From: Scott R (jse885@spinn.net)
Date: Mon Jan 13 2003 - 04:08:14 GMT
Erin,
----- Original Message ----- >
> If Zen encourages silence then why are you surprised we
> are not talking about Zen;-) Kidding, but it is hard to talk
> about zen though. I definitely do think of Pirsig as a Zen person.
> I was wondering if anybody who knows about postmodernism
> tell me it would say about Zen. The discussions here that seem most zen to
me
> seem like it would be dismissed as postmodernist (hi Platt).
> I don't know enough about postmodernism to say if I would
> call Pirsig a postmodernist but would be interested
> from hearing about it from somebody who does know more about
> both zen and postmodernism (Scott??).
I call Pirsig a postmodernist but only in a very broad sense, namely,
someone who has assimilated modernism, has seen its weaknesses, and attempts
to correct those weaknesses without junking it all (as religious
fundamentalists want to do). I also accept Pirsig's word that he is a Zen
person, but as with all spiritual communities, there are Zen people and
there are Zen people. Some are anti-intellectual, some are not. Some Zen
communities emphasize asceticism, some not (or not as much).
On Zen and silence, in my understanding, it is not that silence is
preferable to talking, but that unless and until one learns to be silent at
will, one's talking tends to be attached (ego bound). So the Enlightened one
will be silent when silence is called for, and talk when talking is called
for. After experiencing Nothingness, one returns to Somethingness.
Now, is Zen postmodern? Obviously not, in that it long predates modernism.
On the other hand, I see in it a philosophy (that all is contingent, that it
is the mind that moves -- thanks Mari for posting my favorite koan), that
gives postmodernism a groundless-grounding.
- Scott
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