Conversations with El Who Loves Me

       This morning, after a fortnight of immersion in Christian history and thought, I awoke craving Sufi poetry.  It seems to smooth over the rough edges that Christianity leaves in my soul.  When I read Christian history or study the Bible I often become concerned with right and wrong, heaven and hell, punishment and sin.  This is unusual and disquieting for me, and I start to worry about getting things right. 

       Going back to my last post, where I explored the idea that the names for God were actually names for an experience, I would name it "God Who Loves Me."  Being right (or wrong) doesn't even enter into the equation. Craving reconciliation between my experience and my reading, this morning I picked up The Soul of Rumi, opened randomly and read.  It began with

No mistakes can be made or said when your consciousness is in your love and your love is in God.

        If I err, or if I offend you, please forgive me.  I know some of you who read my blog are devout Christians who are challenged by what I write in my blogs.  Some are devout practitioners of Judaism, or Unitarian Universalism, or paganism, who feel the same way.  There are even a couple of atheists in the crowd. Please know that as I type these words into my laptop, my consciousness is in love to the best of my ability.  Rumi continues: 

Hypocrites give attention to

form,  the right and wrong ways of professing belief.  Grow

instead in universal light…

…Let your eyes get used to universal light.  Don’t miss your own splendor!

(emphasis mine)

God Who Loves Me spoke to me through Rumi, a 13th century Persian Muslim.  Later this morning, God Who Loves me spoke to me through Michael Coogan, a modern professor and author of A Brief Introduction to the Old Testament.  Coogan said writings of one particular author of the Bible can be distinguished from others by his unique depiction of El (God):  

“The deity is typically manifest in his “glory.” This is a concrete image that means a light-filled cloud that both indirectly reveals the divine presence and simultaneously conceals it.”

          Rumi used to say that humans were like lamps—each lit from within by a divine flame and each covered with a lampshade that allowed the light to shine out differently from each of us.  I must have had that in mind as I read the above passage, because I was struck by the image of everyone as “God’s glory.” We are all light-filled clouds that both indirectly reveal the divine and simultaneously conceal it.  This is the vision of humanity I feel called to share.

          May you see your light, shine your light and be your light.  Be aware that you are an opening through which the absolute manifests.  May your presence allow those around you to do the same.  Blessings, love, and light.  Amen.

The Many Names for God

       Many years ago, when my daughter was four and quite concrete, she desperately wanted a kitten.  I told her I’d buy her one when it was fall.  On a lovely late September day such as this, distracted after a long day at the hospital and late picking her up from day care, I commented on the beautiful fall weather.  Naturally she wanted a kitten that night.  Naturally I honored my promise. 

       “Mama, what can I name the kitten so it will come when I call it?”

       “Sweetheart, it doesn’t matter what you name your kitten, if you call it a lot it will come when you call it.”

       This went on for several rounds, until finally I said, “Well, what do you want to name your kitten?”

       “A Lot.”

       I’m sure you get the joke, only it’s not a joke it really happened.  And since I was distracted and tired I thought maybe that was supposed to be short for Lancelot and tried to get her to pick a new name because I thought A Lot was a stupid name. Once I figured it out, we named the cat A Lot.

       What if it’s the same with God?  What if God comes to us whether we call it God, or Krishna, or Artemis—just so long as we call it a lot?  What if all God wants is to be called?  Is that so hard to imagine?  Not for me; I suspect that’s how it works.

       Every faith I have thus far studied features spiritual practices such as prayer, meditation, reading of sacred scriptures, fasting, etc.  These are excellent tools for bringing about an altered state of mind and, subsequently, an experience that is perceived as religious or holy in some way.  The experience of a devout Muslim in prayer will be similar to that of a devout Christian in prayer, and not at all like that of an atheist eating a ham sandwich.  The main thing seems to be that when we engage in spiritual practice we experience the holy.  God isn’t as hung up on dogma as we are.  The ultimate world traveler, God comes to different cultures, places and times in manners that are appropriate for that time and place. 

       Here’s a list of Hebrew words that get translated as variations on “God.”  I thought it was interesting, because these names can be viewed not as merely names for God, but attempts to name an experience of God.  And, sweetie, it doesn’t matter what you name it, if you call it a lot it will come when you call it. 

• El~                “deity,” also the root for Allah, used by modern Muslims
• El Ro i~          God who sees me
• Ismael~          God has heard  (this is the name of Abraham’s son, patriarch of the Muslim faith that binds the Muslim, Jewish and Christian faiths together)
• El Shadday~   often translated as “God Almighty” but it's not an easily translatable word
• Israel~           One who struggles with God
• El Elyon~       God Most High
• El Olam~       God of Forever
• Elohim~         God
• Yahweh~       Lord

I Will Be There

If you happen to be lost in the wilderness, Moses is your man.  Set adrift as an infant, he led his people out of slavery in Egypt as a man.  No matter how lost he gets he always seems to find his way.  His quest for freedom echoes in the hearts of every group who has ever suffered oppression, and every empire smacks of pharaoh.  It is a timeless story.

We haven’t read Exodus yet, but in a case of cosmic foreshadowing I attended a lecture last night by Harvey Cox (The Future of Faith) where he discussed Exodus.  That was the first in a lecture series called ‘Coming to Grips with the Bible,’ which Cox advises because the Bible is part of the psyche of every member Western civilization whether we like it or not.  Coming to grips with the Bible is coming to grips with ourselves. 

The talk was supposed to talk about the archaeology of the exodus period.  Well, that portion of the talk was short.  There is no archaeological evidence of Moses.  Nonetheless, the story continues to inspire.  It inspired Martin Luther King in the 60’s, and it inspires Liberation Theologians now.

Dr. Cox shared a new translation of Exodus that adheres more closely to the literal Hebrew.  Y’know how the angel tells Moses to go to the Promised Land and “tell your people that ’I am that I am’ sends me to you?”  The more literal translation is “Tell them 'I will be there' sends me to you.”  

Genesis, which was the reading for this week, seems to have a similar theme. Deceit, disguise, underhanded tricks and manipulation.  Exile and immigration.  Yet  through it all Yahweh—God—watches over everyone, catching them by the shirt collar when they seem about to careen over a cliff and bringing them safely home. 

These tales bring me an odd sort of comfort right now.  I am a stranger in a strange land.  Without my tribe—my children, my close friends, etc—I feel vulnerable.  I’d planned to go to seminary when my youngest son was grown. Negative life circumstances advanced the entry date to this year. So although I'm excited about seminary, I’m living 2000 miles from my twelve and sixteen year old sons and  quite sad to be missing so much of their lives.  Some days it gets me down.

But here’s what I hear when I listen to these stories with my heart: 

You will be deceived by appearances, betrayed by people you love, and exiled to foreign lands.  God will protect you through all of it and lead you home.  And in the end, I will be there.

So What's Up With Paul, Anyway?

I was dreading this week’s readings for Intro to Christian History.  We had to read 1^st and 2^nd Corinthians.  Of Paul’s writings, I had only read Galatians and was deeply moved by quotes such as Gal. 5:6 “the only thing that counts is faith working through love.”  But in First and Second Corinthians I would find out what a homophobic, misogynist bastard he really was.  Or so I thought. 

In Galatians Paul emphasized faith in Christ as redemptive and sufficient for spiritual purity and downplayed the need for rules. The tone of the letters to the Corinthians is certainly different.  He is harsher and more directive regarding rules they should be following. So what gives?

Well, the difference here is not so much in Paul as it is in the community to whom he is ministering.  In Galatians he is ministering to a mixed group of Jews and Gentiles that are fighting about whether or not the Gentiles need to follow Jewish law before becoming Christians.  He knows that focusing on rules will only fracture the group, and so he focuses on faith and love.

The Corinthians are a totally different group.  By the middle of the first century Corinth was populated with the dregs of Roman society—recently freed slaves and peasants.   Imagining they had received a “get out of jail” free card as the result of spiritual wisdom, they believed they’d been released from every law.  They were braggarts prone to malicious gossip that turned their back on the unfortunate.  And they were unconcerned about the consequences of their extreme promiscuity because there would be no consequences: Jesus was coming back any minute to judge (and end) the world.  Some people can’t behave lovingly without threat of punishment; the Corinthians were those kinds of people.  They needed rules because they didn’t know what to do without them.

After reading, a few things occurred to me.  First of all, I wouldn’t want Corinthians for neighbors, and I bet you wouldn’t either.  Even if you’d hate Paul, you’d hate them more.  At least Paul would keep his lawn mowed and he wouldn’t wake you up at 2am with some drunken brawl in the street.  Secondly, Paul spends more of the letter encouraging Corinthians to knock off the nonsense and add value to the world by refraining from gossip and spiritual competitiveness and giving to the poor.  In other words, he wants them to use their remaining time wisely, not “party like it’s1999.” Our focus on his sexual advice is our focus, not his.  Thirdly, the words typically translated as referring to homosexuality are slang terms for which there is no known translation, so how can we really know what he had to say about homosexuals? And lastly, Paul believed Jesus would return to Earth during his lifetime. He wasn’t making rules for future generations to follow because he didn’t think there’d be any.

Paul was wrong about that, so we shouldn’t be surprised he was wrong about other things, too.  Still, though, I have a soft spot for the guy.  He wandered from town to town getting the shit kicked out of him for sharing his gospel of salvation through faith in Christ Jesus because he loved people enough to care about what happened to them, and he believed the end was near.  But Jesus never came.