Human Genius Lies in Admitting Error (and Lovingly Addressing It)
"Fully human" is a fertile hybrid between the imperfect ignorance of error and the perfect knowing of love
Human being is imperfect perfection. This apparent contradiction is the source of both human genius and human suffering. It is also the fount of human creativity. Leonardo Da Vinci’s famous image, the Vitruvian Man pictured above, demonstrates this principle. The divine proportion and symmetry of the human body contrasts with the earthly aches and pains that same body suffers on a daily basis. WTF?
Why are we constantly bedeviled by this two-fold, contradictory reality? Why the Angel of Perfection and Virtue on one shoulder and the Devil of Imperfection and Vice on the other? Yet there is genius in this if we embrace this apparent contradiction as the primary condition for our own creativity, including that greatest form of creativity called love.
We can all understand the desire to escape a bizarrely confusing human life, but, think about it: Maybe there is a different trouble with the heavens and the higher dimensions. Might it get a little boring? With all the higher realm Eden-like guarantees of eternal bliss and refinement, perhaps things get a bit too “white bread,” and we decide to alight here on earth for a little excitement and complication.
Maybe we need the introduction of density and raggedness in order to EXPERIENCE the full substance and nature of the finer frequencies. Perhaps the absence of perfect bliss makes our hearts grow fond of the sublime and more keenly appreciative of our spiritual birthplace.
So why don’t we just embrace the contradiction? Why are we pissing and moaning and pitting perfection and imperfection against each other?
Why indeed?
Do we not see this crucial existential error made in our theologies and our interpretations of spiritual prophets? I stopped reading a book on Jesus by James Martin, a Jesuit follower, precisely because of his refusal to accept error as essential to full humanity. As a result, his book became instantly uninteresting. Here is the doctrinaire passage on page 2 that turned me off:
Jesus is fully human and fully divine… Jesus was born and lived and died, like any human being… He needed to be nursed, held, burped and changed… He experienced sexual longings and urges… As a fully human being with fully human emotions, he felt both frustration and enthusiasm. He grew weary at the end of a long day and fell ill from time to time… Like all of us he sweated, sneezed, and scratched… Everything proper to the human being— except sin— Jesus experienced. (my emphasis)
Wah? Jesus was fully human except for the one thing that makes us truly human— ERROR, along with ignorance, losing our cool, and even sometimes being cruel. Yes we can love, but we can also hate. “To err IS human,” fully human.
Inexplicably, right after offering this completely illogical and unsupported statement about a stain-free Jesus (can you just see Jesus hawking laundry detergent— “See, spotless, just like me!”), Martin offers an example of Jesus from the gospels on page 3 which sure looks like sin to me.
Jesus sharply rebukes a woman and denies her request to heal her daughter. Why did Jesus apparently kick the old woman to the curb? Because she was not Jewish. Jesus’ “kind words” to her went like this: “It is not fair to take the children’s food [i.e. the children of the tribes of Israel] and throw it to the dogs [goy rabble like this old woman]).” The woman then owned Jesus with the reply: “‘Yes it is, Lord,’ she said. ‘Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.’” Basically she was saying that Jesus was treating her as less than a dog, and guess what? He was!
Any morally discerning person could rightfully chastise Jesus for this display, as he was wont to do with others. Last time I checked, strident prejudice certainly qualifies as a sin! Yes, Jesus may have wept, but he apparently also, on occasion, expressed contempt. It’s in the Bible for all who have eyes to see and ears to hear, even if modern-day Pharisees (intellectuals, preachers, and teachers) remain deaf and blind.
Perhaps, these scholars need Jesus to be spotless because of their own psychological vulnerabilities. Perhaps they desire perfection in their leader as a proxy for their own error, for their own tenuous security, power, and authority. It is a small but consequential step from prophet to idol, from messiah to dogma. Voila! An unimpeachable savior then emerges who is conveniently fully human, so you can fully relate to him, but somehow NOT, so you have to listen to him.
What a racket, and dare I say, a completely transparent and human sin!
I believe, if Jesus were asked point blank, that he would not only have admitted to sin, but used it as a teaching moment for the taming of arrogance, for forgiveness, and for spiritual redemption. “Perfection” in this sense is not spotlessness but BEING PERFECTED through the turn to our higher selves and higher guidance to resolve error, ignorance, and wrongdoing (also known as repentance). Jesus called this turn being “one with the Father” (i.e. at-one-ment). We can only admit error from our higher aspects. It is a humbling experience! We have much to learn, and I believe Jesus had much to learn as well, if he were indeed fully human.
Furthermore, to strip Jesus of sin is to strip him or divinity and communion with a loving, healing, and informing God. A spotless Jesus has no need for a Father or even a Mother for that matter. Nor would he be a good example to humans, providing a completely unreasonable and unreachable standard.
One may argue that Jesus may have lost it now and then, but that these lapses were justified and unintentional so as to not count as sins. To this we need merely look at the Greek root for sin— hamartia— which means “missing the mark.” Intention is not required for this root notion of sin. Simple error will do. We know this well in our own society. Child neglect is a form of abuse for this reason. It is precisely a LACK of intention when responsibilities arise that constitutes the sin. And it was Jesus’ lack of empathy and due attention to the old woman which constitutes the same.
It has been said that peace is not simply the absence of war but the presence of love. The same can be said for virtue: It is not the absence of sin or vice but rather the presence of responsible and loving address of real error, intended or unintended. What would happen if we developed a new morality, and even a new science, around the relationship between sin and goodness, error and correction, ignorance and learning, vice and virtue, instead of trying to pretend we are all one or the other.
A Buddhist open child’s mind is a good bulwark against the close-mindedness of the jaded adult, but there is something to be said for genuine adult maturity as well:
“When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways.” - 1 Corinthians, 13:11, NSRVA
It is time to grow beyond childish notions of being on Team Perfect. Not even the greatest among us has ever been perfect, because the condition of being fully human fully includes “missing the mark.” If this is so, then no “chosen” person or tribe has the authority to foist itself above others. No ideology has a claim to inherent rightness. No position or reputation can insulate the highest or condemn the lowest. Even excellence itself becomes a process of refinement through the responsible and glad address of error.
We are all one in error. And we are all one in love. And it is precisely in embracing these twin realities and the craft of their coming together that we will grow as individuals and as a species.
Thank you for this beautiful spiritual (and human) piece. I love when people refer to the core of spiritual traditions in a practical way. I believe that all great beings came to teach us to be like them - both human and divine. Yes, I am still learning to forgive myself my own mistakes...and sometimes my own enthusiasm creates them but also teaches me the joy of life. So I am getting there!
My study of Yashua and other Masters informs me that they possessed great skill in achieving states of being in the one-ness ...accessing the divine frequencies and transmitting this to others for healing, teaching, etc., And exhibiting unconditional love. However, the density of the material world, the third density, does not allow us to hold that high frequency, light energy always in our bodies; it's so fast and takes a great deal of processing to move through. The masters who walked here were all subject to being human. They all told us that all humans can access the same energy as they, and how, for those with the eyes to see and ears to hear. We have just forgotten that to be human is to be divine.