The books or the music in which we thought the beauty was located will betray us if we trust to them; it was not in them, it only came through them, and what came through them was longing. These things—the beauty, the memory of our own past—are good images of what we really desire; but if they are mistaken for the thing itself they turn into dumb idols, breaking the hearts of their worshippers. For they are not the thing itself; they are only the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never yet visited.As I noted in my Hopeful Midwife, pt 4 post, the sublime works as a kind of ping on the ontological radar: it alerts us to the fact that the Real is at large. For those with theological commitments, it is a ping on the God radar (or godar for shiggles). Consider this joy evoking diagram I masterfully crafted:
In this diagram, the Man with the Green Hat (or Magat for short) sees something that resonates with that which lies beyond the curtain of subjectivity. Magat has just experienced transcendence, he has for a moment set aside the world of duality and caught a glimpse of what might be. He is given license to do this because he (and I would argue the entire cosmos) is created in the image of God (imago Dei).
For those of us without theological commitments, transcendence can be explained via the possibility that we are all part of an ecosystem; a Whole; a mass consciousness that we tap into for a fleeting moment.
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I spewed coffee all over the laptop at Godar and magat, gleefully giggling.
I forgot how much I love Surprised by Joy, and I love the connection here. I would say though that the transcendence experienced by someone who has a theological position cannot be too different from the idea of the Whole. What the clip showed was a body of people joined, one whole responding to a music outside of themselves. Ultimately both, the northerness and the whole, have in common the desire for community, for connection, for being part of something bigger than our little selves.
I'm sure I'm influenced by postmodern pluralistic mother culture, but I'd like to think that describing the universe in a way that appeals to both theists and atheists is at least a good place to start. Call it "base camp." I'd like to think we can climb the mountain together. The key, though, is that both parties have to acknowledge that their beliefs are provisional, which I'm afraid most fundamentalists would be unwilling to do.
By the way, I can't use the up or down arrows to navigate your page. What's up with that computer master? :)
hmmm... i don't know. i tried ie and firefox and they both work fine for me...
Not ashamed to say that some of this is going totally over my head, but also: despite being an atheist, I do like the way you describe the universe, and see some of my own beliefs reflected in it. Provisional FTW!
Ooh, I responded to the other post before I found this one. :0) Yay!
As a pagan, both explanations worked for me. I feel like people should be good with plugging in their own familiar terms, but I understand that sometimes that's just expecting too much.
These posts have made me curious about other people's triggers... oddly, it's not the sort of conversation I've ever had. And trying to remember some of my past experiences is difficult. Argh. *note to self - write down moments of joy and connectedness*
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