On the road - in religious mythologies (no pejorative - myths are a proto-poetic means of transmitting information which cannot be conveyed in ordinary style), travel is often a central theme. Lao Tsu, the man from whom Taoism was derived, left the courts of China to wander the back-places and wilderness, into which he disappeared. Gautama Buddha left his home to wander among the people and fast in the wilderness in search of enlightenment. Moses and the tribes of Israel wandered in the desert for 40 years (or so I recall), Abraham left Ur for a promised land by the distant Mediterranean, St Paul wandered the Arabian desert for inspiration, John the Baptist roamed the desert, and on and on. It most such cases, the Road was the material shadow of the spiritual quest - of purification, far apart from the contamination of quotidian human realities. The body had to be hardened to suffering - to want - while the mind had to be freed from the deafening roar of social law, custom and prosaic desires and conflicts. Most importantly, the desire for freedom - for God or ultimate reality - had to be honed and strengthened to overcome everything else the brain and body craved in its human shell.
Thus we come back to Lent again, which mimics Jesus's wandering fast for 40 days in the desert. My first real thought about this was: how can anyone go without food, never mind water, for 40 days? The answer might be that "40" was not the correct day count, but only a reflection of the magic the Hebrews put into that number (numbers in the older civilizations have always had magical connotations, as they do to a degree today. Ask any gambler). Or it might be that he fasted for 40 days, like the Muslims on Ramadan, but was allowed to eat and drink at night (although there would be little for him in the desert). Or it could be that his divinity and purity allowed for this.
I don't know, but it might be important, for one of the greatest lessons that Christians are taught during Lent is that "man does not live by bread alone," which was Jesus's response to Satan when he was tempted with food and water during his fast. He was also offered the power over all the kingdoms of the Earth if he would worship Satan, and of course refused that as well, the meaning being that Spirit, or God, should always come first. Man needs bread, but first he needs spirit - he cannot survive without either, and of the two, spirit is by far the most important.
It is this that we are told from the lectern - place God first in your life. Worship not Mammon. The bread you need will come after. Or will it?
In one of the Gospels, Jesus is able to take a few baskets of fish and bread and feed thousands. Modern apologists have said, "well, he prevailed upon the people to share all that they had brought," but I don't think so. The people in general were hungry because they had not prepared for so long a meeting; the few who had come with something could not possibly feed the thousands who had not. In another Gospel, Jesus tells his listeners that they should not worry about tomorrow's bread :for look at the sparrow - he neither reaps nor sows, but is cared for by his heavenly father; how much more beloved are you? - But how can this be? Certainly, if Jesus is God, he could create all the food he wants. But what of us? We know that if we do not sow or reap that we will go hungry. In more austere societies, we would simply die. It has happened as it is happening now, not only to sin-stained adults, but to thousands of little children. Could their faith feed them?
In the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve lived off the fruits in the garden - we know they ate of them, because of the infamous fruit from the Tree of Knowledge. In the dark caves of the Himalaya, however, we are told that certain very holy anchorites live off of nothing but sun and air. Some European travelers have attested to this as well as they might, and certainly such people can and have gone 40 days without food - or at least for longer periods than most of us can. It is also a certainty that some of these people are able to generate intense heat from their bodies to keep from freezing in the high altitudes. This is a fact - but this might be due to an awakening of a certain metabolic process that is active in most warm-blooded animals. Your dog, for instance, is only somewhat protected by its coat. Much of its heat comes from the body cranking up its metabolism. Anthropologists have said the same of traditional Eskimos and Australian Aborigines. Could the ability to go long periods without food, and live with very little, be a body adaptation? And could it be learned, as the heating of the body apparently can be?
Probably so. But we (it is all my fault, I know) drift from the original message in all this - that God will take care of all those with sufficient faith. Again, the vicars tell us that this is all about what we place FIRST in our life, spirit or Mammon. But there is an insistence here in the Gospels, just as there is the continuing echo of this from the religions of the East: God, or Spirit, is enough. After that, all else will be supplied.
It is very hard to test this belief, for, if it is treated logically, it falls into tautology; that is, if one fasts and lives, he has sufficient faith; if he does not live, he did not have enough faith. As it is a good bet that all who are reading this could not live without food and water, we might say that all of us lacked perfect faith. That is probably so. But if you did have perfect faith, would all fall to you? Does perfect faith enable one to rise above what we understand to be the laws of nature?
Again, it is an important question, and not just for the spectacle of the incredible fasting sage. It appears from the Christian Gospels themselves, as well as from other religious traditions, that a certain degree of faith - or facility of spirit - can free one not only from soul suffering, but from all suffering. Faith in this context is not a simple relinquishment of one's will to God, but a move of inner reality to total spirit, even as the body continues to exist. With this move, we are told, all our physical needs will be met. We will, essentially, be living by the laws of another reality even as we exist in this one. Countless witnesses of saints, holy men, and shamans have attested to miracles in their presence - from St Francis levitating, to miraculous healings, to prescience - to all manner of things that should not be able to happen. This, I believe, was what Jesus was telling us - that, as Mohamed said, Faith can move Mountains. In this, the symbol and metaphor are one in the same as reality - when they are accompanied by sufficient faith or immersion in the reality of spirit. That is the new evolutionary plane that the Sci Fi writers, as well as some great theological thinkers, are referring to. Not just pie in the sky - which might be good enough - but the real thing. How much more loved are you than the sparrow? FK
Thus we come back to Lent again, which mimics Jesus's wandering fast for 40 days in the desert. My first real thought about this was: how can anyone go without food, never mind water, for 40 days? The answer might be that "40" was not the correct day count, but only a reflection of the magic the Hebrews put into that number (numbers in the older civilizations have always had magical connotations, as they do to a degree today. Ask any gambler). Or it might be that he fasted for 40 days, like the Muslims on Ramadan, but was allowed to eat and drink at night (although there would be little for him in the desert). Or it could be that his divinity and purity allowed for this.
I don't know, but it might be important, for one of the greatest lessons that Christians are taught during Lent is that "man does not live by bread alone," which was Jesus's response to Satan when he was tempted with food and water during his fast. He was also offered the power over all the kingdoms of the Earth if he would worship Satan, and of course refused that as well, the meaning being that Spirit, or God, should always come first. Man needs bread, but first he needs spirit - he cannot survive without either, and of the two, spirit is by far the most important.
It is this that we are told from the lectern - place God first in your life. Worship not Mammon. The bread you need will come after. Or will it?
In one of the Gospels, Jesus is able to take a few baskets of fish and bread and feed thousands. Modern apologists have said, "well, he prevailed upon the people to share all that they had brought," but I don't think so. The people in general were hungry because they had not prepared for so long a meeting; the few who had come with something could not possibly feed the thousands who had not. In another Gospel, Jesus tells his listeners that they should not worry about tomorrow's bread :for look at the sparrow - he neither reaps nor sows, but is cared for by his heavenly father; how much more beloved are you? - But how can this be? Certainly, if Jesus is God, he could create all the food he wants. But what of us? We know that if we do not sow or reap that we will go hungry. In more austere societies, we would simply die. It has happened as it is happening now, not only to sin-stained adults, but to thousands of little children. Could their faith feed them?
In the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve lived off the fruits in the garden - we know they ate of them, because of the infamous fruit from the Tree of Knowledge. In the dark caves of the Himalaya, however, we are told that certain very holy anchorites live off of nothing but sun and air. Some European travelers have attested to this as well as they might, and certainly such people can and have gone 40 days without food - or at least for longer periods than most of us can. It is also a certainty that some of these people are able to generate intense heat from their bodies to keep from freezing in the high altitudes. This is a fact - but this might be due to an awakening of a certain metabolic process that is active in most warm-blooded animals. Your dog, for instance, is only somewhat protected by its coat. Much of its heat comes from the body cranking up its metabolism. Anthropologists have said the same of traditional Eskimos and Australian Aborigines. Could the ability to go long periods without food, and live with very little, be a body adaptation? And could it be learned, as the heating of the body apparently can be?
Probably so. But we (it is all my fault, I know) drift from the original message in all this - that God will take care of all those with sufficient faith. Again, the vicars tell us that this is all about what we place FIRST in our life, spirit or Mammon. But there is an insistence here in the Gospels, just as there is the continuing echo of this from the religions of the East: God, or Spirit, is enough. After that, all else will be supplied.
It is very hard to test this belief, for, if it is treated logically, it falls into tautology; that is, if one fasts and lives, he has sufficient faith; if he does not live, he did not have enough faith. As it is a good bet that all who are reading this could not live without food and water, we might say that all of us lacked perfect faith. That is probably so. But if you did have perfect faith, would all fall to you? Does perfect faith enable one to rise above what we understand to be the laws of nature?
Again, it is an important question, and not just for the spectacle of the incredible fasting sage. It appears from the Christian Gospels themselves, as well as from other religious traditions, that a certain degree of faith - or facility of spirit - can free one not only from soul suffering, but from all suffering. Faith in this context is not a simple relinquishment of one's will to God, but a move of inner reality to total spirit, even as the body continues to exist. With this move, we are told, all our physical needs will be met. We will, essentially, be living by the laws of another reality even as we exist in this one. Countless witnesses of saints, holy men, and shamans have attested to miracles in their presence - from St Francis levitating, to miraculous healings, to prescience - to all manner of things that should not be able to happen. This, I believe, was what Jesus was telling us - that, as Mohamed said, Faith can move Mountains. In this, the symbol and metaphor are one in the same as reality - when they are accompanied by sufficient faith or immersion in the reality of spirit. That is the new evolutionary plane that the Sci Fi writers, as well as some great theological thinkers, are referring to. Not just pie in the sky - which might be good enough - but the real thing. How much more loved are you than the sparrow? FK
RSS Feed