Father and Son in two religions

"The lost son" by Rembrandt

Yoroboshi and his father (courtesy to Tadayuki Naitoh　http://www.p-om.net)

A photoblog posting by a lady who lives in Japan and calls herself “Japanalia” placed a fascinating father-son story on her blog. It made me think of another ancient story about the father-son relationship, found in the Bible, namely the Parable of the Lost Son (Luke 15, 10-32). Japanalia explains the story as follows:

YOROBOSHI, the Noh play, is the story of a boy, falsely accused of a crime, and therefore driven out of the house by his father. The boy wanders around for a long time and endures a lot of sufferings which lead him to blindness. Finally he reaches the Tennoji Temple in Osaka, where he settles begging for alms. Meanwhile his father finds out the accusations have been false and goes in search of his son. He, too, reaches the same temple where he is reunited with his son and at the end of the play they go back home together.

YOROBOSHI - the Noh mask - has many versions, but all have closed eyelids, starggly hair over the brow and a suffering expression.The mask is meant to show that the boy's blindness brought him closer in spirit to the beauty of the plum blossoms, causing him to appreciate the flowers through their fragrance. Although he is now blind, he has become one with the universe and can see all that surrounds him

YOROBOSHI is rendered in English as "priest with faltering step" OR "the beggar monk".

The story in Luke 15, 10-32, runs as follows: A father had two sons. One of them asked his part of the inheritance, got it, and “took his journey into a far country, and there he wasted his substance with riotous living”. He wasted that much, that he soon was urged to take a job as a pig guardian, rewarding that less that he was urged to eat from the pig food. Then he regretted his departure and wasteful behaviour and returned home. He bowed his head before his father and asked him to make him a servant because he felt no longer worth being his son. But his father “fell on his neck, and kissed him”, and he ordered new clothes and also to slaughter the fatted calf, and that evening there was a feast at the occasion of the return of the son. The older son, who had remained with his father, got jealous and found it unjust: he argued that he had been loyal and served the family all that time, while his brother had left to waste his share, and had been of no use to the family during the time, and now he was honoured with a welcome party? But his father corrected him, saying that a loss had been restored, and now he had two sons instead of one, reason to rejoice.

If we compare the two stories there are differences and similarities. The most striking difference is that in the Japanese story the father is the “accused” party, having mistakenly repelled his son and sent him away. In the Bible story the son is the accused party. A second difference is, that the Japanese “victim party” (the son) full into deep misery but through this misery he got a rich reward which he would have missed if he hadn’t been sent away and suffered so much. In the Bible story the victim party is also struck with misery (losing a son) but the core of the story is the misery of the son, the accused party. In both stories the son is the leading part of the play. In the Japanese story the son is compensated for his misery by deep insight and active participation in the universe, a spiritual reward. In the Bible story the son is compensated by his father’s forgiving and full acceptance as a son again. In the Japanese story the son forgives his father (the other way around) who also enjoys the taste of being forgiven and accepted by his son.

In the Japanese story the sufferer wasn’t responsible for his misery: it simply occurred to him. That’s why is not the accused party. In the Bible story the sufferer made the (stupid) choice by himself and suffered the consequences of his own decision. Nevertheless, he was forgiven.

That brings us to another very important difference between the two stories: in the Japanese story both father and son are earthly creatures, men like you and me. In the Bible story the father is portrayed as an earthly creature, but is compared to the “heavenly father” namely God. Inn the Japanese story God is represented as the “God of Nature”, coming closer to it means (in Western terms) coming closer to God.

Both stories end in an act of forgiving. Both stories deal with a very important and intimate social relationship: father and son. Both stories tell us that no matter how big our misery is, there’s always a Good that protects us from evil as long as we have faith. The Good makes the Japanese blind son sensible for sacrosanct things he would have ignored if he would have kept his sight. The example of the father and son relationship in both parables is very well chosen because a good father ignores the failures and fallacies of his son if the son returns and acknowledges him as a father. In the Japanese story the Good made the father search for his son, and makes any arguing by the son redundant because of the great wisdom and insights the son has acquired.

The stories teach us that religions may differ in external symbols, stories and parables, but that they agree in their sense of the Good. It ‘s such a pity that so many people don’t see that, and argue about how to interpret symbols and usages that people use to get hold, to understand or to recognize the Good. English is a lucky language because Good differs only one letter with God, and devil differs only one letter with evil. This sense of good and bad is not innate in men but grows with education and guidance. That’s why holy books of revelation or old epic stories such as Baghavad Gita are necessary, to guide the educators. But alas! When people say that only their own story is the true story, that only they know what God wants from us and it’s only “their” God who is the only true God. I am convinced that Jesus Christ used the “Father” metaphor just because only a father, as the then ruling family head, was gifted with an almost innate feature towards his children: he would always forgive them, no matter their deeds and actions, if they only would return to him. But it was men who made this Father a Man on a throne in the clouds. That’s OK as long we see it as a metaphor. Symbols often bear more of Truth than the concepts or meanings to which they refer, because we men are very limited in our sight. Let’s become like the Japanese son and acknowledge our limitations so that we can take part in the Good.

Overwhelmed by feelings: good or bad?

This fire has been "good": it resulted via a rational process in a delicious loaf. Fire can also be "bad", and used via a rational process in destruction and misery.

Well we have been talking about thinking, haven’t we?

Yes, and we found out that thinking is very important: it leads our activities, or better: it’s supposed to lead our activities, and it’s sometimes disturbed by emotions. Thinking comes up, just like emotions arise. The trouble starts when our emotions instead of thoughts are going to lead our activities . These emotions must do so via thinking again, but not the thinking is the originator of the activity, but the emotion.

Can you give an example?

Before I do this, first this: I assume that every adequately, harmoniously raised and educated adult will know the distinction between good and evil, so to speak. (I assume also that they exist, on which not everybody agrees, especially not many psychiatrists). Books are written about this distinction by great philosophers and scholars, e.g. Immanuel Kant or C.G. Jung, but our thinking alone isn’t able to make that distinction totally. It’s kind of feeling in our minds. A feeling for ethical thinking and behaviour. It’s like Goethe says: “A good man, in his dark urges, is well aware of the right path”. It has also to do with evolution.

Evolution theory? How come?

Let’s first give an example, or rather two, of thinking being led by emotions, by sheer feelings. Because, as we just concluded, a good man is aware of good and evil in his heart, emotions can be good or bad, arising from the heart, the emotional part of the mind. Adolf Hitler let his thinking being led by his feelings of hatred and superiority. Which, in fact appeared to be feelings of inferiority, and he had to compensate this by thinking how, after all, the whole thinking world was wrong and how he, the great leader and artist, would change the world by brutal violence. How good emotions can lead thinking is another story, these people are often led by feelings of love and willingness to help. This can make them sometimes naïve, seeing no danger from powers around, or make them heroes. The “problem” of Mother Theresa was that she didn’t take care of herself, and used all her intelligence to organize things for the better of those she helped. The emotion-directed thinking is mostly troubled, blurred and less affected by logical insight, no matter if the emotions are “good” or “bad”. Only when it comes to elaboration of instrumental knowledge such as planning, organizing, engineering, then the thinking of emotion-led people becomes very clear again.

What about terrorists?

These people are also led by bad feelings, but they don’t recognize them as bad, because they are not “good men” as I explained. They are often extremely intelligent and use their brains for intensive thinking, but their thinking is focused on some aim that they “think” (better ”feel” ) to be the all-justifying aim, allowing them to commit the most horrific acts.

Why is there a distinction between thinking and feeling? Is this distinction that sharp? Don’t you think (I could also say “feel”) that there is a grey area in which we “fink” that is, at the same time feel and think, without being able to say what’s leading what?

Yes, I agree, such an area exists. But the sources are well-distinguishable, and at both extremes we have pure feelings on the one hand and pure thinking on the other hand. To take an example: a woman feels intensive love for a man, and he pretends to have them also for her (he is afraid of loosing her attention). Suddenly, during their love-play, the man, not totally overwhelmed by feeling, remembers that he has a business appointment in ten minutes. Or he whispers in her ear: did you post these payments to the garage already, darling? How do you think the woman will react?

I think she will be overwhelmed by loss of her positive emotions which are replaced by negative ones.

Of course! So we agree on the distinction that can be made between feelings and thoughts. I believe (believing is mostly a result of thinking with one great exemption, we’ll deal with that later on) that we as humans are different from animals because we have to think. We have a thinking ability and are simply urged to use it, just like animals are urged to use their instincts. An instinct is a feeling that leads to an activity in the animal’s mind. In humans the instincts are disrupted, and allocated on the one hand to the feelings (which animals also have), and on the other hand to a new area, namely the area of thinking. This I see as a result of the evolutionary process. Let’s deal with this next time, then we also deal with “the purpose of thinking” as promised last time.