I’m not one of those who is expecting the end of the world tomorrow. My own tradition takes more a “No man knoweth the hour” approach to the whole question. But I do have to say that I’ve been surprised and a little disturbed by the cultural response to this little calendrical phenomenon. I’ve heard hostility, sarcasm, dismissal. I’ve heard these believers called “nut cases,” “superstitious” and “frauds.” “False prophets.” “Insane.” “Brainwashers.”
There’s a Jewish teaching that you should treat everyone you meet as if he or she might be the Messiah, because hey, you never know. I don’t think it would be the worst thing in the world if large or even small numbers of people behaved as if they were hoping to welcome the divine.
Portrait of Clara (as a chemist)
1 month ago
9 comments:
Good point, RG.
Yep. Thanks for this.
Hmmm. A very Messiah-like thing to say, GT.
Rad: I wonder what GT means.
Um,Green Thoughts? Shoulda been RG, I guess. I like being called Rad, though.
This reminds me of Martin Buber's _I and Thou_, which is a book that has had a deep impact on me. I used to put in my resume, back in the days when I was a SalaryMan, that one of my interests was "Buberian philosophy." But I also insisted that my job title, back in those days of the first internet bubble, was "philosopher king."
Anyway, Buber's idea is that we are engaged in relationships constantly: we have a relationship with each other, of course, but also with the chair and the tree and the traffic light, and with the guy in the car next to us, or at the next table in the restaurant, or at the other end of an online discussion. (I don't recall if Buber's philosophy would span time as well as space, but I think I might just pretend it does.) Those relationships could, according to Buber, have only two manifestations: I-it and I-thou. We engage with the picnic table, rightly, as an it. So our relationship is I-it. But to God, our relationship, rightly, is I-thou. The challenge, as I remember, is to learn to encounter everyone else (and perhaps every living thing, not just the homo sapiens) in that same relationship we have with God: I-thou. So you, RG, are a thou, and so is Ink, and Lisa B., and radagast--or at least I aspire to treat you all as such.
That's what Buber says, at least. And it sounds pretty good to me.
Rad: Duh. Should've figured that one out, huh?
JW: That Buber book was a big early influence on my scholarship, on my diss, actually,-- the idea of naming and by naming substantiating the other. Now get back to work.
I, too, am saddened by the widespread mockery that these believers have been subject to.
But I think there's a difference between "treating everyone you meet as if they might be the Messiah" and expecting imminent rapture. In the former case, you (arguably) working to bring about God's kingdom on earth. In the latter, it seems, the idea is that the world is so corrupt, and going to end any day ANYWAY, that there isn't much focus on improving or changing what we've got while we've got it.
Flav: fair enough. I guess I was imagining that the two were inseparable, but clearly that's not always how it plays out in action.
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