I was going to tell you about something
that happened this afternoon, but unfortunately although this was this
afternoon two weeks ago I haven’t got round to doing anything about it until
now.
So.
I was going to pretend that it had happened
on the day I wrote it. No one would be any the wiser (especially as it relates
to rain, which in 2012 seems to be happening most of the time).
But then it occurred to me that another
principle that needs to run through this blog is one of honesty. Honesty with
regard to what I believe, what I think, and how I behave, but also with regard
to simple facts.
Actually, I think it’s impossible to be
completely honest. Any human attempt at communication cannot avoid some
distortion of the truth: it’s impossible to avoid putting some spin on what is
said/written/expressed.
If you don’t believe me, try it (and be
honest with yourself (insofar as that is possible…). Review the last thing you
said. Even the most trivial.
‘The bathroom’s free’. OK, the core factual
statement is true (unless you’re particularly perverse). But how do you say it?
Do you put an explanation mark at the end, to try and show a friendly
demeanour? Fair enough. But note the words ‘try’ and ‘show’. In a tiny way,
you’re playing a part, attempting to project a facsimile of how you feel
towards them. And it may be a very tiny way indeed. But it’s still there. Even
the most spontaneous communication must involve some element of choice, of
consideration. Without that it’s just a response, a reflex.
I said ‘human’ communication before: is
that one reason why some of us like dogs? That their communications with us
(appear) unconsidered? Is this true for all animals? Is part of what makes us
human the inability to be completely truthful (‘I lie, therefore I am human’)?
Or, to put it another way, is it inherent in language that truth cannot be
communicated without some untruth as well?
There is here, perhaps, a parallel with the
Sufi understanding of ‘veils’*. Put simply, this considers that all created
things are veils that hide the Divine, but that, because all things are from
the Divine, they also show what it is like: they simultaneously obscure and
reveal. Maybe, for us, our language consists of the veils we wrap around
ourselves, both revealing and obscuring our identity: crucially, even the way
our communications distort the message tells the hearer a lot about us.
Of course, the kind of dishonesty I’m
talking about here isn’t blameworthy. It’s unavoidable. For us (presumably not
God) there is a spectrum, with necessary distortion at one end and blatant lies
at the other.
Anyway…
I need to aim to remove unnecessary
dishonesty from what I say, leaving behind only that which tells you more about
me than what I’m actually trying to say does.
I’ll talk about what I meant to talk about
when I started in my next post…
*See, for example, ‘Sufism: A Short
Introduction’, W C Chittick, Oneworld, ISBN 1-85168-211-2
