historical context enhances beauty of sacred texts

[Guest guest]

Namaste:

 

In my view there is no essential conflict between our ability to date a sacred

text historically, and our devotion to the religious traditions embedded in

those texts. I was introduced to text criticism (linguistic dating) years ago

in grad school at the U-Chicago Divinity School (home to such notables as

Sanskritist Wendy Doniger O’Flaherty whose works you may have read). It was a

very exciting time. The Dead Sea Scrolls were emerging; linguistic knowledge

of ancient “near-eastern” languages like Aramaic, Assyrian, Sumerian etc was

growing rapidly; archaeological evidence for time and place positioning was

also getting very strong.

 

Even scholars working in other religious traditions (like me) were excited about

what was happening Biblical research. It offered a paradigm for study of

scripture in all the great civilizations.

 

Immersed in study of sacred texts in this very academic setting, I was often

impressed by the devotional character of my professors – especially the older

ones. I worked alongside Jewish and Islamic scholars, Christian theologians,

experts in Vedic, Dravidian, and Indo-Iranian civilizations, professors from

China and Japan with vast knowledge of Buddhism, Shinto, and a huge range of

Asian traditions, even theorists from some of the non-textual shamanistic

traditions (who read rituals as a text). World experts in religion, they had

all devoted their lives to scholarly research in the history and scriptures of

their faith.

 

These scholars had not drifted into any sort of self-satisfied rationalistic

scientism. Rather, the more they knew about the sacred texts core to their

traditions, the more powerfully they heard divine truth speaking. They were

deeply religious people. Towering intellectuals as well as seasoned mystics -

but of course, not a fundamentalist amongst them. Compassionate, wise, and

unshakably committed to sustaining the religious traditions of their birth,

each worshipped in his own sacred space - church, synagogue, mosque, mandir,

and ling. But in study they were real philosophers: articulate, open-minded,

humble, and above all mature.

 

The humanistic psychologist Abraham Maslow wrote that true creativity – the end

goal of self-realization – requires a profound tolerance for ambiguity. As we

approach a more mature understanding of sacred texts by appreciating their

historical context, a tolerance for the imperfection of human knowledge and

also for the fragile emotional condition of many believers is surely required.

 

 

Historical scholarship can support deep belief. Perplexing contradictions in

the holy books we revere today can often be explained by parsing out mixed

lineages, cultural adaptations, and accruals. (E.g., the two different

creation stories Genesis I and II.) As the list was discussing re: uccha and

swakshetra of Rahu/Ketu, there is significant doctrinal contradiction in the

current versions of canonical Jyotisha texts. Historical scholarship can

clarify these issues so that serious students of the vidya can advance in their

intuitive practice.

 

Fundamentalists of all religions choose to resolve scriptural contradictions by

appeal to charisma of a living human authority – preacher, imam, guru, rabbi,

etc. Believers lacking Maslow’s “tolerance for ambiguity” may retreat

emotionally into dogma, fearing the loss of righteousness. But believers

grounded in mystical and intuitive truths of ageless Divinity have nothing to

fear – and very much to gain – by carefully watching eternal truth take a

joyride on the vehicle of human history. In the end, historical scholarship

reveals another beautiful aspect of the interplay between human and Divine.

 

Sincerely,

 

Barbara Pijan Lama

bpijanlamajyotisha (AT) msn (DOT) com