Paradox and Mystery

     This is the second in a series I'm writing on the paradox, mystery, hiddenness, and seeming absence of God.  The first was "Christianity as a Mode of Being."  You may want to read that post first before continuing with this one.

Paradox and Mystery

     One day, some of the brothers came to see Saint Anthony, and among these was Father Joseph.  Wishing to test them, the saint mentioned a text from Holy Scripture, and starting with the youngest, he asked what it meant.  Each brother explained it as best he could, but to each one, the saint said, “you have not found the answer yet.”  Last of all, he asked Father Joseph, “What do you think the text means?”  He replied, “I do not know.”  Then Saint Anthony said, “Truly Father Joseph has found the way, for he said: I do not know.”[1]

The Sayings of the Desert Fathers

     To encounter God—and through encountering God to therefore follow Christ—means to encounter the twin pillars of mystery and paradox.  God is mystery.  He is both known and not known.  He is One and yet Trinity.  He is immanent, and yet He transcends all.  He is fully human, and fully divine.  Because of these things, He is also paradoxical.

     To be Christian also means that we cease following a religion, for the truth is that Christ is the end of religion.  This is why Christianity is not a religion, and a “religionless Christianity”[2]—to use the words of Boenhoffer—is the only way to fully follow Christ.  Religion implies a belief system.  It is the pagan impulse that is so prevalent in our human, fallen condition.

     If it is not a belief system, then what does following Christ mean?  Unfortunately, “following Christ” today means “studying” the Bible on a regular basis, becoming a “prayer warrior”, or engaging in any of the many clichéd “experiences” you can have or groups you can belong to at any number of fundamentalist churches.

     But this is not the way to truly follow Christ.

     Following Christ means, first and foremost, encountering the God of mystery and paradox—the God that is Mystery and Paradox—and then to live this encounter in the world, and through living this paradoxical encounter, to be paradox and mystery.  It is only at this point of being—a being that embraces and yet transcends all that is paradox and mystery—that we can be true to Christ, and it is at this point that he becomes our savior.  He saves us from an idol of God that we have made for ourselves, and he saves us from the philosophies that attempt to usurp this pagan idol-worship, but in the end only mire us in an attempt at life that ultimately rejects Christ.

     By embracing paradox fully, an ironic thing happens.  In a sense, it ceases to be paradox, for it no longer presents us with a problem that needs to be solved.  But it never ceases being mystery.  In fact, the further we enter into an encounter with God, the deeper the mystery tends to be—utterly and forever fathomless.

     And this Mystery that we encounter, and then live through and in, pervades everything that is our life, and everything that Christianity offers to us, and to the world that Christ has saved.

     This happens at many levels, and in many ways.

     The first way—and perhaps it is not the first way for everyone, but I think it tends to be—is that mystery pervades life, and by this I mean that it pervades our human existence, an existence that we would have previously encountered as an existential angst and pull.  When mystery enters into our existence, we cease searching for answers, or searching for satisfaction, or searching for meaning that we thought we would find in Christianity to begin with.

     In this encounter with mystery and existence, we are free to be ourselves, we are free to finally be human.  (And to be fully human is to enter into Christ’s way, and to become divine.)  We are free to not know.  We are free to be broken, and not pretend that we were ever anything else.  This is the true salvation that Christ offers.

     Our brokenness is not something to hide from.  It is not something that prevents us from “achieving” salvation—although I understand this is often how it’s presented.  In fact, our brokenness is the very thing that saves us.

     It is often thought that Christ loves us—and therefore God loves us—in spite of our brokenness.  But I don’t think this is true.  Our brokenness only doesn’t save us when we don’t admit it, when we don’t embrace it as the very fact of existing.

     This failure to admit brokenness—and therefore fail to encounter the God of seeming paradox in this instance—was the very sin that the Pharisees are guilty of in the gospels.  Repeatedly in the gospel stories, our savior hangs out with sinners of the worst sort, but he never berates them for what they are.  In fact, it seems that he is almost lackadaisical about just how broken they truly are.

     Personally, I never really thought enough about this as a path to salvation until I was reading a passage from the Russian martyr-saint Pavel Florensky[3]:

     “Why did Christ love so much the society of harlots and publicans?  Just imagine—these were real harlots who would fight, conduct indecent talks, and swear…  and Christ preferred their company to that of the Pharisees.  Just think, why is it said that the ‘power of God is performed in poverty’?  Poverty is not only weakness, not some poetic sickness like tuberculosis, but sinfulness, defilement.  Christ was with sinners not because they needed him more, but because, for Him, it was more pleasant to be with them; he loved them for their simplicity and humbleness.”[4]

     It was more pleasant to be with them; and it is more pleasant for Christ to be with us—in a real, palpable sense; mysterious yet utterly real—when we too admit our brokenness, actually get in touch with how broken we are.

     When our brokenness becomes real to us, so does God become real to us, and so does Mystery become real in ways that no words can ever do justice.

     For Mystery to pervade our life, and for God to become an ever-present state of being, I think that something else must occur: we must often enter into our faith slowly through a process of doubt.[5]

     Now, I’m not saying here that conversion happens through a process of doubt.  In fact, I think that true conversion has little to do with weighing all of the rational arguments for and against God.  No, our initial conversion when it is true—and by true I mean that it is not contrived, but rather it is a deep pull, a longing of the heart—is centered in the heart, when we encounter things such as truth, beauty, love, and mystery.

     When I think about initial conversion[6], I am often reminded of the story of how Russia was converted to the Orthodox Catholic faith.  To those who are Orthodox, it’s a common enough story.  For others reading, I think it bears repeating[7]:

     Prince Vladimir of Kiev and of all of Rus wanted to find a religion to unite his imperial court. Any religion would do. He just wanted to find the right one. So he did what a good ruler would do—he took emissaries from the royal court and sent them out and said, “Find out about all the religions out there and come back and tell me which one is best, and that’s the one we’ll use.”

      They went out and visited many different religions, many different forms of Christianity. Christianity was not yet firmly divided in the way we think of it today, but there were already longstanding schisms by the time of the conversion of Russia. We often think of the Great Schism as being the schism between the Roman West and Constantinopolitan East. But this was a late schism, much sadder. More divisive schisms had happened long ago—schisms, for example, at the time of Chalcedon (451 A.D.). Schisms which, lest you think history is all in the past, still divide us today in 2010. Lord, have mercy.

    So he sent out his emissaries and they visited here and there. By one tradition, they went to the Islamic court, asked about Islam, and wrote back to Vladimir and said, “It’s a nice religion, but they don’t allow alcohol, and this would never go over with Russians.” They went to Germany, Europe and throughout the world.

     One group of envoys went to Constantinople. This is what they wrote in their own words, “When we stood in the temple [this is Hagia Sophia where you can still go today, the Church of Holy Wisdom], we hardly knew whether we were in heaven or on earth. For in truth it seems impossible to behold such glory and such magnificence on earth. We could not possibly relate to you what we saw in that place. But one thing we know, there God dwells among men, and all the worship of other countries is to us, forevermore, as nothing. We cannot forget that beauty which we saw. Whoever has enjoyed so sweet a sight will never be satisfied with anything else; nor will we consent to remain any longer in paganism as we are now.”

     We cannot forget that beauty.

     It was not some system of catechesis that converted the Russian people, nor was it some long-winded diatribe—as you might find at your average fundamentalist church on any given Sunday morning—but it was beauty.

     But after that initial, genuine conversion, then what?  This is where entering into faith slowly through a process of doubt comes into the picture.  This is where a process of doubt allows us to deepen our conversion experience by making it constantly experiential.  We must encounter doubt as a path of not knowing that is deep, abiding, and never settles for shortcuts.

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[1] Adapted from “The Sayings of the Desert Fathers” by Benedicta Ward.

[2] By “religionless Christianity” I certainly don’t mean a “Churchless Christianity.”  What I mean is a Church that loses all sense of paganism (see my previous post on Christianity as a way of being).

[3] Florensky was a martyr that was killed under Russian communist yoke in 1943.  His thoughts should have a wider readership, but he is little known to the Christian world outside of the Orthodox Church.

[4] From “Salt of the Earth,” pg 16.

[5] I am borrowing this phrase from the Czech—and Roman Catholic—priest Tomas Halik.  He writes of this in his book “Night of the Confessor,” chapter 5, entitled “Discreet Faith”.

[6] I say initial conversion because we must not think of conversion as something that happens once, and then is done.  (As is so common among “born-again” evangelicals who speak of “being saved” or “knowing our Lord Jesus Christ as our personal savior”.)  Rather, conversion is an ever ongoing, ever deepening relationship with the Triune God.

[7] The story as told here is quoted from Archimandrite Irenei’s “Orthodoxy and Mysticism” which you can find elsewhere on this blog, or you can listen to his series of the same title on Ancient Faith Radio .  For a more in depth account, see Metropolitan Kallistos Ware’s book “The Orthodox Church.”

Orthodoxy and the Noble Eightfold Path, Part One

     What follows in this article is not a syncretic blend of Buddhism and Orthodox Christian spirituality.  However, it does use the Noble Eightfold Path as a guide for living the Orthodox way of life.  And—it must be noted—that the Noble Eightfold Path offers a very good vehicle for transmitting the wisdom of a particular religious tradition, whatever that tradition may be.

     Before we get much further, a little backtracking needs to take place on my part.  So here goes…

     Before I started this blog, I had ideas for several blogs—primarily because I thought I had the ideas for several really cool blog titles.  One of them that I thought had a particularly good ring to it was going to be “From East to East.”  (The other one that I really liked was “Hardcore Christianity: Kick-Ass Asceticism for Orthodox Christians Living in the 21^st Century”—but I digress.)  The blog idea “From East to East” had a particular resonance with me for a couple of reasons.  One, I always enjoyed Eastern philosophy—and still do; I think it has quite a lot to offer modern man.  Two, coming to Orthodoxy from Eastern philosophy, I realize how well the religions of the East (primarily Buddhism and Taoism) actually prepared me for Orthodoxy.  For those who come to Orthodoxy from one of the Western forms of Christianity—whether its Protestantism or Catholicism—there are several stumbling blocks that are difficult for many to get around: the nature of Original Sin, and therefore the meaning of Christ’s atonement, and just what the Paschal mystery actually means; the notion of salvation as an ever-ongoing conversion which will lead us to theosis, to name just a couple.  However, if you had already decided that the Western theological concepts have no (or very little) meaning for you—which you surely must do if you are going to take an interest in the philosophy cum religions of the East—then there aren’t very many stumbling blocks (or at least there are different stumbling blocks) that will prevent you from adopting Orthodoxy’s theological underpinnings.  In fact, you will find a concept such as theosis particularly gratifying and satisfying to your intellectual palate—it seems so close to the Buddhist and Taoist understanding of enlightenment; in fact, theosis is often described as enlightenment.  And third, I knew that my understanding of both Eastern philosophy and Orthodoxy (both which are, I must admit, not that in-depth) could help as a sort of catechesis for those readers who, although they are currently practicing Eastern philosophy, still have a yearning for Christ—whether that yearning may be small or large.

     However, I decided against doing several blogs because I thought that I might not have enough material to regularly update each one.  With that being said, I still want to write the occasional article dealing with the intersection of Far Eastern religions and Eastern Christianity.

     Hence, the article you are staring at on your computer screen.

     Before we get to the meat of this article, and what an Orthodox Eightfold Path would look like, I think it’s important to discuss some of the similarities and the differences between Eastern Christianity and the Buddhist religion.  Here are a few (and perhaps we will discuss these and others in more depth in a future article):

• They are both “practitioner’s religions.”  And I think this may be what can best attract followers of Eastern religions to Orthodoxy compared to other forms of Christianity.  What I mean by a “practitioner’s religion” is that—although both of these religions have beliefs, very different and important beliefs—they are rooted in practice.  Buddhists are expected to meditate regularly, practice mindfulness, and train in compassion (to name a few).  The Orthodox are expected to pray daily (in both a contemplative and discursive manner), fast regularly, practice watchfulness (almost the exact same thing as mindfulness), and engage in other ascetic disciplines.
• Neither of these religions have the goal of “getting saved” as the penultimate achievement.  What turns off many Westerners from the Christianity that they were raised in (or exposed to) is the idea that the goal of being a Christian is to just “accept the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal savior” and then you’re done.  (And then, of course, you can listen to the ongoing debate over “once saved, always saved” and other such nonsense.)  For the Buddhist, “salvation” is achieved by attaining enlightenment.  For the Orthodox Christian, to achieve salvation is to attain theosis, or union with God—nothing else will cut it.  Theosis is similar to enlightenment, except that union is achieved with a Personal God: our Savior, Jesus Christ.
• Both of these religions have a healthy distrust of the self.  In fact, I can think of no other religions—outside of Orthodoxy and Buddhism—that view the notion of the self in such similar ways.  In Western Christianity, for instance, there is often a lot of talk on how you need to get in touch with your inmost self, or discussion that the ultimate good comes from your inner self.  Only Buddhism and Orthodoxy claim that this is a bunch of hogwash.  Buddhism says that you lack an intrinsic, inherently independent self, while Orthodoxy claims that the self is simply not to be trusted, because the Truth is that you are not what you take “your self” to be.  You are not your body.  You are not your mind.  You are your soul.  As Saint Macarius the Great (c. 300- c.390) said, “The heart is such a small vessel; and yet dragons and lions are there, and there poisonous creatures and all the treasures of wickedness; rough, and uneven paths are there, and gaping chasms.”

     Now, before we get into the Eightfold Path, I want to discourage anyone from trying to practice more than one religion at the same time.  It won’t work, and, to be honest, it does a disservice to both religions.  And to back up my point, I offer the following quote, not from an Orthodox theologian, but from the esteemed Buddhist scholar Bikkhu Bodhi:

     “One approach to resolving this problem that is popular today is the eclectic one: to pick and choose from the various traditions whatever seems amenable to our needs, welding together different practices and techniques into a synthetic whole that is personally satisfying. Thus one may combine Buddhist mindfulness meditation with sessions of Hindu mantra recitation, Christian prayer with Sufi dancing, Jewish Kabbala with Tibetan visualization exercises. Eclecticism, however, though sometimes helpful in making a transition from a predominantly worldly and materialistic way of life to one that takes on a spiritual hue, eventually wears thin. While it makes a comfortable halfway house, it is not comfortable as a final vehicle.

     “There are two interrelated flaws in eclecticism that account for its ultimate inadequacy. One is that eclecticism compromises the very traditions it draws upon. The great spiritual traditions themselves do not propose their disciplines as independent techniques that may be excised from their setting and freely recombined to enhance the felt quality of our lives. They present them, rather, as parts of an integral whole, of a coherent vision regarding the fundamental nature of reality and the final goal of the spiritual quest. A spiritual tradition is not a shallow stream in which one can wet one's feet and then beat a quick retreat to the shore. It is a mighty, tumultuous river which would rush through the entire landscape of one's life, and if one truly wishes to travel on it, one must be courageous enough to launch one's boat and head out for the depths.

     “The second defect in eclecticism follows from the first. As spiritual practices are built upon visions regarding the nature of reality and the final good, these visions are not mutually compatible. When we honestly examine the teachings of these traditions, we will find that major differences in perspective reveal themselves to our sight, differences which cannot be easily dismissed as alternative ways of saying the same thing. Rather, they point to very different experiences constituting the supreme goal and the path that must be trodden to reach that goal.”[i]

     I hope that settles that.  Now, on to the Path:

The Orthodox Eightfold Path

     The Eightfold Path has—as the name implies—eight “limbs” to it.  They are: right view, right thoughts, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right concentration.  They are not meant to follow one after another, as steps that you are to climb.  Rather, they are meant more as spokes on a wheel.  Each spoke relies on the other, and the wheel can really only have its full strength when none of the spokes are missing.

Right View

     This is always the first limb on the path.  In fact, without this limb, the other steps on the path will eventually fall apart.

     For the Buddhist, right view would mean the “Four Noble Truths”.  Or, at least, it would mean the Four Noble Truths as a starting point, though it might also contain the “Three Treasures” of the Dharma: non-self, impermanence, and suffering.  If you don’t believe in the Four Noble Truths, along with the “truths” of non-self, impermanence, and suffering, you can’t rightly call yourself a Buddhist.

     For the Orthodox, right view must mean several different things.  First, it means that we have faith in the Creed, which all Orthodox Christians recite at every Divine Liturgy.  In fact, the minimum that is required of anyone wanting to convert to the Orthodox faith is belief in the Creed.

     But the Creed should also be a starting point.  Another thing we need to have for right view is a “Patristic mind.”  For the Orthodox Christian, to put on the “mind of Christ” is also to put on the “mind” of the Holy Fathers of the Church.  And to put on the “mind” of the Fathers of the Church we need to read and study what they had to say—for what they said in the past is not relegated to some bygone era.  Rather, it is actually applicable to our lives in the 21^st century.  The Patristic teachings need to be looked at seriously, then applied to our current lives.

     In addition to the Fathers of the Church, we need a firm foundation in Holy Scripture.  We need to read scripture, realizing that it too speaks to our lives in these modern times.  Saint Tikhon of Zadonsk says, “Whenever you read the Gospel, Christ Himself is speaking to you.  And while you read, you are speaking and talking to Him.”

     In addition to Scripture, Church Fathers, and the beliefs that we hold to be Truth, we also need to study and read as much as possible from many different traditionally Orthodox sources.  In this way, our mind is slowly transformed into a Patristic, Orthodox mind.

Right Thoughts

     “It’s no mystery that thinking can make us happy or miserable.  Let’s say you’re sitting under a tree one fine spring day.  Nothing particular is happening to you, except perhaps the breeze is ruffling your hair, yet in your mind you’re far away.  Maybe you’re remembering another spring day several years back when you were feeling terrible.  You had just lost a job, or failed an exam, or your cat had wandered off.  That memory turns into a worry.  ‘What if I lose my job again?  Why did I ever say such-and-such to so-and-so?  No doubt this or that will happen and I’ll be out on my ear.  Now I’m really in for it!  How will I pay my bills?’  One worry brings up another, which brings up another.  Soon you feel your life is in shambles, but all this while you’ve been sitting under a tree.”[ii]

     When you have the correct view to begin with, your mind will naturally flow into thoughts that are correct.  And when you practice the other steps on the Path, your mind will naturally flow into what is Good and True.  This is another aspect in which Orthodoxy has the “advantage” over other forms of Christianity.  I know many Protestants who believe they have the correct view, but their internal lives do not show the fruit of such beliefs.  They are no more at peace internally than anyone else.  (In fact, I know atheists who are more at peace than many theists.)

     When Orthodoxy is practiced sincerely and fervently—a life rooted in taking part in all of the Sacraments, in other words, a life rooted in the Church,  along with daily prayer—your mind begins to truly change because you change your thoughts.  Change your thoughts and you change your mind.

     But our thoughts also aid in the rest of our lives.  Our thoughts change how we approach Divine Liturgy, for instance.  When we want to participate in the life of the Church, when we believe that the Body and Blood of our Savior are truly found within the Sacrament of communion, then the liturgy becomes divine.

     And the same goes for the rest of our Orthodox lives.  Here are the words of Elder Thaddeus of Vitovnika:

     “Our life depends on the kind of thoughts we nurture. If our thoughts are peaceful, calm, meek, and kind, then that is what our life is like.  If our attention is turned to the circumstances in which we live, we are drawn into a whirlpool of thoughts, and can have neither peace nor tranquility.

      “Everything, both good and evil, comes from our thoughts.  Our thoughts become reality.  Even today we can see that all of creation, everything that exists on earth and in the cosmos, is nothing but Divine thought made material in time and space.  We humans were created in the image of God.  Mankind was given a great gift, but we hardly understand that.  God’s energy and life are in us, but we do not realize it.  Neither do we understand that we greatly influence others with our thoughts.  We can be very good or very evil, depending on the kind of thoughts and desires we breed.

     “If our thoughts are kind, peaceful, and quiet, turned only toward good, then we also influence ourselves and radiate peace all around us—in the family, in our whole country, everywhere.”[iii]

Right Speech

     “Think how often you say to yourself, ‘If only I hadn’t said that,’ or something like, ‘When I saw the look on her face, I knew that what I said had hurt her feelings.’  Wrong speech causes us many problems.  We lie and then get caught in it; we say something nasty about a co-worker and get him into trouble; we speak inconsiderately and offend a client or friend; we spend a whole day in meaningless chatter and get nothing done.”[iv]

     You should notice at this point how right view flows into right thoughts, and right thoughts naturally flow into right speech.  In fact, right speech is nothing more than a natural outflow of the other two.  It’s also why it’s impossible to practice right speech if you’re not first practicing the other two steps.

     Many who were raised in a Protestant upbringing (as I was) may notice that Protestants often behave as if doing something or not doing something (we’ll get around to right action momentarily) or saying something or not saying something somehow makes him or her holy.  However, right speech and right action have nothing holy about them if they are not predicated upon right thoughts.  What does it matter if you say or do something “holy” if your thoughts are not peaceful and kind?

     When outlining the Noble Eightfold Path, the Buddha said that right speech has four qualities: It is always truthful.  It is never malicious or unkind.  It is gentle, not crude or harsh.  It is moderate, not useless or meaningless.[v]

     In Part Two, we will conclude with the remaining five steps on the Path.

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[i] “The Noble Eightfold Path: The Way to End Suffering” by Bikkhu Bodhi.  The Buddhist Publication Society

[ii] “Eight Mindful Steps to Happiness: Walking the Buddha’s Path,” by Bhante Henepola Gunaratana.  Gunaratana translates the second step on the Path as “skillful thinking.”

[iii] “Our Thoughts Determine Our Lives: The Life and Teachings of Elder Thaddeus of Vitovnika.” 

[iv] “Eight Mindful Steps to Happiness: Walking the Buddha’s Path,” by Bhante Henepola Gunaratana.

[v] ibid