=kit036.txt

KIT 36 - Old Wine in New Bottles

We think and feel differently today to the way our ancestors did
in many areas, not only owing to the advances in technology,
communications or science, but in terms of our philosophy of life,
of our sensitivity to dissonance in music, and unrealism in art.
We have moved quite a few steps in areas unexplored and even
shunned by our ancestors. In no way could we build a cathedral
like Notre Dame of Paris or Chartres or Cologne, nor would the
ornate structure of Milano Cathedral or the filigree niceties of
the more stylized Indian music tally with our sense of clear lines
and functionality.

If we care to take an analytic look at the evolution of
architecture, we will realize that the new emerges as of necessity
out of the old, like organic life out of the inorganic. The new
Coventry Cathedral was planned so that the ruins of the outdated
cathedral are still in view, somewhat organically integrated. In
an effort to bridge the old and the new, in Ted van Leer's and
others' compositions, medieval folkloric tunes lead into the rock
and roll style, spanning centuries with ease. Composers demure at
the thought of composing anything of the caliber and maturity of
J.S. Bach, yet Stravinsky in the Symphony of Psalms brought
something of the mettle of the masters of the past through,
monumentally.

Yet in the areas of spirituality, particularly religion, most of
our cultures are medieval in their thinking and jaded in their
emotions. For the sake of clarity, let us at least get a basic
confusion out of the way; spirituality must not be confused with
religion, nor necessarily, religion with spirituality. At best,
religion is institutionalized spirituality, sclerosed into dogmas,
rituals, partisan allegiances and the establishment's power game.

If the major areas of our cultures can be updated, cannot
spirituality be updated by extricating itself from its religious
underpinnings? Of course! And what is more, this is what we are
about. Pir-o-Murshid's ideas were challenging to the established
thinking in his time; the full implications of their relevance
only come into perspective in our time. When asked what I would do
when I was grown up, he said, "He will spread the message to the
intellectual audiences of the future." That was the language of
the time. Today we would say that the awareness of people in the
80's interested in spirituality requires an updating in keeping
with the thinking of our time. This is precisely the material of
my brainstorming. Since Pir-o-Murshid's time, humans have landed
on the moon. We can think of Planet Earth objectively as zoomed
upon from outer space, instead of thinking of outer space as seen
from the Planet. Science has provided mystics with several
paradigms which serve as practical models to represent experiences
that mystics could not explain before; the holistic paradigm,
inverted space, new vistas in psychology which fascinated Pir-o-
Murshid.

Sometimes we are saying what our predecessors were saying but in a
new context, which means that implications with regard to our
present way of living and thinking need to be woven into the
picture. Being out of context reeks of an anachronism. Recently,
Coleman Barks presented a rendering of Mevlana Jelal-ed-Din Rumi's
poetry, which is to say the least, unsettlingly challenging and
uproariously provoking. Would Jelal-ed-Din have thought this way
if he had lived in our time? There is no way of knowing. Yet
somehow, just like our bodies are those of our ancestors,
converged and mutated, so with our minds. Our minds are their
minds that have moved with the time. The Bible is appreciated by
some in a modernized version.

Pir-o-Murshid lived much closer to our time. Could his words bear
the trauma of Coleman's packing? How would Ulm Cathedral look if
one replaced some of its naves by modern modular units? How would
Pir-o- Murshid's thoughts be rendered in our modern jargon? What
ideas would be catalyzed by those thoughts in an innovative and
inventive way? Instead of saying, "The mind of God", one would
say, "The mind of the universe", as I have been coining it.
Instead of saying "Divine emotion", one would say "Emotion in its
cosmic or transcendental dimension." Instead of saying, "Our
divine inheritance", one would say, "The transcendent dimensions
of the person looked upon as the whole person", that is, by virtue
of the holistic paradigm or wholistic paradigm of our time.
Instead of "spirit, one would say, "Energy in its subtlest form,
operating as a catalyst." Instead of saying, "Make God a reality",
one would say, "Actuate the resourcefulness programmed into your
psyche, which is cosmic and impersonal." Instead of saying, "The
hand of God or the divine intention", one would say, "The software
of the universe." Quite frankly, I prefer Pir-o-Murshid's own
words, although the above renderings sound very much like the way
I speak and think. He said, "If it is not the coin of the day, let
it be rendered an antique." There is room in our day and age for
Notre Dames, for plainsong and square dancing and Bach and
Schumann without doing what Kosmos did to Bach's three part
"Invention in Solaris." But there is also room for "Solaris" too.
So there is room for Murshid's original words, and also Pir
Vilayat's rendering.

It is not just a matter of linguistics; there is a shift in values
in our time. For example, today we are wary that there may well be
a touch of masochism in saintlihood or sadism in mastery.
Predictably, Pir-o-Murshid had pointed out that the act of the
policeman punishing the boys who had beaten up a dervish was
better than that of the dervish inviting them to beat him for his
foibles. Murshid said that mastery was not desirousless nor
checking or frustrating impulses, but harnessing them. He wondered
whether the rishis in the Himalayas would have the philanthropic
dispositions of many American businessmen and that he wanted to
show how one could bring spirituality into life in the world.
There is no doubt that his thoughts were clearly novel as compared
with the traditional spiritualists. Yet the thoughts and beings of
the Hindu rishis and Christ and the Sufis found a new life in Pir-
o-Murshid in their relevance to modern life in the world; so his
thoughts live and blossom in us.
    
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