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Last Updated: 8-26-2000
Copyright © 2000. All Rights Reserved by Charles Notess, Loveland, Colorado.
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Mariana Caplan, in her 1999 book "Halfway Up the Mountain", and Karen Armstrong, in her 1993 best seller book "The History of God", both say that few persons can become great mystics. Armstrong describes how Christians and other monotheistic religions have an esoteric component. This means that the are some basic realities or truths that can not be explained to the general public.
As an introduction I shall summarize briefly what this means and how one can try to feel enlightened about the mystery of the esoteric.
Armstrong gives as an example, on pages 114-5, "The attempt to describe them (mystical experiences) in words was likely to be as grotesque as a verbal account of one of Beethoven's late quartets". Any verbal attempt to describe ends up being a distortion, a false likeness, an idol: it could not reveal God himself. We can not understand God intellectually. We can approach him if we bypass the distorting influences of our ego, prepare ourselves according to the traditional actions and silences of our culture. Only then might one have a mystical experience wherein he/she feels that one's whole being is close to God or in communion with God or at one with the cosmos.
Caplan provides a description in greater depth. She says that the greatest obstacle to becoming a mystic is our own ego. She writes on page 8 that our ego "runs the SHOW of our lives. It is the director, narrator, all the actors, and the critic all in one. That is, ego runs the show until - who we really are - starts running it. This shift, from being run by ego to becoming identified with that which actually runs the show, is the process of genuine spiritual life." Ego is selfish and gets in the way when we try to be a mystic. One can not break loose from the ties of the ego unless one has considerable experience within the culture; especially with those elements related to mysticism.
The importance of one's culture in orienting one toward mysticism is where Armstrong's historical emphasis is most helpful. More will be said about her book in a subsequent section following this one on mysticism.
Caplan says that one can not have a mystical experience like one gets a hamburger at a fast food restaurant. Many New Agers are looking for the fast path to an experience and they get taken by gurus who are eager to make a fast buck. A weekend at a retreat might make one feel free and enlightened, but that is far from an authentic experience and will not have a lasting impact. The use of drugs can set one up for climbing a spiritual mountain, and it can provide feelings of ecstacy, but these reactions are an inauthentic way up the mystical mountain that leads shortly to a downer reaction.
Caplan places great importance on the ego as creating obstacles to progressing up the mountain that represents an authentic mystical experience. (See page 5.) The ego diverts us off the path partly because of our emphasis on individualism. In our relationship with other persons, we think along the line: "I am me and you are you". For example, we might be two coworkers competing for the same job slot. Thus, unconsciously, we assume that we are two separate beings and we often ignore social connections to each other. Many human beings, separated in this way, manage their lives as loners; although, they might be close friends with coworkers or others. Thus, the more we emphasize our individuality and separateness, the more we must depend on our ego and we become its prisoner.
In our complex world, many persons are uncertain about where to place their trust. This uncertainty coupled with our separateness and individualistic orientation make it difficult for us to make commitments. The Boomer generation as a whole has had a very hard time making commitments, especially to a particular religious faith.
A primary function of religion, in general, is building a relationship to a Supreme Being, or to God. For many, especially children, God is viewed as an authority figure and judge. Our relationships to authority figures, such as God, or even a teacher, our supervisor at work or a spouse, are influenced by the relationships that we had early in out lives with our father or a primary care giver. To have a good relationship with the divine requires commitment to learning about the spiritual traditions in one's own culture. It is such traditions that guide one along the path toward mystical experiences; toward the path up the mountain as Caplan says.
In summary, to have an authentic mystical experience, we have to eliminate, ignore and/or overcome the egoistic concerns generated when we consider sharing and making commitments.
The monotheistic religions of the Western world (Jewish, Christian and Islam) are essentially active faiths devoted to assuring that God's will is done on earth. To do God's will requires some kind of relationship with God. Armstrong writes on p. 211, "Since the West has never been enthusiastic about mysticism,... there is little understanding of the intelligence and discipline that are essential to this type of spirituality".
Walter Stace in "The Teachings of the Mystics", in 1960 wrote "If anyone thinks that mysticism consists in useless dreaming, or in the idle and selfish enjoyment of wonderful experiences without any practical and valuable effects in life, ... It is the universal testimony of those who know that mystical experience transforms human life and alters character - often from the squalid and the mean to the noble and selfless". Mysticism is not spiritualism, or ghosts, telepathy, or precognition according to Stace. Mysticism involves the apprehension of an ultimate nonsensuous unity in all things, a oneness or a One to which neither the senses nor the reason can penetrate. It entirely transcends our sensory-intellectual consciousness.
Karen Armstrong, in her book "The History of God" shows that the three monotheistic religions seem to oscillate between an extreme of being dominated by the philosophical theologians who emphasize the scientific method, logic, authoritarian governance, orthodoxy and rationalism on the one hand, and on the other hand an opposite extreme of being dominated by mystics who deemphasize dogma and doctrine, are more creative and imaginative, and emphasize a more subjective and spiritual approach to God. The latter is more common during times when the majority of believers feel uncertain and threatened by what is to come in the near future. When the mystics reach the point of saying that everyone can have a mystical experience, the organized doctrinaire and/or fundamentalist literalists force them to retreat and the pendulum swings back, after regressing to an earlier set of doctrines.
With the advent of radio and television, charismatic leaders of the fundamentalist variety have found it easier to sell their route to certainty with the help of large crowds of followers who seek quick and easy salvation. The mystics have not been so successful with help of the media because as Caplan and Armstrong both say, It is not easy to get quick enlightenment through mystical experiences. One does best with extensive training one-on-one with a skilled and experiences teacher and guide after one has become familiar with the cultural practices associated with the climb up the mountain.
This cyclical variation reminds me of the writing of a Russian-American sociologist who was ahead of his times, Pitirim A. Sorokin. Sorokin started the Sociology department at Harvard in 1930 after fleeing the Communist government in the USSR. Sorokin's prodigious publications are summarized by Barry V. Johnston edited and wrote a 51-page introduction on Sorokin in a 1998 book, "Pitirim Sorokin - On the Practice of Sociology". Johnston, a sociology professor at Indiana University NW has written two books on Sorokin, one of which summarizes his very interesting biography. Sorokin got a scholarship, at age 14, to a conservative Orthodox Seminary which trained teachers. He ended up second in command in the short-lived Kerensky government, was imprisoned by Lenin who ordered him shot. His friends got him a pardon and he fled tie USSR in 1922.
Sorokin defined the two extremes of the cycle as Sensate and Ideational. The Sensate Culture views reality and truth through the senses. This focuses on what can be sensed empirically. In the religious terms used in the other parts of my paper, there is a strong influence by those who prefer certainty and either seek it in a literal translation of the religious texts (fundamentalists) or through a faith in logic and the scientific method which works so well in the natural sciences. The empirical part of ultimate truths become dominant in the Sensate periods.
At the other end of the cycle is the Ideational, wherein reaity and truth are communicated by spiritual and supersensory experiences. Others might use the terms, enlightening, mystical experiences and revelations.
Johnston writes on page 37, "Sensate knowledge gives us science, technology and physical comfort but tells us little of the spirit. The truths of faith address those issues but leave us relatively helpless in the face of nature".
Armstrong points out that the Eastern Orthodox faith emphasizes the spiritual aspects moreso than does the Western Christians, Roman Catholic and Protestants. Do more spiritual peoples have less time for commitments to technology and scientific research than do the Western Christians who place less emphasis on mystical aspects of faith? Do the personalities that prefer more doctrinaire interpretations of political and/or religious faith find technology less uncertain and more comfortable to deal with because of the high degree of specialization and the mathematical and scientific tools available to test theories? Others say that the southern Europeans enjoy life at whatever level or station they find themselves whereas the northerners work harder and have a greater puritan ethic and work ethic? Is it partly the climate and average temperature? These are interesting questions that I have not found discussed in any of the books that I have read.
Sorokin was ahead of his times and his writings have important concepts that are relevant to transitions from the modern to postmodern epochs.
If one keeps in mind the stages of faith development described by Fowler, it is possible that the mystics and prophets have achieved higher stages of faith than have the fundamentalists or empirical scientists. As the educational level of a society increases, and as the life expectancy for persons in a society increases, it is more likely that the balance will tend toward the mystics. A balanced mix of both categories are needed in a democratic society. Problems arise when one or the other extreme gains power in legislatures and zealotry destroys the ability to build consensus.
Most pastors do not reify a particular image of God or a way of relating to Him, for their congregation. This is because within most congregations there are members of all ages and at different stages of faith development. Children relate best to an anthropomorphic image of God. They are not ready to build their faith based on a direct relationship to a cosmic creation process that is continually evolving.
Those adults who progress to higher stages of faith development understand the risks of replacing the anthropomorphic God with a concept that is more difficult to describe. Since we all have the proclivity for relating to some kind of transcendent care giver, I believe that many adults can relate to both an anthropomorphic and a more cosmic process at the same time. In fact, they have to because we humans relate mostly to other persons. If we have a relationship to our car or become attached to our home, or favorite professional ball team, those relationships are one-way relationships. We might trust the car to serve us or our team to win, but it is we who have to fix the car, and we can not do much for the ball team, but pay for tickets to attend the games and cheer louder. But when we relate to a friend, they can make us smile and they help us when we have need for sympathy.
It is very difficult for us to pray to a process of cosmic evolution. One pastor friend of mine said that when we pray we have to relate to a metaphor of God and remember that the metaphor does not limit the power of God. This is a difficult task. The metaphors tend to become anthropomorphic representations in many public prayers. Our language does not help us get out of this predicament.
In sum, if we suffer from too many metaphors some of which are overlapping and others contradictory, we need to carefully prune our trees of faith.
Nelson Thayer in chapter 4 of his 1985 book "Spirituality and Pastoral Care" wrote about these ideas in his discussion of prayer. On page 80, Thayer wrote the following paragraph.
"To recapitulate somewhat, pastoral care was defined in relation to world-construction and maintenance. In this section, the focus has been on consciousness as the construction of reality, another way of talking about world-construction. The Christian Church affirms the REALITY of what it symbolizes by God, Christ, Jesus, Holy Spirit. It affirms that these symbols point to the ultimate context and power of our being and that we can participate in and be engaged by this power. Symbols function to open us to this reality and thereby serve as vehicles for its power or influence upon us. These affirmations find little support in the culture of modernity. And in fact day-to-day, ordinary life in most cultures is not sufficient to sustain such a religious consciousness. All religions have recognized the need for spiritual practices in order to keep the culture and its individuals open to the specific definition of reality affirmed by the religious system."
Keeping in mind Sorokin's cyclical aspects and Caplan's climbing the mystical mountain, we as individuals oscillate between anthropomorphic relationships and mystical relationships depending upon the circumstances. In the anthropomorphic case, we often rely on mediators to help us, as individuals, interpret what God wishes us to do in particular situations. The mediator might be a clergyman or an internalized Jesus.
For dealing with uncertainty and complex situations, a mystical relationship might be more fruitful. One can relate to an anthropomorphic God, a Virgin Mary, a saint, or a cosmic force field, depending upon what kind of traditional preparation one has experienced.
Return to my paper on "RESPONSES TO UNCERTAINTY IN A COMPLEX, CHANGING WORLD".
Copyright © 2000. All Rights Reserved by Charles Notess, Loveland, Colorado.
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