Wednesday 18 October 2023

Mysticism - Christian and Buddhist (2)





 Moving on - well at least I am - one distinction often made by some is that between the "Word" (Eternal Logos) as "Person" (Christian), and that of an "Impersonal Force" (Buddhism)


It is sometimes claimed that such a distinction will inevitable effect any "fruits of the spirit' that come to be - those fruits being (according to St Paul in the NT) "love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control."

I see no such evidence and I would suggest that the question revolves around what it is to be a "person". A person, as opposed to an individual, or an ego that exists behind the eyes, looking out in fear, afraid to embrace the river of change.








Speaking personally (!) one small phrase of Thomas Merton's was for me a constant companion for many years, the phrase being "The contact of two liberties".

He used it in a letter to Aldous Huxley, when he (Merton) entered into dialogue over Huxley's advocating the use of drugs to induce "mystical" experience.

Merton went on to explain that as he understood it true mystical experience must needs have all that Huxley spoke of, plus something more which he could only describe as personal, in which God is known not as an object or as Him up there or "Him in everything" nor as "the All" but as I AM, or simply AM, and that such depends upon the liberty of that Person. Thus, the contact of two liberties.








As said, this question was part and parcel of my inner life for many years. Since resolved - seeing that all is relationship, inter-being and why reduce the relationship to just two? Possibly we all have to find our own answer.

Anyway, whatever, there are some fine words from the book "Understanding Buddhism" by the Catholic scholar Heinrich Dumoulin:-

Whether, on its deepest ground, being is personal or impersonal, is something that humans will never be able to plumb by their rational powers. Here we face a decision which one makes according to one's own tradition and upbringing, and still more according to one's faith and experience. The Christian sees ultimate reality revealed in the personal love of God as shown in Christ, the Buddhist in the silence of the Buddha. Yet they agree on two things: that the ultimate mystery is ineffable, and that it should be manifest to human beings. The inscription on a Chinese stone figure of the Buddha, dated 746, reads:-

"The Highest truth is without image.

If there were no image at all, however, there would be no way for truth to be manifested.

The highest principle is without words.

But if there were not words at all, how could principle possibly be revealed?"








So words there must needs be. As I see it, all Reality is revelation. Every word holds the potential to reveal truth. And we must watch our own tongue!

Jesus said:-

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. ' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbour as yourself. '

These can be profound and deeply incarnational words. That to love each other IS to love God. Distinctions between "persons" and "impersonal forces" fall away in lived experience.








Well, I'll finish with some more words of St John of the Cross, often received well on Buddhist Forums.

To reach satisfaction in all
desire its possession in nothing.
To come to possess all
desire the possession of nothing.
To arrive at being all
desire to be nothing.
To come to the knowledge of all
desire the knowledge of nothing.
To come to the pleasure you have not
you must go by the way you enjoy not.
To come to the knowledge you have not
you must go by a way in which you know not.
to come to the possession you have not
you must go by a way in which you possess not.
To come to be what you are not
you must go by a way in which you are not.
When you turn toward something
you cease to cast yourself upon the all.
For to go from all to the all
you must deny yourself of all in all.
And when you come to the possession of the all
you must possess it without wanting anything.
Because if you desire to have something in all
your treasure in God is not purely your all.

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