Thanks Sylvester for that translation!
But I still don’t get ‘you should protect your metta’ out of that?
The related objects of the verbs are ‘mind’ and ‘son’, so I agree there’s no need to interpret the passage as saying we should protect all beings as a mother protects a child. So if that’s ruled out there’s no need to convert the meaning to ‘protecting the mind’.
I just notice that the verbs in each part of the simile are different-
Mother protects child
Yogi cultivates metta/mind (metta is cultivated)
If we are already given a clear description of what the meditator should do to mind/metta, why should cultivate be changed to protect?
It seems more like its either saying -
Yogi should cultivate metta with the care, conviction and totality that a mother would protect her son
Or
Yogi should cultivate metta to all beings without limit or exception as mother protects son without limit or exception (unstinting). (Which makes sense contextually because the rest of the sutta is about all the size, shapes, locations and types of beings one should cultivate metta for).
Maybe related also to - [quote=“Zenqi, post:61, topic:3832”]
Ven. Analayo’s assertion that metta is to be directed in all directions and isn’t limited to living beings or sentient beings.
[/quote]
Aaaaaanyway, I am not going to go on about it. Maybe it’s ambiguous which part of the statement the simile is meant to relate to. I just don’t see sufficient evidence to supplant the given verb cultivate for the meaning of protect, which have very different meanings.