Today we are going to go a little deep here on the Buzzyblog, but I assure you that it is only for today and tomorrow we will be back cruising the land of country stores, jokes, rock n roll and b.s. as usual.
As for going deep, I have to warn you upfront that whenever I try this, I am a little like that Titan submersible in that I require a lot of QA help and oversight when exploring deep subjects. So bear with me here.
I consulted Father Thomas Merton’s Daily Meditations for 26 June. After reading the following discussion of banalities and abstractions, poetry and naked minds, my first thought was “Where the heck is the Heraklitean River?” (Told you I’m shaky on all of this philosophical stuff.)
After some googling, the best I could determine is that there is no real Heraklitean River and that it is a reference to the Greek philosopher Heraclitus (click here.) (Think maybe they changed that c to a k for a reason?)
The river reference has to do with Heraclitus’ famous quote that one can not step in the same river twice. It all has to do with some larger theory of his that everything is in flux, life is constant change, opposites attract and we’re all gonna die. (OK I just threw that die business in there but you get my drift – things are moving until they aren’t.)
Somewhere in my internetting though, I came upon an even more interesting discussion of all of this on a blog written by a retired Episcopal priest (click here.) Here is what he had to say about Merton, the river, his father etc:
Think I’ll swing by St. Michael’s Cemetery later today and say hello to some folks that I know there.
Rivers have always been metaphors for life, growth, change and even death. Johnny did a couple “river songs” including this remake. (To read about the “vainest knife” lyric click here.)