I am fascinated by day 24, which basically says the Bible is literally God’s Word – which Warren equates to Truth – and that we are to adhere to it by the letter whether it makes sense to us or not. He uses lots of quotes from the Bible to support these assertions:
Jesus prayed, ‘Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth.’
‘Through the Word we are put together and shaped up for the tasks God has for us.’
Jesus said ‘The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life.’
‘God decided to give us life through the word of truth so we might be the most important of all the things he made.’
And there are others, but the point is Warren equates “word” in all of these selections with the Bible – the only place to find God’s guidance is the Bible.
Reading spiritual texts – and I include in here not only religious cannons like the Bible, the Koran, the Bhagavad Gita, the Ramayana, the Vedas, Buddhist Sutras, and the Tao Te Ching, but any writing of a spiritual nature, which for me has included Rick Warren and this book, Deepak Chopra, Ram Dass, Eckhart Tolle, Khalil Gibran and others – is a fantastic way to grow your own spirituality. You can read what other spiritual seekers have to say about life and ponder for yourself where truth actually lies. That’s what spirituality is – seeking truth – and it is a never-ending process. We are constantly testing truth and finding new truths, new faces of old truths.
It’s actually a lot like science – you posit a theory (consciously or unconsciously), test it out by making specific choices and engaging in specific behaviors (consciously or unconsciously), and you find out whether your theory holds up (whether you accept the outcome or not). For example, I have often posited that if I could explain to someone the error in their thinking, they would appreciate my insight and quick intellect and immediately forgo their erroneous logic in favor of the clearly right answer. Seeing error, I made the choice to try to correct it with logical explanation. I did this over, and over, and over again. It has taken me at least 20 years of constant experimentation with different people and under different conditions and using different choices of words and tones of voice to understand that my theory simply doesn’t hold water – it’s not true.
And there is not a soul in this world that could have told me that, that I would have blindly believed and given up my fruitless endeavors on account of their word. I had to figure it out for myself. And that’s just one example of the many truths I have run up against and surrendered to. We all have to discover truth for ourselves and in our own time.
I read a great quote recently, something about “you can’t tear the skin off a snake; the snake will shed its skin when it’s ready and not a moment before,” which is meant to refer to any and all spiritual enlightenment – you can’t force Truth on someone, they have to discover it for themselves. That’s what it means to say that each person has their own path, must follow their own guidance. We each know different truths to be real, and we each have our own truths to learn, and no one else can tell us how to do that. That’s also why we shouldn’t judge each other – it’s not for me to tell you what path you should follow because I can’t possibly know, and in judging against you I judge against myself and block my own path unnecessarily.
I like the quote from Jesus above: “Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth.” God’s Word = Truth. I’m not trying to make some religious argument here but clarifying that all we’re really talking about is Truth. Forget about God, forget about Jesus, forget about religion, forget about spirituality – this is about Truth. Truth goes by many names – God, Jehovah, Allah, Rama – and those who have really embraced and embodied Truth – Jesus, especially, but also Buddha – have been deified by those who are too fearful and ashamed to realize they have the same capabilities. But it’s all just Truth in the end.
Warren says the only place to find Truth is in the Bible, but I just can’t buy that. I think this belief stems from the idea that God no longer talks to people the way he did in the Old Testament, and so the only place to find God’s guidance now is through Jesus Christ and the New Testament. But I don’t believe that God no longer talks to people. I don’t think God ever stopped talking to people – I think people have a misguided understanding of what God’s voice sounds like. They think if God speaks it must be some booming voice from the sky, as if God were external to us. But God is not external. God is Truth. God is the name given to Truth by people who would rather worship Truth than live it. Truth is everywhere, and it’s in everything, and it’s in you. Truth speaks to you through your internal guidance system – what is known as the Holy Spirit in Christianity. It’s not a question of whether Truth speaks to you, it’s only a question of whether you listen.
The Bible represents the learning of its authors. And, while that learning is great and helpful and thought-provoking and all that, it cannot “have the first and last word in [your] life,” as Warren asserts. Whether you’re reading the Bible, A Brave New World, or The Ethical Slut, you can’t simply adopt the authors’ confidence in the “truths” they promote – you must run them by your own internal guidance system to determine whether they are true for you. Don’t get me wrong – I’m an idealist and I believe only in universal Truths (or perhaps only one Truth), so I do not believe that something can be true for one person and not for another. But, that is entirely beside the point. The point is that you must discover the truth for yourself, not by reading about the truths discovered by others, but by running up against them, challenging them, and ultimately surrendering to them. Yes, surrender, because why would you ever fight Truth? How futile and insane would that be?
