MDers AN OBSERVATION
TOM & ROGER DANCE IN THE MOONBEAMS
TOM POINTS A RHETORICAL FINGER
WHILE ROGER EATS A MOONPIES
TOM
> The essense of the rhetoric taught by the sophists is the same as the
> stories told by Pirsig about sitting on the stove, etc. These stories,
> parables,analogies, have been used for ages by those who wish to convey the
> essense of indescribable experiences. In other words the failure of logic
> leaves one no other choice if your intent is to accurately pass on the
> knowledge of those experiences to others and future generations. Therefore
> those teachers often used paradox and logically absurd statements to point
> the student in the direction of Truth.
DAVE
Thanks for completing the Zen/Rhetorical circle for me. As you point out
Pirsig was faced with preach'n in the Church of Reason ("the West") more
specifically to start with, America. While reading ZMM years ago, I, as I
would guess is the case with most Americans had no exposure to Zen, let alone
any understanding of it. The final illustration in the classic Zen story, The
ten cow or ox herding pictures, "Entering the City with Bliss bestowing Hands"
illustrates the final step in Zen practice is bestowing or passing along to
others the benefits of one's insight. Let's assume for a moment that Pirsig
is trying to pass along his insights of a "heathen Eastern
philosophy/religion(s)" to a predominately Christian, logical, and science
worshipping culture; What method would you use? Pirsig chose the rhetorical
form of the "quest" novel "heavily interlarded with philosophical
ruminations", as one critic put it, and it worked. But only up to a point. It
gained a huge readership, gave him freedom from writing tech manuals, but
feedback from ZMM readers suggested many, while intrigued, had extracted
neither an understanding Quality or Zen from it. I surely didn't.
The history of Zen shows it successfully spread by dynamically and
pragmatically adapting its practices to the psychology of the culture it was
addressing. You claim with "Lila" he chose to "pander" rather that stay in
the trenches and fight. I would suggest that Pirsig was/is "fighting" but in a
classic Zen way.
To paraphrase a Japanese Zen koan.
A Zen master of the "No Sword" school was sitting in a boat waiting to be
rowed acrossed a river when a braggart samurai got in the boat and proceeded
to taunt the master, challenging him to a duel, claiming the "No Sword" school
was a logical absurdity. After repeatedly declining the master finally agreed
but suggested rather than delay the other passengers they should be let off in
at an island in the middle of the river. When they arrived at the island the
braggart jumped out first seeking to have a few more seconds to prepare. The
master placed one foot on the shore and violently shoved the boat out into the
river, winning the contest without a blow.
Zen practitioners claim it is the essence of Buddhism. I think the argument
can be successfully made that the MoQ in "Lila" is the essence of Zen. A
further distillation, if you will, but one that is rhetorically tuned to the
psychology of Western culture. The first rule of preach'n is you have to get
a congregation, ZMM got the passengers in the boat and rowed them to the
island, "Lila" shoved the boat back into the river.
The question now is: Is the West going to remain on the island or learn how to swim?
If "Lila" panders to the static patterns of Western culture in order to be
heard, the modern Zen response might be "And your point was?" Zen unashamedly
claims to be pragmatically oriented to one end, enlightenment, the means are
inconsequential and while often appearing cruel, uncaring, or nonsensical in
the end they are not.
ROGER
> 1) DQ is [everyday] Direct Experience.
> 2) Reality is composed of Direct Experience.
> 3) Conceptualizing is one such experience. Conceptualizing is the
> experience of building models of ourselves and our world. Conceptualizing
> builds static, shallow (though extremely useful) patterns out of dynamic
> prepatterned reality.
> 4) The conceptualized, patterned world is a model built from DQ [events emanating from the pool of ultimate reality. Quality]
DAVE
Admire your patient snipping, quoting, and commentary. [Brackets are my
additions] Don't think you should abandon the "everyday" position in that I
feel the SQ/DQ LS discussion is about this very point. I have been
concentrating my reading over the past few months on Zen and Zen history and
have come to the conclusion that Zen "enlightenment" or "satori" is in part
about changing ones point of view such that DQ is able to become an intuitive
part of every day existence. Believe Pirsig suggests the same.
Pirsig's references to hurricanes, heart attacks, and hot stoves is merely a
way to rhetorically and practically show that everyone does and has
experienced DQ. but that static patterns can and do become so pervasive that
the everyday experience of DQ is overlooked, lost, or shielded from perception.
The final brackets are an attempt to keep within your four statements the
limits of DQ/SQ as they are still, for any individual or group, just a portion
of the ultimate reality, Quality, which is as a whole unknown and unknowable.
But you could be wrong, and so might I.
Dave
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