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*Brian Wilcox. 'the way hidden'. Flickr,
If you are lucky and work hard enough, you may someday experience freedom from the known.
*Jiddu Krishnamurti
Freedom from the known can only occur, not by escape from the known, but entering so fully into the known, the known opens up depths you can only intuit, so know indirectly, intimately. Then, freedom from is freedom within, the known simply known differently than prior. Now, the known is liberating, the arena of wonderment.
* * *
We may think of a mystery as something hidden to remain hidden, for it cannot be known. This is true and untrue as to the Mystery, from which all mysteries flow and return like oceanic tides.
* * *
Alan Watts, in The Book on the Taboo of Knowing Who You Are, contrasted two views of God, or the Mystery. The usual religious one can be summed up in one sentence: God is above all things. The second, more attuned to ancient Indian religion is: God is under all things.
In the former, God is so distant, so to be and remain a mystery. In the latter, God is so near, so to be and remain a mystery. Yet, we are, with either, living in a wasteland, even if not truly alive, having thrown ourselves without the Garden. And the wasteland is a wasteland, strewn with our technological 'toys.' The one thing we cannot do in the wasteland is stop long enough to see we are, indeed, in a wasteland. We must remain busy, even if we are busy with sports, eating, reading, religious activities, meditation, or eyes glued to a television or computer screen. We must perpetually distract ourselves, call the distractions good ones or bad ones, and call this freedom of choice.
* * *
Ironically, atheism has become more popular in my country. Yet, atheism rarely if ever, it seems, speaks of other than this mythological deity distant in the sky or above the sky. That is, atheism is theistic in its denial of God. Yet, it is denying god, not God, even as many theists are believing in god, not God. Taking God to be god is no less absurd than assigning the life of a living rose to a plastic carnation.
What this theism does is denude the world of reverence. Whether the atheist or the theist, mystery no longer stops us in our steps, no longer rapts our busied minds, no longer fills our eyes with tears of devotion, and we are left without a living sense of the immediacy of the Good, the True, the Beautiful. Theism and atheism are alike caught in the known, only from different directions, one bogged down in matter, one trying to escape matter and worship a god apart from that matter.
Yes, the above is a caricature. I think the general outline is applicable enough to be helpful, however. If we do not honestly look at the consequences of our worldviews, we not only lack integrity, we cannot consciously choose more wisely. We will simply play some game, even be it god or not-god and not see both are refusals to see and love Truth. Our wasteland is still a wasteland, be it adorned with godless or godly, good or evil, kind service to others are profane selfishness.
Continued... |
