Pyeong Hwa Gyeong: Episode 13
Pyeong Hwa Gyeong: A Selection of True Parents’ Speeches
Book 1: The Principles of True Peace
Speech 3: A World of Living for the Sake of Others, Pg 54-57
Living for the sake of others is the original ideal
If God were the King of wisdom and the center of everything, where in the relationship between the subject partner and the object partner would He place the origin of the true ideal, true happiness, and true peace? God pondered whether it was better to make the object partner live for the sake of the subject partner or vice versa. If God had made the object partner live for the sake of the subject partner or for Himself, as soon as He had done so, every person in the position of a subject partner would also have made the object partners standing before them live for their sake.
If this had taken place, the path to unity would have been blocked. They would have become divided. So, where is the path that can serve as the origin of peace, through which the subject and object partners truly can become one? Not only God Himself but also true human beings accept the principle that they need to exist for the sake of others. That is why true love stems from living for the sake of others, why the true ideal stems from living for the sake of others, and why true peace and true happiness can be found only when one lives for the sake of others. Humankind has not known that this is the basic principle of the creation of the universe.
If you ask me to describe true parents, the answer would be that they are people who were born for their children, who live for their children, and who would die for their children. Only then can the love of the true parents be established, and only then can they appear before true children as ideal parents. Furthermore, we can understand that only then can the parents become the center of peace and the standard of happiness before their children. On the other hand, where should the standard of true filial piety be set? It needs to be set in the position corresponding to that of true parents. Only children who feel that they were born for their parents, who live for their parents, and who would give their lives for their parents can become true filial children. Only such children become ideal children before their parents, become children who can be truly loved, and become the object partners of happiness and peace. Based on this standard, if we were to propose a formula at this point, I am sure you would assume that such ideals as true love, true happiness, and true peace can be found only at the place where one exists for the sake of others.
The principle of creation of the universe and the origin of happiness
Then what kind of person is a true husband? If there were a husband who felt that he was born for his wife, who lived for his wife and who was willing to die for his wife, his wife could only praise him, saying her husband was the owner of true love, a husband of the true ideal and a husband who was the subject partner of true peace and happiness. The same would be true for the wife. When applying this formula to the nation of Korea, what kind of person would be a true patriot? If you were to ask this question, you would have to say it would be someone like Admiral Lee, Soon-shin, who was born for the nation, lived for the nation, and in spite of difficult circumstances, gave his life without a word for the sake of the nation, for his king above him, and for the people below him.
If we were to apply this principle of living for the sake of others to the world and ask who is the greatest among all the saints in the course of history, we would find the answer right away. That person, more than anyone else, could only be someone who lived for the sake of humanity. Many among those present here are not Christians, yet I tell you, the person who lived and died for the sake of humanity and who also prayed for the enemies who took his life, whom he very well could have hated, is indeed Jesus Christ. Thus he is the greatest saint in history. This is what we can conclude by applying this formula. In this way, we must always remember that the principle of the creation of the universe, and the origin of human happiness, begin from existing for the sake of others.
To give another example, if you were to ask why men were born, many among the prominent figures here tonight could easily think they were born for the sake of themselves, especially since you are in high positions here in Korea. Originally, however, men are born for the sake of women. Nobody can refute this fact.
From a proportional perspective, men have broad shoulders, and women have wide hips. If you go somewhere like New York City and get on a subway car packed with people, you will see that when a man with broad shoulders and a woman with big hips sit adjacent to one another, they fit perfectly in that limited space. This just goes to show that we were born to form a reciprocal relationship in which we can live for the sake of each other. In short, men were not born for the sake of men; they were born for the sake of women. Correspondingly, women were not born for the sake of women; they were born for the sake of men.
You need to know that problems arise when we are unsure about this fact. I know well that since God, the Lord of creation of the universe, established this as a principle of creation, we cannot enter the world of goodness, truth, happiness, and peace, the world of love and ideal, without following this principle.
Religion teaches us to align with the original law
You may not know that I have had many spiritual experiences through which I explored and learned about the spirit world. If you ask me about the standard of life in the original world where God dwells, that is to say, the place called the kingdom of heaven or paradise, the answer is simple. It is a place where only those who lived for the sake of God can enter, the place where only those people who knew they were born for the sake of others, who lived for the sake of others, and who were ready to die for the sake of others can enter. Since this is the structure of our ideal, original homeland, God has established many religions throughout the course of history through which He has trained human beings to help us find our way to that world.
Religious believers need to be gentle, humble, and sacrificial because that is the law of the original homeland. You need to be trained in the course of your life on earth to fit in when you go to the original homeland, as preparation for the moment of your passing to that place. The higher the level of a religion, the more it emphasizes a higher degree of sacrifice and service. Such religions have to emphasize this because we need to live in accordance with the laws of that world. In light of this fact, we have no choice other than to admit that God carries out His providence as history progresses. Regardless of how voluminous are the scriptures that make up the Bible, they are all in accordance with this one principle: “One exists for the sake of others.”
Jesus said, “Those who find their life shall lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake shall find it.” (Matt. 10:39) We know that he spoke such paradoxical words ultimately to have us harmonize with the principle of the original world where we exist for the sake of others.
Then why did God have to establish this principle of existing for the sake of others? I will point out a few reasons. Taking our better nature into consideration, if you owe a favor to someone who truly devoted his life to you, would your original mind tell you to put fifty percent of what you owe in your pocket and pay back only fifty percent, or would it tell you to pay back more than one hundred percent? If you were to ask your original mind this question, it would give you a clear answer. It would tell you that you ought to pay back more than one hundred percent.
To put it another way, if Person B owed a debt to Person A, Person B ought to give back more than one hundred percent of what he or she owed. In that case, Person A would wish to give an even higher percentage back to Person B in return. As they pursued this giving and receiving back and forth, the value of their exchange would not decrease; rather, it gradually would increase. The concept of eternity is based upon this principle.
The concept of eternity vanishes when you live only for your own sake. If you were to consider the motion of any entity, you would see that the greater the resistance it encounters, the stronger its response has to be in order to maintain itself. The reason that God, the King of wisdom, established this law of living for the sake of others was to enable us to maintain our position eternally. We have to bear in mind that God had to establish this principle of existing for the sake of others because God Himself embodies this principle.
Not only that, to establish the foundation for eternity is to establish your foundation to develop and prosper eternally. We can advance and develop beyond our present status only when we feel stimulated, and only when we are growing beyond our present status will we be happy. Since this is the case, God had to establish the principle of existing for the sake of others.
What is another reason that God established the principle of existing for the sake of others? Let us say there were ten family members in a household. If the youngest were to live for the sake of the family more than anyone else, then the parents and brothers and sisters would place that one at the head of the family, even though he or she was the youngest. By living selflessly, in time, the youngest family member would emerge naturally as the central figure of that household.
FFWPU, USA