Richard Rohr's Daily Meditation

Yes, And

The Questio

Tuesday, January 7, 2014

What the Sic et Non/Yes, And approach allows you to do, quite frankly, is to be non-reactionary and non-rebellious. You do not need to prove that your statement is the last and final statement, which is what the ego always wants to do. Rather, you just ask others to consider it. Abélard and Lombard laid the foundations for what we call Scholastic philosophy. [1]

When Scholastic philosophy was at its best (in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries), the development of an idea proceeded by what the great teachers called the questio (Latin, “to seek”). Our English word “quest” may come from that understanding. The systematic asking of questions opened up wonder and encouraged spiritual curiosity by drawing out pros and cons for answers to the question, thus refining the question itself instead of just looking for the perfect answer.

Unfortunately, in later centuries this practice degenerated to needing answers, and preferably certain answers. We moved from wondering to answering, which has not served us well at all. This need to be right reached its nadir in what we today call fundamentalism, common in almost all religions, and in most political discourse today. [2]

[1] Adapted from Sic et Non; Yes, And webcast recording (MP3 download)

[2] Adapted from The Naked Now: Learning to See as the Mystics See, pp. 46-47

Gateway to Silence:
Yes . . . and . . .

 
 

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