At the end of the movie, and apparently the book as well, after telling two very different versions of his tale the main character asks which is the better story. When the journalist (in the movie) chooses "the one with the tiger," Pi responds, "And so it goes with God."
I've heard several interpretations of what this line is intended to convey, but here's what Yann Martel, the author of the book and, so, the line itself, as said:
". . . Pi makes a parallel between the two stories and religion. His argument (and mine) is that a vision of life that has a transcendental element is better than one that is purely secular and materialist. A story with God ("God" defined in the broadest sense) is the better story, I argue, just as I think the story with animals is the better story. But you choose."(I found this in a transcript from the ABC's Good Morning America Q & A with the author as part of their "Read This!" book club.)
A lot of time and intellectual energy by a lot of people has gone into the project of coming up with convincing arguments for a belief in God and here Martel, through his character Pi, is essentially saying that the reason to believe in God is that it makes for a "better story." And he acknowledges that it is, fundamentally, a choice.
I've thought this for a long time. It's not my only answer to the question of why I believe in God (and, as Martel says, "defined in the broadest sense") but it is one of my favorites. And last night, coming across this "argument" again I remembered two of the sources that long-ago influenced my thinking.
One is the wonderful book Illusions: adventures of a reluctant messiah, by Richard Bach. Bach had gained huge fame with his earlier Johnathon Livingston Seagull, but it was Illusions that really grabbed me by the collar and has refused to let go. It tells the story of Bach himself, during one of the summers he spent barnstorming around the country in an old biplane. The story tells of his meeting a man named Donald Shimoda who, it turns out, is actually the Messiah who had returned to earth but had essentially quit that job when it became clear that people really didn't want to listen to his message. Still, one doesn't quit being Messiah too easily and, so, he agrees to teach Bach what he knows about the meaning of life.
Word eventually gets out about this mysterious stranger and the wonders that seem to follow him, and he gets interviewed on the radio. After sharing some of his teachings the host asks him why he believes such things. Instead of saying, "I live my life this way and it works" or something even faintly convincing like that he says, simply, "I believe it because it's fun to believe it."
This is, I think, echoed in another book that shaped me -- The Teachings of Don Juan by Carlos Castenada. One of those teachings has to do with "the path with a heart."
"All paths are the same: they lead nowhere. They are paths going through the bush, or into the bush. In my own life I could say I have traversed long long paths, but I am not anywhere. Does this path have a heart? If it does, the path is good; if it doesn't, it is of no use. Both paths lead nowhere; but one has a heart, the other doesn't. One makes for a joyful journey; as long as you follow it, you are one with it. The other will make you curse your life. One makes you strong; the other weakens you."All paths are the same -- they lead nowhere. Still, you need to chose, and so you might as well chose the path witha heart. The path with a heart will be more fun. It will make for a better story.
And so it goes with God.
In Gassho,
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7 comments:
Do all paths lead nowhere? Or do they lead to the same end? Does it matter - really - what path you take if it is to the true end? Perhaps it is the way you travel the path that will get you to the end. And, then, why not take a (the?) path that has the heart - the heart that breaths out love and in that love is the joy of living.
Something like that may work.
Arthur Rashap
I fail to understand why you think a path with God inherently has more heart than a path without God. It strikes me that there are more fundamental elements of a path that determines whether it unites both heart and head in a way that is both meaningful and effective.
I am very surprised that a UU minister would imply that people who are atheists or agnostics or humanists are following a path without heart.
I won't repeat all of what the late Christopher Hitchens said in one of his debates about why he believed in the way he lived his life -- you can find it at http://socraticmama.com/2011/12/16/christopher-hitchens-and-the-poisoned-chalice/secular-parenting
but part of it was his belief -- and experience -- that by following his path, he was following the only path that for him, allowed "the discussion about what is good, what is beautiful, what is noble, what is pure, and what is true" to be fully engaged in during this life, because it allowed that discussion to be engaged in without certainty or security. According to Hitchens, "I want to live my life taking the risk all the time that I don’t know anything like enough yet… that I haven’t understood enough… that I can’t know enough… that I am always hungrily operating on the margins of a potentially great harvest of future knowledge and wisdom."
Now, I'm sure that as a UU minister you would argue that you define your path with God in a way that allows for questions and learning, and that does not deaden life with a false security and arbitrary authority. So that your path, in your view, allows for the hunger for new knowledge to be satisified. And maybe that is so.
But what I want to argue is that is completely absurd for you to imply that someone like Hitchens was not following a "path with a heart". There is emotion and a different kind of faith in many non-theistic paths. The concept of God does NOT define whether a life path has a heart. And part of being open to new knowledge is understanding that there are a variety of human experiences and beliefs that can be lived with integrity and meaning.
Thanks for your passionate response, Tim. I'm afraid, though, that I must not have been clear about my primary point -- that it is a choice whether or not one believes in God. It isn't a "fact" that one can "prove" or "disprove." It's a choice. And one only you can make.
I have doubt that you and someone like Mr. Hitchens can indeed follow "a path with a heart" without involving God. I've known many people who do. But I wasn't talking about either of you. I was musing about my own choice, my own sense that a life "with God" makes for "a better story."
My problem with folks like Mr. Hitchens -- since you brought him into this :-) -- is that he tends to paint all religious people with the same brush, claiming that all are irrational or stupid (or duped, perhaps a combination of the two). Yet the "God" that he rejects has absolutely nothing in common with the "God" I affirm, so his dismissal says nothing about my belief. We are, in fact, talking about two entirely different things.
Looks like I'll need to write some posts on what I mean when I say "God."
Thanks for your passionate response, Tim. I'm afraid, though, that I must not have been clear about my primary point -- that it is a choice whether or not one believes in God. It isn't a "fact" that one can "prove" or "disprove." It's a choice. And one only you can make.
I have doubt that you and someone like Mr. Hitchens can indeed follow "a path with a heart" without involving God. I've known many people who do. But I wasn't talking about either of you. I was musing about my own choice, my own sense that a life "with God" makes for "a better story."
My problem with folks like Mr. Hitchens -- since you brought him into this :-) -- is that he tends to paint all religious people with the same brush, claiming that all are irrational or stupid (or duped, perhaps a combination of the two). Yet the "God" that he rejects has absolutely nothing in common with the "God" I affirm, so his dismissal says nothing about my belief. We are, in fact, talking about two entirely different things.
Looks like I'll need to write some posts on what I mean when I say "God."
I don't disagree with your point that Hitchens and some other new atheists tend to paint all religious believers with the same brush.
Personally, I prefer writers such as Andre Comte-Sponville, who have a somewhat more charitable and cooperative view of the possible relationships between theists and atheists. http://www.amazon.com/The-Little-Book-Atheist-Spirituality/dp/0143114433
If I didn't have this broader view, I would be unable to be a lifelong committed UU, as our congregations include a wide variety of perspectives on theism.
And I'm glad you expanded your remarks to clarify that you believe a wide variety of paths with respect to theism can have a heart. This was not clear, at least to me, in your original post.
I'm sure your definition of God is quite broad, as it is for most UU theists I know. The relevant issue is, is it a good idea to use the word God, with all of its historical baggage, if the definition is broadened to be consistent with a fully liberal religion? There are pros to redefining the language of traditional religion, and also potential confusions.
I think the recent post by James Ishmael Ford is relevant to this discussion:
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/monkeymind/2013/06/god-as-prose-god-as-poetry-unitarian-universalism-faces-a-new-age.html
Thanks for the point to Andre Comte-Sponville, Tim, someone I'm not familiar with. And I, too, thought it a happy coincidence that James should post as he did while we were engaged in this conversation.
Over the next few posts I'm planing/hoping to clarify not only what I'm intending to mean by the word "God" but also why I continue to use it. I'll be interested in what you think of them!
You might find interesting the following post by a well-known journalist, Virginia Heffernan. I think this suggests some dangers in going with something because it is a "better story". She quotes the same part of Life of Pi that you quote, but for very different purposes. Is this a slippery slope?
http://news.yahoo.com/why-im-a-creationist-141907217.html
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