Since everything is but an apparition, perfect in being what it is, having nothing to do with acceptance or rejection, good or bad, one may well burst out in laughter.

Long Chen Pa

The Natural Freedom of Mind

It is doubtful many of us remember those heady days of childhood when words first worked their magic for us. We can relive the experience vicariously, of course, watching the children in our lives as they grapple for the right words to describe the world about them. There is no doubt that words give us great power since they permit us to reach beyond what is essentially a subjective experience to make contact with others we encounter in life.

For all the magic, if one is fortunate in one’s education, a time comes when one begins to question the assumptions that lie beneath both language and the culture in which language is nested. Learning a second language gives us a first glimpse at another way of seeing the world. Studying cultural anthropology gives us glimpses at how people find meaning and expression through their own unique life experience. It begins to dawn on us that cultures throughout history and around the world have grappled with the question of how human life came into being in this breathtaking cosmos visible to us in the night sky. Those of us in the west were nurtured with a creation story described in the Hebrew bible in which God created the heavens and the earth over six days before resting on the day called Sabbath. For Christians the story is elaborated upon with the birth of Jesus and his eventual crucifixion. We were told in Sunday school that he “died for our sins.” The resurrection marked for all of us the possibility of redemption.

What a surprise to learn that other cultures composed equally elaborate stories about how the world came into being and how we should navigate through the challenges of life.

If one is daring enough to step beyond the bounds of one’s own cultural and religious inheritance a question quite naturally arises. Since our view of the world is the product of a culturally defined story, how do we discover the truth beneath the myriad stories accumulated through the millennia of human history?

I’ll pause here for a moment to explain the essence of the dilemma. Language is a great artifact of culture. As children we are given words as well as associations. The first words invariably are connected with objects and attributes of objects. We learn the word ball as we are given a particular object. Soon we will learn that the ball is round and that a color is associated with it. We begin to understand that roundness is independent of any particular round object, even as we learn that red can be associated with things other than balls. The process unfolds naturally and to the delight of the child mastering the language of his culture. It is not surprising that eventually the process involves learning communal social/religious values and taboos that are then applied to experience even as attributes were applied to objects. The object is red and round, while one particular behavior is “good” and another is “bad.”

What isn’t made clear in this process is the fact the language with which we are most familiar is but one way of dividing an otherwise seamless reality that comes to our senses without clear delineation or meaning. It should not come as a surprise that how the world becomes divided is dependent on the needs of the members of a given society and the culture that developed over time. Residents of northern climes whose existence is dependent upon understanding of ice in all its forms will look at the world differently than a resident of a desert area whose relationship to water is completely different. The common denominator is our need as humans to master as best we can whatever physical and cultural elements make up the world we inhabit.

The quote above from the Tibetan master Long Chen Pa, who lived in the fourteenth century, invites us to look beyond the particular frame we were given as children to what lies beneath language and culture. He begins by observing the perfection of what simply is, distinguishing it from the judgments culture applies in attributing goodness or badness to what is. There is no inherent need to accept or reject anything in this view, since the attributes that would lead one toward either valuation are simply cultural/religious artifacts.

I love the story of a man approaching his wife as she is cutting the end of a ham she is about to cook for dinner before placing it on the roasting pan.

“Why are you cutting off the end of the ham?” She gives him a rather blank expression as she considers her answer.

“My mother always cut the end of the ham off…”

It is some months before they visit the wife’s mother for a holiday celebration and the same question is directed at her as she too cut the end of the ham off before placing it in the roasting pan. Her response is the same as her daughter’s.

“My mother always cut the end of the ham off…”

As happens with these teaching stories, we eventually arrive at grandmother’s house, again on a holiday and again as the matriarch of this family is cutting the end of the ham off. The question is asked and the matriarch responds.

“Because it is too big to fit in my roasting pan.”

Daughter and granddaughter continued the practice despite the fact they owned large roasting pans that would surely have accommodated the ham without necessitating the now ritualized practice of cutting off the end.

Such is the nature of much that we take for granted in this world. Custom can dictate our view of the world even when it has no relationship to fact or reality. Religious rituals typically create means of distinguishing one group from another, one view of the world from another, one set of meanings about the world around us from another. Separation and difference are celebrated rather than experience shared as humans.

Long Chen Pa sees humor in such distinctions.

I appreciate that in a world without inherent meaning, a world with great uncertainty, it is natural we would search for meaning and attach ourselves to those who offer a sense of security through the certainty of their worldview. Christians find salvation in their relationship with their Lord. By confessing one’s “sins” and asking forgiveness one is liberated from damnation. “Sins” are defined, and although the form of confession may vary, that too is defined by the particular sect. Catholics have the confessional. The sacrament of Holy Communion is a ritual cleansing, partaking of the body and blood of Christ who took our “sins” upon himself to the cross. Participating in this form can be greatly comforting to those who embrace the tenets of the religion. Of course, those who do not are damned, at least in the eyes of some denominations of Christianity.

We note that throughout history wars have been fought in the name of religions, even as they’ve been fought in the name of nations, or tribes. Each of these groups represents an organizing principle that exists exclusively to offer comfort and security to its adherents. We take these associations so seriously, and yet, they are all cultural artifacts, creations of those seeking meaning and security in a world where everyone we know, including ourselves, will eventually die.

Long Chen Pa laughs because we take it all so seriously. He, of course, comes from a culture that places great value in looking squarely at the fact of death. Buddhists meditate on the vase already broken. They meditate in the charnel grounds where the bodies of those recently dead are given as food to circling vultures. Some consider Buddhists to be remarkably morbid yet as Long Chen Pa’s laughter suggests, humor and lightness can be associated with facing the realities of life.

The teachings of the Buddha include what are called Four Transforming Truths.

1) Human existence is precious - This may be presumptuous but the belief reflected is that in a world filled with both animate and inanimate elements, being given a human incarnation rather than any other possibility is a rare and wonderful gift.

2) All things are impermanent – The time of our death is uncertain and we depart from this world alone.

3) The laws of cause and effect are unavoidable – We reap what we sow.

4) Our attachment to pleasure and avoidance of pain is at the root of suffering.

Appreciation of these fundamental truths is at the heart of the “practice” of Buddhism. Buddhism is less a religion than an invitation to look squarely at the human journey we all share. When a man approached the Buddha as he sat beneath a tree and asked whether he is a god, the Buddha said, “No, I’m not a god, I’m awake.” His realization sitting under the bodhi tree was simply a dis-identification with every story he’d ever been told about who he was and what was the meaning of the world in which he lived. He awakened to the truth toward which the Long Chen Pa quote points, a truth without qualification.

The Buddha made clear that it is the responsibility of each of us to make this journey our own. His “enlightenment” offers a path but nothing more. We are each invited to risk stepping beyond our conditioning into the reality of this human journey. It is at once exhilarating and daunting to give up the rituals of our childhood that we’ve often embraced as adults without critical thought. I’ve no idea what differentiates those who take up the invitation and those who don’t, though I’m inclined to believe that the greater one’s fear of the unknown, the more intense the grip one maintains on whatever cultural/religious construct has offered succor in the past. Perhaps it is the pain of holding on so hard that ultimately motivates one to entertain another possibility.

May all beings be peaceful! May all beings be happy!