The certainty of unknowing

 I've reached a bit of a dead end on exactly how to express my own thoughts, of saying where I am (if anywhere) But sitting down once more in McDonalds I started reading once more a biography of Ludwig Wittgenstein, this by Ray Monk. As I dipped in the little phrase "the certainty of unknowing" popped up and hey! here was the hook on which to hang yet another string of waffle as I down another white coffee (no sugar)

Before I have mentioned reading "Joseph and His Brothers" by Thomas Mann. Still reading it, now about page 550, just another 1000 or so to go! Good stuff, although much of what Mann writes is a little above my head - I lose touch with what he is exactly saying, or meaning. But good to stretch myself at times - as Dogen has said, "where we do not understand there is our understanding." Especially as he also said that "we are what we understand".

I've reached the part in the story of Joseph where he is off to Egypt after being thrown into a well by his brothers, who have grown sick of his dreams of grandeur. His father, Jacob, has had his seven days of mourning, ripping at his clothes, in total despair of having lost his beloved son, thought now to have been ravaged by a wild beast, presented with Joseph's coat of many colours soaked in blood. A well known story, yet perhaps not nowadays, I don't know.

The final passage of the first part of the novel I have read a few times now. Very deep, yet in many ways, simple. The passage keeps returning to my thoughts. Those who know the story of Jacob will know how he worked for many many years to earn the right to marry his great love, Rachel, Laban's daughter. When the great moment arrived, Laban tricks him, sending in his other daughter Leah for the glorious consummation of Joseph's love. In the darkness of the wedding tent Joseph thinks he is making love to Rachel, only to find out in the morning that he has been duped.

In the final.passage of the novel referred to, the inscrutable will of the very silent God is spoken of, stating that the greatest moment of Jacob's life so far had thus proved to be only "disillusion and deception". Then the loss of his son Joseph is mentioned. Thought to be dead and thus bringing what was the most terrible moments of Jacob's life, mourning the loss of another he loved so deeply (the child of his eventual union with Rachel) Thus the most terrible moment of Jacobs life was also disillusion and deception. As the end of the whole story will show.

Much there to ponder. Is it ever possible to come to any definitive judgement of any moment?

For me, Faith brings with it the "certainty of unknowing".

"All shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well"