bobjots : redux

1 Comments

1. 
   Siuyin
   1

   What’s wrong with being esoteric and meandering? True Christian culture as it was begun in community was never rigidly institutional - so any hint of “orthodoxy” just reeks of institutionalization which in fact was the only real “heresy” if you want to speak about divergent acculturations. As for “esoteric and meandering”, those attributes tend to reflect (in sequence) diversity and evolution. All cultures have a certain amount of diversity within them -(esotericism) and all cultures do change from within (they meander), that is, they do not remain static as though frozen in time. This does not mean though that it was or is healthy for Christian culture to become institutionalized - that would render it frozen in structural artifices, unable to fluidly engage the world due to having lost sight of the original Christian way of being and doing. But sometimes, even I myself cringe inside at the word “esoteric” for it sort of conjures up images of what I will refer to as the “mixing-it-all-in syndrome” which is a characteristic feature of the “dread and distintegration” so prevalent in this ultra fast modernity. Mixing everything together in a big hodge-podge of incompatible cultural value systems such as some types of New Age systems of thought which blend varying types of guruism with Biblical values and practices into one philosophical complex. I must emphasize that in relation to the discussion about the change from healthy community oriented enculturation in Christian culture to an awkward, basically un-Christian diversion to institutionalism, a certain cultural continuity that breathed life into and helped symbiotically sustain a dynamic variety within the life of the Christian community throughout the Roman Empire was on the whole paled into insignificance particlularly following the ardent genocide and culturicide of the great persecutions and culminating in almost total politicide (the community’s loss of internal political efficacy and cohesion) after the succession of Constantine to the throne. These were the circumstances that allowed institutionalism to gain an unrelenting foothold. This sizable turningpoint within the history of Christianity is what has led to the illusion of “orthodoxy” being artificially embedded within Christian values. Jesus Himself never spoke in any of His stories or teachings about orthodoxy being what matters to the building of God’s Kingdom - in fact the only people who were inclined towards that were the pharisees. Although I must admit, that sometimes, the plotlines in some of Jesus’ stories were designed to appeal to the sensibilities of the pharisees in terms of the way the characters were described. I have not as yet worked out why He chose to do this, considering many of their ways were not really compatible with His and this trait of a fairly large incompatibility between phariseic and Christian values is stridantly visible throughout the Gospel narratives. I guess it’s just another of those perplexing ironies!

   Apologies if I gave the impression somehow that I am dogmatic!! I certainly have no intentions of spreading dogmatism either - I do feel however that there is a fundamental difference between militancy and dogmatism - one can be militant (i.e. strongly commited to a certain way of believing things) without necessarily being dogmatic (i.e. the tendency towards repressing another’s right to believe in what either their mind or heart perceives to be the truth). Given this, for all the limitations institutionalism may pose for expressing Christian culture, it is a reality and it does have a place insofar as education is concerned - after all, it is but one educational model among two. How’s that for breadth?! What’s the other you might well ask?…

   October 31st, 2008 at 9:58 pm