The Difficulty of Words
Corinthians
February 9, 1986
As a Christian preacher, I stand in perpetual admiration of Buddhist teachers. They are able, by the simplest of stories, to make the most telling points. One story that I heard recently tells of a meeting between the Buddha and an odd little creature known as the monkey God. I am not sure who this monkey God was exactly, but the story tells you clearly enough all you need to know about him.
After the fashion of monkeys, apparently he was impudent and, above all, he was very vain and boastful. These qualities became apparent as soon as he and the Buddha came face to face. The very first thing the monkey God tries to do is to prove that he is just as great as the Buddha. To establish this, he sets about performing a number of tricks. The kind of magical acts that are designed to astonish.
The Buddha sits there pondering and inscrutable. Giving no particular sign of being impressed. Finally, out of desperation, the monkey plays his trump card. He takes an enormous leap into the air and completely disappears from sight. Eventually, he comes back and then just stands around for a while, obviously worked too as Buddha says nothing right through the monkey God has just come back from the outermost limits of the universe and implies that this is a journey that even the Buddha might find difficult to take.
Then the monkey God stands around a while longer, hoping that the Buddha will ask him how it was done. But again, there is no question forthcoming. So again, the monkey God replies to a question that has not been asked. he explains that at the outermost limit of the universe, he saw five huge granite pillars extending into the clouds. And what does the Buddha think of that?
This time the Buddha does answer, but not in words; instead of saying anything he simply raised his hands up before the monkey’s eyes. As the murky God watches, his attention is drawn to the Buddha’s fingers, which seemed to become not 5 fingers but 5 huge granite pillars. These pillars extend up infinitely, and the tops are lost beyond sight.
I envy the ability of the priest. The Buddhists tell that kind of story when faced with religious questions. It tells us that even at silence or a simple action, you can teach profound truths. When you come right down to it, the kinds of things we talk about in religion are always difficult, often almost impossible to put into words. In this information culture, we must rediscover silence. Speaking about the unspoken as our task. Poetry is what we are about. If I as a preacher, were an unusually brave man, I would keep my friend’s advice. I would stop speaking, perform some action in silence, or maybe slip into poetry.
In the 13th chapter of acts that is what Saint Paul shows in describing love. He slips into poetry as this passage is called, the great hymn to love. First Paul describes the characteristics of love. It is silent, kind, not jealous or boastful. Not arrogant or rude, does not insist on its own way it is not irritable or resentful does not rejoice that wrongs. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
But after all this description Paul ends by saying that you cannot fully understand or articulate love. To use Paul’s own words now we see in a mirror darkly now we know in part. Words fail, concepts fail, it is at this point that we become shepherds of silence rather than servants of the word. It is not that words about love are useless. Paul’s words are beautiful, worth repeating, but the fact is that words are not enough. Suppose a man comes to a friend who has fallen in love and asks him to describe the experience, there would appear to be two courses open
First he might define the symptoms, analyze the feelings, and give some characteristics. The result would be a fairly comprehensive account, but probably little understanding. The second course would be to tell his friend nothing, but either recount a story of love or point him in the direction in which he may experience love
A person said to me I can be a Christian on my own. I don’t need the church. I can learn about ethics by reading some good philosophy. I laughed. I have heard it before so many times
This is like learning about love from a marriage manual, or being married and living alone. How I wanted to say don’t you understand the Christians are lovers and one cannot be a lover alone? The lower needs the beloved, or, as the poet said our hearts are restless until we find our home with thee. But I held my tongue and remained silent, but what could I say except that he had forgotten his nature
Let me conclude with this story that reinforces this notion, ohh more because it comes from the eastern tradition. Mohammed sat down in the shade of an ancient banyan tree, its roots stretching far into a swamp. As he sat there he noticed a scorpion that had become hopelessly entangled in the tree roots. The old man reached down to extricate the scorpion, but each time he touched it, it lashed his hand with its tail, stinging him painfully. Finally his hand was so swollen he could no longer close his fingers so he withdrew to wait for the swelling to go down
As he sat down he noticed the young man who had been watching from far off. The young man laughed and said you are wasting your time trying to help a scorpion that can only do you harm. The old man replied, simply because it is in the nature of the scorpion, testing. But my nature which is to love.
Now we see in the mirror darkly, but every so often by a gesture, a word, a story, a sacrament we may begin to understand we are like the monkey God. We are outrageous, ludicrous, vain, and boastful we talked too much, posture too much, communicate too much. But in answer to all our words God holds before us not answering but a person who says
This is my body, this is my blood. Come and join yourself to me.,
Amen