Due to the press of business, posting here has been rather sparse for a while. In fact, traffic to this blog has always been minimal. I suppose that is the result when it isn't widely known, the topics are/have been rather esoteric, and the author is himself rather eccentric(?). But I find that processing through writing and editing helps to clarify my thoughts so if this is only helpful for me, so be it.
By way of renewal then, I have begun reading Thomas Merton's (another eccentric, not always understood or valued by the ecclesiastical establishment - I have always been drawn to such people, they are after my own heart) The Way of Chuang Tzu and shall offer commentary on both Merton's introduction as well as the poetry in the book (that he has translated from other translations). I offer here Merton's own justification for my interest in his work: "I simply like Chuang Tzu because he is what he is and I feel no need to justify this liking to myself or to anyone else. He is far too great to need any apologies from me. If St. Augustine could read Plotinus, if St. Thomas could read Aristotle and Averroes (both of them certainly a long way further from Christianity than Chuang Tzu ever was!), and if Teilhard de Chardin could make copious use of Marx and Engels in his synthesis, I think I may be pardoned for consorting with a Chinese recluse who shares the climate and peace of my own kind of solitude, and who is my own kind of person." (The Way..., pp. 10-11)
My next post will begin the dive into the Introduction. Stay tuned...
No comments:
Post a Comment