In this episode today I reflect on Lent as an expression of Nonduality. I explore how the symbol of the Cross expresses the same reality as the Yin Yang symbol.
In this episode today I reflect on Lent as an expression of Nonduality. I explore how the symbol of the Cross expresses the same reality as the Yin Yang symbol.
Nondual Lent
It is the Lenten Season on the Christian calendar. This year I did not start the season off by attending an Ash Wednesday service the way I normally would because of the pandemic. I watched our church’s Ash Wednesday service online, but it was not the same. Virtual ashes don’t have the same visceral quality as real ashes.
In this episode today I reflect on Lent as an expression of Nonduality. The Christian liturgical year revolves around two cycles: the Advent-Christmas cycle and the Lent-Easter cycle. It is said that being a Christian is like riding a, a bicycle (bi-cycle) with these two cycles carrying us through the year.
One of these cycles has to do with light and the other darkness. Advent-Christmas is about birth and light. Light coming into the darkness in the birth of Christ. Lent-Easter is about the darkness of the death of Christ, which culminates in the light of Easter dawn. There are elements of darkness/death in the light cycle and element of light/life in the dark cycle. The Christmas narrative has the massacre of the innocents and the Passion narrative ends with resurrection.
Christmas originally fell on the Winter Solstice. When the date was chosen in the 4th century December the solstice fell on the 25th, but it shifted slightly away from the date when the calendar was adjusted. So now the two are separated by a few days. I think this is unfortunate. If I was in charge of the church calendar I would put Christmas back on the solstice, but the pope has not asked my opinion on the matter.
The solstice was not originally chosen because it was the date on Jesus’ birth certificate. Jesus was not born on December 25. We do not know his birthdate. The Winter solstice was chosen because in Mediterranean cultures it was already a holiday, a cultural celebration of light. It was the moment when the days began to get longer, when light began to triumph over darkness.
Likewise the Lenten Easter cycle falls at the time of the Spring Equinox, which is the beginning of spring in the Northern Hemisphere. Day and night are equal. The death of Jesus originally happened at the Passover, which falls on the night of the full moon after the vernal equinox. Once again, the Church later allowed Easter to get separated from the Equinox, which is too bad.
My point is that both of these religious cycles are related to the interplay of day and night, light and darkness in nature, life and death. These liturgical cycles are the equivalent to the Yin Yang symbol of ancient China. The yin yang is a visual expression of duality within a wider all-encompassing unity. The cycles of the Christian year communicate the same thing.
Lent is a meditation on duality and nonduality. It is a meditation on the dualities of life and the wider unity. Lent focuses on the darkness of the approaching death of Jesus. It culminates in Passion Week, which begins with a flash of great light with the Triumphal entry of Jesus. Then it proceeds to the darkness of Gethsemane, Jesus’ arrest, trial and crucifixion. Then life and light again at Easter.
One interesting aspect of Lent is that the forty days of Lent do not include Sundays. Sundays are little feast days in the midst of a season of the fast days. They are little oases of light in the darkness. They are like the circles of light and darkness in the Yin Yang symbol. In the dark half of the symbol there is a disk of light. In the light half of the Yin Yang symbol there is a disk of dark. The same thing is happening in the Christian observance of Lent.
For me the Yin Yang symbolizes Lent just as much as the cross does. The two symbols are related in my experience. The cross is a symbol of both light and darkness, good and evil. It is a symbol of death. Yet the empty cross is a symbol of resurrection – of life because Jesus is not on it. The crucifix, which is the cross with Jesus still on it, did not become a symbol of Christianity until the Middle Ages and never became the symbol of Protestant Christianity.
Both the cross and the Yin Yang express duality encompassed by a great unity. The Cross is an ancient symbol, more ancient than Christianity or the Yin Yang, and found across cultures. A cross unites the four cardinal directions. It unites up and down, left and right. It unites heaven and earth, and humans to humans, and humans to all things. In Christianity it represents the two commands to love God and love one another.
As a Christian I find the Yin Yang symbol just as powerful as the Cross. The fluidity and movement of the Yin-Yang communicates the ever-changing relationship between life and death, good and evil, light and dark. This is on my mind a lot this Lent.
For one thing yesterday we brought our cat to the vet and he told us he had about a week to live. I know that it does not have the same power as the death of a person. But for those of you who have pets, you know that the death of a pet is always hard. So this Lent we are starting off the season dealing with death in our household.
On the larger stage, the ongoing political and social tensions in our American society disturb my peace of mind. Sometimes I find myself thinking about them at night as I lay down to sleep. At such times I have taken to picturing the Yin Yang in my mind’s eye.
I picture the light and dark as the interaction between good and evil in society, between conservative and liberal, Republican and Democrat, justice and injustice, right and wrong. Of course both sides of the spectrum see themselves as good and their enemies as evil. That is what is so useful about this symbol. It helps me see the two as relative. There is not one without the other.
In my mind’s eye the two sides of the Yin-Yang are a never-ending cycle, like the storms on a weather map. From a higher perspective, good and evil are storms in the human psyche and human society. There is no such thing as good and evil outside of the human mind. Humans create these categories, and they become very real to us.
As nondual awareness these battling dualities are one. Yin and Yang. Spiral galaxies spinning in space. On the psychological and moral level they are real, but on a spiritual level they are parts of a greater unity. So when my mind is disturbed by what is happening in American society and in the world, I let the Yin Yang bring my mind into a state of equilibrium, and I fall asleep.
Lent performs a similar function to the Yin Yang. Not that it causes me to fall asleep. That is not what I mean. It helps me see that the forces of good and evil are part of a greater whole. Sometimes Christians talk about a Greater Good, which is beyond good and evil. The forces of evil and hate destroyed the life of Jesus, yet the forces of darkness were not able to extinguish the light. After crucifixion came resurrection. After death came rebirth on Easter. It is all part of a bigger unity.
When Christians observe Lent we enter into this passion play of good and evil. In the end we see it as part of a bigger unity. Duality is viewed in the light of nonduality. This is what Lent is about. It is not about giving up something for 40 days. That is fine to do as long as you see what it points to. It is giving up duality. It is about seeing the Risen Lord in the Crucified One. It is about seeing both aspects of Christ as One Reality that we call God or Divine.
Lent is seeing ourselves in the story of Jesus. It is seeing the story of Jesus in all the stories of good and evil that are playing out in our society and in the world. It is not just about reading a Bible story. It is seeing the Bible story in the newspaper stories of good and evil. It is embracing them and seeing them as part of a deeper unity. It is the resting in the peace that Christians call the Will of God. Lent is a pilgrimage into the heart of nonduality.