The sovereignty of Good
I am sitting on my train to work, reading Iris Murdoch's book "The sovereignty of Good". A young lady comes standing next to me, holding her coffee cup just above the book I took from the library.
I feel a bit tense now, and I realize it's not much about the fact that I don't want the book to be stained. It is about the care I feel Iris' words deserve, against the frivolity of coffees. I find myself moving away the book a little bit. Her writing is so valuable; the price written in the back cover is only a silly symbol, a joke actually. What a strange thing to hide a diamond within a common object, behind a little price. A coffee can be drunk, consumed, gone, replaced everyday with a new one. While we might need to come back to Iris's words a few times to fully grasp them, her reasoning is one of a kind, and leaves a mark. She's the one leaving a stain after all, if you let her.
I am surprised to find out that Iris is "someone who gets what I mean" (it would be more correct to say, I get her or so I believe...) especially on regards to art, and a self less art as I have come to intend it after years of inner struggle about my own position (criticism?) towards current photography, photographer's personalities, the media-induced styles and all the same fashion-induced topics (if not propaganda).
She has inadvertently held a mirror on the importance I give to morality behind all that. I refused to call that inclination of mine in that way as I perceived a negative connotation on the word morality, as a form of external rules, not integrated, often used by people for judging. That's it. Actually Morality when integrated and genuine, coming from experience, (from meeting the karma's consequences for example) is discernment and care for impacts. That's why integrity has functioned a less charged word for me, and still, by becoming easy for me is dismissing some importance. We need confidently affirm the importance of morality in this world, especially now. Not as a empty conduct of good actions, but as a widen look to our own motives and responsability of choices...as a way to care.
The Via negativa (not doing the evil) is a necessary starting point, but not the end of a moral choice. Morality is not passivity, quite the opposite. It's making good use of our life time.
The Via positiva (for me) is to dig enough deep, "to come out to the other side" where all is integrated and peace is found. For example only naming the needs behind my feelings, validating them, has allowed me to soften the impact of some experiences. To find out what matters and why. Embodying a new compassion towards the self when it's less than perfect, and understanding Karma (this concept probably deserves a post on itself) has allowed me to fully know that God/Good is always operating beyond all, and we may just not see it because of our preferences, filters, obscurities.
For now, for the sake of my notes, here a passage on art by Iris Murdoch.
Luke 11:37-41
37 When Jesus had finished speaking, a Pharisee invited him to eat with him; so he went in and reclined at the table. 38 But the Pharisee was surprised when he noticed that Jesus did not first wash before the meal.
39 Then the Lord said to him, “Now then, you Pharisees clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside you are full of greed and wickedness. 40 You foolish people! Did not the one who made the outside make the inside also? 41 But now as for what is inside you—be generous to the poor, and everything will be clean for you.
