Beyond "smelly little orthodoxies"
Terrance Keenan, the zen twelve-stepper who I mentioned in an earlier post as the author of St. Nadie: Zen Encounters with Loneliness, delves on page 12 into one of my deepest concerns: fundamentalism, aka in its sneakier form, dogma. He writes, "...Orwell [George?] would have us stand against all the 'smelly little orthodoxies which are now contending for our souls.'" I want to see if I can tackle this subject from a positive perspective, since I believe it's better to light a candle than to curse the darkness.

If orthodoxy helps me improve my spiritual condition, how can it be wrong? This presupposes, though, that I am able to avoid the common pitfall of orthodoxy/fundamentalism/dogma which judges other ways. No one has a patent on the truth. As I try to get at in my mini-manifesto, the truth is the truth no matter what we say about it. My path is as good as my perception of truth, as is yours.

Keenan's opinion is that orthodoxy and/or rationality necessarily detract from our ability to perceive truth: "We do not leave make-believe behind when we emerge into so-called adulthood.We just call it rationalization. It is said rationalization is more important to life than money, food, or sex. ...How difficult it is to know the know the actuality of our inner voice, to know it is not some fiction we have created, a rationalized mask over our own godless wildness. I wanted to be free of myself and was at the same time afraid that to be so was a kind of death. ... Perhaps I am too often absent from my own being."

Zen is all about the experience of truth, and Keenan is saying that the experience of truth is different than talking about it. I agree. The truth behind Christian grace and Buddhist dharma and Sufi tales and koans from zen itself is an undiluted and inviolable whole. As the Course in Miracles starts off, "Nothing real can be threatened. Nothing unreal exists."

The difficulty is in bringing this unified whole from one's solitary experience into the world, and to find unity with others in the shared work of constructing an enlightened society. This statement is in one sense a tautology, since authentic holy work will inexcorably lead to a higher manifestation. But my point is that our most immediate environment is our relationships, and we are rational creatures. Therefore, our responsibility is at least two-fold: 1) to do our holy work so we can experience truth and 2) to maintain our awareness in our "worldy" experiences, including our reasoning (Keenan's "rationalty") and our relations with others.

Truth is one. Orthodoxies are many. Let's hold hands and jump towards unity.