"I have learned, in whatever state I am, to be content. I know how to be abased, and I know how to abound; in any and all circumstances I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and want."
-Paul (A.D. 1st cent.)
Tuesday, November 03, 2009
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"I have learned, in whatever state I am, to be content. I know how to be abased, and I know how to abound; in any and all circumstances I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and want."
I'm assuming Paul followed the teaching of his Master, Who encouraged those who see someone by the wayside in trouble, to take him in and succor him.
Trouble is, I don't believe it. Paul had an agenda, and it didn't include those less fortunate.
The further trouble is, unless we want to keep our card entitling us to humanity, we'd BETTER help the guy in the gutter. As Jesus advised. (Not Paul.)
Thinks me, anyway.
I agree. Paul was not only an opportunist and a tax collector, he never even met Jesus.
But that's not the point of this quote. He simply said he's found contentment no matter which direction his life turned.
Would this quote ruffle your feathers a little less if it was said by Dick Nixon, who had a more than shitty childhood and became the first president to resign in disgrace, or Nicola Tesla who knew poverty and wealth many times in his lifetime but never succored someone from the gutter?
Paul was imprisoned seven times, stoned, driven into exile, and crucified, all with patient endurance while establishing christian dogma. Can mother Teressa claim so much?
Plenty of people on both sides of the poverty fence have had crappy upbringings; plenty of same were either loving or stingy. I don't buy nurture, nor nature. I buy Free Will.
(That is, I don't "buy" it ... we either exercise it or we don't.)
Sounds like a walking, talking contradiction to me.
Pretty much the story of life ... yin, yang, et cetera ...
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