There is much to ponder for any sensitive person about the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki towards the end of WW2. One aspect (among many others) always leaves me bemused and wondering.
The primary target for the second bomb was Kokura. However, weather conditions were not good for this target and very near the last minute the target was switched to Nagasaki.
There is something about this that I find shocking. It calls into question virtually any belief you care to name. Thousands of "souls" spared, thousands more obliterated in an instant. If the weather, perhaps, had been different over Nagasaki, then all would have been different - that is, for those who lived in the two cities involved.
I realise that for some all this will simply confirm the sheer randomness of Reality. "A tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing".
Yet for other reasons, I remain convinced that Reality has significance. But what of "karma"? What of the "love" of God?
I remember way back when some lady on TV (I can't remember exactly who or even the full context) said that when she saw the suffering of children, in famines and wars, preferred to think that there was no "higher" purpose or meaning involved. At the time I was into Theodicy reading a few thick books (!) and I saw her attitude as a cop out. To me, then, I saw such a lack of meaning as a total denial of significance, almost an acceptance of nihilism. Maybe she meant it as such, but now I begin to see something quite profound in our seeing no "meaning", no conclusion, no "belief" with regard to anything, any "happening".
For me it gets back to the "silence of the Buddha" in the face of all metaphysical questions, this simply because any answer at all (positive or negative) was not conducive to the living of the "holy life" (the path to the end of suffering)
I think it is right to surmise that no human being has the foundation of knowledge to answer the questions posed here - but I'm beginning to see just why this must be so if we wish our mind/hearts to live truly. "Answers"/"beliefs" only corrupt, divide, bring conflict and discord. Beliefs cling. Faith, lets go and allows our mind/hearts to respond to Reality as it unfolds in each moment.
In many ways I think we simply need the heart of a child.
Related Quotes:-
Belief is for those who do not want to know the truth
(Nietzsche)
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