A lovely love story - not necessarily romantic - we find in the Christian Scriptures, Gospel of John 21.11-18. A story of delicate, devoted affection...
But Mary stayed outside the tomb [of Jesus] weeping. And as she wept, she bent over into the tomb and saw two angels in white sitting there, one at the head and one at the feet where Jesus' body had been. And they said to her, "Woman, why are you weeping?" She said to them, "They have taken my lord [Greek, kurios, sir, lord], and I do not know where they laid him."
When she had said this, she turned about and saw Jesus there, but she did not know it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, "Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?" She thought it was the gardener and said to him, "Sir [kurios], if you carried him away, tell me where you laid him, and I will take him." Jesus said to her, "Mary!" She turned to him and said in Hebrew, "Rabbouni," which means "teacher." Jesus said to her, "Stop holding on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers [i.e., his disciples] and tell them, 'I am going to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.'"
Mary of Magdala went and announced to the disciples, "I have seen the lord [kurios]," and told what he told her.
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Intriguing that Mary does not recognize Jesus until he speaks her name, even though they had been close friends.
What does this point to? She refers to him as "my lord," a title of respect also translated "sir," and by "rabbi," or "teacher."
Mary recognizes Jesus only when he speaks to her as Jesus, not by official titles like "lord" or "rabbi" or with the impersonal, gender-identity "woman." The angels had spoken, "woman," and Jesus, too, initially.
As Martin Buber wrote:
The basic word I-You can only be spoken with one’s whole being.
The basic word I-It can never be spoken with one’s whole being.
The meeting between Jesus and Mary shifts from I-it to I-You. In this, there is no objectivity. It is a thing. You is a sacred self. Jesus is not an it. Mary is not an it. Materialists hold the world in it. Hence, the relational landscape is dust and dearth. The You world is fecund foliage and flowing waters.
He, a man, having bones-and-body like her, speaks forth "Mary!," a female, from an equality of persons with two names: Mary and Jesus. Within this intimacy is equality. "Mary!" is a word inviting the ease of familiarity, of closeness. He says "Mary!," like when a Zen teacher uses a "turning word" that awakens the disciple. Jesus, too, is exclaiming, "Wake up!" He loves Mary too much to walk away content with her remaining asleep.
Something harasses us to wake us up. Sometimes it whispers, sometimes yells. We run, but we cannot outrun it. Sad those who no longer can hear even while running in the opposite direction.
* * *
As we grow spiritually, we may shift to this relational leveling; that is, we no longer give the same high esteem to apparent spiritual or social elites we once did. And we no longer approach persons as though we are more holy or enlightened than them. It does not come to mind, negating the I-You, for there is no gateway for it to enter in. One no longer wishes to be less or more holy or enlightened than others. These words are seen through, dewy pearls melting in the Sun.
Spirit levels the relational field, as Jesus does here with Mary by speaking her name. There are no spiritual elites - not even a Jesus or a Buddha. And do we not dishonor others if we cling to them as such? We can love them, we can recognize their wisdom and skill, but we need to let them come down off the pedestal on which we have placed them. Spiritual beings want to be one-among, not one-over. This is a gift we give others, and they give us. To be a spiritual being is to realize your true, dignified humanness, not thinking of oneself as floating in an ethereal realm above the crowd. One wants to walk on dirt, not streets of gold.
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What does he mean by telling Mary to stop holding on to him? Seems he means more than just physically letting go.
Mary can no longer know Jesus as she knew him. She is invited to enter the unknown and newness of the present Jesus to know him now, standing before her - the only way to know her friend. There is no Buddha, saint, Jesus, your neighbor, your lover, you ... of the past. Yet, this does not mean there is no Jesus and Mary. Is there any other way to know anyone?
The words "lord" and "rabbi" are from Mary's memory, the past; a newness is present to her that did not come into the present. The relationship is different and will never return to what it was. This is a death to her, and a new life. Jesus has come forth from a tomb, she is now to do the same. We can live in the tombs of the past, trying to keep others there with us, detaining those we love in those sepulchers. Or we can be with them now.
The only way we can truly know anyone intimately is to see the other as a continuing disclosure. Everyone is part of the same Life-flowing. Zen practitioners say, "You never see the same river twice." You never see the same person twice. You never see yourself twice. You never see the tree in your yard twice.
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This is eternal life - not duration, but quality. A Buddhist can enter Nirvana right now. A Christian heaven right now. You can see someone in Nirvana now, in Heaven now. Saints and holy men and women are all around you.
Continuity is part of the flow, but we mistake continuity for sameness. You look the same, so you are the same, we think. Not true. Appearance misleads; spirit rightly guides. Look out from behind your eyes.
When looking out from behind the eyes, spirit sees spirit, love recognizes love. One sign of this seeing: you see the youthfulness of the other, and whether it is an infant or someone age 100. Appearance ages, spirit is ageless and spans ages.
Materialists do not live in this seeing. They live in appearance. They are asleep. Waking up means insight into this ageless presence. Take a group of ten persons sitting in a room; there are ten persons, but one presence. Person ages; presence is eternal, not for living forever, but for living free of birth-and-death.
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I joke about my late parents wondering what happened to their boy, for I changed much after leaving home and going into many years of studies. One matter was my engagement with Buddhist thought and practice, when my parents raised me as a conservative, evangelical Christian, where any interest in any other religion was taboo. Somehow, we once had a Buddha image in our home. It ended up being removed, for we were told it could bring evil into our home. Any religion not clearly Christian was termed a cult. We believed what we had been taught. We were taught no other options.
Brian, after many years of metamorphosis, was still Brian as to continuity, but he was not, for he was not the same Brian, and he is and was more than Brian. Yet, each person, like Brian, is innately created with this destiny to surprise us with changes, even baffling and disturbing ones.
We never know when the river will turn in an unexpected direction, and we are the river. We do not know the new we are becoming, even as others do not. We cannot see, for we are not outside the river. We cannot see ourselves, even as our eyes do not see themselves. There are unseen, hidden forces, mostly deep underwater, shaping the currents we call our lives. Sometimes, life reminds us of that. Possibly, it is doing so always, but we may not be willing to be quiet and still enough to learn to see this subtleness. Regardless, seen or unseen, hidden forces, gentle and not, shape us into forms that never before were. We are moved along, whether we choose to be or not. There is always a strangeness about us.
* * *
So, Jesus tells Mary to let him go. No one can grab hold of anyone else. Can you grasp air in your hands? Can you capture sunlight in a jar? Others release us into our freedom, or they cannot love that we are and become, and vice versa. We must let ourselves go, again and again, too. If we have a relationship with God, we must let God go, again and again. No one can capture God. If we change, can we say God does not? Possibly, that is something for you to contemplate.
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I once sat down to share a meal with a religious volunteer at a jail where I was the Senior Chaplain. His son informed him he was gay. The father told me he had rejected his son, he would have nothing to do with him due to the son's sexual orientation. His excuse was his religious belief that homosexuality is sinful. How sad that he had an idea of what his son ought to be, rather than loving his son as his son. He could not let go of what he had thought his son to be. What was in his head, a belief, a thought, was to him more important than the man his child had become. His son, he held in the past. He refused the son's freedom to evolve, to surprise, even to baffle him - even disturb him by the son's becoming. How sad for both son and father.
* * *
This knowing someone and ourselves only now sounds very Zen-like - it is.
Yes. In that moment between the past and future is the nakedness of time. Is zero. Is the man's son being reborn? His rebirth arises out of zero into zero. We really never become anything solid. We keep melting back into zero. Yet, being nothing, change is possible. Otherwise, we are frozen rather than flowing. The impermanence of the self, resting on the Self, is a blessing.
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Ben Connelly, a Zen Buddhist teacher, says his teacher directs him at times with this simple wisdom, "Just come back to zero." Whatever we appear to be, we are zero. Yet, that zero contains worlds, and your name. We embody potentialities, and this includes many ways of being, including diverse races, ethnicities, beliefs, sexual orientations, religious preferences, ... One face assumes many faces.
This ever-renewing you is what is meant when a Zen Buddhist says, "If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him." There is no past Buddha, no past you.
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So, why does God prefer to clothe with a body - Mary's body, Jesus' body, Buddha's body? Your body? Why does God want to speak a name and hear a name?
While this something calling our name is ineffable, our-being-known arises as close to us as that name. This closeness can feel threatening. Do we really want the familiarity? Or do we prefer the safe sense of strangeness? Distance? Will we welcome God into our bed? The world into our arms?
Too, hearing our name called, the one speaking is too close to see. Still, we can hear - not words, something more intimate. Words would be too far away. In being-known, we know. In my being-known, I know. Seeing out from behind my eyes, I see you through your eyes.
* * *
Returning to zero.
Once I say, "I know you," you are not zero, you are held in time, a number among numbers. I do not see you.
Once I say, "I don't know you," you become for me an ever-renewing revelation.
Your something will always be a mystery to me - I cherish that.
I love the something, still, your appearance is another something to love.
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(C) brian k. wilcox
*Martin Buber. I and Thou. Trans. Walter Kaufmann.
**Ben Connely. Inside the Grass Hut: Living Shitou's Classic Zen Poem.
