The Long
and the Short of It
Delivered by
Bruce Arnold, August 14, 2005
At the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, New Bern, NC
In Asia, when an elephant is young, its handler will often braid a rope from grasses, loop it around the calf's leg, and stake it in the area where he wants the calf to stay. When the elephant is grown, and clearly strong enough to snap the string of grass, he still thinks it is strong enough to hold him, He has never tested it out.
This is true for us as well. There are many items in our mental toolbox that we have carried around without doubt from before our earliest memories. Among them are such apparently unquestionable concepts as time and space.
However, these are not as ironclad as we may have thought. Many examples may come to mind. At one time, people took it for granted that the sun goes around the earth, and that the world was flat. The divine right of kings was an article of faith for centuries. More recently, modern physics shows us that even such seemingly fundamental ideas as time and space are fluid, not
immutable.
Another such category concerns what we call polarities. A polarity is what you've got with two opposites. To give an example, a most common polarity would be north and south. We even refer to the north pole and the south pole. Another polarity is positive and negative. You can think of many others, such as hot and cold, long or tall, day or night, in or out, thesis and antithesis.
These qualities permeate our entire existence. Every perception, every judgment, Take the word “every.” It has a polar opposite, “none.” If you look at anything, you will size it up in multiple polar terms, perhaps without being aware of it. For instance, I look out the window to see if my neighbor is home (“home - not home.”) When I see his car, I will also notice if it is large or small, near or far, colorful or drab, even wet or dry, depending on the weather. I may not be conscious of having noticed these other things, but I will have.
One thing we notice about polarities is that they have no essential or intrinsic meaning. If the earth were only one temperature, no matter the time of day or location, we would never have had the idea of hot and cold. Neither is there an absolute long or short; in my family, where the men are all over six feet tall, I am short at 5'10", but when I lived in France where the men average only 5'7", I was tall. Up or down, in or out, good or bad, they only have meaning by contrast with each other.
It can be easily seen that polarity is one of the central characteristics of our universe. Without polarity, it would be entirely different. I cannot begin to imagine what it would be like. Consider that one of the ways in which polarity is found, is in positive and negative. Without positive and negative, there would be no protons or electrons, therefore no atoms. Polarity is also found in vibration, and without vibration there are no waves. No waves, no light. no heat, or any other form of radiation. I will go so far as to say that polarity is The fundamental property of all the universe, whether in the form of matter or energy. It is the matrix within which all other properties are found. When you read those articles about what happened in the first three seconds after the Big Bang, the very very very first thing that has to happen is a polar differentiation: where there was Nothing, there is now Something.
Somehow, the ancient sages knew this. Listen to the Hymn of Creation, from the Rg Veda:
At that time there was neither
existence nor non-existence,
neither the worlds nor the sky.
There was nothing that was beyond.
There was no death, nor immortality.
There was no knowledge of the day and night.
That one alone breathed, without air, by itself.
Besides that there was nothing.
Darkness there was enveloped by darkness.
All this was one water, without any distinction.
It was inactive, covered by void.
Or from the Tao Te
Ching:
There is a thing inherent and natural,
Which existed before heaven and earth.
Motionless and fathomless,
It stands alone and never changes;
It pervades everywhere and never becomes exhausted.
It may be regarded as the Mother of the Universe.
I do not know its name.
If I am forced to give it a name,
I call it Tao, and name it as supreme.
Or from the Bible:
In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness [was] upon the face of the deep.
Or from the Diamond Sutra:
Thus shall ye think of all this fleeting world:
A star at dawn, a bubble in a stream;
A flash of lightning in a summer cloud,
A flickering lamp, a phantom, and a dream.
All of these suggest that you had Nothing, and then you had Something.
So far, so good. All very interesting, but a little dry perhaps. If you wanted a physics lesson, you might not have gone to church to get it. What is all of this good for? Surely there is a point.
There is. The recognition of the meaning of polarity has profound implications for how we live our lives. If we understand that the same man can be short in America but tall in France, then we know that we have to ask the question of any judgment: by whose definition? If there can be no long without short, no up without down, then there is no good without evil, no wrong without right, not even any love, without hate.
Two people look at an abortion clinic. One sees a place where women can get the procedure done in a sterile and caring environment, and is glad that the back-alley abortionist is a thing of the past. The second sees a place where innocent human life is terminated unthinkingly. They are both right, so far as right goes, each within his own context. Short in America, tall in France.
If you see that solely as a political matter, then pick your side and thrash it out. But if you want to approach life from a spiritual angle, it is not so easy. You have to be honest enough to see that there is no absolute right or wrong. You have to recognize that all life is inextricably linked, so that decisions here have consequences, often unforeseen, over there.
So that is the first way that polarity affects our spiritual lives: we have to be honest about the fact that this is the way things are: nothing will ever be entirely good because there is no good without bad.
A little more physics: left to themselves, things tend to seek equilibrium. Pour cold water into a hot drink, and it will re-stabilize at a temperature somewhere between the two. Put a fat kid on one end of a see-saw, and a skinny kid on the other, adjust the fulcrum, and they balance each other.
And when you come down strongly in favor of one end of a polarity - if you grant no credence to the opposing point of view - you are actually strengthening it, for even in human affairs, an equilibrium will be struck. Lean too far in one direction, and something will shove you back. Affairs progress, not through the victory of one over another, but (as Hegel noted) by the emergence of a synthesis from the clash of thesis and antithesis.
Again, from the Tao Te
Ching:
When all in the world understand beauty to be beautiful, then ugliness exists.
When all understand goodness to be good, then evil exists.
Thus existence suggests non-existence;
Easy gives rise to difficult;
Short is derived from long by comparison;
Low is derived from high by position;
Resonance harmonises sound;
After follows before.
Therefore the sage carries on his business without action, and gives his teaching without words.
So that is the second way that polarity affects our spiritual lives: the knowledge that if we push too far in one direction, we create or strengthen its opposite.
Then too we must realize that we ourselves are polar beings: consciousness and unconsciousness, ego and shadow. Our motives are always mixed, because there is always a part of ourselves that we do not see, do not want to see. An essential part of the spiritual life is to look unflinchingly into our own shadow and own those parts of ourselves with which we are uncomfortable.
Finally, there is the realization that, as important as the polarities are, it is possible to transcend them, at least for a time. This is the goal of all meditation or yoga or contemplative prayer: To see beyond appearances and man-made definitions into that Reality which overarches and contains all the pairs of opposites. But that is a separate topic all its own, of which I will have more to say at a later date.
Please join me in a moment of meditation.
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