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Issue #1363 - Friday, February 28, 2003 - Editor: Gloria
The British artist Charles
Hardaker, A.R.C.A. N.E.A.C. R.B.A.
has created a series of paintings inspired by Gospel of Thomas
logia
that are housed in Townley Hall, near Drogheda, and Newgrange,
thirty
miles from Dublin, Ireland. See them all at:
http://www.misericordia.edu/users/davies/maya/paint.htm
Extensive resources also are on the Gospel of Thomas homepage, with many links to other sites, including a discussion of the movie Stigmata.
http://home.epix.net/~miser17/Thomas.html
Thanks to Clarence on Allspirit ~~~~~~~~~~
| Directed, Photographed and Edited by
Thomas Riedelsheimer GERMANY, 2000 90 MINUTES IN ENGLISH ROXIE RELEASING Scottish artist
Andy Goldsworthy “builds elaborate installation
pieces out of Mother Nature’s flotsam and jetsam in
its own natural habitat (open fields, seashores,
riverbanks). Goldsworthy spends hours altering the
landscape or working his elemental materials into
man-made paths and patterns of harmonious grace. A
finished work can last for as long as a few days or as
short as a minute before a light breeze or an eddying
tide picks it apart like carrion... German documentarian
Thomas Riedelshiemer’s affectionate, awestruck look
at the man and his mission to tap into a frequency of
symmetrical order in terra firma’s chaos is as
hypnotically dazzling as his subject’s abstract
expressionist products… A gorgeous, wide-screen,
35mm time capsule.” |
 |
| Thanks to Mary Bianco on NDSNews |
http://www.filmforum.com/rivers.html
Thanks to Mary Bianco on NDSNews
~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~
just this! just
this!
First
days of spring-the sky
is bright blue, the sun huge and warm.
Everything's turning green.
Carrying my monk's bowl, I walk to the village
to beg for my daily meal.
The children spot me at the temple gate
and happily crowd around,
dragging at my arms till I stop.
I put my bowl on a white rock,
hang my bag on a branch.
First we braid grasses and play tug-of-war,
then we take turns singing and keeping a kick-ball in the air:
I
kick the ball and they sing,
they kick and I sing.
Time is forgotten, the hours fly.
People passing by point at me and laugh:
"Why are you acting like such a fool?"
I nod my head and don't answer.
I could say something, but why?
Do you want to know what's in my heart?
From the beginning of time: just this! just this!
~Ryokan
From: 'The Enlightened
Heart' Ed. Stephen Mitchell
Thanks to Gill Eardley on Allspirit
~~~~~~~~~~
Recently, Steven Seagal was proclaimed the reincarnation of a 17th-century high Lama. A huge controversy sprang up; many people thought that the religion was selling itself out. I think that a mistake has been made. Steven Seagal is...well... unenlightened, to say the least. I, for one, would not be in the least surprised if the Dalai Lama apologized profusely, and informed Fred Rogers that he, in fact, was the Supremely Enlightened one.
When the Zen Master Gutei was asked a question, he would
reply by lifting an index finger. Another Master kicked a ball.
Another slapped the questioner. Mr. Rogers smiles beatifically
and answers the question.
Rogers spreads his wisdom to children by asking subtle koans; the
more traditional Zen koans--What is the sound of one hand
clapping, What did your face look like before your parents were
born, Does a dog have Buddha-nature-- these are echoed by Rogers,
who asks more laid-back questions: How would you listen to a
fish, Can anyone else ever be you, Isn't it a good feeling to be
alive?
Think about the similarities of his words to those of Zen students; one Western Zen student was asked, after training for seven years, what Zen training leads to. He replies: "No paranormal experiences that I can detect. But you wake up in the morning and the world seems so beautiful that you can hardly stand it." Compare that to Rogers: "It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood, a beautiful day in the neighborhood...wake up in the morning and say: I think I'll make a snappy new day ...won't you be my neighbor?" This is a man who is one with his surroundings, be they the Potala in Lhasa or suburban Pittsburgh.
Think about Mr. Rogers' childlike delight in even
the most simple of tasks: whether it is tying his shoes, feeding
his goldfish, or getting his mail. Mr. Rogers seems to genuinely
enjoy everyday life. When one watches his show, one is reminded
of the Zen poem,
My daily activities are not different
Only I am naturally in harmony with them.
Taking nothing, renouncing nothing,
In every circumstance no hindrance, no conflict
Drawing water, carrying firewood,
This is supernatural power, this the marvelous activity.
http://www.netreach.net/~barry/mrrogers/
~~~~~~~~~~
Note, if you will, how the vast bulk of sufi literature is
stories
and poems which celebrate mysticism, and say nothing about
joining groups
and doing practices; and even where they do, the practices
are general,
the groups and their leaders are metaphorical. Everyone has
a Way,
everyone has a Sheikh. The 'sufi' path is for everyone, it
is the whole
point of life. Those who want to keep it separate for an
elite are going
against the scriptures, not carrying them out as they believe.
Perhaps the greatest of all sufi
scripures (written 1177 and thus
predating Rumi and most of the others) is "The Conference of
the Birds," by
Attar. In this book, the Hoopoe, one of the birds, is
encouraging his
fellows to come with him on a great mystical quest to find the
king, the
Simurgh (which translates as 'thirty birds,' the ultimate number
of birds
who finally succeed in the quest - so the birds themselves are
the object
of their quest). From p13 of the deTassy/Nott version:
*First Manifestation of the Simurgh*
'An astonishing thing! The first manifestation of the
Simurgh took place
in China in the middle of the night. One of his feathers
fell on China and
his reputation filled the world. [this, btw, is probably a
reference to the
I Ching, hex 53 top nine] Everyone made a picture of this
feather, and
from it formed his own system of ideas, and so fell into a
turmoil. This
feather is still in the picture-gallery of that country; hence
the saying,
"Seek knowledge, even in China."
'But for this manifestation there would not
have been so much noise in
the world concerning this mysterious Being. This sign of
his existence is
a token of his glory. All souls carry an impression of the
image of his
feather. Since the description of it has neither a head not
a tail,
beginning or end [the tai-chi], it is not necessary to say more
about
it. Now, any of you who are for this road, prepare
yourselves, and put
your feet on the Way.
from "The Conference of the Birds" by Farid ud-Din
Attar (Afkham Darbandi
and Dick Davis, trans., p180-181)
*The Stone Man*
A man in China has become a stone;
He sits and mourns, and at each muffled groan
Weeps melancholy tears, which then are found
congealed as pebbles scattered on the ground
(What misery the world would know, what pain,
If clouds should shed such adamantine rain!).
This man is Knowledge (sensible, devout;
If you should go to China seek him out),
But he has turned to stone from secret grief,
From lack of zeal, indifference, unbelief.
The world is dark, and Knowledge is a light,
A sparkling jewel to lead you through the night -
Without it you would wander mystified,
Like Alexander lost without a guide;
But if you trust its light too much, despair
Will be the sequel of pedantic care,
And if you underestimate this jewel
Despair will mark you as a righteous fool
(Ignore or overvalue this bright stone,
And wretchedness will claim you for her own).
If you can step outside the stage we know,
The dark confusions of our life below,
And reach man's proper state you will possess
Wisdom at which the world can never guess.
The path brings sorrow and bewildered fear,
But venture on until the Way is clear,
And neither sleep by night or drink by day,
But give your life - completely - to the Way.
The statement, "Seek
knowledge, even unto China" has been a phrase
associated with the sufis from before the origins of even this
material. It has always meant that it is important for the
individual to
seek Truth *outside* of any cultural norms imposed from within or
from
without. It refers to the broadmindedness of sufism, the
openheartedness
of sufism. The universal acceptance of Truth wherever it
may be
found. The Oneness of mysticism, regardless of
source. ..
So, friend marcos, Junayd's
adopting of sufism from the choices
presented to him was unlikely to have been a denial of buddhism
or taoism,
both of which were probably available to him. In Junayd's
time, the box
just said, "cereal," and that was it; now you have
people arguing the
merits of alphabits over count chocula. The streams of mysticism
coming
from the east were no doubt what enlivened Islam sufficiently to
have
created sufism in the first place. Those liberated souls
willing to "seek
knowledge, even unto China" then called themselves sufis,
and were
eclectic, not exclusive. The True Men among them adopted,
adapted and
transformed methods as they saw fit.
Thanks
to Terry Murphy on SufiMystic
~~~~~~~~~~
The
End of Analysis
I want to give
you a taste of the difference between analysis and awareness, or
information on the one hand and insight on the other.
Information is not insight, analysis is not awareness, knowledge
is not awareness. Suppose I walked in here with a snake
crawling up my arm, and I said to you, "Do you see the snake
crawling up my arm? I've just checked in an encyclopedia
before coming to this session and I found out that this snake is
known as a Russell's viper. If it bit me, I would die
inside half a minute. Would you kindly suggest ways and
means by which I could get rid of this creature that is crawling
up my arm?" Who talks like this? I have
information, but I've got no awareness.
Or say I'm destroying myself with alcohol. "Kindly
describe ways and means by which I could get rid of this
addiction." A person who would say that has no
awareness. He knows he's destroying himself, but he is not
aware of it. If he were aware of it, the addiction would
drop that minute. If I were aware of what the snake was, I
wouldn't brush it off my arm; it would get brushed off through
me. That's what I'm talking about, that's the change
I'm talking about. You don't change yourself; it's not me
changing me. Change takes place through you, in you.
That's about the most adequate way I can express it. You
see change take place in you, through you; in your awareness, it
happens. You don't do it. When you're doing it, it's
a bad sign; it won't last. And if it does last, God have
mercy on the people you're living with, because you're going to
be very rigid. People who are converted on the basis of
self-hatred and self-dissatisfaction are impossible to live
with. Somebody said, "If you want to be a martyr,
marry a saint." But in awareness, you keep your
softness, your subtleness, your gentleness, your openness, your
flexibility, and you don't push, change occurs.
I remember a priest in Chicago when I was studying psychology
there telling us, "You know, I had all the information I
needed; I knew that alcohol was killing me, and, believe me,
nothing changes an alcoholic -- not even the love of his wife or
his kids. He does love them but it doesn't change
him. I discovered one thing that changed me. I was
lying in a gutter one day under a slight drizzle. I opened
my eyes and I saw that this was killing me. I saw it and I
never had the desire to touch a drop after that. As a
matter of fact, I've even drunk a bit since then, but never
enough to damage me. I couldn't do it and still cannot do
it." That's what I'm talking about: awareness.
Not information, but awareness.
A friend of mine who was given to excessive smoking said,
"You know, there are all kinds of jokes about smoking.
They tell us that tobacco kills people, but look at the ancient
Egyptians; they're all dead and none of them smoked."
Well, one day he was having trouble with his lungs, so he went to
our cancer research institute in Bombay. The doctor said,
"Father, you've got two patches on your lungs. It
could be cancer, so you'll have to come back next
month." He never touched another cigarette after
that. Before, he knew it would kill him; now, he was aware
it could kill him. That's the difference.
The founder of my religious order, St. Ignatius, has a nice
expression for that. He calls it tasting and feeling the
truth -- not knowing it, but tasting and feeling it, getting a
feel for it. When you get a feel for it you change.
When you know it in your head, you don't.
Anthony de Mello, SJ