On Jun 23, 2005, at 2:15 PM, Dave Land wrote:
I've carried on with Dan a little about the idea of relative evil, or
that social context provides the backdrop against which actions are
judged to be meritorious or wrongful. This dovetails with the above
passage in the sense that as soon as we pass any judgment we're
missing the big picture; we're immersing ourselves in context.
I've just read Bishop John Shelby Spong's "Rescuing the Bible from
Fundamentalism," which has as a major theme that the Bible -- and
every spiritual experience that has ever been put into words -- mires
the inexpressible in the subjective. We do not *have* objective
language, he says, and we fool ourselves when we act as though we do.
That's definitely a problem, yes. Language is awkward, in many
instances; in some cases it's just not the right tool to use. When
trying to use language to express a nondualistic understanding of the
cosmos, one is left with things that seem very foolish: "A flower is
not actually a flower, which makes it the one and only real flower that
exists." Ouch.
Language is, like the Buddha, two and a half pounds of flax.
A theologian of the early 20th century said that we needed to
"demythologize" God. Spong counters that we can only "remythologize"
spiritual experiences: as soon as we put them into words, they become
locked into our prejudices, experiences, world-view. In a couple of
years, generations, centuries, our "demythologized" explanation will
be just as ridiculously dated as the "heaven is just above the dome of
the sky" ideas that underlie the Biblical authors' explanations.
Very possibly, which is a solid argument against literalism of any
kind, of course. If you take religious expression as -- at its best --
being a kind of dialectic between humans and the universe we inhabit,
we can almost see that understandings gained from religion are useful
only in a given context. (They ARE useful, but *only in context*.)
There's a striking parallel here between the self-correcting modes of
science and the idea of a genuine religious (or perhaps philosophical)
dialectic. As the search for understanding -- *any* understanding --
progresses, ideas must be tested against what is observable. If the
ideas don't match apparent reality, it is always the ideas that must
change.
Hence we've had to retool our understanding of physics, not once, not
twice, but three times in one century. That's really astounding when
you think about it. It seems to me that the best religions would
include something like this self-correcting process, and use the human
mind's ability to inquire to update and self-correct, excising
doctrines that are clearly and simply false. *Sometimes* this happens,
albeit slowly; the RC Church, after all, finally did come around to the
heliocentric model of the solar system, though 400 years after the rest
of the world had accepted the facts.
Most of the time, though, we end up with an almost pathological
separation between apparent reality and the views held by (at least
some) religious-minded individuals. Often this separation is
superficially harmless, but I'd argue that anything that allows a
person to become comfortable with intellectual separation from what
appears to be real is actually quite dangerous; it lays the groundwork
for further breaches from what is, in a larger view, a more "real" or
at least rational world model and approach to life in that world.
Religion isn't like pot, in the sense that pot is alleged to be a
"gateway drug" via which users will eventually become addicted to
crack; however, just as pot use can be a sign of generally edgy or
risky behavioral tendencies, an addictive personality or a wish to
abrogate even the most basic life-skills and responsibilities, early
acceptance -- particularly unquestioning acceptance -- of some
outrageously false religious doctrines might be a sign of eventual
separation from "reality".
You don't go right from pot to crack, and you don't go right from
baptism to bombing abortion clinics; but there's *some* reason,
perhaps, to be concerned.
Spong's conclusion is that the Bible is nothing more or less than a
particular, peculiar peoples' record of *their* experience, rooted as
in their world-view. The Bible doesn't tell us as much about God as it
tells us about the writers' abilities to express their experience of
God. It is for us to try to "inhabit" their world-view so we can
attempt to discern the experience was that their limiting words point
to.
That's a remarkably Zennish/Buddhist-in-general conclusion. Thich Nhat
Hanh -- a pretty highly-respected Buddhist monk -- has stated that one
requirement of Buddhist teachings, in order for them to be valid, is
that they be "relevantized" to meet the needs of a given audience or
student. That is, you not only speak in terms a given person can
understand, but you use his language and world metaphors. It makes no
sense to speak to a beef-eating SUV-driving American about rice balls
and rickshaws.
Further, the Dalai Lama has said that to the extent science disproves
*any* Buddhist teaching, it is Buddhism, not science, which will have
to change to fit newer human understandings. If we discover that
rebirth is completely, totally impossible, the Buddhist idea of rebirth
will have to go. (Fortunately that's all right. Buddhism works just
fine without the idea.)
It bears noting that this is an extraordinarily liberal view of the
Bible, which puts a lot of people off.
I'm hardly surprised. There are several beloved sacred cows being
tipped here.
Taoism in China eventually colored Ch'an, which in Japan is better
known as Zen. There is a deep Taoist flavor to all Zen teachings, and
of all the traditions in the Buddhist lineage Zen seems to be the
most difficult to grok. Koans don't help; they're deliberately
formulated to be inscrutable. Even getting past the idea of dualism
is extremely difficult, and Zen makes it muddier by avoiding
explication. That's part of the Zen perspective: When you speak of
something you are discerning, and discernment takes one away from
enlightenment or realization of the essential nature of life.
You root it in the subjective, to root this in the subjective.
:D
Thanks, Warren. Much better than "Zen is evil and should be
eradicated."
Don't get me wrong here; Zen *is* evil and it *should* be eradicated.**
--
Warren Ockrassa, Publisher/Editor, nightwares Books
http://books.nightwares.com/
Current work in progress "The Seven-Year Mirror"
http://www.nightwares.com/books/ockrassa/Flat_Out.pdf
** That's a koan.
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