One-summit Universalism
Part I - The Whole beyond the Parts
There are many paths to the top of the mountain, but only one summit. The ‘summit’ is the exalted state of consciousness of the one who authentically & autonomously knows - and who also lives what she or he knows.
At the summit, when we look out, there is only mystery the formless whole in all directions.
The birds have vanished into the sky,
and now the last cloud drains away.
We sit together, the mountains and me,
until only the mountains remain.
Li Po (701-762)
To introduce a second metaphor we, and all forms, emerge, like a wave on the ocean, and after a while we return into the formless whole.
In mystery we are united. Our countless permutations of beliefs dissolve when we stand silent, word-less, before infinite mystery.
Standing before infinite mystery all are one - humanists, religionists, non-theists etc.
It is the only place at which we all are perfectly united.
At the place of mystery we are united because there are no concepts, beliefs or theology - no belief systems, no ‘I’m right and you’re wrong’.
At the ‘top of the mountain’ there is just silence, infinite space, no time - the awe and wonder of the view stretching out infinitely in every direction. In everyday life we get glimpses, flashes of this whole beyond this frenetic, contingent world. We all are mystics just as we all are philosophers, and poets, painters and dancers - they all are part of being human - from babyhood onwards.
When we stand before such mystery we are on the shoreline. It is the shore between the land of the known and knowable and the ocean of the unknown and unknowable. At that place we can turn to face the land of concepts - or the ocean of silence.
Facing the land there is the sweetness of language and concepts but in our engagement with the world comes disappointment, fear, envy etc. This means the ego rises - and torments.
When we turn back to face the ocean, or lose our ‘small self’ by becoming at-one with the ocean, then the ‘past-and-future-centred’ ego has stops its raging.
The more we can live in the now the more we bridge the two, the parts and the whole.
This infinite mystery can only be pointed at, not captured in concepts, creed or belief-system. What we need to do is hold that nowness more, to rest in it and let it expand - so that the torments of ego come back less and less - and less frequently overcome us.
We can’t capture the whole - but we can experience it - just as we experience the infinite ocean when we lose our sense of separateness in a warm, salty sea. We just can't conceptualize it, or measure it or weigh it.
To stand in front of infinite mystery is to experience awe and wonder and the ineffable. Poets, mystics and seers try to convey the reality but inevitably fail - often magnificently.
We can of course deny it by saying that there is nothing beyond what we understand.
Infinite mystery can only be pointed at. Concepts belong to the known and knowable realm. There is no conceptualization of the infinite by the finite. This is why for Buddhist there is no (naming of) God. The realm of the finite cannot deal in any comprehensive sense with the realm of the infinite. We can only inadequately, as poets and scholars, say how it is when we tremble and shiver through sensing the whole. The more we sense that whole the more relief we experience from egotistical lives, in which we guard the chimera of separate existence. At the centre of that ego-guarding is fear of annihilation.
The antidote lies in silence.
Part 2 - ‘Just below the summit ‘ - a chance for peace-making via ‘spiritual federalism’
Those who really know, when they stand at the summit, or just a bit further down the path up which they ascended, do not need help in recognizing others who have ascended via different paths.
For the rest of us there is some ‘technology’ that helps us overcome our fear, insularity and need to make others into enemies. With Karen Armstrong we can say that 1. the practice of compassion and 2. the deepening of sensibility through realization of the Golden Rule can help us toward what we might call ‘spiritual federalism’.
By this term I simply mean that we can continue to live in the ‘state’ of our own particular belief-system whilst acknowledging a federal ‘sameness’ that transcends my and most other belief systems.
This is based ultimately on recognition of our shared humanity; we all love and we all suffer.
Such a ‘dual allegiance’ enhances the particularity of a chosen belief system, not the opposite - unless we are led by closed-hearted preachers.
Closed-hearted preachers have a reasons for perpetuating exclusivity of the sect they lead. Some are gross reasons, power, money, status, money-extraction. Some are less gross but involve fear and ideas of salvation that ‘make-wrong’ the other.
The ‘technology’ of amplifying compassion and ‘Golden Rule realization’ is what is needed to open the hearts of those who are caged in exclusivist belief-systems. All the great wisdom traditions provide treasure-houses of teachings to help with this aim.
There are a number of great teachers of compassion and the Golden Rule from all wisdom traditions. For now I have chosen five. They also point to the stillness and silence beyond the pettiness of our concept-structures.
Part 3 - Five great ‘Pointers’ and livers of compassion and the Golden Rule
I have chosen five ‘pointers’ - figures about whom no claims of Divinity are made; but who all point to the Mystery with great eloquence, great profundity, great humility. They also have walked the talk in matters of compassion and the Golden Rule. They also do somewhat different jobs for us. I will provide sources for them all in due course. I have started with Tolle - see link below.
Abdu’l-Baha
Armstrong
Heschel
Tolle
Wilber
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