Since this is a church pulpit and what I'm about to read has been listed as a sermon, it would nor mally be a safe bet I'm going to talk about God. However, this happens to be a Unitarian Univer salist church, and--worse yet--I happen to be a philosopher; so all normal bets are off. In fact, what I'm going to do immediately is make sure this sermon won't be too easy to follow--instead of just talking about God, I'm going to talk about talking about God.
Lots of folks talk about God. Scan your radio dial any Sunday morning and you'll probably come away with the impression that using ordinary language to describe God must be roughly about as problematic as telling your neighbor the current price of motor oil at K-Mart. But if we step back a little and view religious discourse more broadly, this impression doesn't hold up so well. Con sider, for example, the following fragment from the Upanishadic literature of India:
Again, Shankara, who has been called the Thomas Aquinas of Hinduism, begins one of his famous prayers with the invocation "Oh Thou, before whom all words recoil ... ." The safest con clusion, it seems, is that some folks think it's harder to talk about God than others do.
Now, what does it normally mean to suggest that something is difficult to talk about? Well, in some cases, it just means that it's somehow improper to discuss the subject. And for some people, God is apparently a subject of this kind; consider, for example, historical cultures in which even writing the name of God was viewed as abhorrent. Although views of this sort reflect a sense of reverence one can respect, they present a certain non-negotiability that discourages analysis. Hence, I will set them aside from consideration for our present purposes. Another possible mean ing is that the difficulty in talking about something concerns some lack of knowledge. Indeed, any discourse worth listening to normally presumes that the parties are expressing their knowledge of something--otherwise, as the phrase has it, they "don't know what they're talking about." And, I suppose, there are some for whom this is enough reason to say nothing about God; after all, if the Author of the Universe so totally transcends our understanding that we can have no knowledge of it, what is there to say about it? I'm somewhat less patient with this point of view, and quite happy to dismiss it from present consideration. I will presume we can have at least some know ledge of God, and focus specifically on the possibility that that knowledge is not always express ible in our natural languages. In other words, I'd like to explore, for a bit, the notion that our human languages may not be a strong enough vehicle to carry everything we really know about God. Proponents of an altogether transcendent Diety may sit quietly and listen--unless, of course, they can explain to us how this Thing of which they have no knowledge whatsoever is related to the God I'm discussing. Oh, and by the way--I'm focusing on knowledge of God, rather than just belief. Anyone can say what they believe about God, but "knowledge"--at least as philosophers typically use the term--is something stronger than belief. A mere belief can be false--and you can assert it without always obliging yourself to justify it. But if you claim truly that your belief is actually knowledge, it had better be true and you may be challenged to give some sensible account of why it is more than just a belief that you hold.
So let's begin at the beginning. Who are the people who most notably have trouble saying what they know about God? That is, who suggested there was a problem in the first place? Well, prob- ably the most obvious answer that comes to mind is "the Mystics." And one of the finest analyses of the religious mystical experience was given by the famous American philosopher and psychol- ogist, William James. In the sixteen lecture of his Varieties of Religious Experience, James notes the following two properties that seem to him to define such experiences.
1. Ineffability. The handiest of the marks by which I classify a state of mind as mystical is negative. The subject of it immediately says that it defies expression, that no adequate report of its contents can be given in words. ...
2. Noetic quality. Although so similar to states of felling, mystical states seem to those who experience them to be also states of knowledge. ... They are illuminations, revelations, full of significance and importance, all inarticulate though they remain; and as a rule they carry with them a curious sense of authority for aftertime.
Well, that's a start; so far, James has described states of consciousness that (1) yield knowledge and (2) present content that cannot be expressed adequately in words. But for our present pur- poses, something is obviously missing; what we need to know is whether James also believes the knowledge acquired in these states is, specifically, knowledge of God.
Some of James' remarks seem to suggest that he does; consider the following:
In mystic states we both become one with the Absolute and we become aware of our oneness. ... In Hinduism, in Neoplatonism, in Sufism, in Christian mysticism, in Whitmanism, we find the same recurring note, so that there is about mystical utterances an eternal unanimity which ought to make a critic stop and think, ... . Perpetually telling of the unity of man with God, their speech antedates languages, and they do not grow old.
On the other hand, James later adds a rather strong qualification:
In characterizing mystic states as pantheistic, optimistic, etc., I am afraid I over-simplified the truth. ... The classic religious mysticism, it now must be confessed, is only a 'privileged case.' ... It is carved out from a much larger mass; and if we take the larger mass as seriously as religious mysticism has historically taken itself, we find that the supposed unanimity largely disappears.
The point of this qualification is important, but we should read it carefully. He is not really deny- ing that there are some mystical states which reveal--in his own words--"the unity of man with God." What he adds here, roughly, is that reports of mystical experience in general are, as it were, all over the map--showing, that is, a bewildering kaleidoscope of contents.
But doesn't this point raise some reasonable doubt about the credibility of mystical conscious- ness? One might argue, for example, that if an Air Force pilot complains to his commander that-- although his vision is normally excellent--he occasionally opens his eyes to find only a field of red and green color patches, then the commander can be expected to relieve the pilot immediately from flight duty and send him to the base eye clinic. The most natural assumption should be that the pilot's eyes are now a defective instrument for reliably acquiring knowledge about the physi- cal world. (Of course, the commander might not choose exactly those words at the time.) Analo- gously, if mystical states present a bewildering variety of visions then we may be inclined to suspect that the "noetic" quality which James associates with mystical consciousness is illusory or misleading.
Being a wily philosopher, though, James anticipates this line of objection, and answers it by say- ing that--in general--mystical states add meaning to the world of ordinary experience. Reports of their content, he argues, should not be treated as assertions of objective facts; rather, they present fresh points of view from which objective facts may be regarded. Hence, they enjoy immunity from the critiques we normally direct against claims of fact. As James puts it,
... there never can be a state of facts to which new meaning may not truthfully be added, providing the mind ascend to a more enveloping point of view.
But, as Ted Koppel might say, "Hold on, here"--if mystical experience is supposed to yield knowl- edge, shouldn't it give us something more substantial than a mere "point of view"? After all, the common philosophical definition of "knowledge" is "justified true belief," and that surely doesn't sound much like "point of view."
Indeed. Knowledge is not just a point of view. But does it follow that a point of view cannot be an important part of our knowledge of something? Consider a very literal and simple example--I encounter a statue in an art gallery. Do I really know what the statue is before I have walked around it, and viewed it from different perspectives? Again, can a corporate executive really have adequate knowledge of a business plan without considering its legality, its environmental impact, its effects upon corporate growth ... in short, without regarding it from different points of view? Perhaps it would be a more fair assessment to allow that a new perspective revealed in a mystical experience can at least be an element of our knowledge of something.
"Knowledge of what?" is, unfortunately, still an open question. William James seems satisfied that a mystical experience can reveal knowledge of, say, "the unity of man with God" although "no adequate report of its contents can be given in words." All due respect to Professor James, there still appears to be a communication problem here. Hypothetically, consider a non-mystical Christian's encounter with a Christian Mystic. Let us suppose the Mystic insists he has just expe- rienced an extraordinary state of consciousness in which he saw the unity of man with God. The non-mystic may, in fact, believe him--but exactly how is he certain the Mystic isn't just reporting a bad headache? Worse yet, suppose the non-mystic is Saturday Night Live's "Church Lady"; since the Mystic can't give an adequate report of his experience in words, how does Church Lady know he didn't really attain knowledge of--dare I say it--SATAN?
The answer, at least in the Christian tradition, seems to be that both Mystics and non-mystics have managed to toss some ropes to each other to bridge this communication gap. Earlier in this cen- tury, for example, an immensely popular book appeared called Das Heilige (which translates as The Idea of the Holy). Written by theologian Rudolf Otto, The Idea of the Holy clearly accepts the thesis that language can serve as a vehicle for expressing knowledge of God. Indeed, Otto opens his work with the following remarks:
It is essential to every theistic conception of God, and most of all to the Christian, that it designates and precisely characterizes deity by the attributes spirit, reason, purpose, good will, supreme power, unity, selfhood.
Now all these attributes constitute clear and definable concepts: they can be grasped by the intellect; they can be analysed by thought; they even admit of definition.
... a religion which recognizes and maintains such a view of God is in so far a 'rational' religion.
Only on such terms is belief possible in contrast to mere feeling. And of Christianity at least it is false that 'feeling is all, the name but sound and smoke' ...
Almost immediately, however, Otto adds an important qualification:
But, when this is granted, we have to be on our guard against an error which would lead to a wrong and one-sided interpretation of religion. This is the view that the essence of deity can be given completely and exhaustively in such 'rational' attributions as have been referred to above and in others like them.
Throughout Das Heilige, Otto sustains this broad, but balanced interpretation. What Otto calls the rational attributes of God can be known and can be expressed in language. On the other hand, he acknowledges that these "rational" attributes do not capture the totality of our knowledge of God. There are also other "moments" of religion, among which we find what Otto calls the "distinctive category of the holy." This category is experienced in the "numinous" state of mind, which is characterized by feelings of awe, dread, majesty, self-depreciation, and awareness of "the wholly other." Beneath the understanding of God that can be conveyed in words there is a "hidden, inac- cessible to our conceptual thought, which we in so far call the 'non-rational'." Clearly, Rudolf Otto and the many ordinary Christians who have read and understood his work are satisfied that the knowledge attained in at least some mystical experience is knowledge, specifically, of God.
Ropes have also been tossed by Mystics to help bridge the communication gap. William James is probably right in observing that Mystics tend to deny their experiences can be adequately expressed in language; nevertheless, Mystics do talk about them. In fact Mahesh Mehta, refer- ring to Indian and Buddhist mysticism, has the following to say:
When ineffability is said to be the common denominator of mystical experiences it is only a metaphorical way of conveying the want of a fully satisfactory description of the intensity and poignancy of the mystic ecstasy. Apart from the fact that inexpressibility is also an expression, it may be pointed out that the mystics were not only not inarticulate or nebulous, but when we take into account their copious utterances abounding in vivid descriptions dressed in noble and beautiful poetic images ... , one begins to wonder how mystical experience can be regarded as completely ineffable.
So let's take a look at some examples of what Mystics have actually said, and see if we can con- nect them somehow with our more "rational" descriptions of God.
Let's begin with some comments by Saint John of the Cross:We receive this mystical knowledge of God clothed in none of the kinds of images, in none of the sensible representations which our mind makes use of in other circumstances. ... There, in this abyss of wisdom, the soul grows by what it drinks in from the well- springs of the comprehension of love ... .
Now, to the ordinary Christian, who is prepared in advance to say or write "God loves us," at least the latter part of Saint John's account must have a familiar ring. Again, let us listen to the testi- mony of the neo-platonic philosopher, Plotinus:
He who thus sees does not properly see, does not distinguish or imagine two things. He changes, he ceases to be himself, preserves nothing of himself. Absorbed in God, he makes but one with him, like a centre of a circle coinciding with another centre.
Isn't Plotinus describing something very much like the "self depreciation" which Rudolf Otto takes to be a common component of the "numinous state of mind"? And is this not echoed in the quality of mystical experience described by Saint Teresa, in the following words?
In the orison of union, the soul is fully awake as regards God, but wholly asleep as regards things of this world and in respect of herself.
Finally, let's listen to a first-person report of mystical experience that is quoted by William James:
And this feeling of being surrounded with truths which I cannot grasp amounts to indescribable awe ... .
Once again, we're reminded of Otto's "category of the holy," which is marked by feelings of dread, majesty and awe. Indeed, there is much in the words given to us by Mystics that at least plausibly sounds like they are describing a special kind of knowledge of God.
But now, from the back of the room, I hear Ted Koppel again: "Hold on! A little bit ago, I thought I heard you saying Mystics were the readiest example of folks who have difficulty talking about God. Now you are claiming we can make sense of much that they say about God." Yes, Ted; as always, you are quite perceptive. And the truth--as I see it--is that both of these claims are cor- rect. Just to balance things, let me conclude with a brief look at some of the more bizarre things Mystics tend to say--and, perhaps, why they use language in such odd ways.
Beginning with the "why," it's rather striking that no less a Mystic than Saint John of the Cross happens to give us a fairly articulate explanation; here's what he has to say:
Fancy a man seeing a certain kind of thing for the first time in his life. He can understand it, use and enjoy it, but he cannot apply a name to it, nor communicate any idea of it, even though all the while it be a mere thing of sense. How much greater will be his powerless- ness when it goes beyond the senses! This is the peculiarity of the divine language.
Now that seems reasonable enough. Natural languages, such as English or German, are pretty good instruments for talking about motor oil or the colors of leaves--in short, for talking about the things we normally experience. And essentially what Saint John of the Cross is telling us is that mystical experiences are of such rarity our natural languages have simply never constructed resources for describing them. And if the Mystic feels compelled, nevertheless, to try, the way he uses language is likely to be rather bizarre.
A classic example of such use is the so-called via negativa construction. Probably originating in the Upanishadic literature of India, it became nearly a commonplace feature of the western mysti- cal tradition, appearing in the Christian writings of St. Bernard, Angela of Foligno, St. Gregory and others. The following words of Dionysius the Areopagite, however, probably provide the clearest example of the construction:
The cause of all things is neither soul nor intellect; nor has it imagination, opinion, or reason, or intelligence; nor is it spoken or thought. ... It is neither essence, nor eternity, nor time.
All of which doesn't make a whit of sense--until we remember that the Mystic has directly experi- enced something for which his language has no words. Seen from that perspective, the via nega- tiva is really quite logical--the Mystic simply undertakes to catalogue what the subject of his vision is not!
Unfortunately, the effectiveness of the via negativa is somewhat diminished by a feature of our language comprehension known as "presuppositional ground." Suppose I tell you "The dog is not large"; your presuppositional ground for understanding this consists of the notion that the dog is something other than large. Hence, no matter how many things the Mystic tells us God is not, we seem to have a stubborn psychological disposition to suppose there is still something that God is. Perhaps that is why some Mystics evolved an even more bizarre way of talking about God. Let me give an ancient Indian example:
It moves, it moves not, it is far, and it is near.
Now we can't get away! Our logical intuitions are outraged, because we know nothing in our experience corresponds to such a description. At which point, the Mystic says "Aha! That's exactly what I'm trying to tell you!"
So what do we conclude from all this talk about talking about God? I'll suggest that perhaps the most concise summary comes--once again--from India. The Hindu tradition has evolved two names for the Deity it conceives. Saguna Brahman is the name applied to the "God-with- attributes" whose nature is linguistically expressible. An alternate name, Nirguna Brahman, is reserved, however, for the "God-without-attributes." Apparently, it is a part of Hindu wisdom that sometimes it's hard to talk about God.