“Fount of Reason”
By Rev. Nastasha Ostrom
Preached Sunday, August 13, 2017
Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Raleigh
There is a story that is often told about Abdul Qadir al-Jilani, an 11th century Persian Sufi…
It is said that Jilani was a lover of truth in all its manifestations. As a boy he was curious and eager to learn and attain knowledge. He loved observing the world and had so many questions about it. One storyteller, Faye Mogensen, speculates that:
“Perhaps he wondered:
How many grains of sand are there in the desert?
How far away is the sun?
How many turns of the wheel make a cubit?
Questions, questions, questions.”
Jilani’s family was poor. His father had died before he was born, and his mother had to support them both. But his mother knew that her son was a bright boy who loved to learn. And so she saved up 40 coins so Jilani could to travel to Baghdad to study.
When Jilani was eighteen and it was time for him to depart for Baghdad, his mother sewed the 40 coins into her son’s shirt to hide the money from robbers. Then she shared her own love of truth with her son.
She said, “Always speak the truth, my son. Remember that the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, said, ‘Truth leads to righteousness, and righteousness leads to Paradise’. Promise me that you will always be truthful.”
“I promise, Mother,” Jilani told her. And he departed on his journey.
As the caravan made its way toward Baghdad, Jilani’s wondering mind wandered freely, questioning everything. The caravan wandered too, making good progress.
They nearly made to Baghdad without trouble when they were suddenly attacked by bandits. The travelers were all utterly terrified as the robbers relieved them all of their belongings.
All except Jilani, that is, who remained calm and whose 40 coins remained hidden in the secret lining of his shirt.
Then one robber asked Jilani, “Do you have any valuables on you?” The man assumed that this young poor boy would not have anything, and was merely trying to frighten him. And so he was surprised when Jilani replied very calmly, “Yes. I have 40 coins.”
The bandit was sure the boy must be lying and thought it was a great joke. He told the other bandits about the “poor boy with 40 coins”, and they all had a good laugh at Jilani’s expense.
This drew the attention of the bandit leader, who became curious and questioned Jilani. “Do you have any valuables on you?” he asked, and again Jilani replied, “Yes, I have 40 coins.”
The bandit leader laughed and said he must be lying, and Jilani grew stiff with affront. “I am not lying! I have 40 coins on me. They are sewn into my shirt.”
Now the bandit leader laughed harder and said, “You are clearly a fool to tell me such a thing.”
And Jilani grew more offended, for he was no fool, but a lover of knowledge and learning. He faced the bandit leader squarely and declared, “I love the truth. Loving the truth means not just seeking the truth with my mind, not just loving the truth with my heart, but always telling the truth with my lips and living the truth by honoring my promises. I told my mother I would be honest, and I would rather be slaughtered here than have my words become a lie. Here are the 40 coins.”
Now, the strangeness of the boy’s response shocked and rattled the bandits. All the other travelers had been terrified, far too terrified to even look at them the wrong way, let alone talk back.
The bandits could not believe that a young boy was not only so fearless in the face of danger, but also possessed such integrity. They grew ashamed in the face of his brave example, and as the story goes, they gave all the travelers back their belongings, and departed, resolving to change their ways.
When I first heard this story, I was surprised. Maybe you were too. The story did not end the way that I thought it would. After hearing all about Jilani’s love of truth, knowledge and learning, I assumed that he would use his bright mind and keen reason to get himself out of the predicament he had found himself in. Maybe he’d calculate the exact angle at which to throw a rock at a wagon so it would bounce off and knock out the bandit leader. Or perhaps he’d challenge the bandits to an intellectual contest, winning the caravan’s belongings back after stumping the robbers with a riddle or besting them in an ethical debate about robbery; something that makes use of that keen mind of his.
But that isn’t how the story went. When confronted with the problem of bandits who wanted to rob him and his fellow travelers, Jilani’s love of truth meant bringing the full truth of all of who he was to bear on the problem at hand, not just his bright mind.
He brought his loving heart, drawing on his love for his mother and his desire to keep his promise to her. He brought his steadfast spirit, determined to act with integrity even when dishonesty is far less risky. He brought his experiences, his values, his upbringing, and all of who is to that moment, not just his brilliant mind. He knewhimself to be so much more than just a walking brain.
He did not succumb to idolatry of the mind and spirit.
Idolatry of the mind and spirit. That phrase from our humanist 5th Source is striking. The rest of the Source uses language that seems to better fit the humanism of which it speaks: the counsel of reason, the results of science. But idolatry?
When many of us hear the word “idolatry”, our minds go straight to the First Commandment in Christian and Jewish tradition:
"You shall have no other gods before me.You shall not make for yourself an idol, whether in the form of anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I theLordyour God am a jealous God, punishing children for the iniquity of parents, to the third and the fourth generation of those who reject me."(Exodus 20:3-5)
Surely this is not the kind of idolatry humanists caution against. After all, it would only make sense if humanism required a belief in God. While there are some humanists who do believe in God, there are also some who do not, and one of the defining characteristics of humanism is that even if God exists—and humanism is agnostic on that question—God is not necessary. Or at least God is not emphasized.
From a humanist perspective, the laws of nature are enough to account for the workings of the universe. The findings of science and reason are the most trustworthy sources of knowledge. Human beings are the ones who make meaning. And human capacity for goodness is enough to get us out of trouble when we are confronted with challenges.
So if humanism's warnings against the idolatries of the mind and spirit have nothing to do with worshiping or not worshiping God, then what are they warning us about?
There's a different way of looking at idolatry that I think will serve us well here.The late Unitarian Universalist minister, James Luther Adams defined idolatry as “a segment of reality torn away… inflated” and “made into an absolute”. Meanwhile Rev. John Buehrens, the former president of our Unitarian Universalist Association defined idolatry simply as “worshiping a part for the whole”.
There are many ways that we human beings worship a part for the whole. James Luther Adams frequently wrote about the idolatries of “blood and soil”, by which he meant racism and nationalism. He was speaking during his time of the evils of Nazi Germany. But yesterday’s white supremacist rally in Charlottesville and the horrific attack on anti-racist activists protesting the rally prove that idolatries of blood and soil are not historical at all. Racism and nationalism are alive and well and remain a grave threat that we must confront.
White supremacy is idolatry because it holds up just one human identity among many—white racial identity—as the highest, most important identity. And really, it lifts up white, cisgender, heterosexual, able-bodied, well-educated men as the supreme form that a human being can take. Or at least the most normal form. And that is idolatry. It is worship of the part for the whole.
Idolatries of mind and spirit, blood and soil worship a part for the whole by ignoring one of the central spiritual truths of our faith: that reality itself is a vast interconnected web of being in which all parts are valuable and necessary to the whole. This interconnectedness duplicates itself at every level of existence.
Take our bodies, for example. The many parts of our bodies are connected and dependent upon one another. Take one part of the body away, and unless it is a gallbladder or wisdom tooth or tonsil, chances are you’re going to miss it. Your body won’t be able to function right without it. You may even die.
Conversely, if you focus solely on the wellbeing of one part of the body and ignore the rest, you probably won’t fare so well. You are not just a brain, or a pair of lungs, or a set of hands. Nor are you just a body, or just a mind. Mistaking a mere part of our bodies, or a mere part of ourselves, for the whole is hazardous.
And so it is with the rest of reality. Humanism affirms that we must avoid idolatries that rip parts of reality away from the whole.
The first Humanist Manifesto, which was written in 1933 and signed by several Unitarians and a few Universalists, attempts to reunite the body and the mind, humanity and nature, the sacred and the secular, and individuals and culture.
Humanism argues against idolatries of the mind and spirit by affirming all of these as valuable, interconnected and inseparable dimensions of reality. It affirms that we cannot have any one without the others.
We value reason, but we know we are not disembodied minds. We do not merely say “I think, therefore I am”, but also “I feel, therefore I am”, “I touch, taste, love, weep, therefore I am”. We affirm both the value of our thinking, reasoning, creative minds, but also the goodness of our bodies, including our senses, emotions, and other embodied experiences.
We value human beings—our human capacities for love, reason, vision and creativity—but we also affirm that we are a part of nature, not above it. We seek the wellbeing of our own species as well as that of other species on our planet. We see intrinsic value in the natural world and seek to protect it for its own sake, including often from our own technologies and their environmental impacts.
We value science, but not above all else. We affirm the value of scientific knowledge and technological advancement, as well as the value of the ethical awareness and cultural wisdom that help us use our technology responsibly. We remain humble in the face of our awareness that just as science gave us the polio vaccine, so too did it give us the threat of nuclear winter.
Humanism is iconoclastic. It seeks to demolish idolatries of mind and spirit that threaten and diminish life. In doing so it opens us up to a wider and more whole world and a deeper and more integrated sense of self.
As our false idols crumble away and reveal the wider, more whole world beyond, may our hope expand to fill the new horizon. May that hope be grounded in both our vision for a better world and the hard work of our hands. May we proceed with trust in our human capacities for goodness, tempered by humility for our human capacities for evil. May we resist idolatries of the mind and spirit, blood and soil, that we may always remain open to the vast goodness of life. May we never check parts of ourselves at the door, but know that this sanctuary and this community are a home for our whole selves, body and heart, mind and spirit.