Easter - Ecclesiastes time
How very interesting indeed that although I can never profess to be a Christian, I usually find time around Easter every year to celebrate the historical and spiritual significance of this event. It is almost as if my spiritual clock resets annually by itself.
I am very willing to accept that Jesus Christ had lived at a certain indeterminable time about 2000 years ago, and even if his death and rebirth could not be proven scientifically, it had given birth to one of the most amazing religious movement in human history so far. At this stage of my life, I am not going to pick on the various warts of the Christian faith. They won the Crusades and set the stage for the western civilisation for the next millennium. I think Christian missionaries did a lot of good work over the centuries. There are definitely ongoing politics, hypocrisy, exploitation but I believe the Muslims or other religions would not be spared either . This is a problem of corruption of those in power, not with Christianity itself.
To me, the most important thing is that I could NOT profess in my heart that Christ lived, died and was reborn on the third day. It also does not help that generally, I find most Christian literature one-dimensional, illogical, inconsistent, slightly bigoted, non-thought provoking, biased, judgmental and arrogant. Listening to sales pitch of any religion is quite tiring, but there are three things about Christianity that made me not given up all entirely... 1) Christian music 2) Christian art / architecture... 3 ) the Ecclesiastes...
I love the Ecclesiastes, and reading it every now and then calms me down. It is bleak yet pragmatic, it tells you that life is meaningless yet worth living. Except for 2 other Buddhist books that I have chanced upon in my lifetime, I have never found another book that opened my mind.
I wrote this blog today because while reading a research piece on the interpretation of Ecclesiastes, I found another bit in the life "jigsaw" puzzle that makes me not want to give up on life. On some days, I really feel that life is maddening, random, herdlike and fatalistic... and that most people are blur, incompetent, stupid and selfish. On some days, I suffer panic at some spiritual level as I do not know what I am doing in my life, why I am working in this lifetime, what happens in the next time? My biggest fear at the moment is that there is reincarnation... and I have to do this again and again... :(
So I guess Ecclesiastes is my spiritual band aid.... ( or morphine ? ) .
God's plan is unfathomable. Nevertheless, God has an appropriate time for
every activity (v. 11). The meaning is not, "beautiful in its own way," as
the song goes. God has also placed within the heart of every person a
sense of something eternal and a desire to know the eternal significance of
what we do (v. 11, "set eternity in their heart").
"This quest is a deep-seated desire, a compulsive drive,
because man is made in the image of God to appreciate the
beauty of creation (on an aesthetic level); to know the
character, composition, and meaning of the world (on an
academic and philosophical level); and to discern its
purpose and destiny (on a theological level). . . . Man has
an inborn inquisitiveness and capacity to learn how
everything in his experience can be integrated to make a
whole."
This is why I suffer from existential angst from time to time.... toggling between living passionately in short-term pursuits juxtaposed against long-term ambivalence about the purpose of life could cause of a lot of stress on any day that my mental and emotional energy get worn down. This is life's wear and tear, I guess...
So anyways, this explains it. On one hand, whether we like it or not, we are pre-programmed to seek meaning, purpose and significance in an ephemeral and impermanent lifetime. But, on the other hand, in order to live "awarely", we have to see the conundrum of the futility of human endeavour, and that whatever we seek may not be gained, whatever we gain will always be lost at some point.
This is the human tragedy, that as our hearts searches for eternal significance in this limited physical world, there will always be mental suffering and emotional sorrow.
It is very awakening and humbling to know that the fruit of all human toil and labour is always impermanent.
What does the heart wants, desires and eventually willing to accept in this limited lifetime?
"The ultimate battle is always fought in the fragile terrain of the human heart".
I am very willing to accept that Jesus Christ had lived at a certain indeterminable time about 2000 years ago, and even if his death and rebirth could not be proven scientifically, it had given birth to one of the most amazing religious movement in human history so far. At this stage of my life, I am not going to pick on the various warts of the Christian faith. They won the Crusades and set the stage for the western civilisation for the next millennium. I think Christian missionaries did a lot of good work over the centuries. There are definitely ongoing politics, hypocrisy, exploitation but I believe the Muslims or other religions would not be spared either . This is a problem of corruption of those in power, not with Christianity itself.
To me, the most important thing is that I could NOT profess in my heart that Christ lived, died and was reborn on the third day. It also does not help that generally, I find most Christian literature one-dimensional, illogical, inconsistent, slightly bigoted, non-thought provoking, biased, judgmental and arrogant. Listening to sales pitch of any religion is quite tiring, but there are three things about Christianity that made me not given up all entirely... 1) Christian music 2) Christian art / architecture... 3 ) the Ecclesiastes...
I love the Ecclesiastes, and reading it every now and then calms me down. It is bleak yet pragmatic, it tells you that life is meaningless yet worth living. Except for 2 other Buddhist books that I have chanced upon in my lifetime, I have never found another book that opened my mind.
I wrote this blog today because while reading a research piece on the interpretation of Ecclesiastes, I found another bit in the life "jigsaw" puzzle that makes me not want to give up on life. On some days, I really feel that life is maddening, random, herdlike and fatalistic... and that most people are blur, incompetent, stupid and selfish. On some days, I suffer panic at some spiritual level as I do not know what I am doing in my life, why I am working in this lifetime, what happens in the next time? My biggest fear at the moment is that there is reincarnation... and I have to do this again and again... :(
So I guess Ecclesiastes is my spiritual band aid.... ( or morphine ? ) .
God's plan is unfathomable. Nevertheless, God has an appropriate time for
every activity (v. 11). The meaning is not, "beautiful in its own way," as
the song goes. God has also placed within the heart of every person a
sense of something eternal and a desire to know the eternal significance of
what we do (v. 11, "set eternity in their heart").
"This quest is a deep-seated desire, a compulsive drive,
because man is made in the image of God to appreciate the
beauty of creation (on an aesthetic level); to know the
character, composition, and meaning of the world (on an
academic and philosophical level); and to discern its
purpose and destiny (on a theological level). . . . Man has
an inborn inquisitiveness and capacity to learn how
everything in his experience can be integrated to make a
whole."
This is why I suffer from existential angst from time to time.... toggling between living passionately in short-term pursuits juxtaposed against long-term ambivalence about the purpose of life could cause of a lot of stress on any day that my mental and emotional energy get worn down. This is life's wear and tear, I guess...
So anyways, this explains it. On one hand, whether we like it or not, we are pre-programmed to seek meaning, purpose and significance in an ephemeral and impermanent lifetime. But, on the other hand, in order to live "awarely", we have to see the conundrum of the futility of human endeavour, and that whatever we seek may not be gained, whatever we gain will always be lost at some point.
This is the human tragedy, that as our hearts searches for eternal significance in this limited physical world, there will always be mental suffering and emotional sorrow.
It is very awakening and humbling to know that the fruit of all human toil and labour is always impermanent.
What does the heart wants, desires and eventually willing to accept in this limited lifetime?
"The ultimate battle is always fought in the fragile terrain of the human heart".
posted by POL at 1:04 AM
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