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A Brook in Winter - Easton, ME
Note: "Pure" has many words linked with it in its etymological history - fresh, new, unmixed, simple, sheer, clean, clear, unadorned, chaste, undefiled, ... Below, I avoid terms for "pure" that might encourage misunderstandings of what I mean by "pure" and also its original meanings - among words bypassed are righteousness, virtue, piety, godliness, and holiness - this last appears one time. While these words, in their true meaning, are close to "pure," I decided it wise to avoid them while not denying their usefulness when properly applied. A term close to what I mean by "pure" is "innocent," - I use "innocence" once - as long as this is not read in a judicial sense. Also, the Buddhist terms "wakefulness" and "suchness" are kin to "pure." "Wakefulness" can be read as seeing-purely-what-is, so unmixed, or seeing the suchness of what is. Last, I use "pure" in this work, for it is that which has been arising in the Quiet, so speaking of a truth I have been giving attention to as essential both to my own wellbeing and of society.
* * *
I had looked at the red frame store many times in my first weeks in this northern Maine town. I had never lived among the Amish. To enter an Amish store - nothing modern in sight, not even lights - seemed a strange prospect. Finally, one day I pulled my black ford up to the front and walked in about 3.30 in the afternoon - this time of the year, almost dark inside the store.
I walk into an adjoining room of the main one and survey the handmade furniture. On returning to the main room, a slender woman in her mid-to-late 20s stands behind the counter. She is clothed in typical wear for Amish women - I can see a solid-color dress with long sleeves and a full skirt, with a cape on the bodice. The two customers leave. I walk around and pick up homemade food items, including a loaf of freshly-baked bread, still feeling in a somewhat strange place, but only for it is unfamiliar to the culture I have grown accustomed to.
I place food items onto the counter. We begin talking. The young woman is soft-spoken. She projects gentleness, quietness. She uses a pencil and paper to compute what I owe. I pay with cash - there is no card reader here, one pays by cash or check.
Afterward, we speak pleasant goodbyes. I am glad I finally dropped by. I know this will be a place to frequent. I feel admiration for the goodness these people stand for, regardless of where I agree and not with its beliefs. I respect them for trying to live a reverent, sacred life. I know holiness, adequately understood - not its religious and irreligious caricatures - is admirable, affirming, life-giving. I know I live in a society that has lost almost all reverence, even among the churches claiming to have a hold on it. What this store represents is judged old-fashioned and naive, but it is not - it is timeless.
As I walk toward my truck, goods in-hand, I feel something deeply. I can also feel something surface - tears almost welling up in the eyes. I know what it is about. I feel I just met someone who embodied what has been arising into my heart recently, spontaneously - purity. And this person, symbolizing this, keeps surfacing in the Quiet over the weeks since that first time seeing her. I often invite the memory of her, for it is comforting and reassuring - a reminder of something I wish never to forget and aspire to embody in this world as long as there is this body to manifest anything. In this memory, I also offer silent prayerfulness for her blessing.
I go into the store often to shop. She and I talk. I always feel joy by having been in her presence, glad to have communed face-to-face with someone resonating with the aspiration of my heart. And it is good to be reminded of this purity. In being reminded of it, I am inspired to live it. Possibly, I remind her of it too, but I have no conscious intent to do so. And while I realize she is likely more a sign of this purity - meaning she is somewhat an archetypal projection - nevertheless, I feel graced that she reminds me of purity that is beyond us both.
even a slight ray of sunshine
reminds us of the entire Sun
* * *
The word "pure" is infrequently used now regarding persons. We may say a person is intelligent, kind, religious, spiritual, a genius, resourceful, athletic, talented, a winner, sure to succeed, practically-minded, artistic, ... But pure?
Frankly, being a person of purity appears not in-fashion, out-of-fashion. One reason is self-presentation - how we appear to others - is valued highly, purity lightly, if at all. For example, a beautiful person is beautiful, we think, due to a style of appearance. We assume - for we are taught to - because something's appearance leads to an experience of beauty, the object is the beauty. We miss how beauty - as all noble qualities - is an expression of an impersonal Presence. We fail to see that beauty is pure, or pure is beauty, for all qualities experienced as opposites reflect a single Essence. We think they are different, for the mind is socialized to arrange Wholeness into parts. This socialization, in turn, shapes what we see to be beautiful, so pure. It dulls our sensitivity to the pure, misplacing the pure with socially-constructed ideas - this, again, is true of all the qualities.
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Possibly, we fear purity, and we avoid aspiring to it, for we have equated it with religion, with moralism, with conservatism, with those who feel superior to others, and so positing it as an opposite to something else. This dualistic thinking means either one is pure or impure, like organic is organic or not organic. This is not so. Pure is pure of contrast.
* * *
One standard error is assuming purity is a personal quality. There is no such personal purity, so it is not a matter of morality. Morality is not the same as purity. Purity is purity, for it is universal. Purity is an impersonal trait. If one says, "I am pure" or "She is a person of purity," that is in error. The claim itself to be pure is a denial of it. Purity is something that takes us into itself, we do not become it, and we cannot claim it as something we have. Just so, we cannot have love for anyone, for love is, like purity, impersonal and universal. We can love someone, but we cannot have love for anything. Like with love, we do not possess purity.
Still, the aspiration for personal purity is a step toward purity, for this aspiration is the shadow of purity. To aspire to live a pure life is a hint of the impersonal, universal quality of purity. So, it is commendable when someone seeks to be pure, act purely, dress purely, live purely, talk purely, ... And if one attains what she thought to be personal purity, purity of herself, it will show itself as purity itself.
* * *
Possibly, the following Christian scripture I never heard in a Christian church, for it speaks of consciousness transcending the dualism of moralism, while the church tends to be moralistic - "Everything is pure to those whose hearts are pure" (Titus 1.15a, NLT), or more literally, "To the pure, everything is pure." This scripture is reminiscent of the wisdom of awakened mind, or enlightened heart, in Buddhism. One in purity sees purity amid its absence, for purity is free of absence; hence it is present - seen or unseen. And one pure, seeing purely, may see the purity even within the impure behavior of someone. This does not excuse misbehavior; yet, one often sees impure action is the misdirection of pure intent.
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Purity is full, while impurity is empty even of impurity. Hence, in the absence that is impurity, purity is. For example, in purity, one does not merely see war as cruel; she sees it as the absence of purity. Yet, to see the lack, one must see purely from purity. How can we enjoy peace among ourselves when seeing the darkness as something in itself, rather than darkness being an absence of the Good, True, and Beautiful (i.e., the Pure)? In such duality, so opposition, we foster the opposition we say we oppose. We cannot thereby escape the stress of being-against.
Hence, as with the Puritans, the aspiration for personal and societal purity fosters its shadow. The pursuit of personal purity is egoic, closing one in on oneself rather than opening one outward. In seeking personal purity, one sees impurity everywhere. In not trying to attain personal purity, one sees purity everywhere. - This has grave ramifications for societal discontent, such as in the United States presently. One can see this - apply the principles herein set forth. - The moment you claim to be personally pure as contrasted with all those personally impure others, you define impure as unlike you, inferior to you. You demonstrate you do not know what pure is even while you claim it for yourself. The "i" gladly claims itself pure, for whatever sets it apart from others as special, so superior, is its field-of-expertise.
* * *
One could ask, "What does purity look like?" Purity is not an object we can point to, saying, "There it is." One knows purity only in the experience of purity, though purity itself transcends experience. The pure within you meets the pure within the other - that is the experience.
One can encounter purity by meeting a person, gazing into the sky, or holding a rock in her hand. When self drops as an obstruction to what is, one knows purity. This natural purity melts the sense-of-self in the gap between an object and self, and this meeting is of purity.
The heart knows purity in the immediacy of meeting purity. This happens for the heart is naturally, innately pure. This encounter is a meeting-knowing. Therefore, I shared the experience at the Amish store. If you inquire about what pure means, I can only point you to what signifies and embodies purity for me. This does not mean that something or someone is more or less pure in itself than another, only that there was a living-moment in which purity arose in the meeting-together. Together for the experience is always one of communion, wherein something transcending two manifests.
It is important not to locate the purity only in the other. For example, the Amish woman mirrors a purity within me. There is only one purity. Purity is not split up - in her, in me. So, part of the deep feeling and almost-tears when I walked out was the intimacy of purity within me being felt by her mirroring it.
And what of morality? The experience of purity is reliant on receptivity. One cannot live an immoral life and enjoy purity anymore than one can cover the eyes with dirt and see the sunlight. Moral guidance is to enhance receptivity to the Good, the True, and the Beautiful. Hence, though morality is not purity, and one could keep the rules and be godless, so to speak, morality is grounded in need to align with Truth. Moral living assists in preparing us for sharing with and in purity - Presence.
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*(C) Brian K. Wilcox, 2020
*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. The book is a collection of poems based on mystical traditions, especially Christian and Sufi, with extensive notes on the teachings and imagery in the poetry.
*To contact Brian, write to LotusoftheHeart@gmx.com .
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