Tuesday 2 June 2015

The Universal Quest In Kipling And Anderson

Kim's lama walks around North West India seeking his River of Enlightenment. Mad though this quest is, we are all on the same quest in different forms. My friends go to church. I sit facing a wall. None of us walks around England peering into every river or stream. But we will know Enlightenment when it finds us - or when He finds us if you are a theist. The lama and I refer to one Aryan Lord whereas my Anglican friends refer to their Hebrew Lord. The Ways transcend nation and race. (Malcolm X met white Muslims at Mecca.)

Poul Anderson's Fr Axor travels between planetary systems seeking evidence for the Universal Incarnation. Will he find it? He might, but we expect that many of his contemporaries will not accept his interpretation of the data.

The lama and Axor, clergy beings in their respective traditions, are equally sincere. However, seekers are as multifarious as the Truth is manifold.

"'Stand by. The Divine, in whatever form It manifests Itself to you, the Divine is with us.'" (Flandry's Legacy, p. 261)

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