Making Space for Questions Between a Rock (Fundamentalism) and a Hard Place (Secularism)

Everyone’s so sure these days about God and religion and spirituality. The religious fundamentalists know God, they know the name of God, they know the ways of God, they know the judgments of God, they know who the chosen people of God are and aren’t—self-appointed messengers, they are the voice of God. The atheist fundamentalists know God isn’t, they know the names of all that exists and does not exist, they know the ways of the universe, they know how to judge all—infallibly—in the light of reason, they know anyone who is religious is not a member of the chosen, the enlightened ones—self-appointed iconoclasts, they are the voice of Reason.

But if everybody’s talking (shouting really), who is listening? Listening to other people, to other theories of human existence, to reality itself? To listen requires humility. And that is what is lacking, the humility that recognizes one does not know, that instead of filling up the void with words, a hedge against anxiety, one must sit still and listen. Religious and atheistic fundamentalists, as well as many artists who specialize in ironic distancing, share the same disease: a feeling of absolute certainty about things that cannot be known, a feeling that makes them feel superior to all who do not see or hear or feel reality in the same way they do, whose limited view does not match their limited view exactly.

I have lost all patience with all this absolutism and misdirected chatter incessantly coming from all sides. People are hungry for meaning. They thirst for new ways to imagine and interpret their lives, ways that nourish them and sustain them as they search for ways to live good and meaningful lives. With all this noise and heat coming from the fundamentalists, where is the silence and the light that will show us the way to a new understanding of the complex and mysterious existence we have been born into, a reality that is—whatever you call it—multi-dimensional, at the very least both material and something more than material, something that goes beyond the merely physical?

Let’s stop all the shouting and mutual condemnation. Let’s stop wringing our hands in despair at the state of religious discourse today. Let’s stop taking the easy way out in irony, winks and witticisms that reveal how bored, how above it all, how past it all we are. Instead, let’s get busy and start making space for uncertainty and questions, a space where we befriend silence and practice listening.

Maybe if we can clear a space like that, a place of openness and opening, there will be room for food to grow and springs to burst forth that will nourish the hunger and slake the thirst of those of us who know we do not know and find our way in seeking.
So that’s what I want to do—declare a pox on both their houses, the religious and the anti-religious fundamentalists, and start clearing a space where we can breathe freely, open or eyes, our hearts, our minds in asking questions, genuine questions, about who we are why we’re here, what matter is, what “beyond matter” is, what people mean when they say “God,” what it can mean to say “God” or “spirit” in 2012.

I will try. And I will begin by clearing away some obstacles. I want to dispel certain notions of God that have been dead for centuries but act as if they are still viable. Call them zombie notions of God. Before we can even start listening, we have to rid the world of religious discourse of these zombie ideas and images that suck the life out of every conversation, stop them dead in their tracks.

Coming into the Presence—Elul 3

On Rosh HaShanah and all through the ten days of Repentance through Yom Kippur, we sing and chant, Avinu Malkeinu, Our Father, Our King. We have a host of other metaphors for God in our festival liturgy, too. Witness these we sing when thanking God for remembering the covenant of love with us:

We are your children, you are our father.
We are your servants, you are our master.
We are your heritage, you are our destiny.
We are your flock, you are our shepherd.
We are your vineyard, you are our watchman.
We are the clay, you are the potter.
We are your subjects, you are our king.

Still, Our Father, Our King is the refrain of the Days of Awe. And indeed, these are the two metaphors that permeate and dominate not only the Torah, the writings, and the prophets, but also the Talmud and the Hasidic stories and most of the Jewish tradition, like most of the Christian tradition. They are beautiful, rich, evocative, lovely. God is a loving father, not a slave master. God is a faithful and generous and wise king, not a fickle, bloodthirsty, and foolish one.

It is not the metaphors themselves that are wrong. It is that our world has changed and these metaphors no longer speak to us in the liberating ways they once spoke to our ancestors. They’re dead metaphors. Unfortunately, many of us today no longer even know what having a father present at all means. And very few of us have experienced standing before a king.

Are we just stuck with going to services and praying these words without having a deep understanding of them? Without much of a way to relate to them so that they become meaningful to us? We can use our imaginations to help bring these metaphors back to life, yes. That’s good. But why not use our imaginations with new images so turning toward the Presence during the month of Elul and the Days of Awe is meaningful to us in new ways. Why not ask ourselves, What does it mean today to “Know before whom you stand”? What does it mean to “come into the Presence?” What gives us that experience of standing before someone who or something that existed before we were born, gave us life, sustains us in life, calls us into question, is larger and wiser and in all ways better than we are, showers us with favor, holds over us the power of death, inspires awe and boundless love and speech-defying gratitude in us? What is it that you would bow before, with dignity not servility?

Let Poets Be Our Theologians Now--continued

As we move past the winter solstice, into the increasing light, and toward the beginning of the secular new year, this poem of the Spanish poet Antonio Machado on the creative power of transformation comes to mind:

Last Night As I Was Sleeping

Last night as I was sleeping,
I dreamt—marvelous error!—
that a spring was breaking
out in my heart.
I said: Along which secret aqueduct,
Oh water, are you coming to me,
water of a new life
that I have never drunk?

Last night as I was sleeping,
I dreamt—marvelous error!—
that I had a beehive
here inside my heart.
And the golden bees
were making white combs
and sweet honey
from my old failures.

Last night as I was sleeping,
I dreamt—marvelous error!—
that a fiery sun was giving
light inside my heart.
It was fiery because I felt
warmth as from a hearth,
and sun because it gave light
and brought tears to my eyes.

Last night as I slept,
I dreamt—marvelous error!—
that it was God I had
here inside my heart.

May we be surprised by the transforming power of life in ourselves and in our world in the coming year.

The Name and the Names of God

There is a Jewish practice and a Muslim practice of naming God that together teach us a deep truth about the One.
Jews carry the tradition of the Name that cannot be spoken.  It is the name the high priest once spoke once a year, on Yom Kippur, in the Holy of Holies in the temple in Jerusalem, as he was pleading for God to draw near in mercy.  After the temple was destroyed in 70 AD, the pronunciation of the Name was lost.  Only the letters remain, Yud, Heh, Vav, Heh.  These four, the Tetragrammaton, stand as mute witness to the Ineffability of God, the Unity of God that transcends all thought and speech and calls into question all our thought and speech about God.  In daily practice Jews have two ways of  remembering this pointer to the Ineffability of God.  When the letters Yud, Heh, Vav, Heh appear in the Torah, we say “Adonai,” Lord—at once giving God a name while remembering that we do not possess the Name of God.  When one wants to refer to God in daily speech, to thank or bless or reflect on the One, one says “HaShem, “the Name.” The startling paradox of naming God “The Name” is a potent reminder that we do not have power over the One, nor can we limit the Limitless One (the Ein Sof of the Kabbalists). for to name is to limit, saying, You have these qualities and not others; you have this aspect of being and not others. The practice of The Name focuses our attention on the Light Beyond, that light in which we see light
Muslims carry the tradition of the 99 beautiful names, based on the Qur’an. 

"He is Allah, the Creator, the Originator, The Fashioner, to Him belong the most beautiful names: whatever is in the heavens and on earth, do declare His praises and glory. And He is the Exalted in Might, The Wise. (Qur’an 59:24)
"The most beautiful names belong to God: so call on Him by them;..." (7:180)

The beauty and truth of this tradition is the invitation to all people to call upon the One by the many names, names that do two things simultaneously: point us to the complexity and omnipresence of God, which requires the use of many names rather than a single name; and focus our attention on particular attributes or qualities of the One as they relate to our personal experience in the moment. Again, as with the Jewish practice of the Name, the Islamic practice of the 99 beautiful names embodies a paradox: speaking one or two of the beautiful names while aware that these names are only one of the ways to speak of or name God’s presence.  Thus, the practice of the 99 names keeps before one the transcendence of the One beyond all names, the inability to contain the One in a single name, while offering the faithful a way to approach the Limitless through the qualities of the One as they are refracted in the world, the One light, appearing in many colors through the prism of the world. 
Sufis chant these names in varying combinations during communal dhikr, the remembrance of God, and individual retreats.  All Muslims use these names in their daily devotion to pull their hearts toward the One in the way that they need at that moment.  One woman may call upon Al-Azeez, the Undefeated, while another meditates on Al-Wahhaab, the Bestower. One man may call upon Ar-Rahmaan, the Compassionate, while another may remember the One as Al-Fattah, the Opener, or Al-Sabur, the Patient.  One year a person may draw near to the One as Al-Kareem, the Generous One, another year as Al- Haseeb, the Reckoner. The practice is a celebration of the limitless ways the One is present among us and of the compassion of the One in drawing near to us in the way that our spirit uniquely needs. 
The names of the One are not limited to 99.  There are slight variations in the lists from one tradition and theologian to the next, but here is one version:

1. Allah
   
   • Allah, He who has the Godhood which is the power to create the entities.
2. Ar-Rahmaan
   
   • The Compassionate, The Beneficent, The One abundant in mercy for the believers and the blasphemers in this world
3. Ar-Raheem
   
   • The Merciful, The One who has plenty of mercy for the believers
4. Al-Malik
   
   • The King, The Sovereign Lord, The One with the complete Dominion, the One Whose Dominion is free from imperfection
5. Al-Quddoos
   
   • The Holy, The One who is pure from any imperfection and clear from children and adversaries.
6. As-Salaam
   
   • The Source of Peace, The One who is free from every imperfection
7. Al-Mu'min
   
   • Guardian of Faith
8. Al-Muhaimin
   
   • The Protector, The One who witnesses the saying and deeds of His creatures.
9. Al-^Azeez
   
   • The Mighty, The Strong, The Defeater who is not defeated
10. Al-Jabbaar
    
    • The Compeller, The One that nothing happens in His Dominion except that which He willed
11. Al-Mutakabbir
    
    • The Majestic, The One who is clear from the attributes of the creatures and from resembling them
12. Al-Khaaliq
    
    • The Creator, The One who brings everything from non-existence to existence
13. Al-Bari'
    
    • The Evolver, The Maker, The Creator who has the Power to turn the entities
14. Al-Musawwir
    
    • The Fashioner, The One who forms His creatures in different pictures
15. Al-Ghaffaar
    
    • The Great Forgiver, The Forgiver, The One who forgives the sins of His slaves time and time again
16. Al-Qahhaar
    
    • The Subduer, The Dominant, The One who has the perfect Power and is not unable over anything
17. Al-Wahhaab
    
    • The Bestower, The One who is Generous in giving plenty without any return
18. Al-Razzaaq
    
    • The Sustainer, The Provider.
19. Al-Fattaah
    
    • The Opener, The Reliever, The Judge, The One who opens for His slaves the closed worldy and religious matters.
20. Al-^Aleem
    
    • The All-knowing, The Knowledgeable; The One nothing is absent from His knowledge.
21. Al-Qaabid
    
    • The Constrictor, The Retainer, The Withholder, The One who constricts the sustenance by His wisdom and expands and widens it with His Generosity and Mercy
22. Al-Baasit
    
    • The Expander, The Enlarger, The One who constricts the sustenance by His wisdom and expands and widens it with His Generosity and Mercy
23. Al-Khaafid
    
    • The Abaser, The One who lowers whomever He wills by His Destruction and raises whomever He wills by His Endowment
24. Ar-Raafi^
    
    • The Exalter, The Elevator
25. Al-Mu^iz
    
    • The Honorer
26. Al-Muthil
    
    • The Dishonorer, The Humiliator
27. As-Samee^
    
    • The All-Hearing, The Hearer
28. Al-Baseer
    
    • The All-Seeing
29. Al-Hakam
    
    • The Judge, He is the Ruler and His judgment is His Word
30. Al-^Adl
    
    • The Just, The One who is entitled to do what He does
31. Al-Lateef
    
    • The Subtle One, The Gracious
32. Al-Khabeer
    
    • The Aware, The One who knows the truth of things.
33. Al-Haleem
    
    • The Forebearing, The Clement
34. Al-^Azeem
    
    • The Great One, The Mighty, The Perfection
35. Al-Ghafoor
    
    • The All-Forgiving, The Forgiving
36. Ash-Shakoor
    
    • The Grateful, The Appreciative
37. Al-^Aliyy
    
    • The Most High, The Sublime
38. Al-Kabeer
    
    • The Most Great, The Great
39. Al-Hafeez
    
    • The Preserver, The Protector
40. Al-Muqeet
    
    • The Maintainer, The Guardian, The Feeder, The Sustainer
41. Al-Haseeb
    
    • The Reckoner
42. Aj-Jaleel
    
    • The Sublime One, The Beneficent
43. Al-Kareem
    
    • The Generous One, The Bountiful, The Gracious
44. Ar-Raqeeb
    
    • The Watcher, The Watchful, The One that nothing is absent from Him
45. Al-Mujeeb
    
    • The Responsive, The Hearkener
46. Al-Wasi^
    
    • The Vast, The All-Embracing, The Knowledgeable
47. Al-Hakeem
    
    • The Wise, The Judge of Judges, The One who is correct in His doings
48. Al-Wadood
    
    • The Loving
49. Al-Majeed
    
    • The Most Glorious One, The Glorious, The One who is with perfect Power, High Status, Compassion, Generosity and Kindness
50. Al-Ba^ith
    
    • The Resurrector, The Raiser (from death)
51. Ash-Shaheed
    
    • The Witness, The One who nothing is absent from Him
52. Al-Haqq
    
    • The Truth, The True, The One who truly exists
53. Al-Wakeel
    
    • The Trustee, The One who gives the satisfaction and is relied upon
54. Al-Qawiyy
    
    • The Most Strong, The Strong, The One with the complete Power
55. Al-Mateen
    
    • The Firm One
56. Al-Waliyy
    
    • The Protecting Friend, The Supporter.
57. Al-Hameed
    
    • The Praiseworthy
58. Al-Muhsee
    
    • The Counter, The Reckoner
59. Al-Mubdi'
    
    • The Originator
60. Al-Mu^eed
    
    • The Reproducer, The One who brings back the creatures after death
61. Al-Muhyi
    
    • The Restorer, The Giver of Life
62. Al-Mumeet
    
    • The Creator of Death, The Destroyer, The One who renders the living dead
63. Al-Hayy
    
    • The Alive
64. Al-Qayyoom
    
    • The Self-Subsisting, The One who remains and does not end.
65. Al-Waajid
    
    • The Perceiver, The Finder, The Rich who is never poor
66. Al-Waahid
    
    • The Unique, The One, The One without a partner
67. Al-Ahad
    
    • The One.
68. As-Samad
    
    • The Eternal, The Independent, The Master who is relied upon in matters and reverted to in one’s needs
69. Al-Qaadir
    
    • The Able, The Capable
70. Al-Muqtadir
    
    • The Powerful, The Dominant, The One with the perfect Power that nothing is withheld from Him
71. Al-Muqaddim
    
    • The Expediter, The Promoter, The One who puts things in their right places
72. Al-Mu'akh-khir
    
    • The Delayer, the Retarder, The One who puts things in their right places
73. Al-'Awwal
    
    • The First, The One whose Existence is without a beginning
74. Al-'Akhir
    
    • The Last, The One whose Existence is without an end
75. Az-Zaahir
    
    • The Manifest, The One whom nothing is above and nothing is underneath
76. Al-Baatin
    
    • The Hidden
77. Al-Walee
    
    • The Governor
78. Al-Muta^ali
    
    • The Most Exalted, The High Exalted, The One who is free from the attributes of the creation
79. Al-Barr
    
    • The Source of All Goodness, The Righteous, The One who is kind to His creatures, who covers them with His sustenance and specifies whomever He wills among them by His support, protection, and special mercy
80. At-Tawwaab
    
    • The Acceptor of Repentance, The Relenting
81. Al-Muntaqim
    
    • The Avenger, The One who victoriously prevails over His enemies and punishes them for their sins
82. Al-^Afuww
    
    • The Pardoner, The Forgiver, The One with wide forgiveness
83. Ar-Ra'uf
    
    • The Compassionate, The One with extreme Mercy
84. Malik Al-Mulk
    
    • The Eternal Owner of Sovereignty
85. Thul-Jalali wal-Ikram
    
    • The Lord of Majesty and Bounty
86. Al-Muqsit
    
    • The Equitable, The One who is Just in His judgment.
87. Aj-Jaami^
    
    • The Gatherer, The One who gathers the creatures on  the Day of Judgment
88. Al-Ghaniyy
    
    • The Self-Sufficient
89. Al-Mughni
    
    • The Enricher, The One who satisfies the necessities of the creatures
90. Al-Maani^
    
    • The Preventer, The Withholder
91. Ad-Daarr
    
    • The Distresser, The One who makes harm reach to whomever He wills and benefit to whomever He wills
92. An-Nafi^
    
    • The Propitious, The One who makes harm reach to whomever He wills and benefit to whomever He wills
93. An-Noor
    
    • The Light
94. Al-Haadi
    
    • The Guide
95. Al-Badi^
    
    • The Incomparable, The One who created the creation and formed it without any precedent or example
96. Al-Baaqi
    
    • The Everlasting, The One for whom the state of non-existence is impossible
97. Al-Waarith
    
    • The Supreme Inheritor, The Heir, The One whose Existence remains
98. Ar-Rasheed
    
    • The Guide to the Right Path, The One who guides
99. As-Saboor
    
    • The Patient, The One who does not quickly punish the sinners.

The Name and the 99 names--both practices are powerful and life-giving.  We might be tempted to say that the Jewish practice of the Name points us more toward the transcendence of the One, the Islamic practice points us more toward the immanence.  This is misleading, for it ignores the wide variety of names for God in Jewish prayer—Father, Shepherd, Judge, Lover, King, Compassionate One, The Patient One, Bestower of Gifts Resurrector--and it ignores the many names in the list of 99 that point specifically to the One’s transcendence—Al-Muta-ali, Al-Haqq, Al-Ghaniyy, Al-Baaqi.  Both the Jewish and the Muslim traditions point to the transcendence and immanence of God equally.  This is a graceful balancing act both traditions have mastered: when pointing to the transcendence of the One, never to be far from the glories of the One’s immanence; and when pointing to the manifold glories of God’s presence in the world, never to forget that the One exists beyond all human limitation.

Emily Dickinson’s “Serve or Set a Force Illegible”

Emily Dickinson was acquainted with many kinds of loneliness.  She also engaged in a lifelong conversation with God, that which she inherited and that which she experienced.  I think of her poems—all of them—as hymns in the tradition of the Psalmist. Their meter evokes for me the meter of the Calvinist hymns she grew up with--made new with fresh images, lively juxtapositions of incommensurables that explode into new ways of thinking about God in relation to our world. She was a woman who lived contradiction intensely, sincerely, and gracefully; a woman who understood our experience of God gives rise to our view of God but is always too small, too limited, to be equated with that reality; a woman unafraid to travel to the end of the road where one stands alone—enough reason for me to consider her a mystic.  Consider poem #820:

All Circumstances are the Frame
In which His Face is set —
All Latitudes exist for His
Sufficient Continent —
The Light His Action, and the Dark
The Leisure of His Will —
In Him Existence serve or set
A Force illegible.

(#820; p. 398 in The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson, ed. Thomas H. Johnson)

A Riot of Images for God

At the  beginning of Hayyim Bialik’s poem “Zohar” (1909),  the poet, compelled to speak that which cannot be spoken, spills forth a world’s worth of ways to point to that elusive reality:

In the midst of my childhood I have been engulfed by loneliness,
And craved all my life for silence and the hidden,
From the body of the world I craved for its light,
Something which I could not fathom murmured like wine inside    me.
I was looking for hiding places.  There I silently observed,
I was like a visionary looking into the eye of the universe.
There my friends were revealed to me, I received their secrets,
And sealed their voices in my mute heart.
My friends, how numerous they were:  any flying bird,
Any tree and its shadow, every bush in the forest,
The face of the meek moon shining into a window,
The darkness of a cellar, the creaking of a gate . . .
The sweet and awesome mixture of light with darkness
In the depth of a well,
Where the echo of my voice and my image are found,
The chiming of a clock, the tooth of a saw grinding within a log,
As if they are pronouncing the forbidden name of God . . .

(in Joseph Dan, The Heart and The Fountain:  An Anthology of Jewish Mystical Experience, 252)