HOCUS-POCUS

Most people, I would guess, do not have a favorite philosopher. I don’t think most people can adequately define, ‘Philosophy’. If they remember that Plato came before Aristotle it puts them in rare company. People who actually pursue the subject may be viewed with the childlike reservation of a kid contemplating a two headed frog. I apologize, I do that, philosophy, waiting on my second head. I don’t claim to be smart but I listen well. 

Two favorite philosophers: David Hume was a contemporary of John Locke, Englishmen from about the time of the American Revolution. Instrumental to the age of enlightenment, Hume championed empiricism and skepticism. Moving out of Locke’s shadow he envisioned a natural science of man. In that effort he arrived at a controversial conclusion: ‘passion rather than reason governs human behavior’. Epictetus on the other hand was a Greek, from the 1st century. Not a major player like Socrates or Plato, he did cast light on human nature that is still relevant. He foreshadowed Hume, “There is neither good nor evil but believing makes it so.” He was 1700 years ahead of Hume, making the same observation. Values, beliefs and behaviors are not inherently right or wrong. Hitler wasn’t evil because of what he did; he was evil because of how we feel about what he did. He thought himself a great humanitarian. Otherwise, how could anybody believe slavery was not only beneficial but also humane treatment of human beings, or that it pleased God? How else can some very smart Americans believe building walls is the right thing to do yet other Americans, just as smart, think we should be building bridges? It’s not about intelligence. Intelligence empowers us to calculate the volume of an egg and to write poetry but emotion dictates what we believe and we move to that drum.

I was thinking about that conundrum in church the other day. The sermon started with M.L.K. Jr. but quickly turned to everything that’s wrong in America. I knew her story perfectly, completely and I concur but in the same breath, I have wonderful friends who believe just the opposite. They are intelligent, highly educated folk who think the problem is generated by illegal immigrants and lazy, immoral people of color, and by people who believe as I do. So when I’m in that home, wonderful is terrible and vise-verse, depending on whose mind you read. They are wrapped in the flag with a gun in each hand. Within that microcosm, they treat each other, myself included, with courtesy, kindness and respect. I love them and I understand but my passion is diametrically opposed to theirs. Considering their DNA and experience, it’s the best they can do. There is neither good nor evil but believing makes it so. 

Then the mood lightened, we took to poetry as a tool of reflection and persuasion. In Robert Frost’s work, “Mending Wall” two farmers repair a stone wall that separates their property. One is dedicated to the virtue of walls while the other questions the need for a wall at all. Extreme winters with freeze heave and thaw, ice and wind, gravity, they work all winter against the wall leaving stones scattered on the ground. Frost begins the poem, “Something there is that doesn’t love a wall.” Men stack stones and nature tears them down. Frost observes that his apple trees will never invade the neighbors pine woods but reason loses out to feelings when the believer reiterates, good fences make good neighbors. The wall in Frost’s poem was a metaphor for another wall and we all understood without elaboration. 

While we were in that mode we were reminded that Mary Oliver had died. She was both a psalmist and a prophet for we of a nature based faith. I loved her work, still do. I have no defense against her words. Her poetry, noted by her peers, “refused to acknowledge boundaries between nature and self.” I’ve been stumbling over her quotes what seems like all my life and every time it’s like an open window that bids me outside, to where I truly wanted to be. Oliver counterpoints the farmer who loved his wall. In her poem, “The Summer Day” she incorporates into one short read, a patient, gentle philosophy for this life. It ends with what is probably her most famous quote: “Tell me what it is you plan to do with your one wild and precious life.” She, our minister, wanted to remind us that life isn’t all struggle, it’s a journey of discovery and we must live it as it comes to us. She doesn’t tell us what to believe, that's something Unitarians don't tolerate very well. Mary Oliver modeled for us how to milk this life for every blessing and in the end, how to let it go. M.L.K. Jr. and Mary Oliver, they have passed but what they left behind is worth the keeping. 

Church let out and we went our own ways. I’m still vacillating between Epictetus and Mary Oliver. He says it doesn’t matter, she says it does. I went to lunch with a friend, had falafel, humus and curry chicken. We talked about ordinary stuff. Breaking bread with friends is essential to good life. Knowing that emotion drives us to the extent that we don’t believe anything without its permission; that’s something else. It’s not carved in stone. Actually, things can happen and there are things we can do to change the way we feel. But between random chance and painfully slow process, we don’t see it working until after the fact. If you want to become more or less compassionate, more or less generous, more or less skeptical, cognitive therapy works but it’s not easy and it doesn’t net results fast enough for impatient people. Besides, most people believe that cognitive therapy is hocus-pocus. I think it works, maybe because I feel better about CT than about hocus-pocus.