The words "belief" and "believing" are derived from their original form, "belove." This has implications for how we live, think, and talk about living.
It was not until the Age of Enlightenment in the seventeenth century, with the development of modern science, that "belove" gave way to its new and contemporary form. This shift, while leading to advances in science, has also resulted in a loss of sensibility to the subtler and immaterial aspects of living. We have gained much scientific knowledge, but we have also lost a certain depth in our understanding of life, a depth we can and must urgently restore by re-finding it.
In our contemporary context, "belief" or "believing" refers to the alignment or correspondence (or lack thereof) between our ideas and theories about the world and their factual truth (or lack thereof). For instance, we all believe in the force of gravity, and we experience its truth every time we lift something heavy. In contrast, many no longer believe in the religious doctrines they learned as children, nor do we think the moon is made of green cheese.
On the other hand, we all begin our lives with what the ancient Chinese philosopher Confucius considered a basis and starting point in trust and love. Even before a non-verbal newborn knows that there are such beings as parents who take care of him and that he is himself a separate being, the infant learns to trust that they are safe. That quickly leads to a felt sense of mutual love between parent and child. Confucius proposed that a sound society and a good life are made of the same stuff of which that original trust and love are made.
Such a society and a good life are essentially relational, with trust and love as the primary building material—whether in relations between siblings, friends, spouses, employers and employees, governors and the governed, etc. Many have criticized Confucius for allegedly laying the groundwork for a hierarchical society based on power relations. But that is a misinterpretation. It leaves out the active ingredient of trust and love with which we all begin life.
What Confucius taught is not just a Chinese idea for the Chinese people but a universal and timeless principle. It is the same idea inherent in the pre-Enlightenment words and notions of "belove" and "beloving." This trust and love principle is not bound by time or culture. It is relevant to all of us, regardless of our background. It is a principle that unites us all.
With the advent of modern science, our original capacity for loving based on trusting has eroded. Today, we are the poorer for it. If ordinary people are angrily demonstrating in the streets and actively breaking down their long-supported institutions, it is not only because the economy is unfair, the justice system is unjust, and many politicians are corrupt and sold out to their corporate sponsors. It is, before all these, because we have lost the culturally shared experience and practice of beloving based on trusting. This erosion of loving based on trust is a loss we all feel.
People today turn to such practices as meditation partly, if not primarily, because they want to re-find that largely lost beloving based on trusting. They begin in the right place for this: their innermost and directly felt experiences. Meditation is a deliberate practice of once again starting to trust what they know by directly and deeply feeling it in their very being. That leads to what Emerson considered genuine self-reliance, a beacon of hope in our quest to re-establish trust and love in our lives.
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