From: Elizaphanian (Elizaphanian@members.v21.co.uk)
Date: Sat Nov 23 2002 - 09:23:36 GMT
Hi David,
We _are_ getting somewhere. As I originally hoped, our positions aren't
quite as wide apart as may have sometimes seemed. Perhaps it would be
simplest at this point if I spent a little time explaining what 'Christian
mysticism' actually is, because I think you've got the wrong end of the
stick. It's most certainly not about a paternalist inducing of social
conformity... I'll be free with the traditional language, as you have said
you don't mind it!
Put briefly, in Christian mysticism, the intellect (understood in a
different sense to Pirsig) ascends to an awareness of God first by a
'cataphatic' affirmation of all the different ways we can describe God
(all-knowing, all-good, discovered in the world etc - the 'ten thousand
things'), then by a denial of those things (apophatic denial part one: so
God is not all-knowing, God is not all-good, God cannot be seen in the
world), then by a denial of the denial (apophatic denial part two: God
cannot be grasped by the intellect, even to say 'God is not' is too much to
claim. Here our 'reason' reaches its end and we get stuck in 'nothing'). The
soul can only be carried through this 'cloud of unknowing' or 'dark night of
the soul' if it is carried by love; if that happens - and it cannot be
achieved or controlled by the self - then the person is transformed, by
grace, to take part in the divine nature as a 'child of God'.
First I need to explain more about 'cataphatic' and 'apophatic'. They are
theological terms used for talk about God. Cataphatic simply means
'affirmative' and apophatic means 'negative', so whenever we say something
positive about God we are saying something in the cataphatic approach to
God, and whenever we say the opposite (or deny knowledge) we're using the
apophatic. As it happens, they can't be understood separately from one
another.
But that is to make it much too mundane and academic. To be cataphatic,
theological language must seek to 'overcome itself' - rise, like the best
poetry, above the conventional and banal and stretch language out to its
boundaries, if not beyond. It's a profusion, a babbling, it's what happens
when you've experienced something wonderful and try to communicate it - you
try one description, which half works and half doesn't, so you try another
one, which again half works and half doesn't, and you keep on trying,
building up great cascades of metaphors to try and put across the sense of
what you have experienced. When that is exhausted, you get to the
interesting stage. For in that cataphatic babbling, you need to use
metaphorical language in a sort of dialectic - so you say, God is light,
then you say God is darkness, then you combine them to say that God is a
dazzling darkness - ALL of which really counts in the 'cataphatic', even if
there is negative (ie apophatic) language within it.
The apophatic stage proper begins once this 'bubbling over' has come to an
end, because first we realise that anything we say about God breaks down, so
we cannot use language, and then we realise that the desire to try and
'grasp' God's nature is in itself the problem - for to try and 'grasp' God's
nature is in itself to try and put ourselves 'above' God, to 'dominate'
God - and that is one of the most subtle forms of idolatry.
So this true apophatic stage involves two 'dark nights' - one to break down
our intellectual pretensions, when we realise that we cannot say anything
about God. God defeats everything that we can say, so we must shut up. And
then the second dark night is the 'dark night of the soul', when we undergo
the more spiritually interesting transformation, if we are carried by grace.
This is the abandonment of our own 'will', and the acceptance of the divine
will. At this point - if we are 'graced' - then our 'nature' is changed, the
'stain' of the Fall is removed, and so we are 'supernaturally' able to act
in a God-like fashion, born again as a child of God - when we're not in
control, we 'let DQ happen in us', or 'let the Tao flow through us'; we
submit to the will of God.
BTW a fuller description of 'supernatural' might be helpful. Originally
'supernatural' meant specifically this transformation of human nature by
grace, where human nature was seen as inherently corrupted by Sin. So
'supernatural' meant simply the fulfilment of a person's own original
nature, the removal of sin, and therefore the capacity to act according to
God's will. There was nothing 'magical' about it, in the sense of having
special powers like Superman - the person is still just as much a human
being as you and me. This was corrupted during the thirteenth century,
towards a more 'magical' account, and then the Newtonian revolution sealed
that changed understanding because it fitted nicely with its own
preconceptions (as you would expect - they had a common origin in 12th C
theology). I would guess that most people today, whether believers or
otherwise, see 'supernatural' in the modern sense as one of the essential
marks of Christian belief - that there are all these 'higher powers'
floating around, that Jesus was a 'wonder-worker', with miracles understood
as an 'intervention' within some Newtonian-like stable system. Christianity
is all about *this* world, as I understand it.
So - to return to the Christian mystical path. It's really all about
becoming faithful, ie allowing God to work through you without your ego or
other hang ups getting in the way. Crucially (and this is why I bang on
about 'tradition' all the time in the forum) it is possible to judge (most
of the time) if someone is genuinely on the mystical path or not. And that
is because the fruits of that path will show forth in their life. If they
genuinely become more compassionate, loving, nurturing etc - ie more like
Christ - then they become acknowledged as people who have journeyed along
the way. If they pay no attention to questions of social justice, and
instead waffle on about being 'plugged in to the divine current' ;-) or some
other description of their 'experience' then all they are doing is revealing
their self-absorption and ego-gratification. This is why mystics like Teresa
of Avila pay so little attention to their 'showings' or 'mystical moments'
or 'mystical experiences' - that's not the point of the path, and it's one
of the last idols to be overcome. (Teresa at one point complains to God
about giving her too many 'experiences' because she has a lot of letters to
write, and they're getting in the way).
Of course, this is what you might call the 'ideal' or 'essential' form of
Christianity - it may or may not bear any relation to what you have
experienced in particular churches. Too often the church just becomes a
level 3 organisation geared around its own reproduction from age to age, and
as such it becomes Pharisaical (in the New Testament sense) - and it doesn't
like people pointing this out. And crucially, these level 3 organisations
generate particular conceptions of God which provide them with affirmation -
variations of the bearded man in the sky, either nice or nasty, and getting
involved in the affairs of the earth in particular ways and means, normally
in a way that boosts the egoes of those in the church (which could be
masochistic egoes of course, not necessarily 'prideful' ones).
That conception of God is wholly bound by level 3 understandings, and indeed
the richest teachings in Christian history depend upon a rejection of that
understanding. The first and most important thing to remember in Christian
teaching about God - from the early fathers, through Augustine and Aquinas
and on into St John of the Cross - is that God is beyond our understanding,
radically so. One of my favourite theologians, Denys Turner, speaking of
what we might call 'level 3 atheists', ie those who deny what I've just
described, writes "such atheists are, as it were, but theologians in an
arrested condition of denial: in the sense in which atheists of this sort
say God 'does not exist', the atheist has merely arrived at the theological
starting point. Theologians of the classical traditions, an Augustine, a
Thomas Aquinas or a Meister Eckhart, simply agree about the disposing of
idolatries, and then proceed with the proper business of doing theology."
The key, to my mind, is encapsulated in one of my favourite Wittgenstein
quotations: 'To believe in God is to believe that life has meaning'. If
you're still searching then you still find the world meaningful, and then
you probably are in that cloud of unknowing, and all you can do is wait for
a moment of grace (like the rest of us :-) ) Of course, that cloud of
unknowing can last a very long time - it depends on how 'ego-bound' our
understandings are - but the way through, I would say, is through accepting
the 'gift' of our present existence. We must learn to live without an answer
to the question 'why?' (Someone once said, life is not a question to be
answered but a mystery to be lived. That pretty much sums it up. Except that
Christians would say that the mystery has a human face.)
I've put all this in some detail because I want to get away from the sense
that I'm trying to defend the 'church' - understood as the level 3 social
organisation, as opposed to the 'tradition', by which I mean the teachings
of people like Augustine or John of the Cross. Despite denials, you still
seem to be equating me with someone defending level 3 social structures, not
the level 4/5 teachings.
And the answer to your final question is yes (did you expect otherwise?).
But it's not that important.
Sam
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