Katie and John

As I'm slowly but surely winding my way towards the end of my teaching career I find that I'm devoting more blog posts to my favorite students. Really, this should not be too surprising since I mainly write this blog for myself, and as I rapidly close in on 2000 blog posts this does all form a wealth of memories for me to revisit. Here is a picture of two of my all-time favorite students: Katie Lawrence and John Amigo. Katie was in my class during her first semester at Champlain, so I was clearly able to see her progression over a college career. They both took my COR 220 Aesthetic Expression course their sophomore year that featured the trip to Thanksgiving break trip to Spain and Portugal. And then John later took my junior level class on Islam. It's hard to believe but they both graduated this year, and I'll definitely miss them (that is not hard to believe). This past year they both went out of their way to schedule occasional meetings off-campus to grab a cup of coffee and talk about life, which is something that upperclassmen tend to do as it suddenly dawns on them that they're going to be leaving the nest. They were both film majors and I ended up appearing in (and doubtless ruining) student films, which is where I snapped this picture.

I chose this picture because a) they both look so professional, b) it was colder than hell that day, which seems to always be a prerequisite for every one of Katie's films, and c) my "performance", actually just a crowd scene, ended up on the cutting room floor, which seemed like a fitting metaphor for my role as a teacher.

Peace of Green Fields - 2019

Every family, and I guess by definition every relationship, possesses a secret language, an intellectual and emotional shorthand, that plays a role in the constant narrative. Naturally, my son and I are no different, and our shared language is made up of references to Haruki Murakami novels, bad science fiction and monster movies featured in Michael Welden's Psychotronic Guide to Film, and passages from Marcus Aurelius's Meditations. I was thinking of Marcus's reminder that the peace of green fields is always within us when I spent the other afternoon helping (well, mainly sitting around chatting) my son plant flowers at his place out in Colchester. He's always been an amazing person, and he's now grown into this remarkably thoughtful, grounded and caring man, and I'm so proud of him.

He decided to rent this A-frame for the year, which seemed like a bit of silly idea in January, but turned out to be a brilliant one. It's right on the lake, and also features a bomb shelter that had not been opened in years (and that's a separate post in and of itself because, as you might expect if you know my son, he talked his landlady into letting him explore).

The dock right by his house. From the end of the dock you can see both Mount Mansfield and Camel's Hump. I love the fact that he just decided that living on the lake would be a cool thing to do for a year. Not to make too much of an over-used Joseph Campbell line, but he does follow his bliss in a way that I admire more every year. He has a courage I've never possessed.

My contribution to the project was buying some of the flowers and mulch, which a very aging parent thing to do (it makes us feel that we're still a part of the lives of our completely self-sufficient children).

And his garden, replete with drift wood borders.

The peace of green fields.

What It Means - Day 89

With the possible exception of the word jihad, there can't be an Arabic word that inspires more confusion, misinformation and fear than the word shariah. Glenn Beck has an entire career based on ramping up fear over both words (yes, Beck is a moron, but a dangerous moron since he does this deliberately for money). I'll have more to say about jihad later, but I thought I'd say a few words about shariah because it popped up in class the other night as part of discussion so it's on my mind.

As always, I throw out my normal disclaimer that I'm not an Islamic scholar nor do I speak for my faith. Rather, I'm just an individual believer working my way through faith.

First off, what does shariah even mean? Folks with a knowledge of Arabic will often point out that to say shariah law is a bit clunky because one of the translations of the word shariah is "law," so, following that logic, you'd be saying law law (much as when you're saying Sahara Desert you're actually saying Desert Desert). Maybe a better translation for the word shariah is "path." I say this because I think it's better to think of shariah as a thought process than a set of laws. Shariah isn't like the US Constitution where you could do a Google search and come up with a link to a set document. So, when someone is railing against a Muslim wanted to implement shariah it's important to know what they're talking about; certainly, you can still dislike the notion, but dislike it for what it is and not what Fox News tells you it is.

As always, I'm borrowing heavily from other sources, in this case, not surprisingly, Seyyed Hossein Nasr and his book The Heart of Islam. In this case check out his chapter on "Divine and Human Laws." Again, this book is simply required reading.

When I explain shariah to students in class I usually do so in this fashion: imagine that you're a Muslim trying to live in this world and you are day to day faced with problems that require a decision; shariah is essentially the thought process wherein you would work through that conundrum and come up with an answer.

It's a complicated process, but it would roughly work this way: you'd work your way, top through bottom, of these guidelines.

Not surprisingly, if you're a Muslim you would start with the Quran. The Quran is far more than a book of laws, but there are a lot of laws in the Quran. During the Prophet's life (and thus at the time of the revelations) there was no structured, centralized government and no set law code, so, again not surprisingly, a lot of the revelations provided legal structure. You're that Muslim trying to make a decision so you'd start here,  but also with the understanding that the Quran is not designed to cover every specific contingency to every specific question.

Failing that, you'd turn to the Hadith (sayings) or Sunnah (actions) of the Prophet. That is, did Muhammad ever say anything or do anything that might shed light on your decision. One of the unique things about Islam is that you have this whole body of knowledge that exists outside of the Quran. By way of comparison, Christianity does not have a collection of stories of Jesus that exist outside of the New Testament. Coming back to our present day Muslim trying to make a decision, did anyone ever ask the Prophet a question that might shed light on your situation?

Now, if you don't find the answer in the Quran or the Hadith or the Sunnah, then what? Then you would move to Analogy (qiyas, in Arabic). Again, using an example from class, you may want to download a movie illegally, and that probably wasn't covered by Islamic scholars centuries ago, but there are certainly analogous decisions. This eventually takes us to issues like Consensus (ijma): have a consensus of scholars of the entire community ever agreed on something (as you might expect, all of this gets less and less uniform or likely as you get further away from the Quran as a basis). Eventually you'd work your way through concepts such as Equity (istihsan) or Public Interest (maslahah mursalah).

Now, it's more complex than this, and not every school of Islamic thought would agree upon every step, but at least you get the idea of the thought process wherein you would be trying to come up with an answer to one of the many problems that pop up during your day to day life, which might be a business decision or whether one should cheat on their spouse or what one can eat or anything from the most profound to the most mundane.

So, when Muslims talk about implementing shariah what does that even mean?  In the dozens and dozens and dozens of countries wherein Muslims are in the majority there are only a couple wherein shariah is the law of the land.  In all the others there is also a generally secular and usually Western law code left over from the days of colonialism, so even if you're a Muslim living in a Muslim-majority country you're balancing out the laws of the states with the dictates of shariah. And, as we've discussed, Muslims are directed to, as much as they can, follow the laws of the state. It's also important to keep in mind that shariah applies to Muslims and not non-Muslims, so even if you're a Hindu or a Christian living in a Muslim-majority country shariah doesn't really apply to you (although the notion is that you'd at least try and show respect to the Muslims adhering to it). In the end you're not implementing shariah, because it already exists in your day to day life.

I had a feeling that this would turn into a lengthy post, and, of course, this is just scratching the surface of a remarkably complex concept, but I thought it was worth introducing (and I'll have more to say about it tomorrow using a case study). The last thing I'd like to add is that I'd argue that shariah is not really that odd of a concept, and that every person of faith, or probably even every atheist, has their own version of shariah that influences that decision making process. If you think of shariah as a thought process then I think my statement is irrefutable. If you're a devout Christian facing a similar set of problems in your day to day you probably would go through a different but in other ways similar parallel process. You might start off with the New Testament, and even draw a distinction between the synoptic gospels and the later letters of Paul, and then maybe cycle back to the Old Testament, and if you're Catholic you might then consider a Papal dictate or counsel decision, and the move on to more personal issues such as fairness. Or if you're a more secular Christian you might start with more personal beliefs or even the laws of the state, and maybe only then cycle back to holy scripture. And even if you're an atheist, you would still face similar decisions referencing scientists or philosophers or your own personal philosophy as you tried to make the call on what to do.

This brings me back to the initial distinction between "laws" and "path" as the best translation of the word shariah. If it's a path then I think we're all on our own path no matter our faith or lack of faith. If shariah, and by extraction Islam itself, is nothing more than a set of laws then our faith or more than a set of religious dogma than a true faith.

What It Means - Day 88

"Those who bear the Throne and those who dwell nigh unto it hymn the praise of their Lord and believe in Him and seek forgiveness for those who believe: 'Our Lord, Thou dost encompass all things in Mercy and Knowledge. Forgive those who repent and follow Thy way, and shield them from the punishment of Hellfire."
Quran 40:7

This ayah (the more appropriate term for a verse in the Quran, with ayat being the plural) is drawn from surah 40, sometimes rendered as "The Forgiver." I chose it today because it gets at one of the things that I find interesting, and with which I struggle: the balancing act between a powerful God and a merciful God. One of the complexities of monotheism is the similar balancing act between God the powerful judge and God the merciful forgiver. As I've often opined, this is why polytheism is actually much easier to wrap your head around than monotheism, and why the ancient Hebrews truly began a revolution, on many levels, all those centuries ago when they decided that there was actually only one God. The verse starts off with one of those painfully anthropomorphic descriptions of angels carrying a throne for God, which works metaphorically but shouldn't be taken literally (at least in Islam). No matter how you read it, metaphorically or literally, it speaks to power. Truthfully, that God doesn't interest me; we already devote way too much time in this world bowing to power, and it pains me to consider that we'd be devoting so much of that life adhering to rules so that we can do the same thing in the next world. With that in mind, the line that I'm drawn to is: "Our Lord, Thou does encompass all things in Mercy and Knowledge." As Nasr reminds us in the commentary, "Some understand the structure of this sentence to indicate that God's Mercy precedes or outstrips His Knowledge." (SQ p. 1140) We've discussed previously how sometimes, when discussing the creation of human beings, the passage is translated as God created humans to worship Him and sometimes it's translated as God created humans so that He can be known. Not surprisingly, the latter is what resonates with me. If God is ultimately Good, then He would create humans to share that Goodness, and I would think that Mercy would play a role in the same logic. We don't need more slavish devotion to power, in this world or the next, but admonitions to mercy seem like a requirement.

What It Means - Day 87

"And those who came after them say, 'Our Lord! Forgive us and our brothers who preceded us in faith, and place no rancor in our hearts toward those who believe. Our Lord! Truly Thou art Kind, Merciful.'"
Quran 59:10

Here's another brief verse from surah 59, often rendered as "The Gathering." On one level it is a call that all Muslims should respect and love other Muslims, no matter when they converted. Specifically it relates to those who accepted Islam in the very earliest days as compared to those who converted after the Prophet emigrated from Mecca to Medina as part of the Hejira. Here in Vermont the running joke is that unless you can trace your Vermont ancestry back at least seven generations then you're just a damn flat-lander. Inside of religions there can often be the same snobbery between those who grew up in the faith as compared to the more recent convert. Clearly, on the most basic level, this message is designed to avoid that level of religious division. On a broader sense, however, it's also another reminder of the connection between the Muslim and the Jews and Christians who made up the Peoples of the Book. As Nasr points out, ""But it can also be understood to impart an attitude that all Muslims should have toward one another. Those who came after them can be read as a reference to everyone who enters Islam until the Day of Resurrection, while our brothers who preceded us in faith can be read as a reference to the People of the Book, who preceded the Muslims in belief." (SQ, p. 1353) No matter the level that you read it, the passage emphasizes a universality, but also the importance of what you're doing now, the life you're leading, and not an ancestry which somehow is supposed to grant you a moral authority that you're not earning on a daily basis.

What It Means - Day 86

When I'm teaching Aesthetic Expressions and we're getting ready to discuss Muslim art I'll sometimes ask the students to get out a sheet of paper and draw God, or at least their perception of the divine. After giving them a minute or two I suddenly add, "Oh, and you can't draw a human form." This leads to a combination of confusion and grumbling, although only from the students who haven't done the reading for the day (usually ch. 7 from Gombrich's The Story of Art). I'm trying to get the students to understand a number of things, among them how unconsciously hard-wired they are to the Renaissance sense of beauty and that there are actually many different aesthetic criteria guidelines (essentially, that there are many different interpretations of beauty). I also want them to understand how art reflects culture and religion and ideology, and in turn emphasizes culture and religion and ideology. Similarly, I will sometimes show these two images side by side and state that they're actually the same image, and ask them to argue the point pro and con. Islam, like Judaism and unlike Christianity, has a rule against representing God in a human form. Obviously, this provides a set of challenges, to which artists inside of the Muslim world have answered in three classic ways: calligraphy of verses from the Quran (and which is so stylized that it is sometimes difficult to sort out), images drawn from nature, and repeating geometric patterns.  The first choice is obvious,  and I'll talk more about that later, and the second and third are equally logical once you free your mind of the traditional rules that we don't even know we follow. Think back to the student I instruct to draw God and then refuse to allow them to use a human form; almost inevitably they find themselves relying upon something from nature. And, seriously, what better selection? There's a reason why the Quran, again and again, when the point is being made of the self-evident existence of God, cites nature. The repeating geometric patterns is a lovely metaphor for the logic, complexity and eternity of God.

Now, as a grey-haired bearded dude I can see the obvious advantages of representing God as a grey-haired bearded dude as Michelangelo famously did in the Sistine Chapel, but there is a danger in that. As the old Daoist saying reminds us, once you define something as beautiful you create ugliness. In this sense, anything that is not a grey-haired bearded dude is "the other," and the very definition of less than divine.

Here is one little corner of a famous mosque in Iran (thank, ArtStor) and it shows the classic aspects of Muslim art: Quranic calligraphy, images from nature, and repeating geometric patterns. If you're on the outside looking in the admonition against representing God with the human form appears limiting, but in other ways it's remarkably freeing and inspires a universe of creativity.

What It Means - Day 85

"O you who believe! Reverence God and let every soul consider what it has sent forth for the morrow; and reverence God. Truly God is Aware of whatsoever you do."
Quran 59:13

Here is a passage I culled out of surah 59, sometimes referred to as "The Gathering." My fear is that the hearty souls who check in to suffer through my ill-formed blathering may be even more bored than usual because I'm almost magnetically drawn to the same sort of surah. Truthfully, I'm not trying to cherry-pick only passages that agree with my basic spiritual worldview, although I suppose each of us is perpetually guilty of that in one form or another. We see in the mainstream media, as some homes always have MSNBC on and others only FoxNews, but I think it's true in our sometimes too focused fascination with a particular type of surah or or Biblical book. As we know, I seem to be always drawn to passages which either speak to the universality of Islam and its relationship to other religions or what the faith means on a daily, real-world basis, or, as I think I would argue in this case, both. I do think there is an undeniable universality to this passage in that it would apply at all time to all faiths, mainly because it asks us, no matter our spiritual orientation, to consider what we've been told to do and what we're doing. Essentially, are we talking the talk and walking the walk, to put it more colloquially. As Nasr tells us, "Let every soul consider what it has sent forth for the morrow indicates that everyone should reflect upon the deeds and evaluation how they may fare on the Day of Judgment." This just screams Noble Eight-fold Path to me and a very human Buddhist path to Enlightenment. In the end God can send forth all the amazing messages imaginable, but if we don't consider every one of our actions in relation to them then the world is one big divine echo chamber. And it's not simply that God is Aware, but that we are aware.