take is impossible, and the action cannot last long. The greater the difference between give and take, the sooner the action will break apart. (157:266-67, April 10, 1967) All things originate from one Source, divide into many entities, and then finally rejoin into one great whole. This is how things make progress. From one they divide into many, and then come together as one. From there they divide again and then become a larger being. This means that all will enter a world of oneness that is greater than before. (26:189, October 25, 1969) There is force of attraction and force of repulsion in this universe. Things are attracted to things that relate with them and repel those things that contravene them. God’s power of creation acts to protect the universe from anything that tries to harm it. A reciprocal realm can only form in keeping with this basic logic. When some other being approaches that might harm the reciprocal realm, it is repelled. The force of repulsion is not a bad thing; it is a secondary protective force… to facilitate and perfect God’s power of creation. If there were not a reaction to every action, it would be impossible even to walk. (227:37, February 10, 1992) When a wife dies, or a husband dies, why does the surviving spouse feel sorrow? When a woman’s husband dies, why does she make a big scene by crying “Wah!” at the top of her lungs? She doesn’t just cry; she completely loses her mind. Why does this happen? She and her husband formed a reciprocal realm and, centering on love, entered into the universe’s realm of eternal principle. But the death of the husband caused that reciprocal realm to break apart, and the wife feels a force pushing against her with such force that it makes her skin turn red. That force makes her feel sorrow and pain… Unmarried girls will go around playing, and sometimes you see a group of girls hanging on to each other, embracing each other and such. The same is true with boys. Wrestling with each other, rolling around on the ground like calves, they make all sorts of noise in the village. But on the day one of those young men marries and takes a wife, will he want one of his handsome friends to come and stand next to him in front of his wife? Would any man want that? No, he will kick his friend away, saying, “Don’t ever come here again! Get out of here! Now!” It’s not a bad thing for him to tell his friend to go. He is actually telling him, “You should do as I do, and stand in a position where you can welcome the universal principle.” By kicking his friend away, he guides him to the path to perfection. (218:335, August 22, 1991) Knowing this is the principle, the theory of evolution cannot be sustained. The supposed evolutionary link from amoebas to monkeys to human beings ignores the fact that each of the countless relationships between male and female had to pass through the gate of love and establish a realm of reciprocity. Take sparrows, for example. During the winter, they know nothing about having relationships, so they play around and all become their own positives. But in the spring, when they start making nests and forming reciprocal realms, they become absolute. Both the male and the female of an established pair will repel a third sparrow that approaches. If a female approaches them, the male will repel it; if a male approaches, the female will repel it. Why is that? They repel the third sparrow because it threatens to break up their reciprocal realm and is an aggressor on the realm of the law of the universe. (218:338, August 22, 1991) Hegel and especially Engels, philosophers who came up with the law of the dialectic, saw universal law as decreeing conflict and opposition. Unless we successfully resolve the question of the dialectic within the universe, we cannot find the true formula for the ideal world, nor can we establish peace and harmony with hierarchical order in organizations structured with up and down relationships. We must demonstrate the falsity of such principles as “survival of the fittest,” “the strong eat the weak,” and “power causes progress.” Otherwise, people would think that mistreating others is not a sin. (132:142, May 31, 1984) Some people say the universe is made of energy. It is true that all beings are formed of energy, but what is needed for that energy to exist? No being is energy itself. There is always a reciprocal standard or common base. Before we acknowledge energy, we must acknowledge the common base. If we acknowledge the common base, we must acknowledge subject and object partners… “Relative relationship” does not refer to a thesis-antithesis-synthesis relationship, where a standard called “thesis” and something called “antithesis” oppose each other and become unified as one. Instead, it refers to a relationship where the object partner responds to the subject partner. That is, it means that a subject and object partner respond to each other and engage in action centering on a common purpose. When they engage in perfect give-and-take action and achieve a reciprocal realm, energy comes into being, and only then is the center determined. Even if there is a great deal of action, if the action is going in opposite directions, it will eventually destroy the world. (15:53, February 7, 1965) |