Lukisan Lord Frederick Leighton, Winding the Skein
“This is a wicked generation, it is asking for a sign.
The only sign it will be given is the sign Of Jonah”
Luke 11:29
God speaks his words and his will to humans -his noblest creature- every time and everywhere. His loving wisdom and His perfect revelation are always addressed and communicated to humans. God’s way to reveal his providence, his love, and his benevolence is through and with signs. This phrase through and with signs is not intended to limit God’s way to communicate his revelation but refers to human limitation and imperfectness as creatures. Signs are asked for and needed by humans just as Sadducee asked for a sign to Jesus to read, interpret and grasp God’s reality.
The reality, according to structuralism, is a bundle of signs because a sign will always lead to the other sign; one sign substitutes the other one. The sign can be distinguished in two forms: signifier and signified. The signifier means something which shows and delivers to something meanwhile signified is something that has been referred to and pinpointed by something. As the consequence, the reality is something that exists and at the same doesn’t exist. And something that exists and doesn’t exist at the same time is called trace. Then reality is a bundle of traces. The traces leave the messages for humans because they are entities that have never been but also have gone. What kind of messages has been left in the traces? They can be anything such are traces of ancient civilization, traces of the forming of the universe, and of course the trace of the divine. The divine messages hiding in the traces are needed to be read and interpreted.
One way to read and interpret the divine messages contained in the traces is to make journal writing. The journal writing records all the events which have become traces. This record done by the journal writing is experienced as the facilitator for understanding and for grasping the divine messages communicated through the events of life. The journal writing is also a mirror reflecting the traces of the divine inscribed to the human soul. According to Plotinus human soul is the sparkling of the divine. So the traces remaining in the human soul are the closest to the divine. Then when one looks at his soul more deeply, one also finds the clearness of the divine traces. These divine traces inscribed in the soul become divine voices. This divine voice whispers so softly through his heart. Therefore, the more he retreats into himself, the more he consults himself, and the more plainly he read the god’s love in his soul: just read and interpret and the trace of god and the happiness will emerge. These rules do not come from the principles of higher philosophy, but it is found in the depth of heart written by nature in characters which nothing can efface (Cf, Jaques Derrida, Grammatology)
The journal writing is not a philosophical book in which someone is proud of him cause of his brilliant thought. Journal writing is also not a theological book in which one can understand the divine by rationality. The journal writing is only a simple record and a note of the divine traces in which one has definite freedom to write, to interpret anything without being guilty to the divine one. Yes, it is freedom. Then, this writing is higher and more valuable than any writing. This brings ebullience to the person who writes continuously. He has found the signs. He has not asked again the signs like the Sadducee who had implored it to Jesus. And by journal writing, he knows and realizes that the signs bestowed to him are not only the sign of Jonah but the sign of life. Finally, he thanks the divine one for the messages hiding in traces and not only the messages but also for the divine love and benevolence existing in the traces of his life.
Copyright © 2018 ducksophia.com. All Rights Reserved