The is an old Zen story,
that tells of an Emperor who wanted to understand
the Buddhist teaching, the Diamond Sutra in particular.
So he sent for a old wise monk.
In his own good time
the wise old monk appeared before the Emperor,
he climbed the platform in front of the throne,
and rapped once on the table that stood on the platform.
He then descended from the platform and left.
The Emperor sat motionless for a few moments,
and then one of his courtiers decided to speak.
Excuse me" inquired the courtier,
"may I ask you whether you understood?
The Emperor nodded his head "NO"
What a pity.... replied the servant
for the wise one has never been more eloquent....
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It may be true, you know, a single rap on a table may be more eloquent than all the words. It is possible that you might come to deeper religious insight in meditation on that rap, than listening to the best of orators.
But that is not our tradition,Unitarianism and Universalism arise out of Protestantism and Protestants put the pulpits in the middle of the chancel, and the altar......if that table could be called an altar was put over on the side. Does our furniture express ideas, concepts, does its arrangement assume a grammar, are we not talking, but nevertheless communicating without words? Our tradition put the teaching and preaching function in the center and the ritual that gave form to the community in communion was put on the side.
Now there are many, many Unitarian Universalists who believe that we need more rituals, more ceremonies that celebrate the sacred stories and the rhtymns of our lives.
We may find ways to express reverence without non verbal languages. We may find more and more ceremonies that express our religious values, and perhaps those rituals will communicate to us deeply and that communication will not be through words but movements of the body, through sight, and touch, and taste, and smell, and even silence.
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This little reflection on the non verbal aspects of religious language is more suggestive than analytic. There are many scholars who have commented on the role of instrumental music, art, dance, and other languages that contribute to public worship. We can all think of examples from private devotion and rituals that give our family lives meaning. What is the language that the angel at the top of the Humanist Christmas Tree speaks? What does that Buddha on my book shelf say to me?
I think of a Eastern Woods Native Peoples ritual, the Corn Dance. The whole people dance to renew the cosmos, the join their energies to sun and soil to inspire the corn to grow. It is non verbal, there is a language of reverence inherent in this dance, but words are not spoken. But every child is told the stories, they know how Corn mother gave her gift and how the people join the earth in the enterprise of renewal. Story time is not part of the dance, and the dance is not part of story time. Yes, the meaning is expressed with dance and drums rather than words, but stories with words have informed the understanding of the dancers.
the rap on the table was eloquent because it pointed to a material reality that was being lost in a welter of words. It was a non-verbal gesture that drew its meaning from, and in opposition, to words.
Ritual depends on words to give it meaning. Communion has meaning to us because of the whole history of words upon words upon words that define, and then redefine, and then counter-redefine, what the ritual means.
One of the reasons why Unitarian Universalism is so wordy is that we have not had enough words among ourselves to be able to share meaning through non-verbal gesture. Of course, we are young and new at this, and have chosen, apparently, to separate ourselves from the streams of words that have been used to traditionally communicate religious meaning. The hope is that having eschewed all the old words, some of us will say something new and genuine. I hope so.