Ah, THAT dilemma.

The answer for that one is fairly simple, actually.

Pick whom you wish to save - the kids or the engineer.

You will be rewarded for the lives you saved, but will ALSO be penalised for the deaths you caused.

I understand your point, but didn't those values came from Confucianism? And not from the Chinese folk religion?

Correlation does not imply causation. Just because the salvation of five lives depends on the death of a single one, it does not imply the causation that he or she may be guilty, nor innocent of any misdeeds.

I'm glad JunJun04035 has provided that railtrack example to you, because the variant of my example given was derived from that one.

If what you say is true, does that mean that the Sintua folk religion teaches that it is okay to kill that engineer, simply because you justified the killing with the salvation of five lives? Since this means the reward outweighs the penalisation. That is, unless, the penalisation of murder is greater than other types of penalisation, which I am not too sure if saving five lives can be used to offset the act of killing.

This post has been edited by Deadlocks: Feb 9 2015, 11:15 AM

You really should have gone into more detail with your scenario, then, lol. I was initially under the impression that you were asking me about a scenario where one would have to shoot a man who is himself about to kill five other people. Elaboration makes all the difference.

If Chinese folk religion preaches that killing the engineer in this scenario is okay, I certainly would not have said, in my previous post, that killing him warrants a penalty. I would have said that you would have walked away scot free.

Your reward in such a scenario would not necessarily outweigh your penalty, notwithstanding the fact that you saved five lives as opposed to just one. The magnitude of your punishment would take into account the consequences of his death, including, for instance, whatever hardships the event would inflict upon his dependants.

At the end of the day, you caused the death of an innocent individual. Granted, you did it to save other innocent individuals, but nobody walks on such a serious charge.

The take-home message of Chinese folk religion is that every action, good or evil, will have its upshot, and that everybody pays the piper in the end.

I would add. Faced with two choices, he dropped down and pray to the god he believes in and quickly ask for help. Toss a coins. Head means save the engineer. Tails means save the children.

Let god decides.

That or who knows some sort of miracles may come along, if it agrees with Him or Karma

Food for thought: how do one not know the fact that one will get saved and one would not is not all act of god or karma in play?

does that means you are less guilty? That will never be the question: one is either born a sinner or ending up still as human being and hence still resides in the human world spectrum and subject to all pains and suffering and karma

Whatever helps you pass this life better, whomever you want to believe in. It is your freewill.

None is holier than other. Holding up the believe I am holier than thou is the cause of many suffering in the world today. History is full of such lessons. We should be humble for we are so tiny in thebigger scheme of tgings

This post has been edited by EnergyAnalyst: Feb 9 2015, 12:02 PM

Or with less assumptions.

Everybody pays the piper in the end is really everyone's saying how our actions will have consequences. And some of these questions are important because it teaches people what's right and wrong, and to pay the piper the "right way", however the "right" is defined by the Sintua folk religion, of course. That's the difficulty of not having that sort of thing written down.

The way i see it, Chinese folk religion portrays a great quality of syncretism and liberalism.
Since they worship datuks(Islam), bodhisattvas(Buddhism), chinese sages(Confucianism or Taoism) and many others, their moral values can derives from many source ...kind of like rojak master.

why all of you started a very interesting point without me I hope i am still in time to join. My take on the issue "to kill or not to kill". First I quote a monk from Australia, Perth when asked on issues of karma and if certain things happen is good or bad. His answer is, "Is this good? Is this bad? who knows?" and he proceeded with a story about a doctor and a king. I would spare you the lengthy story but the take home message is "who are we to know what is good and what is bad? what is right and what is wrong? what is retribution or punishment or reward? What might appear good in the beginning can turn bad in the end and what is bad in the beginning can turn good as well. We wont know. In life, nothing is guaranteed nor promised except for two things. You are borned and you will one day perished (die)".

On my favourite quote which i used all the time, I will say "do what you should. Do what you could. And the rest leave it to God/Karma/fate/luck (whatever you believe)". That is my take on most of the things that happens. On your scenario, I will say not to kill is the best choice (5 precepts of monks). But in the monk precepts, there are minor precepts as well and one of it says "if you are in the position to avoid evil but did not do so, then you are guilty of the same evil". This is said by Dalai Lama on one of his talks. In other words, if you see someone is about to commit a great sin and yet you stood by and did nothing, that sin that is about to be commited will effect on your karma and you will carry the sin as well. In other words, if you see a man who are about to denote a bomb to bomb a building of peoples and you have a gun/weapon on you but did not use it, you are the same as the person who denote the bomb. However, in that scenario if you take the gun and shot him down, you will bear the sin of killing but the karma of saving the countless life would prevail.

This is however different from hearing a guy who says he is going to hijack a plane and yet did nothing but you kill him on what he said. I use monk's precept as I believe most of your concerns are actually taken care of. For example, the guy who say he is going to hijack plane yet did not do anything is consider idle talk. In the monk's minor precepts there is a mention "do not engage in idle talk".

Even if someone tells you that X is terrorist, a monk will not do anything since to him, X is just a human and nothing more. there is no label nor past to consider. Monk looks at the person as what he sees right NOW. And i believe all religion do have similar "teachings" about this. See things as they are and do not bother about the past nor how one presents itself but as what the truth should be. Do not jump to conclusions and do not engage in idle talk. Do not gossips or believe gossips until you have facts and prove. Even ancient scholars like Socrates says so.

Anyway, I might have derail a bit but i am just telling you how i come to this conclusion. We should not harm any living beings unless that living beings, be it human or animal or any other living beings are IN THE ACT of killing/disastrous act and there is no other choice you could do to prevent that act but to kill that living being in order to save more lives. Of coz one can argue that there are "better" choices like running and get for help and so on but that itself is "efficiency" question. I believe we wont be penalized for being incompetent nor unefficiency but on "our hearts" when we commit it. And i believe that is what the sintua religion says when the go down to the "courts of hell" to answer the charges. And i believe this answers your "grey areas" of religion as well. All it matters is at that point of time, what is happening and why you do it.

*please dont kill me*

This post has been edited by Wolves: Feb 9 2015, 01:28 PM

Killing is not always wrong. For example, the state has a right and duty to kill sometimes to preserve law and order and prevent further harm to society in general.

This post has been edited by yeeck: Feb 9 2015, 02:09 PM

Let me help bring the thread back to its topic if i may...

isn't Sun Wukong also known as the Monkey King, a fictional character created by author of Wu Cheng'en 吴承恩 's Journey to the West 西遊記?

It is one thing to pray to a legendary hero, one believed to have lived once, but to pray to a truly man-made/ fictional one is another.

Please clarify.

Worship of a magic monkey was already going on long before Wu wrote his novel, which he based upon the existing folklore surrounding this creature, also adding story elements of his own creation to jazz things up a little.

That being said, if you are familiar with the principles of chaos magic, you will understand that an 'artificial' deity can be no less real than a 'natural' one.

Believe hard enough in something, and it might just become real.

I personally think Sun Wukong is the Chinese version of Hanuman.

You wouldn't be the first person to make such an observation, haha.

There are similarities between both monkeys' legends, yes, but there are also quite a number of differences.

Just came across this link:
http://www.gateway-fellowship.com/2009/08/...n-jesus-christ/

Imagine the same thing happen to you, how do you reconcile such experience with your pre-existing belief?

SINTUA religion is from the grass roots community, thus what the grass roots feels and thinks will then being incorporated into this religion they single handed created.
Confucianism is one of the three dominant philosophy set/theory (the two other being Buddhism and Taoism) of Chinese, where play a much more important role the Buddhism and Taoism due to the fact it is always being set up as a educational tool to establish a proper functioning society by the Royals.

Like I mentioned before, SINTUA combines gods/deities from both Buddhism and Taoism culture, organised them in a very Confucianism way (the emperor and bureaucrats system settings, rules and regulation, position and job scope)

Other words:

Of all proper religion in the world, doesn't each and every one of them preach us to be good and kind toward humanity?

So does Sintua.

IS there any relevance where SINTUA get it's philosophy, moral guidelines or even core teachings?

IF SINTUA do posses similarity with Confucianism, DOES it make SINTUA any less religion?

Again, I quote

Killing one is guilty, and it is the same of saving 5 lives. Also, saving 1 lives is sacred, yet killing 5 would be the same.
You should bear the consequence of your behavioural. Nothing more, nothing less.

BTW, And I do feel very amazed that in today's world, one would be so sceptical toward something they don't know. OR maybe you just act you don't know. IF that is true then, the malicious intention you posses do disgust me.

Put it this way:

Sun Wu Kong originates from "Journey to the West", while "Journey to the West" originates from a real event: 玄奘 Xuanzang's pilgrimage to India (or modern day Adinapur, Afghanistan to be exact).

From Tang China 唐朝 capital Chang An 长安 till Adinapur is more than 3500 kilometre, straight line distance on map. There is no proper walking distance documented, but some said it was around 20k km, spanning over 140 countries.

It is near impossible for anyone that travel alone over that distance alone. And there is always more than enough side story regarding the companionship Xuanzang had during his pilgrimage.

Thus comes the characters we don;t know, that travel together with Xuanzang.


Another fact: Xuanzang was born in 600 AD, travel to India by 629 AD.

Journey to the West is written around 1500++ AD, and Journey to the West is meant to be a fictional novel at that time.

Nobody will take the monkey as real, neither that time or currently.

Yet he will remain being the figure he always be. Bless Sun Wu Kong

That's where you're wrong, haha.

See my post above.

To reiterate, the monkey was already being worshipped long before Wu wrote his story; Wu incorporated the folklore surrounding the monkey into his narrative, adding fictional details of his own.

In the eyes of many, the monkey is as real as the nose on your face.

Oh brother. Charles Darwin must be right, we must have all evolved from apes . perhaps that is why praying to monkey king is not all that wrong because

We may be praying to our ancestor. Oh at least an ancestral being that must have existed before us.

Heck if enough people believe in Darwin, it will come to form anyway

Lightened up. This is still kopitiam, albeilt more serious stuff

MAYBE Xuanzang bring a pet.

The Hell deities drink alcohol of all kinds.

Wu Jia Pi, Jack Daniels, Suntory, Martell, Johnnie Walker - the list goes on and on.

Question: Which is more powerful? Tudi Gong of the area or the Datuk Gong of the area, if they are not the same entity?

This post has been edited by yeeck: Feb 11 2015, 05:34 PM