The sage whose words are ambiguous you call great.
Those who advocate discipline you shun.
With one, you treat words the way you want.
With the other, you resent having no quarter.
It is unfortunate that we need the words of the wise. Though they are essential to our beginnings on a spiritual path, they can cause problems because they must be interpreted to be understood. Because words are imperfect, every generation rewrites itself.
People love ambiguity, especially when it comes to religion. They can interpret things any way they want. If they are unhappy with the cast given to a particular teaching, they invent ways to circumvent it, which is why we have so many authorities, schools, and sects.
It is no accident that the most revered sages are dead. They aren’t around to correct our misguided notions, to change their teachings, or even to make mistakes that might mitigate our reverence. Christ, Mohammed, Buddha, Lao Tzu — how many of us are actually devoted to the wisdom that they embodied? Or have we made them mere screens upon which we project our own ideas?
It is important to spend time with a living teacher, one who can correct mistakes and discipline you. But the object of such study should not be the creation of a new orthodoxy. Rather, your goal should be to bring yourself to a state of independence. All teachings are mere references. The true experience is living your own life. Then, even the holiest of words are only words.
“. . .There’s glory for you!” (said Humpty Dumpty.)
“I don’t know what you mean by ‘glory,’ ” Alice said.
Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously,
“of course you don’t—till I tell you.
I meant “there’s a nice knock-down argument for you!”
“But ‘glory’ doesn’t mean ‘nice knockdown argument,’ ”
Alice objected.
“When I use the word,” Humpty Dumpty said, in a rather
scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to
mean —- neither more nor less.”
“The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words
mean so many different things.”
“The question is,” said Humpty Dumpty, “which is to
be master—that’s all.”
— Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland
I tend not to pay too much attention to people’s words. I pay a lot more attention to what people do, and to the feeling I get from a person. Perhaps that’s why I find myself so annoyed at much of what is going on in America today. People who call themselves Christians want to tell others how to live, when Christ himself would never have acted the way they do. They live in big houses, drive fancy cars, vote to cut their taxes, and claim to be Christian? Please. Sell the house and SUV and go live among the homeless and take care of them – then I might believe you’re a Christian. Father Joe is a Christian.
I think Christ would be very annoyed at much of what has gone on in the world in his name. But then, so would Mohammed. I haven’t seen many Buddhist who seem to deliberately distort the teachings of Buddha, but then I haven’t lived in a culture where that’s a dominant religion. As to Lao Tzu, well, I suppose there have been distortions of Taoism, as when it was popular with the Chinese wealthy classes. These days I find most Taoists pretty reasonable people. But in our culture people turn to Taoism as sort of a spiritual last resort after they’ve become disgusted with the actions of those of other faiths and need some spirituality that makes sense.
No Responses