Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
Buddhist
Mary Sang: The Zen Priest Offers an Advent Meditation

Mary Sang: The Zen Priest Offers an Advent Meditation

Last updated on: December 6, 2020 at 9:37 am by James Ford

Mary Sang: The Zen Priest Offers an Advent Meditation 2020-12-06T09:37:40-08:00 James Ford

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

The Zen Priest
Offers an Advent Meditation

James Ishmael Ford

For no good reason beyond the fact this is Advent and I’m thinking about Jesus and the religion of and about him, I’ve recently found myself thinking about the Parable of the Sheep and the Goats.

It’s added in at the end of a collection of parables compiled by the author of the Gospel of Matthew. It isn’t repeated in either of the other two synoptics. And the John gospel contains no parables.

So, a stand alone thing.

It’s also not much of a parable. It begins with an image, the sheep and the goats, but quickly moves into a description of how one can recognize one of Jesus’ followers.
My paraphrase of the central part of the parable goes:

“They asked the good rabbi who would inherit the new world?

He said you will. Because I was hungry and you fed me, I was thirsty, and you gave me drink. I was a stranger, and you took me in, naked and you clothed me, sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.

They said, we did not do these things.

He replied, when you cared for the stranger and the naked, the sick and those in prison. When you served them, the lost and the left behind, you served me.”

First why a paraphrase. I am innocent of Greek. Although I do have a seminary degree and am a bit more than passingly aware of scriptures. But, for me this is a bit of a discipline. Elaine Pagels once noted how in some early Christian communities, one was not admitted as a full member until they could write their own gospel.

My Buddhist gospel continues a work in progress.

Now where I write “new world,” it’s a substitution for the phrase “Kingdom of God.” It probably doesn’t work. But kingdom is more than a bit awkward term for our Republican times, not to mention a sensitivity to the limitations of gender usages, with endless unprofitable preferences given to masculine terms.

At the same time the term Kingdom of God or Kingdom of Heaven has long precedent in Jewish usage. Although not a regularly used phrase. But Jesus seemed to use it a lot. “Seemed” because some contemporary scholars, such as those gathered as the Jesus Seminar are suspicious as to whether Jesus had much interest in eschatological matters.

I personally find it much more likely he was completely about an end-times. The whole structure of the Middle Eastern mythic world view had beginnings and endings. And the suppression of the Jewish people under Rome’s heel, led in that moment in which he lived to any number of wandering mystics calling out the evils of the times (and specifically Rome) and promising succor. Healing. Hope.

Now well more than two thousand years later, there’s no way to know with certainty who Jesus was and what he was about. First, almost everything canonical has been washed through Paul’s Greek style mysticism, and fairly quickly a central promise of eternal life for those who call on Jesus’ name.

However, it doesn’t take a lot of digging to see that probably wasn’t what Jesus himself was about. The gospels themselves, at least the synoptics, were based on what appear to be two oral collections. One containing his miracles. The other his sayings. Beyond that what he was about is not at all clear. Each of the canonical gospels, not to mention those outside the canon, offer their own angle.

All that noted. As I read the sayings of the good rabbi, while he had little use for Rome, and not much more for the established religious leadership in Israel, it seems he cared a lot about the poor and the downtrodden.

And he did preach about this mysterious kingdom. A lot. It was a place where the rich were rebuked and the hungry were given nourishment.

But it was more than that.

I’m particularly taken with the various lines that suggest this kingdom was on the one hand yet to happen, although soon. But on the other hand, seemed already to exist, both within individuals and among them. Luke 17 offers a direct assertion the kingdom is within. Although many modern scholars translate the Greek word as among or in your midst. I appreciate the sentiment, but the weight of scholarship seems to go with the “within.” The controversial but, certainly for me, compelling Gospel of Thomas covers this matter in logia 3, having Jesus say this kingdom is both within and among.

I’m profoundly taken with this.

And while I have a more complex relationship with the evolved Jesus into what is sometimes called the “Christ of faith,” I am deeply called into this place where the sacred, the holy, God, is both within and among. And in some other way, yet to be realized. Instead, a promise. But offered with urgency.

I get that sense of urgency. I look around me, and how the world is, and I see Rome. And, I see the poor. And, I wonder which side I am actually on.

That this place that is promised, and is among, and is within, looks a great deal like my understanding of Mahayana Buddhist sunyata, boundlessness, matters a lot to me. And I have a Buddhist midrash on what it is and how it is. It is promised, because trapped in our ordinary dualisms, we cannot see that bigger thing. What we have to do is surrender our certainties, let go of owning, put down concepts great and small.

However, then, with that, well, the pearl of great price, the peace that passes all understanding. Awakening. Enlightenment. The Pure Land. Heaven.

But what makes it even more compelling for me, is how this awakening is never fully private. I realize it. Although I realize it by letting go of that I which I’ve held as an idol of the heart. And what I find when I let go is a word of encounter, of intimacy, endless realms of subjective meeting of others who are not me, and yet are not completely not me.

Not one. Not two.

And then, in this telling of the ancient story of not one and not two, is that the awakened heart is called as an alignment with the lost and the left behind. Specifically, this awakening is to our identity with the hungry and the poor.

In the absolute realms there are no distinctions. In the relative realms there are many. And, in this world, we must make choices. Among them, with whom do we stand?

It is found in an anticipatory story of this strange messiah in Matthew’s gospel. The angel tells Mary she is to have a magical child, a deliverer of the people.

And her response, in my paraphrase, a call from the depths.

Mary sang.

My heart magnifies the Lord,
My spirit rejoices in God who carries me to the farther shore.
The mystery of it all choses from the least of all people,
and with that grace all generations will forevermore call me blessed.
For the mighty has raised me, holy is his name.
Her mercy is on all who surrender into the great heart,
generation following generation.
The strength of the savior scatters the proud
In the imaginations of their hearts.
The beloved pulls down the mighty,
And raises up the poor.
He has filled the hungry with good things,
And the rich she has sent away.
The Lord calls in the people to mercy,
As she has endlessly over time beyond time.

I read the words, I recall my own encounters on the intimate way, and I find a calling to ponder these mysteries…

(The image is “Annunciation Quilt” by Br. Mickey McGrath, OSFS.)

Uncategorized

Previous Post

December 5, 2020

The Zen Priest Considers Dionysius the Areopagite

Next Post

December 8, 2020 A Rohatsu Meditation

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category A Christmas Carol Abolitionist African-American Ahmadiyya Alan Watts Aldous Huxley Allen Ginsberg Amedkar Jayanti American politics American Zen Anaheim Zen Sangha Anglican Annie Besant April Fool Armageddon Art and Religion artificial intellegence Atheist Awakening B R Ambedkar Barlaam & Josaphat Beatnik Between Bhagavad Gita Bible biography birthday bodhisattva Bodhisattva Precepts Book burning Book of Common Prayer Book of Mormon Brahmo Samaj Buddha Buddhism Buddhist Buddhist Lord's Prayer Butterflies Calendars cartoons cat ChatGPT Chicken Tortilla Soup choices Christian atheism Christian mysticism Christian origins Christian Science Christian Zen Christianity Christianity and Buddhism christmas Christmas Truce Christopher Isherwood Church of Later Day Saints Cinco de Mayo circus covenant critical thinking culture D. T. Suzuki Dalit Buddhism Daniel Defoe Desert Fathers and Mothers dharma talk Dogen Donald Trump Dongshan's Five Ranks Dorothy Day dream Duty Easter ecology Edwin Arnold emptiness Empty Moon Zen Network Episcopal Church Eternal Now Ethics evolution existentialism Faith fantasy Fathers Day film film review fire Five Ranks Folk music food Form and emptiness Four Seals Francis of Assisi Francis Xavier Free thinker friendship George MacDonald Gerald Heard Glenn Taylor Webb God Good Friday Gospel of Gospel of Mark Gospel of Thomas grace Graduate Theological Unioin Graduate Theological Union Guanyin H R Blyth Hakuin Ekaku Hanamatsuri Hanukkah Harada Yasutani Zen Heart Sutra Henry David Thoreau Hermann Hesse Hinduism History and Religion history of religion Holy Spirit home Hospitality Icon Ides of March Isaac Newton Islam Islamic mysticism Jack Kerouac James Luther Adams Jiddu Krishnamurti Joan of Arc Johannes Gutenberg John Donne joke Judaism justice karma kensho King James Bible koan Koun Yamada Kyoto School Lewis Carrol Liberal Christianity Liberal Religion Life Plan Community Liminal literature Literature and Religion Liturgy Lord's Prayer Love Mahatma Gandhi Mahayana Martin Luther King Jr Mary Baker Eddy Mary Magdelene Mary Oliver Mayflower Compact Meditation memories memory metaphor money money and religioin Mormons Mother's Day movie review mysticism mythic Neighborhood Unitarian Universalist Church New Thought Nichiren Buddhism Nonduality not knowing Omar Khayyam Pacific School of Religion pagan Palm Sunday Passover peace Pentecost perennialism Phantastes Philip Kapleau philosophy Pilgrimage poetry Poetry and Religion politics Prayer Precepts Printing Press prophecy prophetic spirituality psychology Pure Land Queer religion queering religion Quietism Ram Mohan Roy rebirth recipe Relationships and religion religion religion and history Religious syncretism Resistance Retirement Retreat review Rissho Kosei Kai Ritual Robert Aitken Roshi Robert Ingersoll Rohatsu Romani religion Rosie the Riveter saints samadhi SanboZen Sangha Satyagraha science science and reigion science and religion science fiction seminary sermon Sesshin Sex and Religion Shinran Sikh Sikh tradition silence Social Justice Socially Engaged Buddhism Society and religion Soto Zen soul spiritual community spiritual practice Spirituality Sufism Suicide superstition Taoism Television Teresa of Avila Thanksgiving theological schools Theosophy Thomas Merton Time Transcendentalism Transcendentalist Trinitarian Trinity Uncategorized unitarian Unitarian Christianity Unitarian Universalist Universalism Vajrayana Vedanta Walking war Willa Cather William Ellery Channing wisdom women and religion women in religion World Teacher Writing zazen Zen Zen Center Zen inspired retriement zen meditation Zen Precepts Zen women

Select a Month September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 February 2026 January 2026 December 2025 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 August 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 September 2024 August 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010 June 2010 May 2010 April 2010 March 2010 February 2010 January 2010 December 2009 November 2009 October 2009 September 2009 August 2009 July 2009 June 2009 May 2009 April 2009 March 2009 February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 September 2008 August 2008 July 2008 June 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 May 2007 April 2007 March 2007 February 2007 January 2007 December 2006 November 2006 October 2006 September 2006

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What Christian group is known for "confession" to a priest?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Methodists Presbyterians Catholics Baptists