Remember that old Bee Gees‘ song Words? It’s about one person offering all they have to another. Well, the one doing the offering must have been a writer because, while the song’s a love story, it’s words that are the big thing on offer here:
It’s only words, and words are all I have
To take your heart away
Well, as this is a blog, words are the way it hopes to reach your heart. Actually, the posts also include photos and sometimes other art, but the main vehicle used here is words.
So, with that in mind I have a couple of words to offer you today. Well, one word and its opposite. Have a look at this sentence from Thomas Merton:
If Irish monks affirmed his Celtic spirit in their mastery of cataphatic contemplation of the wonders of divinity in nature, Buddhist monks evoked his Zen mind and drew him into the apophatic path of formless ’emptiness’…
A quote from the Introduction to When the trees say nothing: nature writings of Thomas Merton
As sentences go (though this is obviously only part of a sentence) this has to rank pretty close to the top for length and denseness.
Kataphatic. What a word! Of course I had to look it up; I’d never heard the word before (this post is a rewrite from notes written a while ago that I never got around to posting.), and even though the sentence seems to suggest the meaning, I was still curious.
Looking at Wikipedia – where they spell it with a ‘C’ like Merton, as well as with a ‘K’- I learned that cataphatic is an adjective that describes an approach to theology that uses ‘positive terminology to describe or refer to the divine (God, Truth, Dharma, Spirit. You know what I mean: the divine).
Apophatic, as you probably figured out already, is when one uses ‘negative terminology to indicate what it is believed the divine is not’. A process of negation or we could say you get to what the divine is by a process of elimination.
Pretty simple concept really, but with a couple of big words to label it, and a lot of words to define it. No, don’t worry, I won’t bore you with the meaning and origin of the words and all the rest. Mainly because I don’t know and I’m not especially interested anyway in all that technical stuff.
I simply resonated with the word, and the concept. Cataphatic made me think of Dick Van Dyke and Julie Andrews singing Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious in Mary Poppins. But let’s not go there: this is a serious blog after all. Except to say there’s more to that word than you might imagine.
Putting aside the aesthetic appeal of the word for a minute, let’s contemplate a while on cataphatic, and it’s opposite, apothatic.
To begin thinking about these two words, it’s necessary to acknowledge the existence of the divine. We can call it God, if we like. Or Dharma, Truth, Spirit, Love, Beauty.
As the quote suggests, a cataphatic approach, ideology, theology, or whatever we call it, ascribes names and forms to the divine, as well as describing where and in what the divine may reside.
Whereas apothatic, again as the quote suggests, does not ascribe names and forms to the divine. Instead it seeks to discover what or who god is or isn’t by a process of negation as described already.
For a long time I labelled myself as a Humanist. I had decided that this physical body is all there is; the physical or material universe is all there is, and that there is no ‘god’ separate from us or who has special powers to affect our lives. No God at all in fact.
But, all that while, I just knew that there was something else, something more than just the physical. And over time, I came to the knowledge that there is indeed more than the simply phsical universe (including we humans).
I’ve thought about it a lot over the years and I came to the conclusion not that many years ago, that I had simply been afraid to name or define that something more. It would have meant admitting to myself that something more really did exist.
That is to say, I was scared of taking the cataphatic approach – and I’d never even heard the word.
Well brothers and sisters, I saw the light. The truth was revealed to me. And what is that truth? Well, to put it simply, I wasn’t scared anymore. Not of names and forms, and not of what I couldn’t see.
Now I could take both the Catophatic and the Apothatic approach: that the something else I had actually always known just was, really is, and can have a name and form, or not. The divine is not an omniscient being or any kind of being at all; As I’m very fond of saying, the divine (or truth, God, Dharma) simply is. And it’s all there is.
Some of you might know that I am really quite fond of the Indian deity, Ganesha . Do I believe that a man with the head of an elephant actually exists or ever existed?. Of course not. Do I actually think that he resides in the lovely painted icon that sits by my bed? Well, obviously not.
But do I believe that there is a spark or aspect or attribute in all life, in you and me, in nature, in (scary word time) creation, that we can tap into to help us overcome obstacles? Or that we can access when we begin new ventures of whatever kind, or when we need strength to face challenges? Yes, I do. Very definitely.
And do I believe in a blue boy called Krishna who lived in India 5000 years ago and spent his time playing in the fields with the village cows and his friends, entertaining them with his flute? Again, of course not. Does he live in the other beautiful icon by my bed? The answer is obvious: no.
But do I chant the Hare Krishna mantra in an effort to come closer to the divine that is… well, that just is? Yes, again, very definitely.
Words. It’s all only words. Only words? Only??
In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God and the word was God. (from the opening of the Gospel of John)
It’s all I have (for now).
Peace and Love from me to you