Words killeth
John Senior considers guidance and spiritual practice
When during my membership application visit I was asked what I understood by the word ‘God’ I replied without hesitation, quoting from my Buddhist vocabulary the paragraph that refers to the unborn, uncreated and unmanifest.
My words as a Buddhist are very different from what a Christian may quote from the Bible, as the words given to Moses that ‘I am that I am’. Undoubtedly, there are many other descriptions from amongst today’s Friends. These are, in my opinion, different ways of saying the same thing. Words may differ, but we must look not at the words and – as the Buddhists say – not at the fingers but at the moon to which all fingers point. From this I see that all the discussion about words, and their meaning in Quaker faith & practice, is a total distraction from the central issue, which is that we have drifted away from our mystical, experiential roots. At the very beginning of Quaker faith & practice there are, however, three clear pointers in Advices & queries:
Take heed, dear Friends, to the promptings of love and truth in your hearts. Trust them as the leadings of God whose Light shows us our darkness and brings us to new life.
- Advices & queries 1
All of us need to find a way into silence which allows us to deepen our awareness of the divine and to find the inward source of our strength. Seek to know an inward stillness…
…Hold yourself and others in the Light, knowing that all are cherished by God.
- Advices & queries 3
Ironically, nowhere in Quaker faith & practice is there guidance for the practice of silence specifically related to these words or on other early Quaker texts that attempt to define the Light and our relationship to it.
A number of Meetings arrange Holding in the Light and Healing sessions, but, again, there is no guidance whatsoever in Quaker faith & practice.
The inclusion in Quaker faith & practice of guidance on these three key spiritual practices would do much to restore us to our experiential roots, where words are left behind.
If we need words to help us on our way then related texts by George Fox published in Rex Ambler’s anthology Truth of the Heart make essential reading and William Penn in No Cross, No Crown gives almost identical guidance to that of George Fox twenty-four years earlier. George Fox, in his 1658 letter to Lady Claypole, advises:
What the light exposes and discovers, as temptations, distractions, confusions; do not look at the temptations, confusions, corruptions; but at the light which discovers them and exposes them…For looking down at sin, corruption, and distraction, you are swallowed up in it; but looking at the light, which discovers them, you will see over them. That will give victory, and you will find grace and strength; there is the first step to peace.
