Day 21

"I Am," who am I?

The more I say about God's nature, dwelling, activity and/or name, the more I realize the irony of my saying it. Even using those three letters seems absurd, capitalizing the first as if it were the name of the holy and mysterious, wholly other. The Jews seemed closest to the dilemma, explaining that G-d's name was 'unspeakable' (G-d is the proper printed form among many Jews today, not to avoid writing it, but to avoid it being erased or defaced once it's been written.)

Is there a name that can capture or describe G-d? Given the abundance of names, titles, and activities ascribed to the divine in the Hebrew and Christian scriptures, I'd guess the answer is 'no.'

"Where does G-d dwell?" seems an equally absurd question - as if we were going to mail a letter and needed an address. Here again, there are plenty of locales offered in scripture: the heavens, the heart, the Temple, countless locations where G-d marked by a pile of stones (primarily where G-d intervened on behalf of or against the Israelites.

Yet, week after week, I stand up with much to say about G-d: where G-d is, what G-d's been up to, what G-d intends for us or expects from us... . This is the crux of the irony. How can we keep silent? Yet, what can we say?

I recall a story told about a theologian who'd written volumes explaining the nature and activity of God. After completing it, he had a dream where he was pushing a cart piled his pages up the mountain of God. Eager to show his 'offering' to the divine, he passed the angels and attendants around the throne who laughed at the comparatively infinitesimal work.

In his book, God Laughs and Plays, David James Duncan writes, "It is necessary to define words. It is also at times necessary to undefine them. One of my aims as a writer of faith is apophatic. From the Greek word apophasis. An apophasis is an unsaying. Out of all the words I have heard in my time, "G-d" is in my view the one most grievously abused by humans; the one most deserving of a careful unsaying."

"Who is this 'I Am?' " "Where does G-d dwell?" Perhaps they're the wrong questions. If it's not equally absurd, maybe we should be asking, "Who am I in the presence of this 'I Am?' "

May we hear our names and find our place in the family of all that is created.