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Tuesday, 20 March 2007 15:13 |
 | | Marc Mullinax |
ìI donít know beans about God.î
óAnnie Dillard
ï
MARS HILL ó In this space I have proposed that healthy faith include regular purging doses of atheism. We get easily barnacled up by tired beliefs, and these tie us up in knots when we try to keep believing something worn out.
Today I
wish to suggest agnosticism for the same reason: the idea that we
really donít know beans about God. Some things we can know, but many
more we cannot in the spiritual dimension of things. Two stories about
elephants illustrate. Iíll comment after theyíre told.
1 ó Two fleas live on the tail of an elephant. One flea is happy where
he is. He has all the food and shelter he wants. He thinks he knows the
elephant, though itís only a small part of the tail. His imperfect
knowledge is nonetheless comforting.
The other flea lives with this first one, until one evening she grows
discontented with the usual eating, drinking and hanging on. She
travels a far distance from the first flea. In human measurement, she
travels down the tail about a foot. Wow, the environment is different:
smells, tail-movement, and other vermin are all different.
She now has a doubled-up knowledge of the elephant. She returns later
to report her experience of the elephant to the first. The first one
disbelieves her. The second flea keeps insisting that thereís more out
there to explore and to know.
2 ó There were six blind persons who traveled together and they came
upon an elephant for the first time. No one told them what it was and
each got positioned at one body part of the elephant. Each felt the
part, and came away with sure knowledge about what the elephant must be
like.
The person at the side of the elephant was sure it was like a wall.
ìNo,î said the person at the tusk. ìAn elephant is like a spear.î
ìYouíre both wrong,î exclaimed the trunk-holder. ìThis elephant is like
a snake.î The fourth one, at the elephantís knee, concluded this animal
was more like a tree.
The fifth blind person, touching an ear, felt an elephant is like a
huge fan. And the sixth one, hanging onto the tail, felt certain that
an elephant is a rope.
Which flea, which blind person was (most) correct? None had faulty
knowledge. But everyoneís intelligence was incomplete, and thus,
misunderstood. Each story character was quite sure of the certainty and
veracity of their facts.
No one questions their intelligence. We feel pretty darn confident like
the first flea that weíve received adequate/accurate view of God. We
may even self-congratulate ourselves on being versed in two religious
traditions, like the second flea, and feel that is enough.
Or we may be like the blind persons who ever-so-quickly under-interpret the elephant: ìmineís the right one, once and for all.î
Everyoneís understanding of the elephant called God is partial at best,
and outright wrong at worst. And so we live our lives, vote, fight,
discriminate and do other everyday things based on this image we carry
around within us. These are necessary images, but make no mistake,
theyíre misunderstandings at the very best.
Every understood deity is partially known, thus an idol. Idols are
images based on insufficient evidence and maintained by constant and
ever-louder affirmation within a tribe of believers. They are
conveniences, for we donít explore beyond their image.
And if we think the elephant is ìout there,î external to us, and not
internal, the idolatry worsens. The divine life is our own life.
(Repeat until understood.) If that realization brings a ìholy
agnosticismî vis-a-vis our received idea of God, this blind flea has
done his job. Next time youíre at your flea circus (religious house),
remember we donít know beans about God.
ï
Dr. Marc S. Mullinax, chairman of the philosophy and religion
departments at Mars Hill College, can be reached at mmullinax-at-mhc.edu.
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