It is Taoist in the sense there is no reference to Buddhism at all. It is Buddhist in that the content is clearly in alignment with important aspects of Cha’an and Zen Buddhism and their derivatives.
It is interesting to trace the history of Buddhism a bit. Buddhism was born amidst a culture of Brahmanism in a relatively obscure part of India, and the imagery and words of the Pali canon reflect that. Early on, a key issue in Buddhism was the doctrine of Anatman, the “non-self” or lack of a separate self. There were several attempts to resolve this issue with the Mahayana school eventually adopting the position of the fundamental formless, transconceptual emptyness of all things. As Mahayana Buddhism moved into Tibet, it comingled with the indigenous shamanistic Bon religion to become Tibetan Buddhism. In China, the Mahayana school found a natural resonance with Taoism which greatly emphasized the non-dual, formless emptyness embraced by Cha’an Buddhism. As Buddhism moved to Japan from China, it harmoniously co-mingled with Shintoism to form many parts of Zen ritual. Rinzai Zen seems to have been influenced by the bushido culture; Soto Zen adapted itself to the working class. Buddhism migrating to Sri Lanka seems to have been transformed less culturally. As a result, the Theravadin lineage does not generally believe in non-duality and many teachers look on the teaching of non-self as meaning that “what people believe to be a self is not a self,” a subtle but important distinction.
Attempts to Westernize Buddhism for Americans are gradually showing the impact of American culture. The founder of the particular temple I attend made a deliberate effort to Westernize the form of Zen for Americans. However, she was English, and rather than adapting Zen to an American culture, she incorporated the forms of the English Anglican church with Gregorian style chanting, formal hymns, organ music and ceremony that seem a poor fit with both Buddhism and those coming from American Protestantism. While the Anglican/Catholic content is very obvious to outsiders, most members of the Order seem unaware of the assimilation, and do not distinguish between what is essential Buddhism and the Anglican style frosting that’s been added. They seem as reluctant to change the Anglican forms as they would be to change Buddhism itself.
The above is not a criticism of Buddhism or the founder of the temple I attend, nor a whining about lack of purity over the centuries. Indeed, as Dogen once expressed when asked about the authenticity of a sutra, Truth is a living substance that can be added to by other enlightened beings, rather than a stagnant declaration restricted to the content of so-called original sutras. Even in Theravadin schools, it is refreshing to hear teachers question some aspect of a sutra that is incongruent with the Buddha’s general teaching, or seems strangely out of harmony with other sutras. The acknowledgment is refreshing because it sharply contrasts with some common Christian claims that all Truth is contained in a Bible, that the content is inerrant, utterly congruent, historically accurate, and in some instances that a particular translation is the only reliable container of what was intended.
The difficulty of discerning cultural content vs. original (in this case, Buddhist) content is not restricted to religion. It is a widespread problem that affects values, political thinking, and even morality. We, as fishes in cultural water, do not generally perceive that we are swimming or living in something that is so totally pervasive that it is invisible. We cannot generally see culture shaping our lives, because it is an integral rather than adjunct property of who we think and believe we are.
In reading Hua Hu Ching, I cannot tell whether Taoism has been affected by Buddhism or whether Buddhism has influenced Taoism. In a way, it does not matter as long as it speaks Truth. But the example reminds me that Buddhism is a roadmap for finding Truth for myself in whatever culture I happen to be in. It is not necessary for the Western mind to develop an Oriental affectation to use the map. Anglican/Catholic imagery attached to Buddhism will endear it to some Westerners but will alienate most Protestant minds. For me, it has been enough to clearly see that the roadmap is reliable while the cultural affectations are not. I will have goodwill toward those who cannot see any difference between Buddhism and cultural add-ons. I will pluck Truth where I find it, whether it is in a junkyard or a mountain meadow. And I won’t complain too much about its surroundings. This is my vow as I step off this mountain of echoes and onto the plains awaiting me.
Namaste
P.S. I don’t want to write another post here, but I would be remiss if I did not mention another book that has proved to be of great value while I’ve been here. It is Experience and Philosophy (Suny Press) by Franklin Merrell-Wolff. It is a the account of an ex-professor from Stanford of his enlightenment experience that transformed his life. It is written with equal respect for Christian, Hindu, and Buddhist paths; the non-sectarian content is a delight in an area where the path almost always overshadows the endpoint. It is by far the most complete and understandable account of a kensho type experience that I have come across. It suffers, like all accounts from the limitations of words, but at least there is a substantial effort made to help the reader understand, and it has almost none of what I would call identifiable religious content, except in the broad usage of the word. As such it provides confirmation of what other religions point to without getting stuck in any particular doctrine.
It is also written in Western style, devoid of the heavy cultural brogue of the Eastern religions. It is quite understandable to Western minds, but not a simplistic read. Wolff sometimes uses a few obscure words, and at least one invented one, but it’s worth the mental climb to understand what he is trying to convey.
While Wolff’s description is helpful, I do not think he found any real way to help others reach what he had found. I’m not sure he knew exactly how he arrived there himself. So, while it’s a helpful description of an endpoint, it’s not the book you want if you’re looking for a path.
Double Namaste!
]]>I listened to a recent debate between Chris Hedges and Sam Harris on religion and politics. The Sam Harris rhetoric was in fine form, excoriating religion, and portraying it as the scourge of the earth. I think Chris Hedges did the better job, particularly if one is interested in arriving at truth rather than skewering religion. When I ran across Lack of Moral Imagination and Softness of Head from Woodmoor Village , the seed germinated into this article.
The Harris rhetoric was better than his thinking. He damaged his arguments in a very serious way by his almost obsessive focus on the ills he lays solely at the feet of religion. It is a narrow view, unsupported by a rational view of the cultural and historical landscape. Religion is NOT the great disease of mankind, and its eradication will NOT solve mankind’s problems. The world in which we live is much more complex than that. If you choose to watch the video, and if you’re interested in truth rather than ridicule (some deserved) of religion, then watch the entire debate.
While Harris bemoans the damage religion has inflicted on the world, he ignores the massive carnage that can directly be laid at the feet of secular humanist societies like recent examples of the the Soviet Union, China, Cambodia, and even the Nazi regime. The number of casualties in those social structures are staggering compared to Iraq, Saddam Hussein, and all the recent terrorism combined. The fact that these human tragedies were not Anglo-Saxon derivatives may make them less painful to Americans, but that lack of pain shows tribalism bordering on racism rather than a comprehension of what took place.
Harris argues that morality should be anchored to rational reasoning rather than religion. And evidently (according to the debate material) in his recent book, he argues that torture may be needed in some circumstances, and that dictators may be the best solution for the Muslim world, who evidently he sees as the biggest threat to mankind. This is the kind of secular humanism that the Bush administration can embrace. No moral constraints — just whatever the government has rationally determined to be in the best interest of the world. So, the Soviets reasoned. So the Red Chinese reasoned. So Pol Pot reasoned.
Harris quickly dismisses the argument that religion should be given quarter because it is useful. It is this argument that is related to the topic at hand - useful delusions. If you have the time, you will probably want to view the video by Richard Dawkins, The Universe is Queerer than We Suppose. If you don’t have time for the whole thing, the last 5 minutes might be enough for you to understand the reference.
Dawkins’ talk points out that our world is filled with incredibly useful delusions. The solidity we perceive in ordinary objects is a concrete example. There is no such solidity at all. The “real world” is incredibly empty; only the Pauli exclusion principle applied to quantum probability space keeps atoms from slipping by each other without any interaction at all. At the subatomic level, electrons and other particles are only defined by characteristics of the interaction. Quantum mechanics says the particles may not exist at all in any form until an interaction occurs. Even time may be a delusion. (A recent article in Discover magazine recaps the some of the latest thinking on time.)
The point at the end of the talk is that evolution has given us a world in which our sensual interpretation of it is incredibly efficient and useful — even though it may be totally and incredibly wrong. The notion of solidity is extremely useful, while the subatomic truth has very limited use for our immediate survival. Our senses adapted to percieve useful truth, and left it to our leisure mind to eventually explore actual truth. The notions of purpose, intent, values, etc. we impute to human psychology may be incredibly useful, while from the scientific point of view, it is not clear they represent truth at all. And to his credit, Dawkins acknowledges that there may be things that will simply always be unknowable.
Benjamin Franklin — agnostic, womanizer, philosopher, scientist, founding father, failed parent, manipulator, and master civic leader — did not think much of religion as a source of truth. He did not have Karl Marx’s cynicism that it was an opiate of the people that they should be denied. He saw its value almost solely in its utility in cultivating morality that he felt essential to any civilized society. So while he personally was doubtful of its truth, he promoted it within society on a universally inclusive basis that included Muslims, Jews, and a variety of Christian expressions. The fruits of Franklin’s view were a funeral attended by denominations that outside that context could hardly stand each other, and seeding of an American society that was respectful of religion while not succumbing to its potential tyranny. The fruit of Karl Marx was the Soviet Union, China, and Cambodia.
In a nutshell, I am convinced that religions may for our evolutionary state as humans, be the same sort of useful delusion that solidity is. They may be the imperfect distillation of non-rational moral truths that are in some sense unknowable, at least for ordinary humans. Just as it would be stupid to try to eradicate the notion of solidity, it is probably stupid to attempt to eradicate religious beliefs because they imperfectly articulate the moral truth at their core. While the belief in a specific deity may be erroneous, the Declaration of Independence is probably not far from truth when it states that liberty is an inherent endowment of our Creator rather than a mere notion of mankind. There is no basis that I can see in history to conclude that man has fared worse because of religious delusions of morality than he would have fared if he had depended solely on his rationality. And without religion, I think he would have missed his best opportunity for knowing Truth for himself.
Religion is not an evil to be eradicated. Secular humanism is not a reliable authority to be substituted for the moral truth in religion which is sometimes imperfectly expressed and nearly always imperfectly followed — even if religion turns out to have been only a useful delusion.
Buddhism almost implies that it is a useful delusion with its teaching that even the Dharma is only a raft, an expedient means to finding unkowable Truth for oneself. Rafts are good things though, particularly in the middle of a raging river.
]]>The intent of writing was always partly cathartic. In many ways, the articles reflect my journey towards Buddhism. Unlike some who see Buddhism as a neat philosophy or Zen as cool, I’ve viewed it seriously — perhaps too seriously at times. My postings were mainly a reflection of some struggles I’ve had with Buddhism, and some of the reconciliations that I’ve noticed.
At the end of this 5-year journey, I am Buddhist. I’m not Buddhist because I’ve experienced some profound enlightenment. I’ve become much less enchanted with ceremonial practice that shrouds Buddhism as it does many other religions. The Buddhist teaching, like Christian teaching, has followed many winding paths throughout the centuries; it is denial of reality to claim the historical perfection of any path or lineage. Most honest histories of Buddhism clearly point out both periods of excellence and degeneration. I do not have to see Buddhism through rose colored glasses to appreciate the truth that I’ve found in its basic teachings.
I have an excellent teacher, yet I can see that he is quite human, often struggling with himself on his own individual path. His advice is not infallible, and sometimes misses the mark completely. It is always worthwhile, though, to listen to his counseling. His experience and integrity have been very, very helpful. Even when the advice fails because of incomplete understanding of the situation, it has still proved to be of considerable value. It is remarkably useful to look at things from a different vantage point, and to discover that yet again one has failed to see things that seem very obvious once they come into focus.
Meditation has become a friend of sorts — a tool for developing mindfulness — a means of freeing myself, if only temporarily, from the feelings, thoughts, and perceptions that normally crowd out the possibility of experiencing life freshly and creatively. It is not what I expected. I don’t recall a single instance of intense bliss, overwhelming insight, or a transforming surge of energy. Either I’m immune to these manifestations or am such a rookie that they have not even come into view. But in a very interesting way, some sort of peak experience doesn’t seem very important anymore.
The Four Noble Truths of Buddhism and a few other very basic Buddhist teachings have turned out to be the most useful teachings I’ve encountered during my Buddhist path. They are the essence of Buddhism — the beginning and ending point. Five years ago, I would have been completely surprised by this outcome. Sure, I read those things as I rushed on to more interesting books about meditation, particularly Zen meditation, experiences of others, and a whole slew of books from modern Buddhist teachers. But when I finally started grappling with the Buddhist basics, I found things I could confirm for myself — perhaps not in the same depth as masters — but at a level that I could know for myself that it was pointing in the right direction. Encountering the non-self, seeing the depth of suffering without being cynical, seeing that much of my existential “suffering” was self-made, seeing specific beliefs that were often imperceptibly forcing me to live within their narrow limits — these were far more valuable than waves of bliss.
So, at this point there is less need in my life for cathartic writing to resolve the issue of whether I’m really Buddhist or not. There is more trust in the teaching — not some self-forced confession of faith to brush aside doubts — but a growing understanding of it as a rational explanation of the world I’m living in. Does that mean that I have no uncertainty about things like reincarnation? No. There is, however, a growing strong intuition that actions have moral consequences that cannot be escaped. And I’m comfortable living my life on that basis, even though I can’t show the truth scientifically.
So, I’m not sure I have much else to say here. I have the beginnings of one or two posts left in my mind, but they are more reflections than reconciliations of incongruent thoughts. If they germinate, I’ll post them in the next week or two. Otherwise I will just join the silence of this mountain.
]]>I’ve often been glad to free of this directive as non-Christian. I don’t have to play dodge ball with this commandment, rationalize it away or ignore it to get rid of the discomfort it imposes.
Yet, after reflection, I think there may be truth here. Franklin Wolff, in Experience and Philosophy , succinctly states it this way.
We never destroy anything by fighting it. A force that we fight may be temporarily crushed, because at the time we may be wielding a stronger force. But it remains true that we have won at the price of certain exhaustion, and meanwhile the opposing force rebuilds itself, partly out of the very force we have expended. Then it comes back on us when we are weak and may conquer us. No man escapes the law by simply dying physically before the rebound.
In subsequent paragraphs, Wolff explains that the task of restraining evil is best viewed as a task of training, and development of skill in transforming energy of evil into its higher mode of expression as good.
I think the crux of not resisting evil is similar to the premise of aikido, where the effort is to use the energy of an opponent’s attack to lead him into a choreographed physical stance where he can be controlled and restrained without doing harm and without being harmed. It is similar in some respects to restraining a child with a temper tantrum — not allowing the unhampered expression of hostility — training the child to behave responsibly — with no intent of injuring or destroying the child.
Perhaps this nuance between resistance and restraint is the key to understanding Christ’s directive while not remaining passive in the face of the evil. Martin Luther King, Gandhi, some in Nazi Germany, and even some fighting in WW II clearly acted to restrain evil without becoming embroiled in delusion about its destruction. Perhaps that is the key to social change which does not ratchet endlessly between the extremes that are usually encountered in political solutions. Perhaps that is the answer to the political disaster the current administration has foisted on a naive electorate. Restrain — train — don’t seek to destroy. Seek to redirect the energy of pro-life advocates into general care and protection of people already alive. Seek to restrain the severe mischief of corporations who are bleeding those who are the lifeblood of their future — at least in the long run — without working for the destruction of free enterprise.
Though this topic is easily related to external events, it is actually more important to those events inside our own mind. We do not need to destroy any part of ourselves — that is not the task. The task is temporary restraint until better elements replace the defective. The task is training and discipline, not a division of the self into “good” and “evil” with the self-righteous intent of destroying our internal evil twin. It is most of all compassion — understanding — without any mushiness about needs to done, or indulgence in the name of being kind.
]]>What I’ve come to see recently is that this frustration is not wholesome. This isn’t a result of some Buddhist catechism that I’ve internalized. It’s just plain seeing. Not seeing this has locked my mind in a rut for several years.
In our culture, anger is viewed as a very mild vice if it does not result in physical violence. In fact, many see it as a positive good that spurs them into action, jolting them from the ditch of lethargy onto a road that leads somewhere else. In the business and sports world, anger is not clearly separated from the aggressiveness that is often highly valued. It’s seen as energizing, mobilizing, and invigorating.
But in fact, what I saw clearly the other day is that it is not anything wholesome at all. My mind immediately and emphatically rebelled at the idea. “What about anger at injustice? What about anger at those causing harm? Anger about wrong? Anger about unnecessary pain and suffering? How can you avoid insipid complacency about things if anger doesn’t rouse you to action? The lack of outrage is a huge factor in many of the world and community problems today.” And so on and so on.
But when I clearly looked at things, and the impact of frustration on my life, the result was starkly negative and painful. I had not been successfully goaded into constructive action. The complexity of some situations foreclosed reasonable resolution. Some factors were simply not under my control at all, despite how frustrating, unjust, wrong, or painful they might be. The frustration had commandeered my attention and energy, painfully forcing focus on misery that was not subject to my will or remedy. In doing so, it excluded other possibilities that remained and obscured the brightness that flicks in and out of everyday life. Because the “big” important stuff couldn’t be remedied, my mind had become chronically heavy with a least of hint of sullenness and cynicism. Outrage reinforced my vanity that “I could see” and that “my principles were sound and just.”
The Buddhist teaching sharply conflicted with all of this. Anger was just anger - a painful poison. There was no good anger, beneficial anger, righteously justified anger - just poison and pain. My mind argued vehemently, but I saw that despite all the arguments, anger was a failed strategy, and a painful one at that. I became willing to let it go of it whether or not I had “just cause,” whether or not I had been wronged, whether or not the situation would be ameliorated, whether or not “right” would prevail. The relief was immediate and broad, and so far has remained generally in place. And the lockdown of frustration has been replaced by freedom and possibility. And while my sense of justice hasn’t been dulled, it currently does not have the cutting edge of pain that has often accompanied it in the past.
I’m not so naive as to believe that I won’t encounter this problem again. But having seen and experienced something once, it’s much easier to see it again. May I keep my eyes open.
]]>Many people have this attitude of dismissing their own experience as of no consequence and it’s the biggest obstacle to progress towards Awakening.
You have to have confidence in your own experience and your own judgment and then just use other people’s experience and guidance in order to home in on it and hone it - but it always comes down to what you experience yourself.
I’ve bought quite a few Zen books over the years. And they seemed bright with the hope of insight as I finally decided to purchase them and awaited an opportunity to read them. As I read them, some were more helpful from others, but all of them failed to have the spark that would ignite my own insight. For a long while, I searched for a better book. Surely, that must have been the problem. I’d read again, be inspired temporarily again by the evanescent fantasy of enlightenment, and would meditate extra hard for the next week or so until the enchantment wore off. I could list the books. Many are classics. Many are written by well-known authors. Some almost have a cult-like following.
Until I finally read, studied, and listened to what the Buddha actually taught, though, there was little connection to my own experience. It was in the context of basic Buddhist teaching that I could finally find something I could know by what I experience. As I’ve progressed from that point, this Buddhist teaching of “finding for yourself” has become much more meaningful and relevant. Understanding how your own mind works, how it gets stuck, what its habits are — those are the difficult things — and the things that have been really worth knowing so far.
The quotation struck a resonant chord about my experience with books. Books, particularly Zen books, no matter how wonderful, are someone else’s experience. They can be useful in the way a map is useful, but like maps, they can be completely misleading about the territory. I think the trip each person will experience must be his own. The territory will have a uniqueness about it that can only at a general, abstract level be similar to another’s. There is a courageous loneliness required to stick to one’s experience at times, but the reality is that one’s own mindscape cannot be experienced by another, even with the best communication skills. Part of the journey is to realize this, and to not shy away from the task by distracting oneself — with the noise of the crowd, the experience of others, even the company of friends. Those seeking the comraderie of a throng based religion are probably better off with Christianity. The Buddhist path to realization cannot be someone else’s road.
]]>It’s not been a pleasant process. It’s been demanding in the sense of being willing to see honestly, without the affective overlay that usually colors and shapes things to our liking. In my case that “liking” includes my pet ideas about how things “should be”, even when some of my “should be” springs from noble aspirations.
The key things that seem to have sunk in include the following:
The “mass of suffering” Buddhist scripture describes is truly there, both in human history and current events. The causes are not simple, but rather a strongly entangled hierarchy of competing wants, desires, fears, hopes, aspirations, and animal instincts in the form of a human body. Love and hate, in contrast to their intellectual separation as opposite terms, co-mingle constantly as they both are the impetus and result of small actions that are so ubiquitous that they are mostly unobserved. Human beings suffer endlessly at the hands of other human beings. And when there aren’t human beings around, there are animals, acts of God, and other things that go bump in the night to disturb any serenity one has managed to glom onto.
To see this mass of suffering without despair and with compassion has been difficult. One is so tempted to look away, to not notice, to focus only on one’s own interest, or to seek shelter from what ones sees by joining with others to insist the picture isn’t there.
To see this picture honestly also means not blocking out the joy, happiness, and sparkle of life that is inseparably part of the tapestry. It’s really there too. And I’ve had to learn to enjoy it fully, even while knowing that it’s ultimately as evanescent and transient as the rainbow shimmering on a puddle in sunlight. It’s taken time to accept joy wholeheartedly without any illusions about it lasting. The pleasantness of the moment is somewhat tempered by being aware it is not any final arrival at happiness. The thrill of success is dimmed a bit by realizing nothing has been finally gained; at least some of the assumptions about the future based on it will turn out to be false.
Seeing the world clearly can be a bit lonely at times. There are few who will see it this way. Most will choose a more comfortable way, and many will defend to their death this comfortable picture, even when presented the most incontrovertible evidence of its falsity. Others will wallow in despair. Others will devote their entire life to reforms of one variety or another, confident in their imagination that if “this” is fixed “that” way, irreversible progress will have been achieved.
I need to stop here to keep this article to a reasonable length. Other parts will follow.
]]>The following are excerpts and paraphrases of the actual text.
]]>Accepting the injustice in one’s life and others is based on accepting that “what one is” is what one has been. Accept that with an open heart and without complaint.
Adapting to conditions is recognition that as mortals we are ruled by conditions - not by ourselves. Success and failure come and go and the body flourishes and wanes depending on conditions; only the Mind is unaffected by conditions.
Seeking is what the whole world does - always looking for something - always longing for something. To seek is to suffer. When you seek nothing you are on the Path.
Practice the truth of the Dharma that all natures are pure. Defilement and purity, subject and object aren’t real. Appearances are in the final analysis are empty of anything real.
I agree with the repugnance of religious cosmogony as a substitute for science. I also think this issue is not easily brushed aside as yet another example of ignorant, arrogant “fundamentalists.”
The larger dynamic in society as a whole is a search for ethical values in a world bent on destroying the foundations they have traditionally been built on. It is not science, per se, that is the culprit, but a groundswell of awareness that the older mythologies just don’t cut it very well in the modern world. If you are sick, would you take a pill or go to a scientific doctor, or to a a minister in hopes that the evil spirits causing your cold could be dispelled? No answer is necessary. Prayer as a medical device has been relegated even by religionists to the narrow niche of the final resort when everything else has failed.
As science sweeps religion aside, it offers no substitute foundation for ethical values. Moral cause and effect are not scientific propositions other than the potential effects of getting caught and punished. And this leaves people foundering as they search for some way to establish value, purpose, meaning, and a defensible basis for justice in their lives that is independent of both power and culture.
Buddhism, though different from Muslim and Christian communities, is a religion, and not a philosophy, because of its postulation of moral cause and effect in the form of karma. Without karma, Buddhism is a philosophy of sorts, but not a very compelling one. Philosophy is particularly wimpy when one needs to tap transformative power to change one’s life.
Those who champion science as the solution to all man’s ills are as arrogant as those who insist that their cosmogony should replace science. The questions of good, bad, evil, and all the other really deep questions of life just don’t fit on the scientific plate. Atheists who insist the world is without a deity based on “scientific arguments” are as flawed as the ones who insist that one must exist.
Where do people get their values from? How should a society teach values in a way that isn’t harmful? If values don’t come from religion, where should they come from? These are the questions that should be asked by those always alarmed about creationism. The alarmists are, of course, right in a small way, but they completely miss the underlying wave by focusing on the froth at its crest.
]]>But recently the “heart” matter has seemed to come to my attention from several different sources. (I’ve learned to pay attention when the same subject seems to converge out of nowhere from multiple sources.) One important source was a newsletter from the resident monk at the temple I attend. Another was a talk on CD by Bo Lozoff at the San Francisco Zen Center. But there were more subtle pointers too. Finally I decided to spend some effort reflecting on it.
The bottom line of the reflection was that my mind does not trust the heart. It does not understand it, doubts its existence, and is quite suspicious that it is being led astray by another fanciful notion at any suggestion of “following” it. I was not aware my skepticism ran so deep.
My first inclination has always been to use the word intuition as a substitute for heart. That fails, though, because my intuition is sometimes faulty, and I’ve been injured at times by the flawed intuition of others. At times intuition is flawed because it is sourced in unnoticed motives and fears, that are also deeply flawed.
The mind (with good reason) has been taught to reject wispy sorts of evanescent notions like fairies, Santa Claus, souls, elves, pixies, and ghouls. It isn’t about to descend into the throes of superstition that has kept men in ignorant, destructive bondage for centuries. The medical profession’s fanciful intuitions about warding off evil spirits and bleeding people to drain the humors causing their illness have been replaced with the much more efficacious tools of scientific reason.
Ramana Maharshi once said of the mind:
It is a bad master, but a good servant
It is a bad master not because it is evil, but because it does not understand its limitations and role. It makes an implicit assumption that what it cannot conceive does not exist unless there is clear evidence of its blindness.
The crux of the matter is that mind cannot understand “heart.” It can understand sensation, feeling, memory, perception, concepts, and consciousness. But its domain is limited to what it can understand. When it comes up against things that it cannot understand, it still tries mightily, with the best of intentions to do so. For the deepest questions of consciousness and existence, the mind has tried mightily; religion and philosophy are the best it has been capable of. When those fail, it typically resorts to denial that the questions really exist or matter.
It is not just that the mind cannot understand the heart now; it never will. Heart just won’t fit within the confines of its understanding. The heart can be known, but not grasped or understood. So the mind will never be able to really say what the “heart” is. People have said: “Listen to the heart. Follow the heart. etc. etc. etc.” I really tried to understand what the heart was saying, but it never said anything I could understand.
If one takes the precepts as a guide to the attributes of heart, it’s clear that the domain of the heart completely transcends the small self the mind is preoccupied with. The questions from the heart are: “What is good? What is compassionate? What is wholesome? — for all beings — for all life?” Now it would really be neat if one could just ask those questions and answers to individual situations would fly to one’s mind. The nitty gritty of existence forever challenges pat answers. The best one can do is to start from the heart, clear and calm the mind, and then act.
The mind really wants to help here, but it’s mostly out of its league. It can only offer up what it thinks it remembered, what it fears, or what it hopes for as a guess as to what might happen. Educated guesses based on experience can offer perspective, but even they cannot reliably offer a solution — only a shrewd idea to be considered by a clear mind reaching to the heart for help.
The problem of course is that all this leaves me not really “knowing” what I’m talking about, which makes me feel a little flaky. And how do I possibly connect with something that is so indefinable? Rather than closing it out because I can’t grasp it, I’ve decided to make the alternative assumption that it can be known without understanding and grasping it — whatever that means — although it somehow seems possible. Maybe it’s like spinach where you know what it tastes like when you eat it, but “understanding” just doesn’t ever apply.
So, how do I start in a different direction without a roadmap? What does this mean for me in practical terms? I don’t know, except it seems the first step is to bring the mind back within its proper limits as a faithful servant rather than a master.
For now, in practical terms, it means the following:
If you attempt to fix a picture of it in your mind, you will lose it. This is like pinning a butterfly; the husk is captured, but the flying is lost.”