Punctum Saliens

I’ve been reading about Vedanta lately and thinking about it in terms of the Christian doctrine of total depravity and the (what I would call extreme) position of “no morality apart from God.”

According to my Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, the word for “sin” in the N.T. is derived from the word hamartano, which means “to miss the mark (and so not share in the prize).” The Greek-English Lexicon by Liddell and Scott also cites the following phrases as meanings for hamartano: “to miss the road”; “to miss one’s point”; “failed in hitting upon the thought”; “to be deprived of, lose.”

According to Vedanta, my individual self is none other than Brahman, the universal self. My “sin” is that I don’t realize this. I’ve missed the mark and so do not share in the prize of peace and tranquility during my life. I’ve missed the point. I’ve failed to hit upon this thought and understand it fully. In other words, I’ve sinned. I was born in this sinful state because from birth, I’ve not realized what I really am. In a way, according to Vedanta, I am totally depraved (at least as far as the doctrine relates to being born a sinner) but my punishment is merely the hell of eternal rebirth into a suffering life rather than the Hell of eternal teeth gnashing in the Lake of Fire.

But then there’s the “no morality apart from God” crowd. (And by “God” they, of course, mean “their God”.) “Look at the Nazis!” they say while shutting their eyes to Gandhi, Siddhartha, &c. Anyway, I see a grave danger in the combination of these two ideas. If I am a) born a total sinner and b) have no moral compass apart from God then the only conclusion is that there is absolutely nothing preventing me from committing every heinous, despicable, detestable act imaginable. Can you see how this attitude colors — or perhaps more precisely, discolors — one’s view of the world? No longer do you see people; you see potential murderers and rapists.

I have personally felt the effect of this attitude. Someone very close to me accused me of doing something that someone else did. I shall not go into details but let’s just say that it was more along the lines of emotionally damaging than physically. There was no reason to believe that it was I who did this act. I had never done anything even remotely like it; never hinted that I would do such a thing. It was totally out of character for me. Again, not wanting to go into details, there were several other circumstances and pieces of evidence that would have pointed away from me as the perpetrator. But this person was absolutely convinced that it was I. They went to their pastor for guidance on what to do about it. They even threatened me with legal action if I did it again. In their mind, I was a sinner without God and so there was nothing I would not do. I had no moral compass and so it was perfectly reasonable to conclude that I did it. Needless to say, that accusation caused more than a little tension in the relationship.

I am no expert in Vedanta, but I don’t see the same reaction from “believers” toward “sinners” as with some Christians. Reading people like Alan Watts who seem to agree with the Vedanta viewpoint, there seems to be more tolerance of those who don’t understand the way things really are. These poor souls are not evil, merely deluded. And it is realized that forcing reality down their throats will not make them see it any more quickly. Which reminds me of a quote from Carl Jung (of course, I cannot find it at the moment) which says that people with faith should be more understanding of people without faith for having faith is easier. (I’ll add an update to this post when I find the exact quote).