Sacrifice

The theme for today is Sacrifice.

I want to start by saying this is a theme
that I believe I am personally unqualified to say much about
and that "we" as a culture
(or at least "my" version of "we")
likewise find a blind-spot around this idea.

The book "Spiritual Literacy
Reading the Sacred in Everyday Life"
otherwise a fulsome survey of contemporary spiritual ideas
mentions sacrifice only on one line, in passing.

Perhaps the best we can do
is open our own book, or press "Play"
and see what unfolds.

The concept grates against modernist sensibility and values:
it accesses ideas of primitivism,
of unwilling
and, we may suspect, unnecessary
losses.

But that doesn't make it an unsuitable topic for contemplation.
On the contrary,
we start with an extra dose of "not knowing"
a deficit of "I already know that!"

Let's start ..
with what is easy, in front of our face, ready-to-hand
(and as it involves face and hand
this may be something different for you than for me)

What does our culture "say" about sacrifice?
How do you feel about the idea,
and perhaps more so, its place in the lived life?

What experiences have you
or someone you know or admire,
had, that bring meaning to this term?

We can sit with the associations first
say hello, listen and let them have their say
draw them out a bit
and see if there's a "something more" involved.

At some point we might get on to collective stories,
our cultural and intellectual legacies.

What are some stories or movies or parables?

One source I like
when I want a systematic (and distanced) treatment of an idea
is the "I Ching", a Chinese tradition
with many contemporary expressions

We can look at chapter 41 for hints.

We could learn a lot about contemporary culture
by comparing the many different interpretations of this chapter.

I Ching chapters start with an "image"
as a grounding for further contemplation:
in this case, a Lake at the foot of a Mountain.
The Lake evaporates and brings moisture to the Mountain
the Lake's surface reflects the Mountain
and is slightly stirred by a light breeze
while the Mountain sits and observes the Lake
and the surface of the lake looks still
but it is obviously alive.

Unfortunately I don't think we have time today
to unfold the metaphor presented in this image
so we may need to sacrifice
what could be an interesting journey.

One title for the chapter is "Decrease".
The chapter looks at the different aspects
of a change (for that is the perspective of the I Ching)
where a "lower" thing decreases and a "higher" thing increases.

It then examines that transaction
(If I can be excused for using a modern term)
from different viewpoints
and examines healthy and unhealthy variations.

The book shows six different variations for each theme
in the second one, it shows a situation
where it's not good to give too much of oneself
but overall it doesn't take sides
since something is not always either good or bad,
healthy or unhealthy.

We can take as a definition of Sacrifice:

A conscious practice
of giving up something that is valuable
for something that is more important

This seems okay, a way to express it
in a semi-modern way.
It has a hint of economics, of "investing" in it.
In this sense, though
it keeps at a distance
from questions about what this means
in terms of "self" and "spirit".

This suggests (to me) some scoping
or I might say, groping, questions.

Is fasting sacrifice?
Is taking time to beautify one's environment a sacrifice?
Can there be unhealthy voluntary sacrifices?
Can there be involuntary sacrifices?
Can an involuntary loss re-imagined to become sacrifice,
and would that be a significant thing to do?

Let's stop there for now
and check in with what these ideas have stirred,
what is reflected and what is observed.