The Happiest Fish

‘You are looking for Jesus of Nazareth who was crucified. He has been raised; go tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you.’

That’s all very well for them, but how will we see him?

This is not the kind of seeing which sees words in the Bible.

It is the seeing of what they point to, a shared aliveness behind patterns in the cosmos. Seeing expressed in spiral galaxies above us when we walk on the beach, spiral shells on that same beach which we walk on, spiral fingerprints on our hands holding them, and spiral dna helix inside the flesh.

This is the kind of seeing the Eastern Church calls Gnosis.

It is self-knowledge, and there’s a wonderful Chinese story about it.

When Chuang Tzu and Hui Tzu were crossing Hao River by the dam, Chuang said: “See how free the fishes leap and dart. That is their happiness.”

As they walked Hui replied: “Since you are not a fish, how do you KNOW what makes fishes happy?”

Chuang said: “Since you are not I, how can you possibly KNOW that I do not know what makes fishes happy.”

Hui argued: “But if I, not being you, cannot know what you know, it follows that you, not being a fish, cannot know what THEY know.”

Chaung said: “OK, then let us get back to your original question. You asked me, HOW I know what makes fishes happy. From the terms of your question you know already THAT I know what makes fishes happy.”

“I know the joy of fishes in the river THROUGH MY OWN JOY, as I go walking along the same river.”

I know the joy of fishes in the river through my own joy.

This unity is the seeing of a shared aliveness, and is related to Christ’s risen life.

The Gospel of John starts: ‘In the beginning was the word,’ and it goes on, ‘the word became flesh and dwelt among us.’

John does not mean a literal word, he means what the word ‘word’ is pointing to.

The Greek for this word was Logos.

‘In the beginning was the Logos,’ he wrote, and he went on, ‘the Logos became flesh and dwelt among us.’

Logos is translated word in English, but it points to a shared aliveness.

Logos is the expression of unity behind nature’s patterns.

Coined by Greek philosopher Heraclitus six centuries before Jesus, it suggests the pattern, the first principle, the knowledge, the unity in the world hidden from our view and the key to self-knowledge.

It is shared aliveness balancing conflicting opposites.

The Eden myth tells us a truth - humans are intended for this pure awareness, with no mental distraction, an innocent union with God, a harmony with creation. We are intended to dwell in grace, the uncreated energy of God, and participate in divine life.

We are intended to possess God’s energy, but if we misuse our will and became separated and spiritually dead, our awareness becomes fragmented, we fall under the illusion of self-sufficiency, and we fear death.

Whereas in God we can act spontaneously, without striving and self-interest, in desiring created things instead, we are lost to shared aliveness and divine life.

When the New Testament is translated from it's original Greek into Chinese, the Logos is rendered as DAO. In the beginning was the Dao, it says, and it goes on to say, the Dao dwelt among us.

Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu was writing about Dao at about the same time Heraclitus was writing about Logos, six centuries before Jesus.

The Dao is the path of heaven, the uncreated cause, the way that creates and balances the strife of opposites by not contending. It is also a pattern of shared aliveness.

The Dao and the Logos are one symbol.

Chinese sage Lao Tzu taught his own Eden myth as a return to the way, when people were closer to heaven and nature, the golden age when man was in a pure state.

Immeasurable indeed were the ancients, he said, subtle, unfathomable and penetrating, in pristeen simplicity like an un-carved block. Rising above compulsive thinking and desire for created things, the sage has no fixed will. The man of the highest virtue is like water, wrote Lao Tzu.

In intuitive perception, he meant, you use your uncreated light to return to unified consciousness, a shared aliveness.

We human beings can know this through intuition, but it was revealed to us humans in the flesh, and dwelt among us, through Jesus.

St John had known Jesus on earth and lain on Jesus’ breast. So his gospel represented the highest grace and truth a person could know through the flesh.

Today we share Jesus’ risen life when we cultivate his grace in our own person, and it becomes real. One might say when we walk on living water. Seeing the risen Jesus means returning to this experience Jesus once returned to us. This shared aliveness.

Shared aliveness is a knowing prior to all things, like the Dao, just as the Logos is in the beginning, the first cause. Because God is not a thing.

Nor is God is someone else, if we experience a return to selfless attention and shared aliveness.

Touching God wherever we touch reality, we are Jesus’ risen life.

We go behind thoughts.

We live what the words point to, the aliveness we all share, whether we like sharing it or not. It is a fact we share it.

Jesus says Love your neighbour as Being yourself.

This is our existential ‘yes’ to belonging to God. Our most exhilarating knowing comes not from thinking, but from the awareness of shared aliveness.

In this we are not separate, we are the risen One.

Not I, but Christ in me.