Killing The Buddha

  
What does it mean to burn a book? Not just any book. The Book, the Good Book: the Hebrew Scriptures and New Testament, otherwise known to Christians as The Bible. Political or religious protests are typically done in public. But if it is a private affair, of a more sacrificial nature, can this sacred text be put to the flame without guaranteeing the eternal damnation of a human participant?

The pages curl back one to another, returning to the nothingness from which they came. The wind and flames unveil written language for what it really is: words, symbols only. But history and tradition are not obliterated, nor abandoned. In the act of destruction, their significance is heightened, transcended even.

The interplay of this extraordinary text and an ordinary act offers a simple comprehensible beauty, and becomes a metaphor of release from the double bind that is living in an increasingly litigious and spiritually bankrupt society.

 Though a fraction of its former self, nothing is gained, nothing lost. The book is bound with steel wire, acknowledging and reaffirming its significance. Sacred yes, but an oftentimes idolatrous object nonetheless. Wax is applied to make this reality more palatable.

  

With the hope of restoring its humility and approachability, water serves to further degrade the piece.

Rust hastens the approach.

"If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him." ~ Zen Saying

In other words.. when an aspirant of Truth becomes bound by the very zeal which drives their thirst for spiritual freedom, they remain ignorant and attached to religious fetishism.

Stone Binding

(Preliminary Studies)

What does it mean to bind stones? A stone being a solid material object, retains the history and evidence of time. To accentuate a stone's form is to reject an otherwise shortsighted dismissal of its physical being and account for the effects of time. To bind a stone is to elevate its inherent essence and to acknowledge its being as something more than an otherwise dumb and inanimate thing to be discarded. To bind a stone is to appreciate it, spend time with it, communicate with it. It is nothing less than becoming one with the stone through the deliberate concentration of awareness and attention.

(Cuyahoga Valley National Park)

To go out in search of stones to bind in their natural environment adds another deeper layer of realization in this understanding.

To go out into the stones' natural environment is to account for the environment. Full of intent, this may not be initially evident. After exhausting all efforts to find a suitable location, spending an afternoon with stones minimizes imposition and gives way to further observation and attentiveness. This overwhelming sensation of mindfulness is possible through the absence of self. There is only the stones in their environment.

The environment becomes an active participant, interacting with me as much as I do with it.

This interaction allows for my efforts to be made celebratory.

The stones are suspended above their source, destined to soon return to the water.

The light begins to fade and I walk away, denying myself the sight or sound of their final offering.