I believe that all the world's religions share, at their core, a desire to find a transporting metaphor1. When you want to attain2 communion with God, what you're really trying to do is move away from the worldly into the eternal (from the village to the forest, you might say, keeping with the theme of the antevasin) and you need some kind of magnificent idea to convey you there. It has be a big one, this metaphor--really big and magic and powerful, because it needs to carry you across a mighty3 distance. It has to be the biggest boat imaginable.
Religious rituals often develop out of mystical experimentation4. Some brave scout5 goes looking for a new path to the divine, has a transcendent experience and returns home a prophet. He or she brings back to the community tales of heaven and maps of how to get there. Then others repeat the words, the works, the prayers, or the acts of this prophet, in order to cross over, too. Sometimes this is successful--sometimes the same familiar combination of syllables6 and devotional practices repeated generation after generation might carry many people to the other side. Sometimes it doesn't work, though. Inevitably7 even the most original new ideas will eventually harden into dogma or stop working for everybody.
The Indians around here tell a cautionary fable8 about a great saint who was always surrounded in his Ashram by loyal devotees. For hours a day, the saint and his followers9 would meditate10 on God. The only problem was that the saint had a young cat, an annoying creature, who used to walk through the temple meowing and purring and bothering everyone during meditation11. So the saint, in all his practical wisdom, commanded that the cat be tied to a pole outside for a few hours a day, only during meditation, so as to not disturb anyone. This became a habit--tying the cat to the pole and then meditating12 on God--but as years passed, the habit hardened into religious ritual. Nobody could meditate unless the cat was tied to the pole first. Then one day the cat died. The saint's followers were panic-stricken. It was a major religious crisis--how could they meditate now, without a cat to tie to a pole? How would they reach God? In their minds, the cat had become the means.
Be very careful, warns this tale, not to get too obsessed13 with the repetition of religious ritual just for its own sake. Especially in this divided world, where the Taliban and the Christian14 Coalition15 continue to fight out their international trademark16 war over who owns the rights to the word God and who has the proper rituals to reach that God, it may be useful to remember that it is not the tying of the cat to the pole that has ever brought anyone to transcendence, but only the constant desire of an individual seeker to experience the eternal compassion17 of the divine. Flexibility18 is just as essential for divinity as is discipline.
Your job, then, should you choose to accept it, is to keep searching for the metaphors19, rituals and teachers that will help you move ever closer to divinity. The Yogic scriptures20 say that God responds to the sacred prayers and efforts of human beings in any way whatsoever21 that mortals choose to worship--just so long as those prayers are sincere. As one line from the Upanishads suggests: "People follow different paths, straight or crooked22, according to their temperament23, depending on which they consider best, or most appropriate--and all reach You, just as rivers enter the ocean."
The other objective of religion, of course, is to try to make sense of our chaotic24 world and explain the inexplicabilities we see playing out here on earth every day: the innocent suffer, the wicked are rewarded--what are we to make of all this? The Western tradition says, "It'll all get sorted out after death, in heaven and hell." (All justice to be doled25 out, of course, by what James Joyces used to call the "Hangman God"--a paternal26 figure who sits upon His strict seat of judgment27 punishing the evil and rewarding the good.) Over in the East, though, the Upanishads shrug28 away any attempt to make sense of the world's chaos29. They're not even so sure that the world is chaotic, but suggest that it may only appear so to us, because of our limited vision. These texts do not promise justice or revenge for anybody, though they do say that there are consequences for every action--so choose your behavior accordingly. You might not see those consequences any time soon, though. Yoga takes the long view, always. Furthermore, the Upanishads suggest that so-called chaos may have an actual divine function, even if you personally can't recognize it right now: "The gods are fond of the cryptic30 and dislike the evident." The best we can do, then, in response to our incomprehensible and dangerous world, is to practice holding equilibrium31 internally--no matter what insanity32 is transpiring33 out there.
Sean, my Yogic Irish dairy farmer, explained it to me this way. "Imagine that the universe is a great spinning engine," he said. "You want to stay near the core of the thing--right in the hub of the wheel--not out at the edges where all the wild whirling takes place, where you get can frayed34 and crazy. The hub of calmness--that's your heart. That's where God lives within you. So stop looking for answers in the world. Just keep coming back to that center and you'll always find peace."
Nothing has ever made more sense to me, spiritually speaking, than this idea. It works for me. And if I ever find anything that works better, I assure you--I will use it.
I have many friends in New York who are not religious people. Most, I would say. Either they fell away from the spiritual teachings of their youth or they never grew up with any God to begin with. Naturally, some of them are a bit freaked out by my newfound efforts to reach holiness. Jokes are made, of course. As my friend Bobby quipped once while he was trying to fix my computer: "No offense35 to your aura, but you still don't know shit about downloading software." I roll with the jokes. I think it's all funny, too. Of course it is.
What I'm seeing in some of my friends, though, as they are aging, is a longing36 to have something to believe in. But this longing chafes37 against any number of obstacles, including their intellect and common sense. Despite all their intellect, though, these people still live in a world that careens about in a series of wild and devastating38 and completely nonsensical lurches. Great and horrible experiences of either suffering or joy occur in the lives of all these people, just as with the rest of us, and these mega-experiences tend to make us long for a spiritual context in which to express either lament39 or gratitude40, or to seek understanding. The problem is--what to worship, whom to pray to?
I have a dear friend whose first child was born right after his beloved mother died. After this confluence41 of miracle and loss, my friend felt a desire to have some kind of sacred place to go, or some ritual to perform, in order to sort through all the emotion. My friend was a Catholic by upbringing, but couldn't stomach returning to the church as an adult. ("I can't buy it anymore," he said, "knowing what I know.") Of course, he'd be embarrassed to become a Hindu or a Buddhist42 or something wacky like that. So what could he do? As he told me, "You don't want to go cherry-picking a religion."
Which is a sentiment I completely respect except for the fact that I totally disagree. I think you have every right to cherry-pick when it comes to moving your spirit and finding peace in God. I think you are free to search for any metaphor whatsoever which will take you across the worldly divide whenever you need to be transported or comforted. It's nothing to be embarrassed about. It's the history of mankind's search for holiness. If humanity never evolved in its exploration of the divine, a lot of us would still be worshipping golden Egyptian statues of cats. And this evolution of religious thinking does involve a fair bit of cherry-picking. You take whatever works from wherever you can find it, and you keep moving toward the light.
The Hopi Indians thought that the world's religions each contained one spiritual thread, and that these threads are always seeking each other, wanting to join. When all the threads are finally woven together they will form a rope that will pull us out of this dark cycle of history and into the next realm. More contemporarily, the Dalai Lama has repeated the same idea, assuring his Western students repeatedly that they needn't become Tibetan Buddhists43 in order to be his pupils. He welcomes them to take whatever ideas they like out of Tibetan Buddhism44 and integrate these ideas into their own religious practices. Even in the most unlikely and conservative of places, you can find sometimes this glimmering45 idea that God might be bigger than our limited religious doctrines46 have taught us. In 1954, Pope Pius XI, of all people, sent some Vatican delegates on a trip to Libya with these written instructions: "Do NOT think that you are going among Infidels. Muslims attain salvation47, too. The ways of Providence48 are infinite."
But doesn't that make sense? That the infinite would be, indeed . . . infinite? That even the most holy amongst us would only be able to see scattered49 pieces of the eternal picture at any given time? And that maybe if we could collect those pieces and compare them, a story about God would begin to emerge that resembles and includes everyone? And isn't our individual longing for transcendence all just part of this larger human search for divinity? Don't we each have the right to not stop seeking until we get as close to the source of wonder as possible? Even if it means coming to India and kissing trees in the moonlight for a while?
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1
metaphor
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| n.隐喻，暗喻 | |
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attain
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| vt.达到，获得，完成 | |
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mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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experimentation
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| n.实验，试验，实验法 | |
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scout
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| n.童子军，侦察员；v.侦察，搜索 | |
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syllables
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| n.音节( syllable的名词复数 ) | |
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inevitably
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| adv.不可避免地；必然发生地 | |
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fable
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| n.寓言；童话；神话 | |
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followers
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| 追随者( follower的名词复数 )； 用户； 契据的附面； 从动件 | |
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meditate
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| v.想，考虑，（尤指宗教上的）沉思，冥想 | |
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meditation
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| n.熟虑，（尤指宗教的）默想，沉思，（pl.）冥想录 | |
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meditating
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| a.沉思的，冥想的 | |
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obsessed
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| adj.心神不宁的,鬼迷心窍的,沉迷的 | |
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Christian
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| adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒 | |
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coalition
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| n.结合体，同盟，结合，联合 | |
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trademark
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| n.商标；特征；vt.注册的…商标 | |
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compassion
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| n.同情，怜悯 | |
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flexibility
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| n.柔韧性，弹性，（光的）折射性，灵活性 | |
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metaphors
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| 隐喻( metaphor的名词复数 ) | |
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scriptures
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| 经文，圣典( scripture的名词复数 )； 经典 | |
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whatsoever
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| adv.（用于否定句中以加强语气）任何；pron.无论什么 | |
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crooked
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| adj.弯曲的；不诚实的，狡猾的，不正当的 | |
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temperament
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| n.气质，性格，性情 | |
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chaotic
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| adj.混沌的，一片混乱的，一团糟的 | |
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doled
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| 救济物( dole的过去式和过去分词 )； 失业救济金 | |
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paternal
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| adj.父亲的，像父亲的，父系的，父方的 | |
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judgment
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| n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见 | |
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shrug
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| v.耸肩(表示怀疑、冷漠、不知等) | |
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chaos
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| n.混乱，无秩序 | |
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cryptic
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| adj.秘密的，神秘的，含义模糊的 | |
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equilibrium
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| n.平衡，均衡，相称，均势，平静 | |
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insanity
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| n.疯狂，精神错乱；极端的愚蠢，荒唐 | |
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transpiring
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| （事实，秘密等）被人知道( transpire的现在分词 )； 泄露； 显露； 发生 | |
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frayed
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| adj.磨损的v.（使布、绳等）磨损，磨破( fray的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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offense
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| n.犯规，违法行为；冒犯，得罪 | |
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longing
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| n.（for）渴望 | |
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chafes
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| v.擦热（尤指皮肤）( chafe的第三人称单数 )；擦痛；发怒；惹怒 | |
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devastating
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| adj.毁灭性的，令人震惊的，强有力的 | |
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lament
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| n.悲叹，悔恨，恸哭；v.哀悼，悔恨，悲叹 | |
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gratitude
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| adj.感激，感谢 | |
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confluence
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| n.汇合，聚集 | |
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Buddhist
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| adj./n.佛教的，佛教徒 | |
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Buddhists
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| n.佛教徒( Buddhist的名词复数 ) | |
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Buddhism
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| n.佛教（教义） | |
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glimmering
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| n.微光，隐约的一瞥adj.薄弱地发光的v.发闪光，发微光( glimmer的现在分词 ) | |
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doctrines
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| n.教条( doctrine的名词复数 )；教义；学说；（政府政策的）正式声明 | |
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salvation
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| n.（尤指基督）救世，超度，拯救，解困 | |
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providence
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| n.深谋远虑，天道，天意；远见；节约；上帝 | |
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scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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spotlight
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| n.公众注意的中心，聚光灯，探照灯，视听，注意，醒目 | |
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