The one who has emerged entire through the winnowing fire of suffering comes out changed and renewed. He has passed beyond dependence on things mortal and has attained a knowledge of the immortal Principle that lies at the root of his own being - which is also the immanent deity. He has passed beyond pleasure and pain to an inner centre where the peace of God is known. He is neither elated by success nor dejected by failure - as the world understands these two results of action, both of which are in fact illusions - but lives in the only fully substantial world, which is one of union of all things in God. The core of equanimity is well expressed in the Bhagavadgita: "To action alone hast thou a right and never at all to its fruits; let not the fruits of action be thy motive; neither let there be in thee any attachment to inaction" (2:47). In other words, the supreme act of man is to be attentive to God's will and do what is required of him. His reward is the eternal knowledge of God which far outstrips any material advantages that might accrue from it.
In the Parable of the Labourers in the Vineyard (Matthew 20:1-16), the tragedy of those who had laboured throughout the whole day was their blindness to the privilege and blessing of working in God's kingdom. That kingdom is every place in which we find ourselves and have the ability to use the gifts with which we have been endowed. Those who came late were much less fortunate, since they enjoyed the heavenly peace for a comparatively short time. But whosoever enters that kingdom gains the reward of eternal life when he puts away thoughts of recompense or demands of reward. The divine munificence is such that even the late-comer is not penalised except by his own tardiness in arriving to enjoy the divine company.
In the Parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32), the tragic figure is the dutiful, no doubt formally religious, older son who is unaware of his good fortune in sharing his father's estate, and this not through his merits but by virtue of his birth as a son of his father. His father reminds him of something so obvious that he had failed to notice it: "My boy you are always with me, and everything I have is yours." The greater joy is to be able to welcome home a brother, who is every man in distress and disrepute, once dead and now come back to life, once lost and now found. Both the father and the returning son had come to this higher understanding of living in Good's love as a result of pain the father as if bereaved of a beloved son, and the son fallen into the despair of penury. When they came to each other again, each had grown from the natural possessiveness that men have for the things of this world to a breadth of self-giving that alone can participate in the divine kingdom. One hopes that the outraged suffering of the elder son, assuaged by the love of the other two, brought him into the kingdom of grace also.
In the blessed state of equanimity, which is called "holy indifference" in the Christian mystical tradition, one is in constant relationship with Him who is the eternal Father. The Buddhist teaching on non-attachment leads to this state of equanimity, but it requires the act of self-sacrifice to raise it from a mere technique of inner cleansing to a way of life that dedicates itself to the liberation of all sensual creatures from the thraldom of time to the expansiveness of eternity. The fruit of equanimity is purposeful, mindful action, the focus of which is God and not the fearful, self-centred person obsessed with the desire to achieve results in order to justify himself. Only when we are centred in the spirit can our actions be direct, harmonious, perfectly executed, and of wide benefit to others. The power of God the Holy Spirit works unimpeded and undisturbed through the person who is at peace in himself and in unitary consciousness with God. He no longer makes demands for himself, because he and the Father are united in will and are one in concern for the world.
Holy indifference means a state of acceptance of things as they are, including the results of one's actions, once they have been brought in faith to God. When Jesus, at the end of a terrible agony of doubt in mind and pain in body, finally prepares to give up His life, He says in what is traditionally accepted as His final utterance from the cross: "Father, into thy hands I commit my spirit" (Luke 23:46). This is an act of submission in complete faith; at this juncture He knows nothing of the resurrection ahead of Him. He has done what He set out to do, and although the result appears disastrous in terms of leading men to the kingdom of Heaven, He gives back to His Father what He had earlier been given, the divine spark. We know that this essence of God had already been glorified because of the wonderful work Jesus had done while on earth. We know that His physical body was to become resurrected into a body of pure spiritual light, universally available to those in all successive ages who call upon His name in faith, as He freely gave up His life as an offering of love to all who had been imprisoned in their own sinful existence. But He knew nothing of all this as He surveyed the tempestuous course of His brief ministry on earth. The terrible cry from the heart: "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" finds its conclusion in an acceptance of things as they are. He had done the deed as best as He was able; the judgement lay with the Father and the results were to be seen in the changed consciousness of all who had been brought into contact with Him.
When He was at the height of His ministry, He had prepared His disciples on three occasions for the final conflict, passion and rising again from the dead. But when He had to undergo these predicted events, His memory was occluded, a circumstance that, I believe, followed the terrible agony in the Garden of Gethsemane. At that encounter with the full weight of psychic destructiveness and evil, though He survived through the power of prayer, He was divested of the inner knowledge that so distinguished the triumphant part of His earlier work. He had to live through the last period as a diminished person in full identity with a diminished humanity, which is what we all are except in union with God. He made that union possible for all people by the supreme act of suffering with them, so that, in the depth of their own agony, they could be with God.
The triumph of the agony of suffering is that one enters a new realm in which there is neither pain nor pleasure, punishment nor reward, but only the peace of perfect knowledge of God. It is a strange and not unamusing paradox of the spiritual life that one enters into the divine kingdom only after one has parted with everything one had previously held dear, especially one's own reputation. Indeed, Jesus warns His disciples to be careful when people speak well of them for thus they spoke of the false prophets in the past. Only the person who has renounced himself completely can be God's prophet, for then he speaks from the authority of the Holy Spirit, untainted by personal prejudices and resentments. It is no wonder that the true prophet is tried in the white fire of affliction, and as his ministry proceeds, so does his faith increase in intensity. Even so great a prophet as Jeremiah had to learn this truth, which was the real answer to the impassioned dialogues he had had with God earlier in his ministry. It was said mockingly of Jesus on the cross: "He saved others, but he cannot save himself." The servant of God, who is the eternal suffering servant, has to pass beyond the polarities of health and illness, imprisonment and freedom, pain and pleasure, life and death, before he can know the way of eternity. Only then can he be the "way-shower" for those who follow him. Each of us has to recapitulate the life of a full person in Christ before we can enter the kingdom of God, but Christ is with us in our travail because He is the "first fruits of the harvest of the dead" (as St Paul writes in I Corinthians 15). He goes on to say: "As in Adam all men die, so in Christ all will be brought to life; but each in his own proper place; Christ the first fruits, and afterwards, at his coming, those who belong to Christ. Then comes the end, when He delivers up the kingdom to God the Father" (verses 22-24). The first fruits are first in a hierarchy of spiritual eminence, not of temporal succession, and those who belong to Christ are not those who say 'Lord, Lord', but those who do the will of God the Father (Matthew 7:21).
A state not unlike that of equanimity can be achieved after a long well-conducted retreat from the world in some situation of peace and beauty. The scales gradually drop from the eyes of the retreatant, and the clamant bustle of life's continual demands is slowly stilled amid the silence of nature. An even more prolonged state of holy indifference to the world's demands and rewards can follow a secluded life in an Eastern ashram. Many young people nowadays opt for such an experience and some spend years in this type of spiritual retreat. It would seem that equanimity can, after all, be attained in much more harmonious surroundings and by means of far less harrowing methods than the submergence of the personality in the dark river of suffering. Indeed, to some modern minds, this emphasis on the necessity for suffering as a way to the full attainment of spiritual mastery must seem overdone if not frankly morbid. But it must also be said that the even-tempered indifference to the outer flux of circumstances that one may acquire in a situation of retreat is a very precariously balanced state. If such a person were to return to the chaos and psychic havoc of the secular city, it is doubtful, to say the least, whether he would retain a calm façade, let alone a tranquil inner composure. Indeed, it is important to bring the retreatant firmly back to the worldly situation before he returns home, lest the contrast presents a temporarily unbearable shock to his nervous system. This is done by the experienced conductor giving his flock clear instructions about a disciplined prayer life, which should be augmented by their presence in a worshipping community. One has, as it were, to bring a little of the peace and dedication that one was given during the period of inner silence to the noise and bustle of the surrounding heedless world. Only then can the equanimity experienced in the silence be gradually realised in the life of active participation in the world's problems. Thus it is evident that the tranquillity one may experience in a quiet situation away from the demands of the busy, heedless world is a long distance from the holy indifference known to the saints of the world's great religious traditions. This is heralded by a change in the person's awareness of reality that follows the purifying effect of loss and suffering. The preliminary awareness of peace in a chosen retreat situation is not to be derided however; it is a way towards spiritual vision divested of the illusion of personal ownership. But it will become a permanent feature of the person's life only after much that he believed was important has been cut away by suffering, and he is left with only the pearl of great price within himself. This is the kingdom within, and it radiates an atmosphere of indifference to the world's judgements and a joyful recognition of the power of God in all situations.
Equanimity is a state in which one proceeds with the duties of one's calling in obedience to the ever-present voice of God. This speaks silently in the depths of one's being, but informs the will with purpose and the intellect with obedience and compassion. The voice of God never dominates the personality; it stands at the door of consciousness and knocks for admission. If God is consciously admitted to our lives, He does not take them over; on the contrary He shows Himself as an intimate friend. He is constantly available to support us and show us the way to liberation from the bondage of all earthly attachments, but He does not intrude to make His presence felt. Dame Julian of Norwich was amazed at the courtesy of our Lord: a courteous person respects the identity and integrity of the other individual, no matter how unimportant he may appear in the world's eyes. In the state of holy indifference, or non-attachment, one is released from all concerns save that of doing the will of God. And this is God's will: that all of us should grow to mature manhood, measured by nothing less than the full stature of Christ (Ephesians 4:13). We work as compatriots with God; without Him all our actions fail, while without us the world's glory does not unfold. As St Irenaeus put it: "The glory of God is a living man." Such a man was manifested in Jesus Christ, and we are to be like Him, since "God became man in order that man might become God", as St Athanasius saw in a flash of supreme intuition. Man's end is "theosis" or deification, an end prefigured in the Incarnation of Christ.
In this respect equanimity is very different from quietism, a heretical view of the relationship between God and man in which the human initiative is put in abeyance so that man may be the completely passive instrument of God. This aberrant spiritual approach occurs in many mystical groups who, while rightly submissive to divine grace, fail to give due weight to the positive contribution of the human will to God's work in the world. As Psalm 127 reminds us: "Unless the Lord builds the house, its builders will have toiled in vain. Unless the Lord keeps watch over a city, in vain the watchman stands on guard." But nevertheless it is the builder who provides the strength and patience by which the house is erected; it is the trustworthy watchman who stands on guard. Both God and man are essential for the work. The one without the other will achieve nothing. It is the divine courtesy that has given man his essential place in building the world, and God emphasises this human necessity categorically in the Incarnation of Christ. "Yet thou hast made him little less than a god, crowning him with glory and honour. Thou makest him master over all thy creatures; thou hast put everything under his feet" (Psalm 8:5-6)
It can be said with some irony that man is now in command of such unlimited physical resources that he may well destroy himself and all the creatures of this earth with nuclear energy, even within this century, unless he undergoes a radical spiritual change. Such a change may well be the fruit of a terrible humiliation and loss of life. What we call evil is often part of the experimentation of man in understanding the world and gaining inner mastery. A young child will pull out the wings of a living insect with little awareness of the distress he is causing that small creature. Only as he himself learns how it feels to be injured physically and hurt emotionally does he come to identify himself with all God's creatures. And in this life there seem to be some who are morally incapable of learning how to enter into another person's suffering. The vast span that separates the bestiality of a Hitler from the spirituality of a Gautama or a Jesus is one of the mysteries of creation. It certainly tells us that there is an extensive journey to be made by the individual human being before he can transcend the purely animal nature in which he is clothed and participate in the divine nature, from which he arose in the beginning as an unconscious, undifferentiated soul and to which He is to return as a vibrant, articulate spirit.
The fully alive man has entered on the way of non-attachment. This does not restrict itself only to material possessions or the opinions that other people might have of oneself. It also involves personal relationships. When Jesus asks, rhetorically, having been told that His mother and brothers are outside asking for Him: "Who is my mother? Who are my brothers?" and looks round at those who are sitting in the circle about Him, He answers His own question: "Here are my mother and brothers. Whoever does the will of God is my brother, my sister, my mother" (Mark 3:32 35). He is showing the true non-attachment that is the heart of equanimity. He is not diminishing His mother or brothers, whom He loves, but is raising up in love all those who love His Father. Eventually, in the time of His passion, He is able to love even those who hate Him and all He stands for. Love has to flow unrestricted even upon those who seem to be least worthy of love. Only by love can they be helped to attain the spiritual stature for which they too are destined. It is in this way that Jesus Himself grows in perfection, as we have already read in Hebrews 5:7-10. Of course, while we are alive there will always be some people who claim a special degree of affection; in the instance of Jesus it seems to have been Mary Magdalene and the beloved disciple John. But even then the resurrected Christ tells Mary of Magdala not to cling to Him, for she was evidently in the act of embracing Him once she recognised Him. In the divine realm there are no special favourites; conversely everyone there is part of a favoured community. On a more earthly level, the only real way of passing beyond the gaping chasm of bereavement is to see the face of the beloved in every person one meets in one's daily life. There is a very deep significance in the disciples' recognition of Jesus in the person of the stranger whom they met on the road to Emmaus. Indeed, He is in every stranger we meet once we have the courtesy and the love to open ourselves to that person and partake of his inner being. But this is a gift of the way of non-attachment. As God told Samuel in the affair of the choice of the young David as king of the Israelites: "The Lord does not see as man sees: men judge by appearances but the Lord judges by the heart" (I Samuel 16:7). Only when we are in a state of equanimity can we effect that higher judgement, for then we are attached to God and not to men.
To love a person means to give oneself unreservedly to him so that he may be as God intended him to be. If one makes any personal demands on that person, one's love is soon perverted through possessiveness to strangling selfishness. What begins as human love all too often ends in disillusionment and cynicism, because we feel we have been let down. It is only when we do not need the emotional support of the other person that we can love him even to the extent of giving up our life for him. This disinterestedness is the very heart of true; service. If we are attached to the one we help by bonds of deep affection, our personal concern will tend to intrude in the work we are called to do. We will be constantly getting in the way of his growth into a full person, just as an over-solicitous, neurotically possessive parent can cripple the growth of his children into the independence that is a prerequisite for mature adulthood.
Non-attachment must, however, be contrasted with detachment. A detached person has a cold, clinical attitude towards the sufferings of other people. He will tend to see their sufferings simply as the way of retribution or of growth of that individual, and feel himself unconnected with them. A non-attached person, on the other hand, is always available to lend a helping hand and a sympathetic ear to anyone in distress. He helps to bear the burden, but does this in such a way that the victim of misfortune is strengthened in his path to become a better, more authentic human being. This is the way of Christ.
"Come to me, all whose work is hard, whose load is heavy; and I will give you relief. Bend your necks to my yoke, and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble-hearted; and your souls will find relief. For my yoke is good to bear, my load is light" (Matthew 11:28 30). In fact, the load of Christ is the sin of the whole world, and it is beyond conception in its magnitude. But even this can be borne when we put the clamant ego on one side, moving beyond our own demands for recognition and recompense, and giving ourselves freely to God's service. This is how equanimity alone can bear the burdens of the world. In this blessed state we are assured of Christ's love and forgiveness and that we are of infinite value in His regard.
There is a reciprocal relationship between prayer and equanimity. It is not possible to enter the depths of contemplative prayer until one has set aside all personal demands and aspirations. On the other hand, the practice of God's presence in silent contemplation makes an attitude of non-attachment more available in everyday life. One starts one's prayer life in dialogue with God, making one's requests known to Him; the end of prayer is silent contemplation of the One beyond all names with these words in one's mind and on one's lips: "Thy will be done." This is equanimity, the supreme mystical reality of personal integrity before the Almighty. It is perfectly summed up in the famous prayer of Rabi'a, an early Sufi saint: "O my Lord, if I worship Thee from fear of hell, burn me in hell; and if I worship Thee from hope of paradise, exclude me from paradise; but if I worship Thee for Thine own sake, then withold not from me Thy eternal beauty." Indeed, the joy of prayer is communion with God; all benefits that might follow this communion pale into insignificance beside the peace of God that passes human understanding. We have to bring this communion with God into the world in which we give our humble service so that a little of the peace of God may enter into our personal relationships. From there the peace may pervade the troubled psychic atmosphere of the world, and gradually effect a change in the consciousness of all men, so that, from being instruments of destruction and hatred, they may emanate goodwill towards their neighbours. This is the way of prayer that can alone save our generation from destruction. But it is only those who have passed beyond the polarities of pleasure and pain, reward and punishment, good and evil, that can be the agents of the new covenant between God and man which Christ initiated by His sacrificial death. Only the person who has passed triumphantly through the refining fire of suffering can be a minister of healing for our scarred, shattered world. He no longer speaks merely for himself, but is a spokesman for all who have suffered and are dispossessed. Through his purified soul shines the uncreated light of God.
In this blessed equanimity of spirit one can begin to enjoy the world as it is. One discovers that its marvels are the things of everyday life one so takes for granted in one's ceaseless strife and anxiety that one misses them until it is almost too late to appreciate them. One begins to feel the joyous activity of a healthy body, the clean, purifying thrust of ice-cold water on the tongue and palate, the invigorating air penetrating the nostrils to the lungs within, and the heat of the sun playing on the skin until it responds in warmth to the beneficence around it. This is the peace that passes human understanding, the peace of Christ such as the world cannot give. It comes to those who have put themselves on one side so that they can give everything they have to life, the life of abundance. Having nothing they possess all things, needing nothing the world is theirs. They may be poor by human standards, but the riches within their spirit are inexhaustible. "You shall know the truth, and the truth will set you free," Jesus said to those who had believed Him (John 8:32). They unfortunately could see freedom only in terms of personal independence as opposed to national slavery. But until one has known the pain of servitude and has passed beyond the personal revolt that this of necessity engenders, one can never know the real freedom of the Spirit.
Freedom is ultimately an attitude of mind. One person may be free in spirit even when crippled, blind and destitute. Another may be in bondage even with enormous possessions of wealth, power and psychic gifts. The only reality is God, and those who are closest to the divine nature are closest to their own soul. These have been cleansed of the external dross that men in their ignorance esteem so much by the fire of God's love in the crucible of suffering. Indeed, one begins to see how complementary are the judgement and the love of God. The one purifies the soul while the other heals it. This reciprocal action is the inner meaning of growth. And growth is the one essential property of life. Life never ceases except inasmuch as it ends in union with God Whose Spirit is the Lord, the giver of life.
Rabi'a was once asked "Do you love God Almighty?" "Yes." "Do you hate the devil?" "My love of God," she answered, "leaves me no leisure to hate the devil. I saw the prophet in a dream. He said, 'O Rabi'a, do you love me?' I said 'O Apostle of God, who does not love thee? but love of God hath so absorbed me that neither love nor hate of any other thing remains in my heart.'" This quotation (taken from A Literary History of the Arabs by R A Nicholson) expresses the true meaning of love in equanimity. When one is centred on God, each person takes his own place in one's love. Hatred and fear, even of what is destructive and evil in the world, are stilled, and a radiance extends to embrace all creatures, whether here or in the psychic realms beyond mortal life. Even such calamities as personal loss and the death of those close to one are now seen in their eternal mode, as a part of the soul's journey to a knowledge of God. Pain gives way to joyous relief and resentment to divine thanksgiving. This is the final fruit of suffering endured with courage and transcended with faith.
Suffering is seen to be the probationary path to selfhood in God.
MeditationThe peace of God, that peace which passes all understanding and is of such a different order from the repose associated with the satisfaction of material craving, consists entirely in opening ourselves to His grace and knowing that all things work to good in eternity to those who love Him and give of themselves freely as a living sacrifice to their fellow creatures.