The intentness of the soul
Tree and boxes art installation in Wapping, London.
I confess that lately there’s been even less activity on EcstaticGaucho.com than usual. There have been other things going on. Amongst other things, I visited the lovely Autumn’s family in Pennsylvania, USA, last week. There I was out of touch with the news and missed ‘the great shoe throwing incident’, where Iraqi journalist Muntadhar al-Zeidi threw his shoes at Bush on behalf of his people. Although I may be slow, it turns out the web has been churning out games and gifs in response to the incident.
Earlier on, part of the problem was with Wikipedia. I’m not a systematic contributor, but will add the odd factoid or tidy up obvious formatting problem. Every now and then I’ll even start a page. Somehow a few months ago I stumbled onto the Nontheism page and got trapped there, like an angel-on-a-pinhead-counting fly in a sticky theological web.
The word nontheism started out as a synonym for atheism, but has become a useful term to describe religious belief which is not theistic. Theism is roughly the belief in a deity, and usually a divine being who created the world. Nontheism is often applied to Buddhism, Daoism etc in which this God(s) chappie(s) either might not figure or takes a different role. There are Christian theologians who have been called nontheistic too. Paul Tillich, an influential Protestant theologian, put it like this: “God does not exist. He is being itself beyond essence and existence. Therefore to argue that God exists is to deny him.” Intriguing!
The page had an section on Christian and Buddhist nontheism, but nothing on Hinduism, so I thought I’d help. After a little research on Google and Google Books I cobbled something together. Uh oh! The next day it had been edited by another Wikipedian. I went in and made further changes, then they changed it back. So we debated our various points on the discussion page (each wiki page has a discussion tab at the top, where you take your issues). It turned out I’d got into an argument with a militant Buddhist with a dharmic axe to grind.
This person seemed to think that Hinduism ‘is’ monotheistic, full stop. Well, we live in a post-modern world where every thing’s up for interpretation. It’s also fairly obvious that the Hindu scriptures do have a few ideas quite different to those Biblical ‘Our father, who art in heaven’ concepts. Luckily, Wikipedia is not about what one might personally think, as everything must be referenced to a sourced document and there are enough scholars who see this nontheism too.
It soon became clear that when it says everything must be sourced, this really does mean everything. Even the most basic reflection on a text can be classified as ‘original research‘, which is forbidden. This means you can quote Karl Marx’s ‘Workers of the world unite…’, but the moment you add ‘which indicates that Marxism is a revolutionary ideology’ you’re in trouble – unless you attribute this fairly obvious reflection to some scholarly source.
Soon I was digging deep on Google Books for references to virtually every sentence I wrote and da Gaucho was gathering virtual dust. Then Mitsube stepped over the line: he started deleting points citing ‘biased sources’ – a tricky manoever. I’d started consulting a wiki-helper by this time. You find one of these solicitous souls by putting a {Help} tag on your discussion page, and a more senior wiki-person will respond. I suspect my helper thought I might be a nut, but he still agreed to help and counseled dialogue. Eventually, my wiki-nemesis agreed that the ‘biased’ sources could be put back. Now the section needs someone who really knows about that stuff to get jiggy with it. Whatever!
On the subject of things spiritual, one of the great things about Christmas these days is getting out my Sufjan Stevens Songs for Christmas album. It’s a box with five CDs, some stickers, and a booklet that includes Sufjan’s musings on Christmas and a story by Rick Moody. All these goodies make it the sort of thing you wouldn’t want to download. Starting in 2001, Sufjan sent out a CD to his mates each Christmas (except 2004) and in 2006 he released the lot of them in a box. Perhaps it’s my mum’s influence (not a good thing for a bloke) who loves Carols from Kings, but now they’re a part of my Christmas ritual.
Each CD contains a mixture of traditional carols (sung Sufjan style) and his own tunes. There are funny songs, naff sleigh-bell jangling numbers, sad tales of Christmas disappointments and rows, rousing and joyful singalongs, and true to Mr Stevens’s forte, they’re usually utterly lovely. The other great thing about the record is that you get stickers and stories. It reminds me of my dad’s Sergeant Pepper LP which had a cut-out of the band, a drum kit and a moustache. They never got cut out, but they did get me dreaming of marching around as Sgt Pepper himself.
Sufjan Stevens is a Christian, but doesn’t talk about it. Possibly because to affirm Him is to deny Him, as Tillich almost put it. He prefers the music to do the speaking… or singing. His music is classic Bhakti Pop: pop music that works as both ordinary songs of love and longing, or devotional hymns. Whether this bhakti is theistic devotion or as Shankara, the great non-dualist (and nontheistic) sage, put it “intentness of the soul on its own nature”, I wouldn’t know.
Tags: Bhakti Pop, Nontheism, Paul Tillich, Shankara, Sufjan Stevens, wikipedia