{"id":541,"date":"2010-03-23T15:14:45","date_gmt":"2010-03-23T15:14:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/apagansblog\/2010\/03\/a-pagan-perspective-on-beauty-and-suffering.html"},"modified":"2010-03-23T15:14:45","modified_gmt":"2010-03-23T15:14:45","slug":"a-pagan-perspective-on-beauty-and-suffering","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/apagansblog\/2010\/03\/a-pagan-perspective-on-beauty-and-suffering.html","title":{"rendered":"A Pagan Perspective On Beauty and Suffering"},"content":{"rendered":"

I had an wonderful
\ntalk with a friend who was for some time a Buddhist abbot before he decided
\nBuddhism was not his final path, and began exploring other spiritual traditions
\nand practices. Whenever our conversations shifts to these kinds of topics, one
\nof their most enjoyable aspects is his speaking mostly fondly of the different
\ntraditions he has explored.  <\/span>And as
\na impressively learned man, he has explored a number of them deeply.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n


\n         My friend’s
\nultimate departure from Buddhism had much to do with its view of the
\nrelationship between beauty and suffering.  <\/span>In Buddhism, he told me, beauty ultimately has to be
\nunderstood as a deceptive cover for suffering (dukkha<\/i>).  <\/span>It is
\nultimately illusory.  <\/span>A beautiful
\nlandscape is such only because of countless and ongoing deaths and other
\nsuffering that maintains it. 
\n<\/span>Insects eating insects, birds eating insects, small animals being eaten
\nby larger ones, parasites eating everyone, and so on.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/span>For example, we
\nhave discovered that Yellowstone’s ecological abundance can only be maintained
\nby the presence of wolves.  <\/span>In
\ntheir absence, elk destroy streamside vegetation and over graze their
\nrange.  <\/span>Forest fires are also a
\nnecessary part of forest rejuvenation in Yellowstone, but when they occur such
\nfires cause enormous death and suffering. 
\n<\/span>Natural beauty, much of it anyway, depends on the presence of violent
\ndeath, and such death involves sufferin.<\/p>\n

But is this
\nBuddhist argument entirely satisfying? Is beauty a deceptive covering for the
\nsuffering that accompanies it? Of course we can probably all remember times
\nwhen beauty’s charms ensnared us in relationships that led more to suffering
\nthan happiness or to committing foolish acts that hurt others.  <\/span>But true as such events are for most of
\nus, are they simply easy-to-grasp examples of something manifesting in infinite
\nsubtleties? Is beauty simply a snare or a lure or is it something else
\nagain?<\/p>\n

Plato provided
\nmy friend another option, which he ultimately found more satisfactory.  <\/span>It is one I will scarcely explore here
\nbecause I have a third interpretation in mind.  <\/span>Plato argued that Earthly beauty is the lure that ultimately
\ntakes us to the ultimate beauty of the One.  <\/span>Far from being a deceptive illusion trapping us in a grimmer
\nreality, it is the path out of that reality.  <\/span>I admit to a greater fondness for this Platonic perspective
\nthan the Buddhist one.  <\/span>But I think
\nthere is a third perspective of equal merit.<\/p>\n

Suffering,
\nincluding death, is the unavoidable price paid for duality, and duality
\nprovides two goods that NonDuality does not, even though within the NonDual
\nexperience there is no lack.  <\/span>This
\nclaim sounds paradoxical, but I think the paradox is more a feature of human
\nawareness rather than ultimate reality. 
\n<\/span>Further, I think understanding this insight enables us ultimately to
\nvalidate the embodied reality we Pagans love, along with <\/i>Plato’s monist One, and the NonDual, but not in any
\nhierarchical sense of one being more “spiritually advanced” or superior to the
\nothers.  <\/span>The fullest expression of
\neach might imply the existence of the others.<\/span><\/p>\n

I want to start
\nwith a personal experience, although hardly one unique to me: climbing a
\nmountain. Years ago I climbed a mountain in Colorado that took me to the limits
\nof my endurance.  <\/span>On that
\nparticular trip I had not yet become acclimated to the elevation change from
\nKansas, where I lived, to its base, at about 8,500 feet. My climb took me
\nthousands of feet higher.  <\/span>As I
\nclimbed it became increasingly difficult for me to move because I was so
\ncompletely out of breath.  <\/span>My
\ninitial ascent was very steep, but as I neared the top the slope became more
\ngentle, so that I could have walked rather than climbed.  <\/span>But I did not walk all the way; many
\ntimes I crawled.<\/p>\n

I was certainly
\nsuffering, and at times I experienced nothing but suffering, as I made my way
\nthe last 100 feet or so to the summit. 
\n<\/span>But when I reached the top, and could see the Continental Divide to the
\neast, Grand Lake to the West, and miles of wilderness spread out beneath me, it
\nwas worth it, even as I was too tired to really enjoy the view.<\/p>\n

My suffering was
\nthe price I paid, willingly paid, for an experience I otherwise would not have
\nhad.  <\/span>The beauty was indeed a lure,
\nbut it was not an illusory lure.  <\/span>Nor
\ndid it necessarily point beyond itself. 
\n<\/span>The beauty of that place at that time was sufficient unto itself.<\/p>\n

If I had been in
\nbetter shape or more acclimated my climb would have been just as beautiful. I
\nwould not have suffered sio much and would probably have enjoyed the summit and
\nits views much more.  <\/span>So I am not
\npraising suffering as a good in itself. 
\n<\/span>Suffering is a price, but one that can be worth it if we choose wisely.  <\/span>Even with a lack of wisdom it can be
\nworth paying, and teach us greater wisdom along the way.<\/p>\n

Duality makes
\nbeauty possible.  <\/span>Beauty depends on
\nsomeone experiencing something, whereas in NonDuality there is only
\nexperience.  <\/span>In The Inhumanist<\/i> 
\n<\/span>Robinson Jeffers wrote,<\/span><\/p>\n

… the human sense\u2028<\/span>
Of beauty is our metaphor of
\ntheir excellence, their divine<\/span>
<\/span>nature: – like dust in a
\nwhirlwind, making<\/span>
The wild wind visible.<\/span><\/div>\n

Absence a being
\nthat experiences there is the wonder of NonDual Experience.  <\/span>I have had such an experience, and
\nwhile there is truly nothing better when within it, beauty (and love) do not
\nmatter when one’s self (and all other selves) disappear, and there is only
\nwonderful experience.  <\/span>It is
\ncomplete, but as soon as self-awareness begins to return, beauty and love begin
\nto manifest.  <\/span>They are
\nfundamental to Duality. <\/i>They are contained
\nin NonDuality but they do not manifest there.<\/span><\/p>\n

Beauty (and love
\nas well, but this post is focusing on beauty) treasure and celebrate diversity.
\nThere are many forms of beauty, and the existence of some does not detract from
\nthe existence of others.  <\/span>The
\nbeauty of a coral reef does not detract from the beauty of a mountain
\nlake.  <\/span>And the beauty of the whole
\nincreases through having both.<\/p>\n

<\/span>This beauty
\nbecomes perfect when experienced as sacred and is a lure to the sacred when
\nexperienced from a mundane perspective. 
\n<\/span>And this brings us to Plato’s insight.<\/p>\n

There is the
\nbeauty of the One from which everything comes.  <\/span>As I understand him, this is the absolute beauty that Plato
\ndescribed as at the end of our philosophical journey.  <\/span>As with the NonDual, when enraptured by an experience of the
\nOne  <\/span>as the source of everything,
\nwe do not experience any sense of lack, no need for connection.  <\/span>We are enraptured by perfect love and
\nbeauty beyond words to describe or limits to notice.  <\/span>So does this not simply affirm Plato’s argument?<\/p>\n

Yes it does, but
\nnot as the final necessary goal of the soul, as he would have it.<\/p>\n

What the One
\nemanates is not<\/i> simply paler reflections
\nof itself, though there is a sense in which that is true.  <\/span>The world is an expression of the
\nOne.  <\/span>It is its palette upon which
\nit creates works of beauty that cannot be experienced when enraptured by the
\nOne.  <\/span>Perhaps the One itself is
\nenraptured by its creations, which is why it is experienced as love.  <\/span>Indeed, I am not sure the word
\n“creations” does the issue justice. 
\n<\/span>The Platonic One enriches itself, becoming more than itself, by
\nmanifesting all possible ways to express beauty, and its love for it.<\/span><\/p>\n

And in my
\nexperience this is validated by my strongest encounters with deities.  <\/span>The Goddess is not the One.  <\/span>She has gender, and other individuated
\nqualities.  <\/span>But my experience of
\nHer was also one of encountering perfect love and perfect beauty.  <\/span>Beauty can be the lure to take us to
\nthis fuller and more complete realization of the nature of Duality as
\nmanifesting in diversity.  <\/span>And when
\nin such a relationship with Duality as Abundance, it is as fulfilling, as
\nperfect in itself, as is contemplation of the One or experience as NonDual.<\/p>\n

Every time we
\nmanifest beauty or love in our actions – and few of us do this most of the time
\n– we bring that daily world into greater harmony with its deeper reality.  <\/span>Because that reality is always there,
\nit is we who bit by bit change ourselves, and are changed by our spiritual
\nexperiences.<\/p>\n

This, I believe,
\nis the contribution many Pagans and practitioners of the Nature Religions can
\nprovide to both Buddhists and Platonists. 
\n<\/span>The contribution is that they are right in their insights as  <\/span>far as they take them, but they can be
\ntaken farther.  <\/span>The Sacred does not
\nculminate in NonDuality or the Monism of the One,, it is a constant reality of
\nall three dimensions, dimensions that cannot be reduced to any one. <\/p>\n

Back to Suffering<\/b>
Something as
\ncomplex as a mind able to experience beauty as we do is the result of a long
\nevolutionary process.  <\/span>Perhaps
\nbacteria experience beauty, I cannot know.  <\/span>I hope so.  <\/span>But
\nif they do, the beauty they experience is not the same as the beauty we
\nexperience.  <\/span>For a maximum of what
\nwe call beauty to exist in the world, there must be an enormous number of minds
\nable to experience it in many different ways.  <\/span>And for those minds to exist, a long process of evolution
\nmust have taken place.  <\/span>Suffering
\nnecessarily accompanies that development and sustains it.<\/p>\n

Dualism
\nnecessitates existence as parts, and existence as parts necessitates existence
\nwith incomplete knowledge.  <\/span>Incomplete
\nknowledge guarantees that mistakes will be made, and mistakes guarantee
\nsuffering.  <\/span>  <\/span>But incomplete knowledge also creates
\nopportunities for creativity, for the unexpected and new to emerge.  <\/span>And when seen and experienced as
\nSacred, the new and creative enable new opportunities for beauty and love to
\nmanifest.<\/p>\n

<\/span>Suffering is not
\nso much a reality we paper over with beauty as the price we pay for it. Beauty
\nis one of the qualities that redeems suffering, (love is the other). Many of us
\nwillingly pay that price.  <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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