Comment on Morning March 13, 2008

I wrote that to love God is to have direction in one's life. Of course, I have been assailed by certain unnamed persons who said that this is the same old holy moly talk they've heard all their lives. Considering that they refer to such statements as "holy moly", one must conlcude that having heard it all one's life does precious little by way of assisting them to the Holy. O.K. I never wanted to prattle on unclearly about such things. Too many people already do so. There is no need of another person to whisper sweet nothings about God into peoples' ears. To love God is extremely analogous to learning a new language. My study of Arabic has reached a point where I do not have to "think", "reason", nor "run down a list" of words and meanings. I can say little things. This morning as I was showering, I looked at the water on the glass door. I thought : 'Ara ma'an 'ala zujaj il babi or I see water on the door's glass. Since it was a glass door, I continued on to: 'Ara ma'an 'ala zujaj al babi min zujajin or I seee water on the glass door's glass. At this point I just rubbed my fingers along the steamy wetness, having reached a point which is O.K. for learning language, but does not make a lot of sense otherwise. Just as one can speak without going through the syntax, grammar, and vocabulary of a language, so also can one live a moral life without going through the syntax of ethics, the grammar of morality, and the vocabulary of the Good. When it has become second nature so that you are not even aware that you are being good, that is when one loves God. If one is aware that one loves God and is good and they judge that there is a great difference between themselves and others who are not so, then that person is at the very first stages of learning to talk to God. In speaking of language, we would say they have just said their very first word. All the books on ethics and morality are primers for people who not only cannot speak, but they are almost mute. Morality is the soul speaking with God, in God's language, and speaking without intermediaries and translators and how-to books. Most of us are at the point where we know what is good and we see it in ourselves and see the opposite in others. Thus, we make everlasting judgements. Or so we think. These judgements are rather like confetti in the sight of God. And the wind blows them quite all away. To be good with God is just to be...good. Nothing else. You know what's good, you know to visit the sick, you do so, then you take off and do something else. You do not think of how good you are nor how bad somebody else is who is not visiting the sick. To do so would be like me trying to speak Arabic while thinking in English, "Wow! I'm really good and loquax at this stuff.". It doesn't work too well. Nor does the self-righteousness work. Our society is rife with self-righteousness. It is the not-too-secret sickness which renders us impotent. It is hard to learn a new language. It is hard to love God, for we do not wish to take the time. We believe that we do not need to. We are already the blessed.