Thoughts on the Tao Te Ching 61

Poem 61

When a country obtains great power,

it becomes like the sea:

all streams run downward into it.

The more powerful it grows,

the greater the need for humility.

Humility means trusting the Tao,

thus never needing to be defensive.

A great nation is like a great man:

When he makes a mistake, he realizes it.

Having realized it, he admits it.

Having admitted it, he corrects it.

He considers those who point out his faults

as his most benevolent teachers.

He thinks of his enemy

as the shadow that he himself casts.

If a nation is centered in the Tao,

if it nourishes its own people

and doesn't meddle in the affairs of others,

it will be a light to all nations in the world.

Commentary

As a frequent traveller I am well used to having my identity checked at passport control or immigration counters as one enters various countries.  In these days of growing terrorist problems worldwide, our identity, and proof of it, was never more important.  Also, if we are users of the Internet, as most of us are now, we also realise that identity theft is a singularly common crime, so must must protect ourselves against that as much as we possibly can.

The beautiful Synogogue in Prague, February, 2016

It seems to me as a Special Needs Teacher and a part-time psychotherapist ans counsellor in a secondary school that one of the most sacred things that I do is to help any individual pupil come to acceptance of his identity (I hasten to add that I teach in an all-boys school, hence my use of male possessive adjective here), to come to realise that the fostering and development of one's own self is the most precious task each of us is charged with as a person. Therefore, coming to an awareness of our real identity is very important for every one of us.

In Ireland, we are celebrating the centenary of the beginnings of our young nation in the Easter Rising/Insurrection of 1916.  There have been many books, journals, magazines and commemorative pamphlets, running into hundreds at this stage, dedicated to this centenary celebrati0n - indeed, our own school has produced two such pamphlets.  To state this in other terms, one could truthfully say that our young nation is engaged in the task of coming to terms with its own identity.  Who are we as a young Irish nation? Where stands the vision of those men who first proclaimed the Irish Republic?  Has their vision of true equality for all "the children of the nation" been actually achieved?  We are, then, at present dealing with this and other questions in our commemorative ceremonies, in the many learned commentaries given, in the books written, in all the various media outlets - written, broadcast and digital - and such activity has been a rewarding exercise for us as a nation as individuals.

Artist at work, Firenze, summer 2002

Our Taoist poem speaks about power and about powerful nations.  Ireland is most certainly not a powerful nation, and yet she has power over her own people, can represent them internationally at the EU and at UN fora.  Power in the hands of evil men can lead to much destruction both of people, animals, the goods of the earth and the work of human hands as we have witnessed in the twentieth century.  Matthew White reports in his Historical Atlas of the Twentieth Century, 2010 that the number of deaths by war and oppression during that period amounted to some 203 million human beings.  One wonders as to what the destruction of animals (mainly horses) and property amounted to - a figure I should prefer not to know as I'm sure it would be mind-bogglingly huge.  As the English Catholic politician and historian Lord Acton famously observed: "Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men."  The statistics quoted confirm that statement.  Power corrupts individuals because of their selfish and worldly-driven and ambitious egos, and it is no wonder then how much more  power actually corrupts whole nations.  The second part of his famous quotation most definitely can be related to such men as Hitler and Stalin and the many hundreds of other despots the world has known since the beginnings of civilization.

Lord Acton, 1834 - 1902

Power, our Taoist poet recommends must always be accompanied by the virtue of humility if it is not to fulfill Lord Acton's famous statement about power quoted in the previous paragraph. Humilty has always been widely viewed as a central virtue in many religions and spiritualities deriving therefrom, and indeed in many philosophic traditions.  It has also often been counterpointed or contrasted with such vices as narcissism, "hubris" and other forms of pride. Humility, needless to say, is related to the adjective "humilis" that can be translated as humble and it is a virtue that became very much abused in Roman Catholic circles over the years where novices in religious orders, and women in particular were called upon to be self-abnegating to such an extent that they might have had a far too low opinion of themselves, perhaps even a low level of self-esteem and consequently very little apreciation for their real selves. However, the Latin word "humilitas" also has a link with the word "humus" which means "earth" or "clay." Hence humility, which obviously entails a certain level of ability to put the ego in its rightful place, also encompasses a sense of being "grounded" and "earthed."  It is this sense of the word that I feel the Taoist poet has in mind in the above quoted lines.

Being grounded and earthed means being able to admit that one does not have all the answers; that the ego has to take its place along with the heart, empathy and compassion as just one motivating factor in our lives; that there is no one right way to live life or any one simple answer to complex problems and that truth is rarely pure and never simple (Oscar Wilde); that everyone makes mistakes and that the admission of them is truly ennobling of the humble person who is always willing to learn.

Individuals as well as nations, then, are called upon by our Taoist poet to be humble, to be earthed, to be grounded, that is to be centered in the Tao.

Thoughts on the Tao Te Ching 43

Poem 43

The gentlest thing in the world

overcomes the hardest thing in the world.

That which has no substance

enters where there is no space.

This shows the value of non-action.

Teaching without words,

performing without actions:

that is the Master's way.

Commentary

Poppy, Easter 2014, Ardgillen Park, Skerries

What we have in the above poem are hard words - ones that contradict our lived experience. I remember an old teacher once remarking to me that there is an ancient animalistic instinct in the herd to tear the weakest member apart limb from limb.  He was remarking on how certain pupils can be bullied because they are perceived as weak.  However, I hasten to add here that this reported anecdote is over thirty years old and that since those times much has been done here in our schools in Ireland to write up good policies and establish equally good anti-bullying practices in our schools and work places.  However, that old teacher's comments still stand.  I suppose it's an ancient instinct that goes back to the survival of the herd in pre-historic times.  And yet, I was more than a little surprised to get hundreds of references on Google to the topic of crushing the weak.  Here is a report that appeared relatively recently in the October 21st 2015 edition of the The Tribune, which is a North Indian Newspaper published in Chandigarh, and the following quotation therefrom is worth reading in connection with our above poem:

Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday accused the Prime Minister, Haryana Chief Minister, the BJP and RSS of practising “politics of crushing” those who are weak.

“This is an attitude shared by the Prime Minister, Chief Minister of the state and the entire BJP and RSS. The attitude is if somebody is weak, he can be crushed. What you have seen is the result of this attitude,” Gandhi said while visiting the Dalit family that lost two children on Tuesday in an attack allegedly by upper caste members in Sunped village near Ballabhgarh.

Two children were burnt alive and their parents suffered burn injuries allegedly after some upper caste members set their house afire while they were sleeping.

The village today erupted in grief and indignation, with the locals blocking the National Highway 2 in protest. (See CRUSHING THE WEAK )

Tulip, Easter 2014, Ardgillen Park, Skerries

I was horrified also to find that there was a Facebook page dedicated to, I quote "Crushing the Weak for Fun" and which has the following "raison d'etre" appended to it under its "About" tab: "This page is dedicated for (sic) all those who believe that the physically and intellectually superior should crush those weaker or less financially stable than they, as sport."  Undoubtedly, it was set up as a "spoof" or "send up" page (I hope) judging by the only photograph on the totally empty profile page.  The whole thing is devoid of content bar what I have reported here, but that the idea should have occurred to those who attempted to set it up mirrors how sick society can be at its lowest and basest level of behaviour.  

More flowers in Ardgillen Park, Skerries, Easter 2014

However, I will leave it to the reader of these few words to add their own examples of how they have experienced the weak being crushed in their lives.  What I wanted to illustrate here is that, more often than not, deep wisdom can contradict lived experience in the short term, in the actual "now" of experience, in the very horrific and painful occurrence of one tragedy or another.  And yet, we know that there is a greater perspective, a wisdom that needs longer to play out, a reflection on experience that issues in a wisdom that is paid for in pain and tears over a longer stretch of time.  That's why no wisdom tradition worth its salt offers easy answers or instant cures or miracles.  I have referred in these posts before to the habit within well-established religious and spiritual traditions of setting up paradoxes, seeming contradictions and a balancing of opposites in a healthy tension that offers no easy answers but rather provokes deeper questions that search out and shine a certain little light into the darker corners of experience.  It is in this sense and in this sense only that the above Taoist poem must be read.  It is stating the deepest truth in a paradoxical way. Yes, indeed, gentleness is a great strength as witnessed by that great master of non-violence and peace, the wonderful Mahatma Gandhi whose practice of non-violence eventually ended in the freedom of India -  though the people of all traditions had to experience much suffering in a chieving it. He showed that those who brutalised the people who demonstrated non-violence in their stance for justice were in fact brutalising themselves in the long run.  And yet, we know that such methods simply could not have worked against the likes of a Hitler or a Stalin, dictators of such an evil level that it required a necessary violence to bring them down and eventually establish justice.  It is then, with all of these experiences and the necessary reflection on those experiences taken into account that we read the Tao Te Chin or any other spiritual text.  In short, life is as complex as the people who go to make it up.  Let us resist an over-simplification of life.  Let us paint it in its full complexity and proceed by contemplating the paradoxes and the tension of opposites that all deep religious and spiritual texts require us to do.  There simply is no alternative to right living and right practice.  Now, let us practise getting to know our deeper selves through pondering meditatively once again our chosen poem:

The gentlest thing in the world

overcomes the hardest thing in the world.

That which has no substance

enters where there is no space.

This shows the value of non-action.

Teaching without words,

performing without actions:

that is the Master's way.

Namaste, friends.

Journal of a Soul 53

People and Systems

As I write these few words, The Irish Times reports the following:

Sgt Maurice McCabe, whose allegations about malpractice prompted the establishment of the inquiry by barrister Seán Guerin, welcomed its findings and said it had vindicated him. “It is a good day after six years of fighting the system. Now I hope my family and I can move on,” he said, expressing his thanks to Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin for taking on his case and passing on his concerns to the Taoiseach. (See here )

Thorny branch versus water: Marley Park April, 2014

For non-Irish readers of these posts, the gentleman in question, Sergeant Maurice McCabe is a whistle blower within the police service, namely An Garda Síochána, here in Ireland. He and another former Garda, one John Wilson, have been treated atrociously by "the powers that be" within that police force, being viewed as traitors and as "letting the side down," to such an extent that the latter former officer had a dead rat nailed to his front door.  Wilson had this to say about the revelations of the Guerin Report: “I find the contents of the Guerin report to be disgusting, truly disgusting.” (see here )

What interests this writer here is the blind loyalty to systems that dulls the conscience and moral sensibility of the majority of individual members of those systems.  It would seem that very few of us are courageous enough to stand up and be counted by "blowing the whistle" on policies, practices and actions that are downright immoral. One needs only to recall the banality of the excuses of many of the leaders of Nazi Germany at the time of the Nuremberg Trials, viz., "I was only following orders."  The great philosopher Hannah Arendt would call this very ordinary and utterly childish use of excuses the sheer "banality of evil."  Indeed, all of the top Nazis were such flawed, weak and all-too-ordinary individuals that truly one feels a certain sense of incredulity when one looks at their pictures in defeat that such weak individuals could have unleashed such evil on the world of the twentieth century.

The present writer works in a small school with some 300 pupils only in the inner city area of Dublin, Ireland.  Even within our small system, there is often an unwritten rule of conformity to the system and of "keeping things running smoothly", of "not rocking the boat" and of not "washing one's dirty linen in public."  It would seem to this writer that systems create their own sense of morality or moral behaviour which are essentially self-referential, and that a sense of a greater moral criterion outside the system is simply not recognized or acknowledged.  Further, such systems seem to override individual conscience.  

Now, dear reader, I am a neophyte in social theory and in the theories of systems and how they evolve and organize themselves.  While the French founder of sociology as a science, Émile Durkheim did not live long enough to propound a completely refined sociology of morality, it appears to me that his thoughts on the matter are quite interesting.  In his moral theory, Durkheim rejected theorists who relied on "a priori" moral concepts, that is, concepts that are independent of experience or that can be reasoned out, "without leaving your couch" (as the contemporary philosopher Galen Strawson says) and are apparently immediately and obviously true. On the contrary, Durkheim treated all moral phenomena  as conditioned both socially and historically.  Each society, he argued, creates over time its own set of moral rules, which can vary dramatically from one society to the next.  In other words, Durkheim is here ruling out the existence of any universal moral code. (This intrigues me, as all the prosecutors at Nuremberg, in my humble opinion, had to stretch their moral vocabulary to include such a universal moral code because of the sheer horrific nature of the Nazi crimes.  The criterion is surely somewhere on an horizon beyond the system or the group.  (Of course, Durkheim had died at a mere 59 years of age before the end of World War 1 in 1917 and before the atrocities that WW II would unleash on the human race, and some 30 years before the Universal Declaration of Human Rights).  Morality, he argued, is a social fact and should be studied as such. Further, he argued, it could be studied just like physics in a system he called a physique des moeurs (physics of morals). 

In summary, then, we can say that according to the father of sociology, morality is a wholly social phenomenon, that is, it cannot exist outside the limits of society. He argued strongly that morality begins only when an individual pertains to a group.  And yet, how does this account for those heroes who stood out against Nazi injustice like the German lawyer Hans Litten who protested against Hitler, even calling him as a witness in a famous court case where he cross-examined him for three hours (1931), a action Hitler never forgot?  In fact, when the latter dictator came to power, he sent Litten to a concentration camp where he was eventually hanged: see here.

Durkheim argued that there is a central moral authority at the heart of morality that commands the enactment of its moral precepts. (One could ask what is the nature of that central moral authority, is it an "it" or an "energy" or a "person" as in a being like a God?). The individual in any specific situation, he argues, feels constrained to act in a moral way by society, and therefore, we may conclude that obligation is a fundamental element of morality.  This higher authority is not so much authoritarian, but rather a desirable authority (Durkheim speaks of the "desirability of morality" in this context) that is worthy of respect and devotion.  In such situations, an individual feels that he or she is working towards some sort of higher goal that Durkheim equates with the good, what he calls "le bien" - a very Platonic concept, indeed.  One could also say that this is a very philosophical/theological concept, too.  

And so, we may infer that this dual obligatory-desirability element of morality interweaves nicely with the influence of religion.  Indeed, this founder of sociology as a science would argue that morality and religion are closely linked as social phenomena: indeed, the moral life of a society, he says, is intimately intertwined with religion.  Moral authority, then, is born out of religious life and draws its authority from the power of religion.  However, to my neophyte mind in this area, Durkheim does not see morality as a one way street where an edict is issued from "on high" by a central power or an image of that central power (i.e., God or a god.  Remember that morality and religion are two sociological phenomena in our argumentation here).  For Durkheim there are two poles at play here: on the one hand, there is the morality of the group, which exists objectively outside the individual. However, on the other hand, there is the individual's way of representing that morality. While society creates many of the moral rules, the individual can add some little personal interpretation and nuances in understanding to them.  Each individual expresses that morality in his/her own way.  Indeed, while conformity to society and to collective rules and mores is often the greater reality for all of us in practice, there is still room for our individual conscience. Durkheim suggests that we all can add elements of our own personality and moral beliefs to society's moral codes and thereby build it up and refine it.  In other words, he leaves room for the individual to create, albeit in such a small way, their own morality. 

There is an old English saying that runs "there's nowt so queer as folk," meaning that there is nothing to account for the strangeness in people's behaviour.  There is a lot of truth in that old colloquialism, and yet if we are to live together in civilized societies we have to have codified behaviours.  There have to be rules and regulations and laws to ensure the doing of justice and the maintenance of peace.  However, as we have seen from my opening paragraph, it is so very difficult to stand up and be counted, especially to stand out from the crowd in any organization and openly reveal its errors, indeed its sheer corrupt practices, to the public.  All such people of such great courage, who have done so, have experienced the contumely, derision, opprobrium if not vilification, defamation and character-assassination of many individuals within that organization or society.  Some, as we have recounted above, have even paid with their lives for their courage in speaking out.

And so I will ask some questions, addressed to myself primarily:

• Do I speak out against corrupt practices within my organization or work place?
• Do I ask the hard questions of my own practices and those of my colleagues?
• Do I sleep easily at night? Why? Why not?
• Do I have the courage to speak my truth openly in my work place?
• What is my truth? Who am I? Am I an authentic human being?
• If I don't speak out for justice and right practices, why is that?  Is that due to my laziness, my cowardice, my lack of interest or my lack of commitment?
• Do I have causes I care about?  Why?  Why not?
• Do I read about whistle blowers and heroes?  Do I admire then?  Why? Why not?

Martin Niemoller

I will conclude this post with one of my favourite short poems about people who failed to speak out. It was written by pastor Martin Niemoller (1892-1984): It basically is a severe criticism of the failure of German intellectuals to speak out against the rise of Nazism:

First, they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out - because I was not a Socialist. 

Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out - because I was not a Trade Unionist.  

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out - because I was not a Jew.  

Then they came for me - and there was no one left to speak for me.

Journal of a Soul 31

Beyond Debate III

Personal Experience

(i) Preliminary Remarks

It is hard to contradict or deny personal experience.  It is, moreover, more difficult still to do so when someone declares they have had a religious experience.  We literally have to take them at their word, or write them off as simply hallucinating. I'm sure we have all encountered sincere and rational individuals who are convinced that they have encountered the divine  or the transcendent in their lives.  There are many millions upon millions of people on this earth who have declared their witness to the truth of these experiences.  Such cannot be denied.  No matter what our debaters on the negative side of the debate say - like Dennett, Dawkins, Hitchens et al - there is no persuading these many millions that they are simply deluded. 

Firstly, let me declare the obvious truth of the observation that many individuals from the lunatic fringe are quite easily drawn to religions of all kinds.  Let us take this as a given. Indeed, I have known a certain few individuals who have manic depression (or more correctly bipolar disorder) and at least one of these individuals goes on a hyper-religious trip during his manic phase.  This is a given, but it is certainly and obviously NOT a valid argument against the truth of religion.

Secondly, let me declare the equally obvious truth that much harm in the form of wars, attempted genocide, torture and suffering of all kinds have been done in the name of religion and by individuals who claim to be firm believers in God.  Once again, this is a given.  And yet, logically it can never be adduced as an argument against religion per se.  Why?  Simply because the operative and significant phrase in the above sentence is "in the name of religion."  Who is at fault when a nation goes to war inspired by religion - the religion qua religion or the fallible fault-ridden human interpreters of that religion?  I would argue logically for the fault of the latter.  

Again, my favourite author on this topic is Fyodor Dostoevsky who, in his inspiring parable "The Grand Inquisitor" in his wonderful novel The Brothers Karamazov deals exactly with this persistent problem of the corruption of power within official religious circles.  Whether one accepts that religion is a sociological phenomenon that naturally grew up for societal needs from the earliest of times or that it is a divinely inspired organisation, one still has to grant that one is relying upon fallible human beings within that organisation.  Having spent some three years of my life within a Roman Catholic religious order in my younger years I can attest to (i) the existence of people who loved power  and who equally loved exercising it and who delighted in lording it over others.  It's the natural lust for power in all humans that comes to the fore in every organisation under the sun. However, I can also attest to (ii) much good done by many sincerely motivated and genuinely good people in the name of the vision which they attribute to their founder, to Jesus and to God ultimately. 

I am no sociologist, but an understanding of the sociological basis of all religions as well as the sociological understanding of organisations both need to be considered here, not just the abstract notions, considered or otherwise, of the negative side of the argument against religions and God as adduced by Hitchens, Dawkins, Dennett et al. 

(ii) A Higher Spiritual Power 

I know a certain few individuals who are recovering alcoholics and they have informed me that but for their trust in a higher spiritual power they would indeed be lost, if not dead. This belief in a higher power is an integral part of the twelve steps programme developed by that wonderful international organisation Alcoholics Anonymous.  Strangely, or maybe not so strangely after all, these twelve steps read like a spiritual/religious programme.  The first four principles or steps run:  

1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol - that our lives had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to  sanity.
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.  (See this link for the web page of the Irish branch of the AA and for more information on The Twelve Steps.) 

Now, the operative phrase I'd like to stress is the underscored one, "God as we understand Him" as it defines God in an absolutely non-denominational sense, or in an open or broad religious sense, leaving it to the individual to interpret who they believe that God to be in their own lives.  

Once again, let me stress here that these persons who have encountered their own demons through the struggle with alcohol, and indeed others through their fight with addictions of all kinds, are utterly convinced that they can do nothing from any of their own inner resources (which are at their lowest ebb, like a totally drained battery, if I may use a metaphor here.) Therefore, they insist that they have to rely on an outer or outward power which they might call God. Admittedly, space is left for the addicted to call that higher power an Energy Source if they do not wish to call it God as such.  

(iii) My Own Spiritual Experiences

I readily admit that I prefer the term "spiritual" to "religious", quite simply because religion has got such a bad press through the actions of so-called believers of all hues and due to the negative press given by the debaters on the negative side of the God-debate.  That I was a religious/spiritual boy goes without saying:  as a young lad I remember being transfixed by the beauty of the old Latin Mass with its Gregorian chant, smell of incense, and the whole aesthetics of that ceremony and others. Also much of the music associated with the traditional Roman Catholic Church is exquisite to say the least.  Each year I still attend the annual performance of Handel's wonderful Messiah and certainly I can attest as can anyone who attends or rather participates in that musical experience, that deep spiritual depths are touched in the human heart through its sheer beauty and overwhelming power.  

I have also had other experiences where I felt I was close to a primal Energy which somehow was sustaining me and indeed the world around me - an experience of God in nature.  I can still remember once when I was a young monk walking around the wonderfully wild and green grounds of our novitiate and experiencing a cloud-burst on a sunlit day. It was more experientially for me than a mere and thorough drenching.  It was, in fact, in a very real sense what is called in theology a theophany, or at least that is the way I remember describing it when I was later writing down the experience in my spiritual diary at the time. A theophany is the appearance of God through nature, or at least, through the power of nature, literally a showing or manifestation of the divine.  Indeed, James Joyce also adverted to such inspirational and transfixing moments as "epiphanies."  In other word we experience a profound spiritual depth in a through a physical occurrence. 

Another link I would make here is what the philosophers have described as "the experience of the sublime." Here is how the WIKI defines this specific notion, and I believe it is a wonderfully clear definition at that: 

In aesthetics, the sublime (from the Latin sublīmis) is the quality of greatness, whether physical, moral, intellectual, metaphysical, aesthetic, spiritual or artistic. The term especially refers to a greatness beyond all possibility of calculation, measurement or imitation. (See Sublime )

As an erstwhile hill walker, I believe that we cannot not be captivated by the sheer beauty and power of nature.  Some of my friends have stood beside either Niagara or Victoria Falls and have been overcome by the sheer frightening and transfixing power and beauty of nature, by its sublimity. I have stood by the Cliffs of Moher here on the west coast of Ireland and have marvelled at their sheer power and beauty.  Then there is the Grand Canyon and many many other beautiful, awe-inspiring and powerfully overwhelming wonders of nature besides these few I have mentioned here. They have been written about widely and many have attested to their awe-inspiring power.  When people declare that they have been moved by a power beyond them, by a deep spiritual energy which is both within and beyond them at one and the same time, who are we to deny the validity of their experiences? Indeed, one can argue that such is a mere psychological or para-psychological experience and not a religious or spiritual experience of a sustaining God.  Atheists could certainly argue that.  However, there are atheists who, while denying the existence of God, readily admit that we humans have a spiritual dimension.  This latter point is one to which I shall return later in these notes here, but for the moment such a diversion is beyond our present purposes. 

What I simply want to underscore here is the validity and authenticity of religious or spiritual experiences no matter whether one can attribute such to a divine source or to a powerful energy beyond us.  To deny the testimony of our lived experiences and those of millions upon millions of believers over thousands of years and well as those of our own times is surely to deny the complexity of human nature and the role of powers beyond our limited ken.  It must surely also betray our pride or hubris in thinking that we know more than fallible creatures actually could ever possibly master.