Ethics for the New Millennium
by Dalai Lama

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Book Reviews of Ethics for the New Millennium

Book Review: Looking for some inner peace?
Summary: 5 Stars

In the first chapter, the Dalai Lama critiques Western civilisation in the most lucid and convincing ways. He speaks of the anxiety, uncertainty, and frustration that plague Western people's minds and causes them to suffer mentally and emotionally even though they live in relative comfort and technological advance. To his mind, this gap between outer appearance and inner reality implies confusion regarding morality and what it constitutes.

The Dalai Lama does not dispute the importance of Scientific enquiry but if we were to go to a nuclear physicist, he says, and say: "I am facing a moral dilemma, what should I do?", he or she would suggest we look elsewhere for an answer. Science is unable to tell us how we ought to act in a moral sense.

The Dalai Lama calls for a spiritual revolution. The essence of this spiritual call is acting out of concern for the well-being of others. But it also entails changing ourselves so that we become more readily disposed to do so. Thus, in essence, he calls for compassion, a lot of it. But why? Why should I become compassionate? Because by becoming so, I become more at peace with myself, happier, less prone to suffering. However, it is not easy to become compassionate overnight. So, he recommends a number of ethics that can help us so that we become more readily disposed to show compassion.

The first ethic is Restraint; and to put this quite vividly, I shall use an example he gave: the undisciplined mind is like an elephant! If left to blunder around without control, it will wreak havoc. But the best description was that if we do not restrain our selfish, negative thoughts, we effectively alienate ourselves from ourselves!

The second ethic is Virtue; this is quite simply really. Just give lots of love, be patient and tolerant, forgive, and be humble! That's all. No seriously, there are a couple of tips to help you do that.

The third ethic is Compassion. This is a kind of motivational goal; a higher spiritual state in which compassion arises without any effort, is unconditional, undifferentiated, and universal in scope.

The book extends to beyond these three ethics to societal ethics, and it also contains a chapter on Peace and Disarmament. Also, the early part of the book dwells on the nature of our consciousness.

This is the first book I have read by the Dalai Lama and is probably not going to be the last. If you're searching for some inner peace, I certainly don't think this book would harm it. But try not to read it all in one go!

Summary of Ethics for the New Millennium

His medicine isn't always easy to swallow, however, for it demands of the reader more than memorizing precepts or positing hypothetical dilemmas. The Nobel Peace laureate invites us to recognize certain basic facts of existence, such as the interdependence of all things, and from these to recalibrate our hearts and minds, to approach all of our actions in their light. Nothing short of an inner revolution will do. Basic work is required in nurturing our innate tendencies to compassion, tolerance, and generosity. And at the same time, "we need to think, think, think ... like a scientist," reasoning out the best ways to act from a principle of universal responsibility. Like a merging of the care and compassion of Jesus, the cool rationality of the Stoics, the moral program of Ben Franklin, and the psychology of William James, Ethics for the New Millennium is a plea for basic goodness, a blueprint for world peace. --Brian Bruya

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