Religion and ethics often walk hand-in-hand. In other words, if we are of a specific religious persuasion, then we are typically prescribed a moral code which is intended to promote correct conduct. Even if we are atheists, we usually find that the laws of our society have been derived (at least in part) from some religious system. The difference for the non-believers is that they think they shall be punished by society and not by a disapproving deity if they should transgress the rules. In either case—”judgement by the divine or by society”—we are encouraged to be moral by outside sources. However, since the acts we commit in the world are intrinsic to our being (in the sense that our acts and our being appear as congruent to each other), the codes that govern these acts ought to be intrinsic to our being as well. It should be the responsibility of each of us to impose our own morality upon ourselves. We can think of this as Ethical Anarchy. [1] In this examination we will see that it is possible to formulate an ethics which does not rely on any outside force, divine or otherwise, and that such a morality is intrinsic to the activity of being human.

We shall begin at the end. The thrust of our entire analysis arrives at the moral code summed up by Confucius when:

Zigong asked Confucius: “Is there any one word that can serve as a lasting principle for the conduct of one’s whole life?” Confucius said: “Perhaps it is the word ‘reciprocity.’ Do not do to others what you would not want others to do to you.” [2]

We find in this no reference to a deity, nor to a system of socially conceived laws. It is a simple principle that relies only on how we ourselves desire to be treated. In other words, our Ethical Anarchy comes down to how we ought to treat ourselves. However, in order to adopt this principle we must come to an understanding of what the self is. There is wisdom in the sage advice, “know thyself.” Thus, we shall now endeavour to get to know our self.

In “The Reincarnating Soul,” Sri Aurobindo tells us that the self that we normally see ourselves as is not the Self, but only an, “ego-sense that makes us cling to the life of a body.” He asserts that, “the Self is imperishable, immutable:[and that it] is not born and does not exist in the body, rather the body is born and exists in the Self” (362). [3] Clearly, Aurobindo’s conception of the Self is not what most of us think of the self to be; however, we can understand what he is getting at by removing the relational components of our common notion of self. This deconstruction clears away the many facets of self which are contingent upon things external, and thus, will allow us to get at the self as it is in itself.

If we are true to this task, then we find that we remove everything we commonly feel the self to be. We must give up the body”?physical relations in the world have shaped it. Since our personality, knowledge and memories have been created by our bodily experiences over time, they too must go. We see that there is nothing about our individual ego-sense of self left, but only a Self that is universal to all things. [4] This is what Aurobindo calls, “the timeless identity of the Self” (363). Thus, we now have a better recognition of who we are: we are a singular and eternal Self expressed in a myriad of ways.

We might think this a bit peculiar, but we can come to understand why we experience difference where there is only a singularity. Martin Buber, in “I and Thou,” asserts that there are two types of “Primary words [which] do not describe something that might exist independently of them, but being spoken they bring about existence” (172). [5] In Buber’s thought, we find that these word pairs, I-It and I-Thou, are basic to every individual’s experience of the world. The I-It is the word that “:can never be spoken with the whole being” (ibid.). In this sense, we find that it is this primary word which brings about the existence of difference: merely a facet of our being speaks it, but not the whole self. The I-Thou, however, “:can only be spoken with the whole being” (ibid.), and as we have seen, the whole being”—our Self”—is that which is found in everything. This is likely why Buber says that all else lives in the Thou’s light (ibid.). The I-Thou is what the Self speaks to itself in order to recognize the singularity of Being, whereas the I-It is spoken by our ego-sense (to use Aurobindo’s term) in order to pick out partial and specific instantiations of the eternal Self. In other words, when we experience the external world (including the people in it) as separate from ourselves, then we are speaking the I-It, and this is spoken by only a portion of our actual Self. However, the whole Self speaks the I-Thou in its recognition that there is no separation between self and other.

In our deconstruction of self we discovered that there is a Self which is universal to all things. Further, we recognized that there is an internal dialogue which the Self maintains. This dialogue is what gives rise to the different manifestations in the world. When the communication is incomplete—”when only a part of the Self speaks”—then only another part of the Self receives the transmission. Regardless, the dialogue of Being is always within the Self. This is why all of us are obligated to impose a morality upon ourselves. Each of us is a part of the Self in relation to itself; thus, we see that there is every reason to not act towards others in ways that we ourselves would not want to be acted upon: our actions are always towards our Self.

References:

[1]”‘Anarchy’ in the sense that the laws and codes which govern the individual are self-formulated and self-imposed and do not derive from an outside prescriptive agency or institution.

[2] The reference to Confucius is from “Analects,” found in the anthology, “Philosophy of Religion Toward a Global Perspective,” by Gary E. Kessler. Printed by Wadsworth Publishing Company, Belmont, CA, USA, 1999.

[3] References to Aurobindo are from the same anthology by Kessler.

[4] Although the focus in this paper is on human relations, we do literally mean all things! We could imagine doing this process (stripping away the parts that are determined by external factors) for anything that exists and find that whatever a thing in itself is, this thing must be common to all things as it is undifferentiated (by the suggested process) from anything else; that is, it must be ubiquitous and homogeneous.

[5] References to Buber are from the anthology by Kessler.

b.e. hydomako is not sure whether his parents were human, and sometimes feels that the sun and the moon are his father and mother respectively (or vice-versa). He doesn’t have a belly button, and the operation to remove the alien implants is forthcoming. Sometimes he thinks that the world is a projection of some malfunctioning machine.

For further information, please contact ausu@ausu.org, or call 1-800-788-9041, ext. 3413.

“The empire never ended,” was a phrase that science fiction author Philip K. Dick was fond of using now and then to describe the state of our world. He was referring to the alleged “fall” of the Roman Empire; however, his sentiment is that there was no fall, but only a changing of the guard. That is to say, Mr. Dick felt that the Roman Empire has merely changed hands a few times over the course of history, and its mentality has never quite escaped the ruling elite who structure and guide our society. He saw all around him, here in our modern world, hands of the Roman Empire shaping the course of our lives.

One of the things that the Roman Empire used to do in order to distract its populace from paying attention to how corrupt its rulers were was to put on shows referred to by some as “bread and circuses.” These were the spectacular blood sports held in places like the Coliseum. What the Roman rulers would do is bring in the underprivileged and the marginalized of their society, give them a place to sit, feed them bread, and then entertain them with gladiatorial combat, elaborate games, chariot races, etc. All of this, as far as I can see, centered around three things: food, violence, and persuasion. Certainly, if we are among the lower classes of a society and yet are fed by the rulers of that society, then we are less likely to want to do something about the corrupt elite. Hunger can be a powerful motivational force, and if it is satiated, then people are more likely to remain docile. The spectacle of violence is also a powerful thing in the lives of humans. If our ruling elite offers us violence for our spectator pleasure, then we are again less likely to resort to violence against these same rulers as they are fulfilling some primal need within their populace. These two things “food and violence” work together to create a powerful persuasive force which quells the opportunities to look at the atrocities of the rulers. I imagine that being able to witness death for sport while having a full belly all because of the ruler’s decree would make many people less likely to seek out and reveal the faults and the injustices of the society created and maintained by their ruler. Certainly we can see that Mr. Dick has a good point, if only we take the time to examine the society that we find ourselves living in.

Leaving many of the obvious examples aside for the time being, let us instead take a look at the recent “Greatest Outdoor Show On Earth” that came and went through Calgary earlier this summer.

I saw on the news that this year’s Stampede had the greatest number of animal deaths ever in the history of this outdoor exhibition. The rodeo took the lives of several horses and ended the lives of other animals as well. The CTV news reported SEE:
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20020715/stampede_animals_killed_020714/ that seven animals died for our viewing entertainment” twice as many as usual. One of the most deadly events, for humans and for horses alike, is the chuck-wagon race. Watching those little carts being pulled around the track by a whole team of horses conjures up notions of absurdity in at least this viewer. It appears to me that the proportions of driver and cart to the team of (I believe it’s) four full-grown horses are insane, and such scale of power to weight is simply looking for accidents and deaths. This year, the spectators of the Stampede were treated to exactly that: the deaths of horses on the chuck-wagon track.

And isn’t this all a little like the chariot races of the Roman Empire. Certainly, we are more “civilized” today in so far as we are not outright allowing the competitors in the event to try to kill each other during the course of the race, but really, how “civil” are we when we can still sit anonymously in a crowd in order to watch a spectacle before us which gives rise to a high possibility of injury and death? What is it that has really changed? We are still as willing to watch blood sports as we ever were, except now we have to pay large amounts of money for entrance to the fair grounds, food, and our seats in the grandstand. So really, the rulers these days are getting even more out of these “bread and circuses” because not only do they continue to distract us from the real problems in our world and also satiate our primal desires for violence, but we also shell out our hard earned money in order to perpetuate this epidemic of distraction.

Yep, Philip K. Dick was certainly onto something when he formulated his notion that the Empire never ended. Not only has it not ended, it has gotten more and more efficient over the years at being able to cover itself up in such a manner that not only do we have difficulty seeing how the Empire still exists today, but we also help pay for its perpetuation and maintenance. It is a subtle and vicious empire indeed, if we are unable to even recognize its hand gripped firmly around our throats.

b.e. hydomako is not sure whether his parents were human, and sometimes feels that the sun and the moon are his father and mother respectively (or vice-versa). He doesn’t have a belly button, and the operation to remove the alien implants is forthcoming. Sometimes he thinks that the world is a projection of some malfunctioning machine.