A long weekend, cloudy and wet, has descended into sleet and snow and freezing rain. Add a nasty little cold virus to that, and you have the perfect ingredients for kicking back in the lounger and reading.
And so I did, putting aside until last night the philosophically heavy book, What is God, by Jacob Needleman, for a lighter read, Caravan of No Despair, by Mirabai Starr. The latter starts off with a real kicker: Mirabai is waiting with concerned relatives and friends for reports on her bi-polar 15-year-old adopted daughter, who the night before had taken off in the car and disappeared into the night. Just then, the editor's edition of her first publication, a translation of St John of the Cross's work concerning enlightenment and the "Dark Night of the Soul," arrives by special delivery. She is congratulated by all. Half an hour later, the police arrive, telling her that her daughter is dead from a car crash. She falls to the ground in grief. If one knows anything about the Dark Night, when God itself leaves the seeker to nothing, one cannot avoid the spooky coincidence. We know where the author is going. We are hooked for the ride.
What follows next is a fascinating and disturbing story of her childhood - of her Long Island Jewish parents suddenly leaving all behind in the late 60's for the hippy life; of growing up in the Taos commune, where a mom leaves out a pitcher of ice tea unknown to all but the mom to be laced with LSD, which gives Mirabai an uncomfortable insanity that re-occurs throughout her life; where she is left to hitch around the South West as an adolescent girl, going from commune to commune learning about Zen and Hindu gurus and chi, and every other New Age philosophy under the sun. Where she is taken in by a charlatan and seduced, who some years later she marries and remains with for 8 unfulfilled years. Of new attachments, of finally finding the right man, of a growing career as a writer of esoteric literature, and as a lecturer. Of knowing just about every spiritual leader of our age, with a personal attachment to the famous Baba Ram Das (Dr Richard Alpert). Where one, such as myself, finds oneself glad that one was never fully entranced and embraced by the hippie life that seemed, at one point, to be so marvelous.
But then it comes back to the death, and to St John of the Cross. It is common to talk of this now, as if everyone has been through it, as if it were a part of the normal cycle of crises in our lives, but Mirabai makes it clear that this is not so. As his translator, she knew the words, and as far as most of us can go, also the meaning behind St John's words, but she did not understand them until the death of her daughter It is not until then that she grasps the complete loss of faith, of hope, of every knowable attachment to God or the Beyond or any other religious or fashionable way we might present this mysterious other. Then, there is nothing; then there is only the facade of knowledge, cheap icing on a cheap cake that does nothing for our real hunger and need. And then, of course, she goes into recovery, where she recognizes something else.
Her writing style and self-presentation are almost too New - Agey, but it is worth the read - she does hit the point of the Dark Night. It is not a fun place to be. There is no hope, no bargaining, no return from it. One is left in ashes. Of course, it is the meaning of every tradition from the sphinx to the Crucifixion, in one way or another, but all those, in the end, are only words or pictures or visions. One has to be there, and when one is, one doesn't want to be there. It is not, in this dark place, anything like the final phase of the noble crusade of life. Some of us have been there already - not I, thank God, but I have known others who have, who have lost children and who have been absolutely shattered. I cannot understand, in being close to them, how they can survive, but they do. For Mirabai, she pieces together the tattered bits of her New Age philosophy and trudges on, now, however, ever mindful of the emptiness that knows no consolation. In it is, yes, mystery, but also a necessary loss of at least part of the soul. It speaks of emptiness - it tells us that heaven or Nirvana or Paradise might not be fountains and willing virgins, but something so utterly alien that we cannot live with it; cannot live with it, just as Moses could not live if he were to look directly at the light of God.
And so, coincidentally, I finished that book and continued to nearly the end last night of What is God? And here, we find, that Needleman is talking of the same thing; that God is not anything at all what we can imagine, so much so that we might as well be atheists, for their is nothing to say about IT, nothing to believe about IT that is truly representative. Except, I am coming to read, letting go of the "me" for the "I am." "I am" fully embraced, with mind, body and heart, Needleman tells us, leads us to humility, which is an opening to everyone and everything else. It is a forgetting of the "me" in a total embrace of being. I will read the final words tonight, but it is clear that he, too, is pointing towards a Dark Night, where all must be lost to be gained, as every great religion has always told us. But, when we see what this is through death, we know that this Night really does take everything - all we understood of comfort, of love, of God, of what is or might be. No wonder we bury our heads in our illusions to hide from this. But to seek is not all foolishness, for we cannot remain with our heads in the sand forever. We are, one way or another, going to know.
One last question: did those of the past, whose belief in their religion was absolute and unchallenged, have this Dark Night on their death beds? Or did they go with their beliefs and visions right past the veil of mortality? It is of utmost importance to know, for the reason for human existence might lie in the answer. Perhaps something of an answer might come to us in the future. FK
And so I did, putting aside until last night the philosophically heavy book, What is God, by Jacob Needleman, for a lighter read, Caravan of No Despair, by Mirabai Starr. The latter starts off with a real kicker: Mirabai is waiting with concerned relatives and friends for reports on her bi-polar 15-year-old adopted daughter, who the night before had taken off in the car and disappeared into the night. Just then, the editor's edition of her first publication, a translation of St John of the Cross's work concerning enlightenment and the "Dark Night of the Soul," arrives by special delivery. She is congratulated by all. Half an hour later, the police arrive, telling her that her daughter is dead from a car crash. She falls to the ground in grief. If one knows anything about the Dark Night, when God itself leaves the seeker to nothing, one cannot avoid the spooky coincidence. We know where the author is going. We are hooked for the ride.
What follows next is a fascinating and disturbing story of her childhood - of her Long Island Jewish parents suddenly leaving all behind in the late 60's for the hippy life; of growing up in the Taos commune, where a mom leaves out a pitcher of ice tea unknown to all but the mom to be laced with LSD, which gives Mirabai an uncomfortable insanity that re-occurs throughout her life; where she is left to hitch around the South West as an adolescent girl, going from commune to commune learning about Zen and Hindu gurus and chi, and every other New Age philosophy under the sun. Where she is taken in by a charlatan and seduced, who some years later she marries and remains with for 8 unfulfilled years. Of new attachments, of finally finding the right man, of a growing career as a writer of esoteric literature, and as a lecturer. Of knowing just about every spiritual leader of our age, with a personal attachment to the famous Baba Ram Das (Dr Richard Alpert). Where one, such as myself, finds oneself glad that one was never fully entranced and embraced by the hippie life that seemed, at one point, to be so marvelous.
But then it comes back to the death, and to St John of the Cross. It is common to talk of this now, as if everyone has been through it, as if it were a part of the normal cycle of crises in our lives, but Mirabai makes it clear that this is not so. As his translator, she knew the words, and as far as most of us can go, also the meaning behind St John's words, but she did not understand them until the death of her daughter It is not until then that she grasps the complete loss of faith, of hope, of every knowable attachment to God or the Beyond or any other religious or fashionable way we might present this mysterious other. Then, there is nothing; then there is only the facade of knowledge, cheap icing on a cheap cake that does nothing for our real hunger and need. And then, of course, she goes into recovery, where she recognizes something else.
Her writing style and self-presentation are almost too New - Agey, but it is worth the read - she does hit the point of the Dark Night. It is not a fun place to be. There is no hope, no bargaining, no return from it. One is left in ashes. Of course, it is the meaning of every tradition from the sphinx to the Crucifixion, in one way or another, but all those, in the end, are only words or pictures or visions. One has to be there, and when one is, one doesn't want to be there. It is not, in this dark place, anything like the final phase of the noble crusade of life. Some of us have been there already - not I, thank God, but I have known others who have, who have lost children and who have been absolutely shattered. I cannot understand, in being close to them, how they can survive, but they do. For Mirabai, she pieces together the tattered bits of her New Age philosophy and trudges on, now, however, ever mindful of the emptiness that knows no consolation. In it is, yes, mystery, but also a necessary loss of at least part of the soul. It speaks of emptiness - it tells us that heaven or Nirvana or Paradise might not be fountains and willing virgins, but something so utterly alien that we cannot live with it; cannot live with it, just as Moses could not live if he were to look directly at the light of God.
And so, coincidentally, I finished that book and continued to nearly the end last night of What is God? And here, we find, that Needleman is talking of the same thing; that God is not anything at all what we can imagine, so much so that we might as well be atheists, for their is nothing to say about IT, nothing to believe about IT that is truly representative. Except, I am coming to read, letting go of the "me" for the "I am." "I am" fully embraced, with mind, body and heart, Needleman tells us, leads us to humility, which is an opening to everyone and everything else. It is a forgetting of the "me" in a total embrace of being. I will read the final words tonight, but it is clear that he, too, is pointing towards a Dark Night, where all must be lost to be gained, as every great religion has always told us. But, when we see what this is through death, we know that this Night really does take everything - all we understood of comfort, of love, of God, of what is or might be. No wonder we bury our heads in our illusions to hide from this. But to seek is not all foolishness, for we cannot remain with our heads in the sand forever. We are, one way or another, going to know.
One last question: did those of the past, whose belief in their religion was absolute and unchallenged, have this Dark Night on their death beds? Or did they go with their beliefs and visions right past the veil of mortality? It is of utmost importance to know, for the reason for human existence might lie in the answer. Perhaps something of an answer might come to us in the future. FK
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