Christ, Jesus, Gospel of John, Dhammapada, presence, truth, truths, love, meditation, absolute dimension, relative dimension, mind ...
Tranquil Waters
Back River... Georgetown, ME
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In the Christian Gospel of John, as his leaving is nearing, Jesus tells his close students, "I will not leave you orphaned. I will come to you." He could have said, "I will send you some helpful information." He did not? "I" shows the priority of presence among Jesus' earliest followers. So much was this focus, they came to refer to themselves by "Body of Christ" - Christ present, Christ's presence.
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Once, when the Sage was speaking to a local group, someone asked...
How do you teach truth to your followers?
I don't.
So, what books do you recommend to them?
For truth?
Yes.
I don't.
Why?
Truth isn't information. Truth is presence.
*Brian K. Wilcox. "Meetings with an Anonymous Sage".
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Better it is to live one day seeing the Supreme Truth than to live a hundred years without ever seeing the Supreme Truth.
*Acharya Buddharakkhita. The Dhammapada. 8:115.
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To varying degrees, truths - notions, concepts, ideas - convey truth. Truths serve like a bridge. This same applies to persons and all within the relative dimension. Similarly, the varying degrees relate to our preparedness, or sensitivity, to receive. Like the ground, some persons are more porous than others. The more porous, the more we can receive and transmit.
Information can assist in preparing us to welcome truth. Information can soften us up. As well, it can be a means of enjoyment of truth. A good book, for example, can drop you into Silence. A wise teacher can be a means of presence, even as you can be for someone. You may think you are enjoying the teacher or the ideas she shares, but you are enjoying truth, or the radiance of wisdom you are meeting with through the teacher and her words. This wisdom is presence.
This quiet winter morning in Maine, I walked my hermitage room in slow walking meditation. I stopped to contemplate a tree limb outside the window. The limb was moving in the breeze. The beauty of that simplicity was present to me, and I to it. I enjoyed truth. The tree limb and breeze were like a good book or a lovely sunset. They were an excellent teacher.
However, truths are limited, even as contemplating that tree limb is. The relative can give you a hint of presence, while presence can give you the taste of itself.
Yet, in touching the relative dimension, you can touch the absolute dimension. When you touch the absolute dimension, the absolute dimension is touching you. You are in love with life. Then, words can drop. Then, you know the best of truths are shadows cast by the Light, the Beloved of your heart. The relative is not, thereby, diminished; the relative world is perceived with reverence, adoration, and gratitude.
When I used to go and worship in a church, I would kneel with others at the altar to receive the Eucharist. I learned not to take any theories of what the Eucharist meant. Theology was not appropriate there on my knees with cupped hands to receive. Though trained in theology, I learned to drop all notions of what the rite meant and any wish for a conceptual understanding and simply receive. I knew no one could tell anyone what the Eucharist means, for they could only share what they think it means. Anyway, what anything means is not a thought of what it means.
The mind - thought - is a veil both inviting and concealing. Learn to let the mind drop. Meditation can be a practice in mind dropping. Then, more receptivity to the Light can arise, for you become more sensitive to truth. Truth sensitives you to itself. Love prepares you for love, and truth and love is one.
*Use of photography is allowed accompanied by credit given to Brian K. Wilcox, and title and place of photograph.
*Brian's book, An Ache for Union: Poems on Oneness with God through Love, can be ordered through major online booksellers or the publisher AuthorHouse.
