I like the saying: it just had "the ring of truth." The ring of truth is the word behind the words, the sense in the statement that what is said partakes of the truth. And, over the years we all develop our own sense of "the truth." We listen to a person tell a story, or a preacher preach a sermon, or a politician give a speech, or a witness testify in court, or one our own family members give an explanation of his or her conduct; and, we get a sense often that we have either touched truth or falsehood. There are times, of course, when we feel like we've gotten a dose of both mixed together and it takes some time to sort that out. And, no matter how often I have been wrong with my sense of what "rings true" and what doesn't "ring true" I cannot be convinced that my ability to distinguish truth from falsehood is not better than average. Of course, everybody thinks that his or her sense of what is true is better than average!
Of course, if there was no deception and the truth was always told, that wouldn't be such a problem, because then discernment of truth from falsehood wouldn't be so important. But, deception does occur regularly, and lies are told regularly. And, as the prophet Jeremiah says: "The human heart is deceitful above all things." Which gets to an even more difficult problem: we can't even seem to tell the truth to ourselves. That being the case, it is hard to get it told to others!
This worrying about truth and falsehood both in our world and in my self has been a real worry for me. This, to me, is the existential situation that drives me, disturbs me, inspires me, and out of which I cry out for the saving help of the One who is true, who is not deceived, who does not deceive, and who speaks truth into our worlds of falsehood and who creates truth out of the ground of falsehood.
My Dad used say: "you can't make apple pie out of horse shit." And, that saying covered a lot of ground, and made sense of a lot of things for me. And, Dad was applying that to what we humans could do and couldn't do within the limitations of this earth.
But, as Jesus said to his disciples: "what is impossible for human beings is possible for God." And, I have really come to believe that God can take the "horse shit of our lying and deceiving and deluded selves" and somehow plant truth in the middle of it and grow something really worthwhile. If we realize our lying and identify it as "horse shit," then perhaps we can use it to fertilize the truth God has planted in our hearts. And, as Dad might have said: "there are a couple of good uses of horse shit, but one of them is not as an ingredient of apple pie." The example of deception and lying can be a helpful example if it is a warning of what not to do, but if it is sold as an ingredient of a way to live, well - just remember the saying my Dad taught me: "you can't make apple pie out of horse shit!"
Friday, July 3, 2009
Praise, Celebration, and the Struggle to Find Our Way to Rejoicing
The part of the Bible I turn to more than any other part is the Book of Psalms. These Psalms are the songs of thanksgiving, praise and lament of the Jewish people. They are traditionally attributed to King David of Israel. And, certainly, he could have written some of them. It is doubtful that he wrote most of them. But, what is really important is not exactly who in Israel wrote these prayers/songs, but who he or she wrote them to and what experience of the Holy One gave rise to these writings, and how these holy words were recited in synagogue and temple and later in church in a way that has literally saved human life again and again as the people continue to experience the Holy through making these holy words their own.
I am always amazed by the movement of the spirit that can be found in so many of these Psalms if you read them with an open heart. For example, Psalm 73 begins reciting a pious phrase: "Surely God is good to Israel and to those who are upright," and then turns to how the Psalmist has personally struggled with believing that in this world. "But as for me, my feet had almost slipped; I had nearly lost my foothold. For I envied the arrogant when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. They have no struggles; their bodies are healthy and strong . . . " So, this faithful Jew is seeking to give voice to what it is to praise God and trust in God's goodness in a world where goodness often seems defeated. And, this Psalm goes on looking back to a time of lament and complaining about it all. And, then, the writer says: "If I had gone on talking like this (the complaining), I would have betrayed this generation of your children. When I tried to understand all this, it was oppressive to me . . . until . . . UNTIL I ENTERED THE SANCTUARY OF GOD. It wasn't that the Psalmist went and took a self-help class on positive thinking or changed his diet and exercise routine. No, he went to worship and right there in the praising of God, he experienced God's presence and saw that the wicked and the arrogant do not rule over the universe. He discovered in the praising that there really is One who is worth praising. And, so the Psalmist writes: "When my heart was grieved and my spirit embittered, I was senseless and ignorant; I was like a brute beast before you. Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand. You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory. Whom have I in heaven but you? And, whom do I have on earth but you? My heart and my flesh may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever."
And, so ends this powerful movement of the human spirit from a heart turned in on itself in grief and suffering to a heart turned outward to God in praise. That's why I turn to these Psalms all the time. They trace the real and holy movements of how human beings struggle to find their way to the Holy One, and how again and again this seemingly hopeless struggle is pierced through and opened up to rejoicing in the presence of our Creator whose existence is the ground of our being and the cause of our celebration.
I am always amazed by the movement of the spirit that can be found in so many of these Psalms if you read them with an open heart. For example, Psalm 73 begins reciting a pious phrase: "Surely God is good to Israel and to those who are upright," and then turns to how the Psalmist has personally struggled with believing that in this world. "But as for me, my feet had almost slipped; I had nearly lost my foothold. For I envied the arrogant when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. They have no struggles; their bodies are healthy and strong . . . " So, this faithful Jew is seeking to give voice to what it is to praise God and trust in God's goodness in a world where goodness often seems defeated. And, this Psalm goes on looking back to a time of lament and complaining about it all. And, then, the writer says: "If I had gone on talking like this (the complaining), I would have betrayed this generation of your children. When I tried to understand all this, it was oppressive to me . . . until . . . UNTIL I ENTERED THE SANCTUARY OF GOD. It wasn't that the Psalmist went and took a self-help class on positive thinking or changed his diet and exercise routine. No, he went to worship and right there in the praising of God, he experienced God's presence and saw that the wicked and the arrogant do not rule over the universe. He discovered in the praising that there really is One who is worth praising. And, so the Psalmist writes: "When my heart was grieved and my spirit embittered, I was senseless and ignorant; I was like a brute beast before you. Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand. You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory. Whom have I in heaven but you? And, whom do I have on earth but you? My heart and my flesh may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever."
And, so ends this powerful movement of the human spirit from a heart turned in on itself in grief and suffering to a heart turned outward to God in praise. That's why I turn to these Psalms all the time. They trace the real and holy movements of how human beings struggle to find their way to the Holy One, and how again and again this seemingly hopeless struggle is pierced through and opened up to rejoicing in the presence of our Creator whose existence is the ground of our being and the cause of our celebration.
Sunday, June 28, 2009
Sunday Afternoon
Its Sunday afternoon. I'm thinking about the worship service this morning, the things that happened this past week, and a little about what is to come in the next couple of weeks. And, I have been reading "The Righteous Empire," a historical book about Protestants in the U.S. by Martin Marty written in 1969. It details the ideas of Protestant Christians in the U.S. that had such a profound influence over the development of the country. In general my thoughts turn in one direction: Christianity has so often been such a distortion of the truth of God in Jesus that I think a lot of people in history who haven't been Christians have been closer to God's will than Christians have been. Of course there has always been a more faithful and less faithful way in the Church, but, clearly among the powerful and influential, it has been consistently a distortion and even a downright rebellion against the way of Jesus. We read this morning the passage in which Jesus is amazed at the faith of the centurior (Roman soldier/non-believer) who is trying to find help for his sick servant (see Matthew 8:5-13). Jesus noticed the goodness and genuine faith of those who were not part of the Jewish religion in which he was raised.
It would have been easier for me to have kept up the belief that Christians are better than other people if I didn't know anything about history and didn't know so many Christians, and also if I hadn't met so many non-Christians as well. Having had these experiences, my advice is that we Christians need to get our house in order before we ever, ever try to judge anybody else. All this about being "saved" when we treat other people badly - it will not stand in the final day. And, I'm not saying I should stand in the final day. I really don't know about that. I think that is God's business, not mine. There are and have been wonderful people in this world, people who have suffered so horribly, but somehow carried on so gracefully. And, there have been people who have been broken in their spirit by their suffering - some of these people ending up hurting others. I try to learn from the examples of both groups of people, so that in my own life my experience in life leads me closer to loving God and neighbor and not further away. Religion has clearly been a powerful and a positive force in helping people in that struggle to deal with life's struggles in a decent and gracious way. Unfortunately, religion has also been a powerful force in helping people deal with life's struggles in a very indecent and very ungracious way as well.
To understand the Bible and the way of Jesus demonstrated in the Bible is to understand that the way of faith is a thorough-going criticism of religion. People often don't understand why somebody who is religious like me would spend so much time criticizing the manifestations of my own religious group. But, as I read the Bible, I see that Jesus didn't criticize the irreligious, but the religious. He turned the prophetic attacks towards the religious Jews, not towards the unbelieving people. Why? Well, I'll move on to one other thing before I close. When Jesus attacked the religious of his day, he stood there ready to show them a real holy alternative. When I attack the religious of my day, I stand there with the religious of my day, and it is only a matter of time until it becomes apparent that the criticism I have made against "them" applies to me as well. So, where is the holy alternative, that true path? It is where Jesus is.
So, part of the reason I attack the distortions of Christianity is that I am part of that tradition that comes from the Biblical witness. And, part of it is also that we often attack most strongly those things in others that we don't want to acknowledge in ourselves.
It would have been easier for me to have kept up the belief that Christians are better than other people if I didn't know anything about history and didn't know so many Christians, and also if I hadn't met so many non-Christians as well. Having had these experiences, my advice is that we Christians need to get our house in order before we ever, ever try to judge anybody else. All this about being "saved" when we treat other people badly - it will not stand in the final day. And, I'm not saying I should stand in the final day. I really don't know about that. I think that is God's business, not mine. There are and have been wonderful people in this world, people who have suffered so horribly, but somehow carried on so gracefully. And, there have been people who have been broken in their spirit by their suffering - some of these people ending up hurting others. I try to learn from the examples of both groups of people, so that in my own life my experience in life leads me closer to loving God and neighbor and not further away. Religion has clearly been a powerful and a positive force in helping people in that struggle to deal with life's struggles in a decent and gracious way. Unfortunately, religion has also been a powerful force in helping people deal with life's struggles in a very indecent and very ungracious way as well.
To understand the Bible and the way of Jesus demonstrated in the Bible is to understand that the way of faith is a thorough-going criticism of religion. People often don't understand why somebody who is religious like me would spend so much time criticizing the manifestations of my own religious group. But, as I read the Bible, I see that Jesus didn't criticize the irreligious, but the religious. He turned the prophetic attacks towards the religious Jews, not towards the unbelieving people. Why? Well, I'll move on to one other thing before I close. When Jesus attacked the religious of his day, he stood there ready to show them a real holy alternative. When I attack the religious of my day, I stand there with the religious of my day, and it is only a matter of time until it becomes apparent that the criticism I have made against "them" applies to me as well. So, where is the holy alternative, that true path? It is where Jesus is.
So, part of the reason I attack the distortions of Christianity is that I am part of that tradition that comes from the Biblical witness. And, part of it is also that we often attack most strongly those things in others that we don't want to acknowledge in ourselves.
Friday, June 26, 2009
Words from Soren Kierkegaard
"It takes moral courage to grieve; it requires religious courage to rejoice."
-Soren Kierkegaard, The Journals
-Soren Kierkegaard, The Journals
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
You Can't Preach a Word You Haven't Heard
As I prepared to preach this past Sunday, I had worked through a couple of passages, and written up my sermon notes two or three times. But, still I wasn’t ready to preach, and I could tell it. Then, on Saturday, it hit me: “you can’t speak a word you haven’t heard.” I had this message about how the Gospel had been corrupted into a human-centered, guilt-focused, and forgiveness-obsessed religion that had lost the vitality of “following Jesus’ way on earth.” I worked from the scriptures where Jesus calls those who hear him to follow, to deny self, to take up the cross, to serve the humble. And, I had a pretty clear word to say. But, I hadn’t heard it within myself yet. I do this often with my preaching. I reach an understanding in my mind about something, and I don’t realize how badly I need to hear the word I am about to speak. It is like I unconsciously struggle to find what I need so badly from God, but the last part of the struggle, the real breakthrough, is when I understand that this word is first of all for me. That is, I need it worse than anyone. Often I don’t have the breakthrough until a couple of days after I’ve preached something. I started to realize on Saturday that I needed to hear this sermon about following Jesus, about getting out of the cycle of confession and pardon and moving to repentance and obedience. And, I have realized even more late this Monday night, how much I need to look to the path Jesus walked on earth. But, it is a peculiar thing how my mind is working on something that my heart needs, but so often the “word” doesn’t break through to my heart and into my life.
This week is a striking case. I have circled around this theme of moving away from a self-focused, guilt-focused religion to a God-focused, deed-focused way of life. I can think of a number of sermons that have touched on this theme. The sermon I preached on the book of James and a “religion of deeds.” Another sermon I preached from Hebrews about the way of Jesus, and yet another sermon where I focused on spirituals and Paul’s saying:”I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and him crucified.”
In some ways, this has become the theme of my struggle of faith, the theme of my life, is to find my way to this full word that I have come to know in part. It is like a lighthouse off in the distance that I keep sailing towards. I get up close enough to it at times to really say something that matters, and then, strangely I sail back out into the darkness again. And, each time I see that lighthouse again, it is like I am seeing it, discovering it for the first time.
On one hand, I get up on my soapbox about this theme, as if I have some idea that “will save Christianity,” and restore truth to preaching, etc. But, my daily life is along the lines of the very ways I criticize in expressing my ideas (which I do think are a little more than simply “my ideas”). As much as I criticize a religious life that is caught in the cycle of confession-pardon, and doesn’t open out to repentance-obedience, I appear to be caught in that very cycle of confession-pardon, and only be able to imagine the open and free life of faith which is the way of real turning from sin, towards God and following the way of Jesus on earth. Late tonight, as I listened to our worship service that I recorded this past Sunday, I started to feel something, imagine something, yearn for something. Instead of thinking about the concept of “following Jesus,” I started to get some feeling for it in my heart. I got some sense of the mystery of it, the newness of it, the hope in it. Instead of singing the words “I have decided to follow Jesus,” I am moved to sing: “I have decided to look for Jesus in the world around me, in the people I see, in my inner life, in the scriptures, as I pray.” And, that other hymn we closed with on Sunday helps my heart sing what it feels: “Seek you first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness. And, all these things shall be added unto you. . . . Alleluia, alleluia. . Ask and it shall be given unto you. Seek and you shall find. Knock and it shall be opened unto you. Allelu . allelu –ia.” And, the thing that really stays with me from that song is that beautiful “Alleluia” part –I think they call it a “descant.” When you sing it with others, it is beyond thought and just lets your heart relax and your spirit unite with others and open to God. I am thinking that that is what it means to follow Jesus.
June 23, 2009, 3:57 A.M.
This week is a striking case. I have circled around this theme of moving away from a self-focused, guilt-focused religion to a God-focused, deed-focused way of life. I can think of a number of sermons that have touched on this theme. The sermon I preached on the book of James and a “religion of deeds.” Another sermon I preached from Hebrews about the way of Jesus, and yet another sermon where I focused on spirituals and Paul’s saying:”I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and him crucified.”
In some ways, this has become the theme of my struggle of faith, the theme of my life, is to find my way to this full word that I have come to know in part. It is like a lighthouse off in the distance that I keep sailing towards. I get up close enough to it at times to really say something that matters, and then, strangely I sail back out into the darkness again. And, each time I see that lighthouse again, it is like I am seeing it, discovering it for the first time.
On one hand, I get up on my soapbox about this theme, as if I have some idea that “will save Christianity,” and restore truth to preaching, etc. But, my daily life is along the lines of the very ways I criticize in expressing my ideas (which I do think are a little more than simply “my ideas”). As much as I criticize a religious life that is caught in the cycle of confession-pardon, and doesn’t open out to repentance-obedience, I appear to be caught in that very cycle of confession-pardon, and only be able to imagine the open and free life of faith which is the way of real turning from sin, towards God and following the way of Jesus on earth. Late tonight, as I listened to our worship service that I recorded this past Sunday, I started to feel something, imagine something, yearn for something. Instead of thinking about the concept of “following Jesus,” I started to get some feeling for it in my heart. I got some sense of the mystery of it, the newness of it, the hope in it. Instead of singing the words “I have decided to follow Jesus,” I am moved to sing: “I have decided to look for Jesus in the world around me, in the people I see, in my inner life, in the scriptures, as I pray.” And, that other hymn we closed with on Sunday helps my heart sing what it feels: “Seek you first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness. And, all these things shall be added unto you. . . . Alleluia, alleluia. . Ask and it shall be given unto you. Seek and you shall find. Knock and it shall be opened unto you. Allelu . allelu –ia.” And, the thing that really stays with me from that song is that beautiful “Alleluia” part –I think they call it a “descant.” When you sing it with others, it is beyond thought and just lets your heart relax and your spirit unite with others and open to God. I am thinking that that is what it means to follow Jesus.
June 23, 2009, 3:57 A.M.
Monday, June 15, 2009
If all else fails, read directions
"If all else fails, read directions." That's what my Dad taught me. Even a very commonplace outing could be an adventure with my Dad. I remember being in "Indian Guides," which was sort of like "Cub Scouts," but with less rules and more cool Indian type things (never had to say the pledge of allegiance and pretend like our country was on the same level as God). Well, when Dad and I were in "Indian Guides," we went for an overnight stay at Camp Montvale, and all of the other dads were on the sidelines, but my Dad was right in the middle of the action. One boy could outrun everyone else, and I remember that his name was Miles. And, Dad got in there and raced him, and Dad was about to fall on him and caught himself (I think he hurt his wrist, but he was all smiles). And, all the kids loved it!!
It was funny at any kind of parent-kid event with Dad, because not only did he not do things in accordance with the rules, but he was constitutionally incapable! And, at times, it made me uncomfortable as a kid. My Dad was who he was, and he was going to be who he was, and it didn't f-ing matter whether the Pope was in charge or the President! Truth was, Dad was in charge by virtue of the freedom he felt to live life fully. He was free and in charge wherever he was.
I remember a short hike, turned into a wandering through the woods a little lost, but really enjoying it all. Or, if our family took our boat out on the Gulf of Mexico, we didn't get a guide. No, we hit sandbars and waited for the tide, but we also saw things like huge sharks that nobody else saw. And, at times, it even could be a little dangerous like the time Mom and Dad were on their way back down Crystal River when it was storming, lightning and a foot of water was in the boat.
No, Dad wanted to go find out what was out there. He trusted this creation. He loved it. He wasn't afraid of it. Dad always taught me to never fear the wilderness or animals in the wilderness. He told me that the only real evil in this world was human beings. Of course, Dad loved people, but he had to tell the truth. That is the only real evil thing in creation. Human beings. Why?
Well, back to turning the commonplace into the adventurous - well, that was my Dad. When other kids Dads were trying to avoid them on snowdays, my Dad was out there on the hill whipping down on a sled like there was no tommorrow. When other kids Dads were criticizing them for being different from others, my Dad waited to see who I would really turn out to be. Dad was about adventure. You couldn't make him fit in. He didn't try to make me fit in. It's a real blessing when those who love you can celebrate that you don't fit in.
"When all else fails, read directions." Dad's real directions to me in life were: "see if you can figure it out with your heart and mind; I bet you can." That's the "all else" part. "All else" rarely failed for Dad.
It was funny at any kind of parent-kid event with Dad, because not only did he not do things in accordance with the rules, but he was constitutionally incapable! And, at times, it made me uncomfortable as a kid. My Dad was who he was, and he was going to be who he was, and it didn't f-ing matter whether the Pope was in charge or the President! Truth was, Dad was in charge by virtue of the freedom he felt to live life fully. He was free and in charge wherever he was.
I remember a short hike, turned into a wandering through the woods a little lost, but really enjoying it all. Or, if our family took our boat out on the Gulf of Mexico, we didn't get a guide. No, we hit sandbars and waited for the tide, but we also saw things like huge sharks that nobody else saw. And, at times, it even could be a little dangerous like the time Mom and Dad were on their way back down Crystal River when it was storming, lightning and a foot of water was in the boat.
No, Dad wanted to go find out what was out there. He trusted this creation. He loved it. He wasn't afraid of it. Dad always taught me to never fear the wilderness or animals in the wilderness. He told me that the only real evil in this world was human beings. Of course, Dad loved people, but he had to tell the truth. That is the only real evil thing in creation. Human beings. Why?
Well, back to turning the commonplace into the adventurous - well, that was my Dad. When other kids Dads were trying to avoid them on snowdays, my Dad was out there on the hill whipping down on a sled like there was no tommorrow. When other kids Dads were criticizing them for being different from others, my Dad waited to see who I would really turn out to be. Dad was about adventure. You couldn't make him fit in. He didn't try to make me fit in. It's a real blessing when those who love you can celebrate that you don't fit in.
"When all else fails, read directions." Dad's real directions to me in life were: "see if you can figure it out with your heart and mind; I bet you can." That's the "all else" part. "All else" rarely failed for Dad.
Monday, June 8, 2009
Albert Schweitzer and “Reverence for Life”
I have been reading “Out of My Life and Thought,” an autobiography by Albert Schweitzer. One thing that amazes me about Schweitzer is how little respect was given to his “thought” by my bible and theology professors at Wake Forest, Columbia, Princeton, and Vanderbilt. Sure, everyone conceded that he had been a great man, and had done a great thing with his hospital in western Africa, started in the early 1900’s. Schweitzer was an accomplished organist, biblical scholar, and then went to medical school around 30 years of age. And, he kept up his scholarly writing and organ playing even after becoming the overseer of a mission in Africa as its lead doctor for decades.
Two things have really impressed me in reading this book: Schweitzer’s explanation of why he decided to be a “jungle doctor,” and his explanation of how he came to the central conviction of his theological and ethical thought. Schweitzer said of becoming a doctor: “I wanted to be a doctor that I might be able to work without having to talk.” He also explains how everybody who knew what a promising scholar and musician he was thought he was crazy for deciding to be a mission doctor. And, later in the book, he explains how he had begun to reflect on the erosion of modern western civilization by the turn of the century (1900)), and that his thoughts had come to full bloom while in Africa during WWI. Schweitzer was driven to diagnose the societal sickness that had resulted in loss of meaning, loss of true ideals, and warring around the world. His reflections show that he was interested in Eastern thought as well as Western. Eventually, one day while he was travelling upstream on a river in Africa to make a house call on a missionary’s wife who was real sick, it came to him: “Reverence for Life.” This was the deepest spiritual and ethical principal that allowed life to thrive in its full material and spiritual aspects. Reverence for life, all life, as he liked to say. Schweitzer puts it this way:
Lost in thought I sat on the deck of the barge, struggling to find the elementary and universal conception of the ethical which I had not discovered in any philosophy. Sheet after sheet I covered with disconnected sentences, merely to keep myself concentrated on the problem. Late on the third day, at the very moment when, at sunset, we were making our way through a herd of hippopotamuses, there flashed upon my mind, unforeseen and unsought, the phrase, “Reverence for Life.” The iron door had yielded: the path in the thicket had become visible. Now I had found my way to the idea in which affirmation of the world and ethics are contained side by side.
- Albert Schweitzer, Out of My Life and Thought, 1933
I want to let Schweitzer explain in his own words what he means by “Reverence for Life” as the foundational conception for thinking and living.
If man affirms his will-to-live, he acts naturally and honestly. He affirms an act which has already been accomplished in his instinctive thought by repeating it in his conscious thought. The beginning of thought, a beginning which continually repeats itself, is that man does not simply accept his existence as something given, but experiences it as something unfathomably mysterious. Affirmation of life is the spiritual act by which man ceases to live unreflectively and begins to devote himself to his life with reverence in order to raise it to its true value. To affirm life is to deepen, to make more inward, and to exalt the will-to-live.
At the same time the man who has become a thinking being feels a compulsion to give to every will-to-live the same reverence for life that he gives to his own. He experiences that other life in his own. He accepts as being good: to preserve life, to promote life, to raise to its highest value life which is capable of development; and as being evil: to destroy life, to injure life, to repress life which is capable of development. This is the absolute, fundamental principle of the moral, and it is a necessity of thought.
The great fault of all ethics hitherto has been that they believed themselves to have to deal only with the relations of man to man. In reality, however, the question is what is his attitude to the world and all life that comes within his reach. A man is ethical only when life, as such, is sacred to him, that of plants and animals as that of his fellow men, and when he devotes himself helpfully to all life that is in need of help.
-Albert Schweitzer
Earlier in the same book, Schweitzer explains his view on religions and philosophies that deny the will-to-live. He considers the Christianity of the Middle Ages and Eastern thought as world-denying spiritualities. He finds these ways of thought as unnatural and thus unspiritual. Of the detachment of other-wordly Christianity and the detachment taught in Eastern religion he says this:
Man has now to decide what his relation to his will-to-live shall be. He can deny it. But if he bids his will-to-live change into will-to-not-live, . . . he involves himself in self-contradiction. He raises to the position of his philosophy of life something unnatural, something which is in itself untrue, and which cannot be carried to completion. Indian thought, and Schopenhauer’s also, is full of inconsistencies because it cannot help making concessions time after time to the will-to-live, which persists in spite of all negation of the world, though it will not admit that the concessions are really such. Negation of the will-to-live is self-consistent only if it is really willing actually to put an end to physical existence.
-Albert Schweitzer
About this will-to-live, I am reminded of one of my favorite passages from the book of Ecclesiastes which discovers this persistent will-to-live even in the midst of a depressing reflection on the fact that death comes to all.
But all this I laid to heart, examining it all, how the righteous and the wise and their deeds are in the hand of God; whether it is love or hate man does not know. Everything before them is vanity, since one fate comes to all, to the righteous and the wicked, to the good and the evil, to the clean and the unclean, to him who sacrifices and him who does not sacrifice. As is the good man, so is the sinner; and he who swears is as he who shuns an oath. This is an evil in all that is done under the sun, that one fate comes to all; also the hearts of men are full of evil, and madness is in their hearts while they live, and after that they go to the dead.
But he who is joined with all the living has hope, for a living dog is better than a dead lion. For the living know that they will die, but the dead know nothing, and they have no more reward; but the memory of them is lost.
Their love and their hate and their envy have already perished, and they have no more for ever any share in all that is done under the sun.
So go eat your bread with enjoyment, and drink your wine with a merry heart; for God has already approved what you do.
Let your garments be always white; let not oil be lacking on your head.
Enjoy life with the wife whom you love, all the days of your vain life which he has given you under the sun, because that is your portion in life and in your toil at which you toil under the sun. Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might; for there is no work or thought or knowledge or wisdom in Sheol, to which you are going.
Ecclesiastes 9:1-10
We find this will-to-live as a surprise at times. Times when we thought we were empty of life, it has swelled within us like an invading presence, mysterious and gracious. As Schweitzer says: “as something unfathomably mysterious.”
Two things have really impressed me in reading this book: Schweitzer’s explanation of why he decided to be a “jungle doctor,” and his explanation of how he came to the central conviction of his theological and ethical thought. Schweitzer said of becoming a doctor: “I wanted to be a doctor that I might be able to work without having to talk.” He also explains how everybody who knew what a promising scholar and musician he was thought he was crazy for deciding to be a mission doctor. And, later in the book, he explains how he had begun to reflect on the erosion of modern western civilization by the turn of the century (1900)), and that his thoughts had come to full bloom while in Africa during WWI. Schweitzer was driven to diagnose the societal sickness that had resulted in loss of meaning, loss of true ideals, and warring around the world. His reflections show that he was interested in Eastern thought as well as Western. Eventually, one day while he was travelling upstream on a river in Africa to make a house call on a missionary’s wife who was real sick, it came to him: “Reverence for Life.” This was the deepest spiritual and ethical principal that allowed life to thrive in its full material and spiritual aspects. Reverence for life, all life, as he liked to say. Schweitzer puts it this way:
Lost in thought I sat on the deck of the barge, struggling to find the elementary and universal conception of the ethical which I had not discovered in any philosophy. Sheet after sheet I covered with disconnected sentences, merely to keep myself concentrated on the problem. Late on the third day, at the very moment when, at sunset, we were making our way through a herd of hippopotamuses, there flashed upon my mind, unforeseen and unsought, the phrase, “Reverence for Life.” The iron door had yielded: the path in the thicket had become visible. Now I had found my way to the idea in which affirmation of the world and ethics are contained side by side.
- Albert Schweitzer, Out of My Life and Thought, 1933
I want to let Schweitzer explain in his own words what he means by “Reverence for Life” as the foundational conception for thinking and living.
If man affirms his will-to-live, he acts naturally and honestly. He affirms an act which has already been accomplished in his instinctive thought by repeating it in his conscious thought. The beginning of thought, a beginning which continually repeats itself, is that man does not simply accept his existence as something given, but experiences it as something unfathomably mysterious. Affirmation of life is the spiritual act by which man ceases to live unreflectively and begins to devote himself to his life with reverence in order to raise it to its true value. To affirm life is to deepen, to make more inward, and to exalt the will-to-live.
At the same time the man who has become a thinking being feels a compulsion to give to every will-to-live the same reverence for life that he gives to his own. He experiences that other life in his own. He accepts as being good: to preserve life, to promote life, to raise to its highest value life which is capable of development; and as being evil: to destroy life, to injure life, to repress life which is capable of development. This is the absolute, fundamental principle of the moral, and it is a necessity of thought.
The great fault of all ethics hitherto has been that they believed themselves to have to deal only with the relations of man to man. In reality, however, the question is what is his attitude to the world and all life that comes within his reach. A man is ethical only when life, as such, is sacred to him, that of plants and animals as that of his fellow men, and when he devotes himself helpfully to all life that is in need of help.
-Albert Schweitzer
Earlier in the same book, Schweitzer explains his view on religions and philosophies that deny the will-to-live. He considers the Christianity of the Middle Ages and Eastern thought as world-denying spiritualities. He finds these ways of thought as unnatural and thus unspiritual. Of the detachment of other-wordly Christianity and the detachment taught in Eastern religion he says this:
Man has now to decide what his relation to his will-to-live shall be. He can deny it. But if he bids his will-to-live change into will-to-not-live, . . . he involves himself in self-contradiction. He raises to the position of his philosophy of life something unnatural, something which is in itself untrue, and which cannot be carried to completion. Indian thought, and Schopenhauer’s also, is full of inconsistencies because it cannot help making concessions time after time to the will-to-live, which persists in spite of all negation of the world, though it will not admit that the concessions are really such. Negation of the will-to-live is self-consistent only if it is really willing actually to put an end to physical existence.
-Albert Schweitzer
About this will-to-live, I am reminded of one of my favorite passages from the book of Ecclesiastes which discovers this persistent will-to-live even in the midst of a depressing reflection on the fact that death comes to all.
But all this I laid to heart, examining it all, how the righteous and the wise and their deeds are in the hand of God; whether it is love or hate man does not know. Everything before them is vanity, since one fate comes to all, to the righteous and the wicked, to the good and the evil, to the clean and the unclean, to him who sacrifices and him who does not sacrifice. As is the good man, so is the sinner; and he who swears is as he who shuns an oath. This is an evil in all that is done under the sun, that one fate comes to all; also the hearts of men are full of evil, and madness is in their hearts while they live, and after that they go to the dead.
But he who is joined with all the living has hope, for a living dog is better than a dead lion. For the living know that they will die, but the dead know nothing, and they have no more reward; but the memory of them is lost.
Their love and their hate and their envy have already perished, and they have no more for ever any share in all that is done under the sun.
So go eat your bread with enjoyment, and drink your wine with a merry heart; for God has already approved what you do.
Let your garments be always white; let not oil be lacking on your head.
Enjoy life with the wife whom you love, all the days of your vain life which he has given you under the sun, because that is your portion in life and in your toil at which you toil under the sun. Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might; for there is no work or thought or knowledge or wisdom in Sheol, to which you are going.
Ecclesiastes 9:1-10
We find this will-to-live as a surprise at times. Times when we thought we were empty of life, it has swelled within us like an invading presence, mysterious and gracious. As Schweitzer says: “as something unfathomably mysterious.”
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