Yeesh!

Psalm 82

6Now I say to you, 'You are gods, *

 and all of you children of the Most High;

7Nevertheless, you shall die like mortals, *

 and fall like any prince.'"

 

Malachi 3:1-5

2But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears?

For he is like a refiners fire and like fullers soap;

 

John 3:22-30

27….,No one can receive anything except what has been given from heaven.

(And also from the commemoration reading; Matthew 11: "John is a prophet and more than a prophet. He is the one spoken of in Malachi 3:1, the messenger who comes to prepare the way of the LORD. No man born of woman is greater than John, but the least in the Kingdom of God is greater than John.")   

At first I intended to abandon my recent notion of trying to find a unifying theme in the readings for the day. Today is the commemoration of John the Baptist, and so the NT reading is left out.

But.

The first thing that grabbed me was in the Psalm, which I usually don’t include. It reminded me of my recent experiences doing zazen, and how I am getting all discombobulated because it (the sitting practice) is wreaking havoc on the everyday parameters I use to cope with my Asperger’s. I also was reminded of an insight I had over the retreat weekend (two weeks ago) which involved a liminal experience of trust. (The thesaurus let me down with “liminal” so I’m stuck with it.) The Oxford Definition of liminal: “2 occupying a position at, or on both sides of, a boundary or threshold.” Since I’m a Zen practitioner, I am skeptical of the technical definition that says, “1 relating to a transitional or initial stage of a process.” I’m also a touch sulky about the interpretation of “liminal” as “indecisive.”

No, it seems to be more about allowing two disparate meanings to co-exist in the same space. So, before I go any farther with this trust thing, I’m going back to the readings.

Deities we are, and kids of the Big Kahuna, but we also die and plummet from power like every other kind of big wig that’s ever lived. Oh, look, we are gods, but not gods! (From Psalm 82)

We are heated, beaten, stomped on, pissed on (literally: Google “waulking”), folded, twisted, rolled up, and beaten on again, all of which fails to change our essential nature in the least. How are we supposed to put up with this? Oh look, we are totally different now, but exactly the same! (From Malachi)

We can’t get anything unless it comes from Heaven. (From John) Well where on earth is that?!  Sounds like it might mean that we can’t get anything that we don’t already have. And then there’s this: Nobody’s more important than John, except the least important person that ever existed. (From Matthew) Oh, yeah, and you better think twice before you try to tell me that God’s Kingdom doesn’t include everybody that ever existed!

So, back to Zen and liminal trust-mistrust; confidence-consternation; confusion-clarity; anxiety-assurance; contradiction-coherence; annoyance-serenity.

No wonder Zen understandings in written form are so weird. Coherent contradictions and skeptical trust; bewildered certainty; exasperated compassion and terrified security.

Yeesh!