The Grammatical Creed

"I do not accept creeds. Truth remains truth. It is the colored lenses of the self that reflect it in various colors."--Guru Nanak

According to a hagiography that I once received from the Sikhs, who trace their origin, or at least inspiration, to a 14th Century holy man named Guru Nanak, the above statement was his response when he traveled to Mecca where he was invited by Muslim clerics to declare himself as a Muslim, on account of their shared monotheistic beliefs. His refusal of creeds has always rung true with me.

Christians, who equate "faith" with "belief" and seldom pause to question this identification, generally are required, at the beginning of every service, to recite some form of the Apostles' Creed, the profession of faith first agreed upon by the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD, convened by the Emperor Constantine to resolve the often vicious ideological disputes among various Christian factions, and thereby establish a mandatory ideology for what soon became the state religion of the Roman empire. The original Nicene Creed was later abbreviated as the Apostles' Creed, which lays out the accepted narrative of Christian beliefs. Here is the version from the Anglican Book of Common Prayer:

I believe in God the Father Almighty,

Maker of heaven and earth:

And in Jesus Christ his only begotten Son our Lord,

Who was conceived by the Holy Ghost,

Born of the Virgin Mary,

Suffered under Pontius Pilate,

Was crucified, dead, and buried:

He descended into hell;

The third day he rose again from the dead;

He ascended into heaven,

And sitteth on the right hand of God the Father Almighty;

From thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Ghost;

The holy Catholic Church;

The Communion of Saints;

The Forgiveness of sins;

The Resurrection of the body,

And the Life everlasting.

Amen.

But why should I--or anyone else, for that matter--believe any of this? Even in this stripped down form, the Creed is full of question-begging claims that make no rational sense.

For example, what do they mean by "only begotten son"--or as the original Nicene Creed insists, "Begotten, not made"? But what living being, from bacteria right up to us, is "made" rather than "begotten"? None that I know. Are we not all "sons (or daughters) of God," since God made both Heaven and Earth, and is our "Father"?

Why must I believe that when Jesus died, he went downstairs to Hell (presumably to release those inmates who happened to be Hebrews with the right belief system but who had the misfortune to have been born and died before he lived) then came back to life, only to "ascend into Heaven"--like what, a rocket? A balloon?  And where is "Heaven" anyway?  Why should any rational person "believe" this mythology?

Other questions are equally baffling and equally silly.  "Sitting on the Right Hand of the Father"--like Charley McCarthy?  And what is meant by "the resurrection of the body" since simple common sense observations tell us that bodies rot and deteriorate and are eventually absorbed into their physical and biological matrix. Where would this "resurrected body" come from, anyway?

But enough said. This creed, repeated mindlessly in various forms by Christians worldwide, is arrant nonsense, which no one with a functioning brain should take seriously. It has no ethical teachings whatsoever; it completely ignores the core teachings of Jesus, acknowledging only that he was born "of a virgin" and died "under Pontius Pilate." The first is mythology; the latter, history, as far as we know.

Buddhism, fortunately, has no creeds whatsoever. Instead, practicing Buddhists often recite the "Three Jewels"--taking refuge in the Buddha, the Dharma, and the Sangha--but even these are broad concepts, subject to multiple interpretations, and there is no requirement to "believe" in them--in fact, the Buddha's last injunction to his disciples was to "be a light unto yourself"--or as Bob Dylan might have put it, "don't follow leaders; watch parking meters."

So just for the fun of it, I've come up with my own Creed, which I call the Grammatical Creed. Here it is:

I am.

Thou art.

He, She, or It is.

We are.

You are.

They are.

Simple, eh? Here is how one might unpack it.

"I am."  This was not only God's response to Moses from the Burning Bush in Exodus. It is also the core of mystery for all of us--our own subjectivity--the fact that there seems to be somebody home, behind my eyes, looking out on the world. Buddhist doctrine ultimately denies the existence of the separate self, but this perspective, even if it is delusional, makes sense to our experience inside this body.

"Thou art."  I deliberately use the archaic Second Person Singular, because of the equally amazing fact that when two people look at each other or talk to each other, they reciprocally acknowledge each other's existence and personhood, as well as their own, yet nobody else knows anything at all about this interaction. Inherent in this is the mystery of communication, of empathy, of compassion.

"He, She, or It is." From my direct experience of "I" and my reciprocal experience of "thou" I can therefore deduce that every living being out there likewise has its own subjectivity. The love we develop for each other can therefore, with some effort, be extended to all other beings--whose existence is no less important to them than ours is to us.  But what about "it," you ask. Does a rock, a river, or a mountain, a lump of coal, or a star have any subjectivity? Maybe, maybe not. But they have properties, which we are bound to respect, for if we do not consider the consequences of our decisions about the material world, we pay for it. When we pump out or dig up and burn fossil fuels, we heat our atmosphere and could destroy ourselves, along with all other complex multicellular life, in which case we will have to get used to being bacteria again… So if compassion comes from acknowledging Thee, Him, and Her, as we acknowledge Me, wisdom comes from taking care of It. Hence the wonderful injunction of Lao Tzu: "Take care of everyone, and abandon no one. Take care of everything, and abandon nothing."

"We are." Now comes the important part. These also happen to be the first two words of Martin Luther King's magnificent summary of the Dharma as a guiding principle: "We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly."  In other words, we all reciprocally depend on each other, both locally and globally, both human and nonhuman.

"You are."  Equally important, any community, which is often in competition with rival communities for resources or otherwise, must ultimately recognize that the "other's" collective claim to identity, value, and respect is as valid as our own. Herein lies an end to all forms of prejudice and bigotry, whether religious, ethnic, nationalistic, or cultural…for communication, respect, and diplomacy are essential to a peaceful and prosperous community, nation, and planet.

"They are." This statement encodes the essential lesson of the Parable of the Good Samaritan: that even those we scorn as "other"--those against whom we define ourselves, the ones we don't talk to, the ones we love to scorn, are still part of the "inescapable network of mutuality" on which we all depend. And for me, that even includes pathological racists, right wing Republicans, born-again Christian ideologues, Muslim fanatics, Jewish hyper-Zionists, Rush Limbaugh-loving rednecks in Hummers with gun racks, and so forth. As Jesus said, "Love your enemies; bless them that curse you…"  This is, of course, the most difficult injunction of all to practice, but it is essential nevertheless. For if our circle of compassion leaves anyone or anything out, it is of no value at all.

It may seem strange that after ridiculing Christian articles of faith, I should end by quoting Jesus. But my disdain for mindless ideological rigidity is entirely consistent with my lifelong reverence for Jesus--not as the "Only Begotten Son of God" (whatever THAT means) but as a Buddha, a fully awakened being, who in that respect could be called an avatar of God, just like Krishna or the Buddha.