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Some thoughts on death (3/1; 12/2/2002)

        When I was in a KCR, a question suddenly came to my mind – what is death?

 

        When life ends, death.  So death is a part of life – the last part.  The meaning of death is to bring a life to its closure.

       

        When one says, ‘I have no fear on death’, and when he or she really means that, the assertiveness, braveness, courage, determinacy, endurance… of facing his or her own life are implied.  When a person who doesn’t know how to live, as also our teacher Kung said, doesn’t be eligible of talking about death.  Death has no meaning and doesn’t say anything when there’s no life.  Death only own its meaning when life is meaningful.  But not all death bears a good meaning.  Some may die very heroically, with honors and praises; some may die silently, without much people care about it.  While not all who die in honors and praises are true heroes, as many great souls were leaving in silence, the true meaning of death lies not according to what other people regard, but according to what this very person know about himself.

 

        The coming two questions - So what is life?  Why should life come to an end?

 

        To find the answer of ‘what is life’ is more a harder question then ‘what is death’, though the second sounds much deeper and romantic.  Life is the continuous enjoyment of learning in suffering in challenges.  (By this definition, death can be seen as one of the suffering challenges in life.)  If life is not enjoyable, let’s go and die.  You are still here – and that’s the reason why life is worthy.  Because you don’t want to die, you want to live, so you will be patient and endure all the bitterness and this keeps you walking.  For those who treasure things around him/ her, life is meaningful because he or she has things he/ she cares, the power and courage to move on, and hence the power and courage to live.  When one doesn’t care about what he/ she lives, his/ her life virtually doesn’t mean anything to him/herself.

 

But how about those who chose to end their lives by themselves claming that they tried to end their lives because of others?  When a mother holding her 3-months-old baby and jumped out of a window, leaving a letter saying that she doesn’t what the baby to suffer without a mum, I really doubt if this act is for the sake of the baby – it’s just an act for escaping from the inevitable problems and responsibilities.  When a girl burns coal and leaving a letter saying that the world means nothing to her because her boyfriend dumped her, definitely this is the silliest and saddest thing to do.

 

        But how about the terrorists?  Their life is surly meaningful with their idea of ‘holy war’ – they give up their lives for the sake of the ‘truth’, ‘righteousness’, and, most of all, their ‘god’.  For instant, some people may die because of their mission, the thing they believe that is their sole goal in life?

 

        I’ll surly not agree with the terrorists whose view of ‘life’s mission’ is totally against what I believe in Christ Jesus, nor will I agree the strike back from the US, her hardly justified slogans and all her Hippocratic activities.

 

        Many people take ‘death’ too Romantic and ignore the true value and meaning of life.  When people can just see the missing portions in their lives and can’t see what they gained through it, or misunderstand the meaning of sacrificing, tragedies come.

 

 

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