Tag: Religion

HONORING THE WORK THEY DO

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

In spiritual traditions, being an elder has nothing to do with chronological age. I’ve known some who are barely in their 20s.

It has everything to do with wisdom and compassion, along with a talent for asking gentle questions and listening deeply. Each one guides the individual to deeper experience and holds us all together.

They are found across the spectrum, from Asian streams of Buddhists and Hindus to Sufis and Muslims to Jews and Christians, where I’ve known them especially among Quakers and Mennonites.

Here, then, respect and honor the elders and the work they do.

Elders 1~*~

For your own copy, click here.

 

ENCOUNTERING THE ELIOT BIBLE

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

The first printing press in America arrived in 1638 at Harvard College in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where it was used to publish Puritan religious materials, including the Bay Psalm Book, free from censorship in England.

Perhaps its most remarkable book, though, was its first complete Bible, which appeared not in English but a Native language in a translation by John Eliot, a task that required him not only to translate all 66 books of the English Christian Bible but also to create a new alphabet altogether.

The resulting 1,180-page volume, now known as the Eliot Bible, appeared in 1663, a translation into Algonquin of the Geneva version used by the Puritans.

(At the time, sects found important distinctions in the texts of their translations. For example, before her execution by Massachusetts Puritans in 1656, the Quaker Mary Dyer’s letters challenging her charges quoted the King James, or Authorized, version, something that would not have gone unnoticed by her accusers.)

With our overwhelming abundance of printed materials today, it’s impossible for us to imagine the immensity of this task. I’m still amazed that small typefaces could be cut as cleanly as they were and then be cast into metal. Hand-setting the resulting type is slow and arduous labor, and each sheet of paper would have been printed individually, rather than in the continuous rolls we now use. (I remember the blur of newspapers on the press, measured in the thousands per hour.) In Colonial times, to store, collate, and bind all of those pages into all of those volumes required both strategy and space in a time when most buildings were small, especially by our standards. As for ink and paper itself? These things were precious.

My first encounter with an actual Eliot Bible came at the Roger Williams National Memorial in Providence, Rhode Island, where Williams’ volume is displayed, along with his notes in the margins, done in his own style of shorthand. Think of that twist: the founder of the first Baptist church in America, banished from Massachusetts by the Puritans, was also concerned enough with spreading the Gospel that he, too, learned the Native language and reflected on ways to open its message.

In these early literary efforts, then, we see glimmers that relations with Native populations in the Northeast could have gone in much more peaceful ways than the violent turns they took in the hands of others.

As we learn in other, more tragic, pages.

ALTERNATIVE CHRISTIANITY

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

Understanding that we don’t see light itself but rather what light illuminates opens a fresh way of envisioning the divine Spirit of life.

As I examine the writings of the early Quaker movement (Society of Friends), I find a remarkable wisdom emerging within their application of the metaphor of Light and through that, an alternative Christianity itself.

Consider the argument and then its applications.

Light 1~*~

For your own copy, click here.

MEETING IN THE MIDDLE

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

The prose-poem presents a subtle challenge. In theory, it should be a natural fit for the English language. In practice, however, what I see all too often is simply wordy prose. Somewhere, the poetry gets trapped or tangled or loses its spin.

Coming across a guideline to keep a prose-poem under a hundred words spurred my thinking. As I considered revising a clutch of drafted poems, a sensed an opportunity. Recast without line breaks, they flew – especially when I removed the punctuation that pushed them toward prose.

I’m satisfied with the results, which I feel are more powerful and vibrant and authentic than either a straight-prose or straight-verse version would present.

Take a look for yourself. Just click here.

harbor cover.jpg.opt370x493o0,0s370x493~*~

 

RANTERS, THEN AND NOW

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

One of the most remarkable periods in world history came in mid-1600s Britain, an outbreak that included the execution of the monarch by commoners (rather than a rival for the throne) amid a host of social, economic, and political upheaval. For an overview of the ferment, you can read Christopher Hill’s The World Turned Upside Down or Antonia Fraser’s Cromwell, Our Chief Among Men.

My primary interest, of course, focuses on the rise of the Quaker movement out of the waves of conflict – with the rise of a two-party political system and a loyal opposition as a byproduct of a pacifist faith. I also see parallels with much of the counterculture experience I’ve known from the hippie era on, where some have remained faithful but many others have flaked away.

The waves of English radicals can be fascinating, from the New Model Army and Levelers, Diggers, and True Levelers on through the Muggletonians, Fifth Monarchists, and others, but for Quakers, the Ranters presented a special cross to bear.

Like Quakers, the Ranters espoused personal experience of ecstatic faith, and the two movements were often confused with each other by the wider public. Unlike the discipline and discipleship among Quakers, though, Ranters had no qualms about sexual promiscuity or any other limitations (it was all God’s will, in their eyes, no matter any hurt to others), at least until persecution hit and they readily recanted. Not so the Quakers, who insisted on eternal Truth. God doesn’t change.

So here we are. What are our deepest values? Where do we stand firm, and where do we yield and bend? What is principle and what is opportunistic? How far out is our vision, and how much a matter of short-term maneuvers?

Where are we – each of us – truly accountable?

Anyone else feeling uncomfortable?

WHY WOODPECKER CAN’T KEEP UP

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 1 Comment

Many days in the newsroom I had the feeling of same-old, same-old. I’d seen it all before. Another election, just different names and tallies. Another car crash or house fire. A store opening or a restaurant closing. Graduations or obituaries. It’s a long list. And then something refreshing would come along, something that prompted the exclamation, “I’ve never seen that before!” Contrary to the doom-and-gloom image of the business, many of us at the newspaper loved having something uplifting to present.

These days, though, it’s more likely to be along the lines of this couldn’t be happening, could it?

The American presidential campaign is just the most obvious. The Woodpecker Reports appearing at the Red Barn are supposed to be a reminder of the underlying currents we thought would be shaping this election season – the history and power-brokers moving behind the scenes, especially. Things we’d seen before, round after round, including the same players or their disciples. Woodpecker can hammer away in the infected trees, as he’s been, but when the forest catches fire, he’ll take flight. I know this: things are spinning too fast to keep up. And that’s before we get to the climate instability that’s more glibly called global warming.

~*~

I’m still aghast at the reports of Sen. David Perdue’s “joking” when he encouraged participants at a religious conference to pray that President Obama’s “days be few,” a reference to Psalm 109. The audience apparently picked up on the calamities to be inflicted not just on the transgressor but on his spouse and children, too – evil thoughts, without question. In the text, however, King David is pouring out his soul in response to political persecution, a situation the Georgia Republican blithely ignores. King David’s lines certainly fit as a cry for help from Obama: “Wicked and deceiving words are being said about me, false accusations are being cast in my teeth,” as verse 2 reads in the New Jerusalem translation. “In return for my friendship they denounce me. … They repay my kindness with evil, and friendship with evil” (verses 4-5) match the good intentions Obama had for reasoning with a Republican Congress. As for the evil man oppressing the king, “He had no thought of being loyal, but hounded the poor and needy and the broken hearted to their death. He had a taste for cursing; let it recoil on him!” (verses 16-17).

Taken in its fullness, the Psalm – perhaps even the Holy One – could point to Perdue and laugh, “The joke’s on you.”

Except that this is serious, deadly serious. Prayer is never a joke, not for the faithful. And the Fourth Commandment (Exodus 20:7) warns: “You shall not misuse the name of Yahweh your God, for Yahweh will not leave unpunished anyone who misuses his name.” (The New Jerusalem here gives quite a different insight than the more traditional take of “taking the Lord’s name in vain,” usually seen as colloquial cursing or words not uttered in polite company.)

In a broader context, we can remember that King David could be both passionate and brash, qualities that got him in deep doo-doo more than once, and thanks to Abigail, he even had to recant one of the curses he was about to impose on her husband and all the males in her extended household (I Samuel 25).

While we’re at it, we can also leap ahead to Jesus commanding his followers, “Love your enemies,” and to look for the plank in their own eyes when faulting the splinter in another’s.

Nowhere do I accept an argument that it can be OK to pray for evil.

~*~

Only hours later came the massacre at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida, the worst mass slaying by a solitary gunman in the nation’s history.

As I read a few headlines quoting people who were suggesting the sinfulness of the lifestyle was the reason for the tragedy, I once again found myself aghast. (When I reread the reports more carefully, this was not their argument; rather it turned against Islam and its followers. Still, I have no doubt the original line of anti-LGBT argument is circulating through many circles.)

What angered me in my reaction was the notion we see all too often of blaming the victims. If their lifestyle were to blame, how then do we align that with shootings in churches, schools, even movie theaters, as we’re seeing? You’re going to blame Amish children or their parents? Come on, now! Or is something else the cause? At the moment, the United States has more guns per capita than at any previous time in its history; firearms were relatively scarce, even on the frontier, as you’ll discover reading wills from the period.

Let me suggest another calculus:

The more guns, the more murders. Period.

~*~

I just wish that mass shootings weren’t becoming same-old, same-old news in America, with only the numbers and frequency rising. Or that the anger weren’t fueling hatred.

Maybe I need to head out to the garden to see what’s new there. Even picking weeds might be uplifting.

OVER THE YEARS OF SITTING SILENTLY WITH OTHERS

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

When I first took up the practice of meditation, my goal was to get high – a natural, chemical-free experience, but a kind of escape all the same.

Moving to the ashram took that a step further. The goal became to transcend this mundane experience, entering into hours of unconscious ecstasy and returning to daily life with a heavenly vision.

Over the years, though, the practice has shifted. Yes, I still value those moments of natural high and clarity and oneness with the universe, but my bigger aim these days is to get grounded. To sit and move in that which is eternal, or my true nature. To be open to the divine around me. To be authentically loving and kind and …

The practice itself still means sitting with others in silence. That hasn’t changed!

REGARDING THE EXISTENCE OF SPIRITUAL REALITY

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 4 Comments

A materialistic outlook misses so much. As does an emphasis on concrete reality or causality.

How would you explain love, for starters? Much less admit passion? Why does music move us the way it does? And pain, be assured, is more than a neuro-chemical calculation. Why does social injustice to others spur our own anger? How could those who own all the creaturely comforts ever feel lonely?

The materialistic reaction to these, I suspect, prompts what we call addiction. Though it’s not always to alcohol, tobacco, illicit drugs, food, or even sex.

For liberation, a spiritual dimension will open. Or else.

NOT JUST A SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 6 Comments

Each week I go to the post office to get the Quaker meeting’s mail. A while back, I wound up going after regular counter hours (the lobby’s open longer) only to find a notice that we’d received a package too big to fit into our rental box. That meant a special trip early the next week to pick it up.

I assumed the mystery mailing would be a big envelope for our finance committee or maybe a box of books for the library or religious education.

No, it was smaller than that, from the apparently richly funded Liberty Counsel Project in Orlando, Florida. I opened it to find a DVD addressed to

PASTORS
&
PATRIOTS

and must admit to being offended.

It’s not that I’m opposed to defending “faith, freedom, and family,” as they put it, but I do take Ephesians 6 seriously. No carnal weapons, only those of the Spirit. Besides, I see no awareness of the impact of corporate employers and economic forces and even popular entertainment culture in the “systematic assault on our liberties” – meaning, if you read between the lines, an imposition of their standards upon the rest of the populace.

The mailing’s title phrase reminds me how much our understanding of the Bible teachings  (and I include Mennonites, Amish, and Brethren in this stream) differs from many other denominations. To me, “patriot” carries too much of the nationalist strain, denying what one Mennonite minister expresses simply as, “We believe Christ came for all people, not just Americans.” The patriot image also inevitably carries a musket, and no intention to “love thine enemy,” much less feed one. And then there’s Samuel Johnson’s observation that patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel. Ahem!

How much I’d prefer instead to see

PASTORS
&
PEACEMAKERS

as a recognition of a higher path and calling.

The subheading, “Silence is not an option!” is also troubling from my perspective, one that embraces silence as strength and speaks quietly in Truth. Shouting (as the exclamation point suggests) too often seeks to drown out all others’ … including the Holy One. Well, the group does keep talking about “doing battle,” but from everything I’ve read, Jesus takes up a cross, not a sword, and urges us to do the same.

Curiously, I was not the only one to first read that line as “Science is not an option” … but then, real scientists don’t shout, either. Still, in the overall scheme of their argument, this may be altogether fitting in their larger stand.

As I continue to reflect on the mailing, there’s no way of escaping many of the ways people and institutions keep trying to wrap God and Jesus (among others, depending on the place and its populace) in flags and partisan causes, rather than opening themselves to the Holy One’s larger mission.

It’s enough to have me thinking of a new bumper sticker:

LET’S SAVE JESUS!

Amen?

AWAITING THE WISDOM OF SERPENTS

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 4 Comments

Failed Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson’s recent endorsement of Donald Trump is disturbing on several fronts.

First, Carson was seen as morally pure, if nothing else, up to this point. Maybe even as innocent as a dove, as Scripture puts it. Not so anymore. He’s cast his lot with, well, dare we say those of ungodly ways?

Second, though, is his reasoning, that Trump is saying one thing in public but something quite different in private.

(Huh? Which one can we trust? Carson believes the words in private, but coming from a con man, can you ever be sure you’re not being sold only what you want to hear? A private conversation can be awfully seductive.)

If this is the case – and Carson’s not the only one perceiving the public/private dichotomy – are Republican voters not being set up for another of the kind of candidacies that have been fueling their anger, the politicians who promise them what they want to hear and then do something quite the opposite in office as they do the bidding of their biggest campaign contributors? Is Trump cynically plying this into the biggest betrayal yet? Is his “telling it like it is” nothing more, as he knows, a big lie?

Of course, the alternative, his public pronouncements are equally terrifying.

Either way, this can’t have a happy ending, not with all the anger and hate that’s brewing.