Ireneus was not a Platonist and he represents a Christian worldview which quickly disappeared under the influence of Neo-Platonism. His emphasis on the materiality of the body is an important counterweight to the influence of dualism and the remains of Manichaism. I suddenly realised how little weight is given in spiritual writing, and in mysticism generally, to the fact that we are social beings. There is the ‘love your neighbour’ bit but this is seen as an interim ethic for this life, important, but a sort of second best to loving God. The more the religious life is directed towards contemplation the higher it is believed to be. Carthusians are held in awe – solitary lives dedicated solely to contemplation. There is the idea of the Communion of Saints but it does not loom large in the writing of the mystics and I began to wonder why not.
The fact that we are social beings is of fundamental importance in our ordinary lives. It is social interaction which makes us what we are, gives us our identity and provides meaning for our lives. True, possessive individualism is a modern phenomenon and pretty widespread in this country. I listened to a programme driving in the car yesterday on why more and more women were deciding not to have children. The basic reason seemed to be the desire to be free of commitments so that they could do their own thing. To me this leads to the impoverishment both of the individual and of society. Paradoxically, we are most fully ourselves when we are most fully involved in relationships with others. The loners, those who hold themselves aloof from demanding commitments, are one-dimensional.
Of course relationships can be, often are, difficult. The more we give, the more is expected of us and we can often feel more drained than filled. Perhaps one of the roots of romantic love is the hope of finding one individual who can encapsulate all that we need in loving and being loved. One relationship is so much easier to deal with than a multitude and the couple becomes a microcosm of society. But even a true love can never be enough and we remain a son/daughter, father/mother, uncle/aunt, friend, cousin, neighbour, whatever. All these are aspects of our personality and to abandon them for just one relationship, or deny them, or cut them off is to diminish ourselves. Donne had it right all those years ago when he said,
‘No man is an Island, entire of it self; every man is a piece of the Continent, a part of the main; if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friends or of thine own were; any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankind; And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.’
All the more surprising then to find that in mystical experience generally there is very seldom the idea of union with others. There are experiences of union with nature, with the cosmos, with God but not, as far as I am aware, with other persons. The talk is of being oned with nature, of God dwelling in the depths of the soul, of the soul being caught up in God. It is all on an individual and one-to-one basis. This is understandable from a monistic worldview. The analogy of the individual drop falling into the ocean fits in with Hinduism but not with Christianity. Given that God is God, the transcendent, the absolute other, creator, origin of all that is – in comparison to whom the individual is less than a speck of dust, as Isaiah puts it – one can understand that the experience of union with him would be so overwhelming that all other relationships would fade to insignificance. God is love and all love is subsumed in him. If all individual love is subsumed in the love of God then so are the individuals. We are back to a sort of monism. This may be the reality of mystical experience but is it the reality of life after death?
If in loving one’s neighbour one loves God, the reverse must also be true. Love is self-giving. It is the giving of oneself to another. The strange thing about it is that the more one gives the more one has to give. It is an emptying of oneself but, like Elisha’s pot, the love does not run out. It is also a strange thing that one can love more than one person. In fact the more one loves the more one is able to love. Surely then in the utter transparency of life after death, when one encounters God face to face, is loved by him and loves in return, everyone else does not vanish from the picture. The experience of Heaven must also be an experience of a community of love. If then the communion of saints is a reality why does it not figure in mystical experience? People experience God, encounter Mary, sometimes individual saints, but never the community of love of all the blessed. Why? More on this later.