An Essay On Contemplation
by Bryce Flaskas
Photo taken by Bryce Flaskas - Hobart, Tasmania. 2022.
“More often than not, the way of contemplation is not even a way, and if one follows it what he finds is nothing” - Thomas Merton, The Inner Experience (p. 2)
“Consequently another Law of contemplation is that if you enter it with the set purpose of “seeking contemplation” or worse still, happiness, you will find neither” - Thomas Merton, The Inner Experience (p. 21)
Thomas Merton, Christian mystic, writer and contemporary philosopher discloses through the epigraphs above, how I’ve chosen to reinterpret and phrase the term “contemplation” in relation to the ideas presented in this essay. Contemplation, as Merton sees it, is not an active verb, or used to seperate the seeker from the experience, but instead a field of awareness. Once chosen to engage with this field of awareness, the contemplative touches and communes with the ‘force of the real’ as Merton describes it. An unfolding depth of natural phenomena, inseparable from our lived experience. While this may not make much sense when viewing it from a linear perspective that is because this mode of inquiry is non-linear and requires a deeper commitment and sensitivity to arise through the individual.
Through referencing various contemplative authors and practitioners, this essay will re contextualise contemplation in terms of engaging with our immediate lived experience as well as giving a broader monastic view of contemplation as a spiritual art-form. What is the purpose of contemplation? How do we perceive form? And what is truth vs permanence?, these are the questions that will provide our body of conversation for the topic of contemplation.
What is the purpose of Contemplation?
The word Contemplation suggests a leisurely speculation, still-remembrance and restful embrace. All these elements may be true of contemplation but still don’t touch on its deeper experiential value. In ancient Greek tradition Contemplation arose as an aristocratic and intellectual pursuit, given the immediate classist values attached to the word this view is still largely entertained today. But Contemplation has also been interpreted as a means of devotion, or communion with a creational ideology for the religious/spiritual seeker. In Plotinus’s view a critical spiritual component for reaching the mystical state of ‘henosis’ (union and oneness with the ‘fundamental reality’ as outlined in the philosophy of Plotinus). Plotinus describes this experience in his works the Enneads;
“When you find yourself wholly true to your essential nature, wholly that only veritable Light which is not measured by space, not narrowed to any circumscribed form nor again diffused as a thing void of term, but ever unmeasurable as something greater than all measure and more than all quantity- when you perceive that you have grown to this, you have now become every vision” - Plotinus, Enneads, 6:92
To arrive at this revelation is incidental to the practice of contemplation, ‘henosis’ accompanies devotion and is not expected or necessary of the Contemplative (as we spoke of before) to arrive here. The practice of contemplation is purely centred within an individuals present experience and to grasp visions of what we believe ‘henosis’ to be, is counter intuitive to the ethic of pure devotion. What Plotinus describes here though is by no means foreign to any one persons experience or exclusive to the practice of Contemplation itself. Being universally applicable we can see similar experiences echoed through many other cultures such as the concept of ‘theosis’ taught by the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Byzantine Catholic Churches. As a process of
transformation, ‘theosis’ is brought about by natural contemplation (theoria physike) or contemplation of God (theologia, to have the “Vision of God”).
Therefore the purpose of contemplation is alterable depending on ones beliefs. Awareness naturally lends itself to the conscious nature of being human and is thus in the grip of our infinitely creative being. The means in which we discover this “Vision of God” is hardly important as long as our intentions are pure. But “What is Contemplation really?”. The worthiest answer is found through a process of negation;
What is most important is unrefined sight,
What is not important is definition,
Not just through the eyes, ears, mouth, nose and touch,
But as well as through an all knowing sixth-sensibility,
Not pleasure, enjoyment or happiness,
But a transcendent experience of reality,
Not gratification, indulgence and rest,
But awareness, life, creativity and freedom,
Not generalised or abstract,
But existential, real and graspable,
Not a sluggish, hollow, restful-contentment,
But a flash of lightning piercing the darkness.
How do we perceive form?
Contemplation can act as a useful perceptual vantage point for experiencing the world. It helps us pierce straight into the nature of things and at the same time, our own nature. The word “nature” here refers to the origin but also the object of the world. Contemplation is the observance of the divine in nature, and to do so would be to bridge ‘heaven and earth’.
Throughout the world we find the high and low, the spiritual and gross, the beautiful and obscene, it is the contemplatives mission to see beyond, beneath and above. This does not mean that we pacify ourselves and prove indifferent to the world, but instead re-engage with the forms and faculties that comprise the lived experience. Each and every one of us engage with the world in a wholly unique way, a child for example upon seeing a tree for the first time would see without societal or professional preconception but wonder and beauty. Comparatively a lumberjack may also look at a tree and although an underlying essence of beauty may remain he would also perceive the tree from the vantage point of his profession. Probably wondering how much he could make from each cutting, where to make cuts, how to cut it etc. This type of conditional comprehension of our surroundings is what the contemplative life renounces. Why? Because, like the lumberjack we are withheld from the foundational beauty of the world and seek comfort within conditional living, temporal finalities, the manipulation and possession of objects, dependant routines, conventional observances, variable attitudes and complacent postures.
Thomas Merton recounts in a journal entry dated November 19, 1968 from his Asian Travel Journal, looking at the Himalayan peak Mount Kanchenjunga in northern India, he felt frustrated that he would not be able to view the Tibetan side of the mountain due to political restrictions. That night he recalls the following dream;
“I was looking at the mountain and it was pure white, absolutely pure, especially the peaks that lie to the west. And I saw the pure beauty of their shape and outline all in white. And I heard a voice saying - or got the clear idea of: “There is another side to the mountain”. I realised that it was turned around and everything was lined up differently; I was seeing from the Tibetan side. …There is another side of Kanchenjunga and of every mountain - the side that has never been photographed and turned into postcards. That is the only side worth seeing.” - Thomas Merton, The Other Side of the Mountain : The End of the Journey, the Journals of Thomas Merton, Volume Seven: 1967-1968 (Asian p.152-53).3
Merton’s point is that if we can only see the near side of an object, how are we supposed to reconcile the object in its totality. Like Merton’s visionary unfolding about the mountain, the contemplative may similarly witness universal truths that were previously hidden from sight. But what is hidden from sight does not mean it is not there, we just don’t have the means to see it yet. Our minds naturally jump to such conclusions, if there isn’t immediate proof of the matter we label the situation as something “unproven” and tiptoe around the mountain, treading with wariness. This is simply our primitive mind in play, protecting us from the perils and dangers that await us on the other side. Contemplation, on this note, is not something merely intellectual or discursive. It involves ones whole being, body, spirit, mind, will, imagination, emotion and soul. Therefore transcending the way we traditionally orientate and perceive form.
What is Truth vs Permanence?
Permanence and truth are polarised concepts that help us further outline the contemplative experience. Contemplation can be understood from two vantage points, neither superior or inferior, one to the other. But within each other. Permanence may be seen as exterior, while truth an interior way of viewing. Why is it important to include these two terms in a contemplative essay? Because to me.. they are guides, revealing the impetus that underlies the motives, actions, postures and vantages of the contemplative seeker.
Permanence is a product of the intellect.
Permanence is a virtue of the body.
… is acquainted with time.
… stays in one place.
… is subject to interference.
Permanence and place are inseparable and therefore one and the same.
… is an idea.
… is an act of violence.
… never becomes.
… only is.
… is to be made visible.
… is impatient.
… is not permanent.
… lives adjacent to consciousness.
Permanence is an undeveloped virtue of God. To say God has willed himself to be permanent would be to make a distinction between superficiality and the eternal counterpart. To be permanent one must will himself or another to be so, God does not wish to be permanent. That is why you never see God. Because he is not a construct of the intellect. Permanence is the idea that we can make ourselves immortal. Permanence distributes love based on the perishable value of an object. Permanence only knows the perishable.
Truth however, is a ground.
Truth is not multiple.
… does not discriminate.
… does not praise.
… does not change.
… does not promise immortality.
… is not abstract or obscure.
… is not a concept.
… is immediately recognisable.
Truth has become.
… is a thornless rose.
… is not blue like the sky.
Nor black as the night.
My dreams do not come true.
My desires do not come true either.
Truth disproves permanence.
Truth, unlike permanence, just is, and does not need to prove or improve its position or posture. Permanence is a prop we use to feed false notions and desires. Something that is permanent, we immediately believe stays in one place, we can invest ourselves in its complexity and beauty, we can contemplate its existence and be on “good terms” with it. But upon contemplation, we observe its complexion fade, it has become less desirous to us now. This is when the prop is suddenly pulled from underneath us and we find ourselves on the ground. So let’s not merely observe the world lets contemplate it, purely intellectualising and analysing the superficial is superficial in itself and can only lead to superficial results.
To Conclude - Contemplation and Work, Where Do They Intersect?
To simplify what is typically thought of as the creative process in the arts, there is an original thought or intention, preceding a series of corresponding thoughts that gather to form an elaborate and seemingly solid ideological structure. What follows is a relationship between physical labour and internal exposition of the original idea to materialise the artwork. In my work I like to discusses process and invite the “other” into the process as well. Although, just as much as my work discusses process, it also discusses freedom. Contemplation and work can be likened to these terms. One denotes a state of “am”-ness and full dynamic range of expression, while the other a state of “becoming”, or cyclical motion. I like contradictions, and in this way the viewer can grasp the paradox of secularity and spirituality. Contemplation, as spiritually prettified as it may seem is first and foremost the observation of the secular. Because when we have completely transcended secularity, we are no longer contemplating. We are completely absorbed within an awareness beyond the act of becoming. Therefore Contemplation is a process. It is by no means the Monastery, but is the path to the monastery, and a symbol of freedom within our lived experience.
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