From: Sam Norton (elizaphanian@kohath.wanadoo.co.uk)
Date: Mon Aug 15 2005 - 13:51:08 BST
Hi DMB, CL Everett, anyone tuning in,
DMB says:
> dmb only WISHES Sam would say:
> "Well yes, there is no mysticism in mainstream Christianity as you, Pirsig
> and Campbell understand the term. Mainstream Christians use the term
> "mysticism" to refer to something else entirely. In fact, my tradition
> specifically denies the existence of any such experience as you guys
> present it."
Sam copies in a post from 13 December 2004. DMB said
> ....I also want to say that the label
> that bothers you so much, Christian mystic, is really not important to my
> point. Clearly, that means something entirely different to you than it
> does
> to me and apparently my claiming the label for myself has offended you
> somehow. And now it seems to have become a distraction. See, I'm certainly
> not denying that there is a long list of theologians and christian
> thinkers
> who would vigorously disagree with everything I've been saying, as you
> have
> yourself. In fact, as I understand it, the vast, vast majority would
> condemn
> these ideas. And so I'm certainly not trying to appropriate that tradition
> or make any claims that it supports my view. Quite the contrary.
And Sam says:
Well that's very helpful, and it will ease a lot if we're clear that
'Christian mysticism' and
'philosophical mysticism' are two different things. However, this may
undercut the 'common core'
idea which you hold, but we can come back to that. I'm very happy that
Pirsig is a philosophical
mystic in the sense that you affirm, and that he is 'updating' that
tradition etc.
> dmb writes:
> Lots of people have been doing the reading, including me. You know the
> names
> of these various readers already. And again, I think this request to find
> Jamesian mysticism within the christian tradition is quite beside the
> point
> and can't be done for reasons explained above.
Except that it is exactly what James himself does and if - for the sake of
argument - we accept that
you haven't been doing it, it's still a prevalent claim that the Christian
mystics were
mystics-in-the-Jamesian sense. Are you now happy to say that the vast
majority of people regarded as
Christian mystics were NOT mystics-in-the-Jamesian sense?
> <snip>....The meaning of the christian
> tradition, as I knew it from living in a christian country and growing up
> in
> the church, only became apparent to me AFTER the mystical experience. It
> had
> an "Oh, now I get it" kind of effect and the whole mythology was infused
> power and meaning, a meaning that had very little to do with the static
> interpretations I'd always heard. And that's why Pirsig's talk about the
> guilded vines of dogma block out the light makes so much sense to me. It
> is
> my personal experience that this is true. And I have to say that when
> ritual
> is asserted to be mysticism, it looks very much like a light-blocking move
> to me.
All I can say is a) my experience was different and led me in a different
direction and b) we need
to explore the link between 'experience' and truth because I think you're
finding what you were
expecting. I'm sure we'll come back to that.
> dmb says:
> Again, it seems you want me to investigate certain things, like "the
> negation of the negation", in order to save yourself the trouble of having
> to explain what it is or why it matters. I mean, you've giving me a
> rather
> clipped and cryptic phrase here. Am I supposed to know all about apophatic
> mysticism because I've used terms they use?
No, you're supposed to understand it because I've explained it before. But
as long as you're happy
to exclude the Christian tradition from what you're arguing for then we
don't need to go down that
route so much; you're using the language differently, that's fine - as long
as we're clear that that
is what you are doing.
>...All I
> know is that you mostly disagree with Pirsig on everything concerning
> mysticism and religion, but I honestly could say why, except that you
> believe the tradition is good. But I don't know why. Not really. In any
> case, I think we can discuss this particular point without reference to
> Pirsig or traditon or anything else....
<snip>
> These are difficult circumstances under which to converse. I
> mean, how can we properly discuss philosophical mysticism when we
> apparently
> can't even agree on the meaning of the key term "mysticism"? I think its
> only fair that we, at least, BEGIN with Pirsig's definitions and
> descriptions, not out of worship or because he's the last, best word on
> the
> topic, but simply because we all have it in common and this is the MOQ
> forum.
I do disagree with Pirsig when it comes to questions of religion and faith,
and if I explain why,
it'll explain why I disagree with you, and why I think it's appropriate to
thrash things out in this
forum, even if we sometimes seem to go a long way from Pirsig. Thing is, if
you are genuinely happy
to separate out Christian mysticism from philosophical mysticism, then most
of my objections are
greatly lessened. We can then just focus on whether Pirsig's position makes
sense, and I don't have
to keep jumping up and down saying that you're begging the question. But
anyway, here's a summary:
I believe that:
1. Mysticism cannot be understood apart from a particular tradition, of
whatever sort (Christian,
Buddhist, Hindu, philosophical etc); in other words, mysticism is not first
and foremost about an
'experience';
2. Different mysticisms do not possess a 'common core' underlying surface
differences; there is no
'common essence', there are only 'family resemblances';
3. More explicitly, 'philosophical mysticism' I see as a Platonic or
neo-Platonic strand of
intellectual enquiry and 'ascent'; I would put Pirsig's characterisation of
the MoQ in this
tradition;
4. Christian mysticism critiques philosophical mysticism, especially the
intellectualism and the
emphasis on experience;
5. Schleiermacher and James (etc) are largely responsible for the common
understanding of
'mysticism' in our society today; they are philosophical mystics, but they
claimed that Christian
mysticism was the same; they are demonstrably wrong in that claim; they also
associate mysticism
with experience _in_a_novel_way;
6. There is evidence for a link between SOM and philosophical mysticism;
that's what my essay was
looking at, and that's what I'd be most interested in continuing to explore.
Now, when you bring certain thinkers to bear to support your position, I
read them as either a)
belonging to the 'original' philosophical mystical tradition (eg Plotinus)
OR b) belonging to the
Jamesian tradition (Wilber, Fox, Campbell etc) and therefore depending on
flawed presuppositions.
It's the presuppositions that I want to explore, and which I see as
interesting for understanding
Pirsig. In other words, even though I think he's wrong and Christian
mysticism is 'right', I think
it's a worthwhile exercise to explore Pirsig's view on this.
What I most object to in your analysis is that I understood you to be
arguing, with Schleiermacher
and James, that Christian mysticism was the same as philosophical mysticism,
either explicitly
(asserting that Eckhart, for example, was a philosophical mystic) or
implicitly (genuine mystics
access a 'common core', therefore if they are true mystics, they will be
philosophical mystics). If
you're happy to let those two arguments drop, then I'm sure we'd move a long
way forward rapidly.
Although it would be asking a lot for you to let go of the 'common core'
viewpoint, I suspect.
Why don't we look at Eckhart in more detail? I'll try and find your post
that you refer to.
~~~
This was written seven or eight months ago. Can't see that we've got
anywhere, despite my being (I think) pretty clear about what you now seem so
surprised about, and you're not taking me up on any substantial engagement
with a particular pre-modern mystic.
Can you answer some straight questions?
1. Do you believe that the Christian mystics are philosophical mystics (as
defined above, ie Eckhart et al were concerned with 'experience')?
2. Do you believe there is a 'common core' underlying all the different
religions?
Sam
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