Saturday, January 05, 2019

behold they are become wells of good water

In passing, researching "To Be or Not To Be, That is the Question: Yhwh and Ea, by Anne Marie Kitz, in Vol. 80 Issue 2 - Apr 2018, Catholic Biblical Quarterly.

I arrive at Wikipedia,  water and Enki: 
The cosmogenic myth common in Sumer was that of the hieros gamos, a sacred marriage where divine principles in the form of dualistic opposites came together as male and female to give birth to the cosmos. In the epic Enki and Ninhursag, Enki, as lord of Ab or fresh water (also the Sumerian word for semen), is living with his wife in the paradise of Dilmun where
The land of Dilmun is a pure place, the land of Dilmun is a clean place, The land of Dilmun is a clean place, the land of Dilmun is a bright place;
He who is alone laid himself down in Dilmun,
The place, after Enki is clean, that place is bright.
Despite being a place where "the raven uttered no cries" and "the lion killed not, the wolf snatched not the lamb, unknown was the kid-killing dog, unknown was the grain devouring boar", Dilmun had no water and Enki heard the cries of its goddess, Ninsikil, and orders the sun-god Utu to bring fresh water from the Earth for Dilmun. As a result,
Her City Drinks the Water of Abundance, Dilmun Drinks the Water of Abundance,
Her wells of bitter water, behold they are become wells of good water,
Her fields and farms produced crops and grain,
Her city, behold it has become the house of the banks and quays of the land.
Dilmun was identified with Bahrain, whose name in Arabic means "two seas", where the fresh waters of the Arabian aquifer mingle with the salt waters of the Persian Gulf. This mingling of waters was known in Sumerian as Nammu, and was identified as the mother of Enki.
(-- Enki, Wikipedia)
I can imagine the earliest experience of water. It must have seemed that one was drinking God, washing with God, cooking with God, immersing in God. 

In earliest pre-Socratic philosophy, Thales of Miletus said that water was 'it.'
3. Thales says Water is the Primary Principle
Aristotle defined wisdom as knowledge of certain principles and causes (Metaph. 982 a2-3). He commenced his investigation of the wisdom of the philosophers who preceded him, with Thales, the first philosopher, and described Thales as the founder of natural philosophy (Metaph. 983 b21-22). He recorded: 'Thales says that it is water'. 'it' is the nature, the archê, the originating principle. For Thales, this nature was a single material substance, water. Despite the more advanced terminology which Aristotle and Plato had created, Aristotle recorded the doctrines of Thales in terms which were available to Thales in the sixth century B.C.E., Aristotle made a definite statement, and presented it with confidence. It was only when Aristotle attempted to provide the reasons for the opinions that Thales held, and for the theories that he proposed, that he sometimes displayed caution.
(-- Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Thales of Miletus (c. 620 B.C.E.—c. 546 B.C.E.)
Walking with leashed Rokpa in City of Rockland yesterday, melting sand and snow brown puddles at edge of every corner, waiting for new tires to be mounted, I am splashed by passing car with the essence of things on black coat and space grey trousers because that's just the way of things.

The white dog asks why, when there are several hundreds of acres of mountain out behind our house, we are walking the edges of snow and ice and melting mix of sand and salt on city streets, rushing cars uninterested in us after the undulation of temperature following several inches of wet storm the day before.

The various faces of water.

The sniggering sound of God.

you cannot not tell your story

ski walking stick

from barn to zendo --

squeaking snow

pre-dawn chant

Friday, January 04, 2019

bedtime

water runs

in sink

dishes

washed

Thursday, January 03, 2019

madame speaker

New Congressional House.

A nice change.

Let's get started.

Wednesday, January 02, 2019

e t h i k o s

Reading 300+ pages of submitted papers.

The day runs out.

Word by word.

nihil obstat

Nothing moves —

still, it arrives at where it is

with no effort, no barriers

Tuesday, January 01, 2019

be forgot

there it is

one day gone

364 remain --

snow on ground

a trappist's thoughts

TUESDAY, JANUARY 1, 2019

Mary

There come to her doors men beating their breasts, confessing their sins, and having received pardon, they return home with joy...In the same way there draw near to her feet...the sad, the needy, the afflicted, the lonely...The prayers of all these who cry out of whatever tribulation she gladly receives and, making supplication to her Son, in her pity she turns from them every evil...with what great kindness she embraces and loves those who are akin to her in purity of heart...

We trust always in the kindness of Our Blessed Lady. She lets all the mercy that Jesus is come to us.

Orazio Gentileschi, Madonna with Sleeping Christ Child, Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum. Lines from our Cistercian father, Amadeus of Lausanne.

still retain the ability to function

2019 will be a troubling, divisive, fateful year. 

2019 will be a loving, kind, compassionate year.
In his essay “The Crack-Up,” F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote, “The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.”     (--in, 1919: The Year of the Crack-Up, by Ted Widmer, NYT, 31dec18)
See what poet Charles Olson said about this in his poem Love.

Then what a sermon in a Unity-Unitarian church said.

Perhaps we are only as intelligent as the situation presenting itself with its intelligence to our awareness comes to be perceived, embraced, and embodied.

begin again

white smoke wanders dooryard,

wood stove doors open this new

year's morning --

Hebrew word, עזר, (ezer, helper)*

arrives as what we are to 

be with 

one-another 


...   ...   ...

       

            *  (note: ezer)

Monday, December 31, 2018

practicing end of year

we sat in silence

then chanted prajnaparamita --

in circle of poetry back in house

wide gaps of listening

nearing new year

not a drop of wine

in my house --

at least an old friend

in Mexico has his Merlot

this, from a hymn, office of readings

The zen monk cycling across Canada, the US, and Central America told us that his koan throughout was "What is this?"


     Good Christian friends, rejoice
     With heart and soul and voice;
     Now ye hear of endless bliss:
     Jesus Christ was born for this!
     He has opened heaven's door,
     And we are blest forevermore.
     Christ was born for this!
     Christ was born for this!


     Tune: In dulci jubilo 66.77.66.55.   Music: Klug’s Geistliche Lieder, Wittenberg, 1535.   Text: In      dulci jubilo: Latin and German, fourteenth century.   Translation: John Mason Neale, 1818-1866

"This" is what truth and reality is in zen awareness.

It is what Christ was born for.

Or, as another hymn says, "This, this, is Christ the King".

Pray for the grace of accuracy to be able to say throughout this coming year --

This is
what I am

becoming;

this is 
what I am

doing;

this is 
what I am

here and now!

Sunday, December 30, 2018

mattock in winter

December 30th, 2018

Meeting an old Monk in deep Mountains

A cassock of coarse threads
A mind of moonlike kind;
A short mattock in his hand
To hew the sticks he finds.
By dark stones on the streamside
Over fallen leaves he goes;
A few wisps of cloud 
Trail two brows of snow.
- Guanxiu (832-912) dailyzen.com

ah, 4am

The hour when everything is at ready.

When prayer seems silent necessity.

And we are invited to listen as night confesses it's true allegiance.