Gentle rain falls on me
and all life folds back into the sea
we contemplate eternity
beneath the vast indifference of heaven
They say “everything’s all right”
they say “better days are near”
they tell us “these are the good times”
but they don’t live around here…
-- Warren Zevon, “The Vast Indifference of Heaven”
Through De La Torre’s anthology regarding liberation across world religions, what “core” values exist, and to what extent do these values reflect a common interpersonal ethics? I have followed Ryan’s keen lead in initiating a discussion of commonality and liberation with Warren (“Werewolves of London”) Zevon lyrics, as few popular singer-songwriters were as successful in providing creative and new musical statements about individuals’ liberation: amidst “Lawyers, Guns, and Money,” the aforementioned werewolves, and a Bad Luck Streak in Dancing School (an album title), Zevon’s conceptualization of spiritual liberation held at its core a search and expectation of unrevealed wisdom at work and at present, always and already.
De La Torre’s anthology is fascinating, providing glimpses of major world religions as current foils to the ever-springing Occupy movement, and other acts of social, political, and economic liberation: believing not that the Occupiers are a diametric galvanization to the Tea Party, but that both entities in the public sphere may sum to mean that more of us than ever are on the Outside Looking In, at something we’re not sure we can trust (my apologies for my potentially-offensive, inclusive pronouns). Which of these two social, political, and economic movements contains as useful a statement as a Warren Zevon lyric may be a useful rhetorical analysis; world religions’ consistency in ethical and ‘merge-able’ principles, as described in De La Torre’s anthology, is the rock n’ roll of this brief discussion.
Can world religions agree on a “vast indifference of heaven,” one in which liberation rests outside of individuals’ experience, to be revealed in a variety of ways? Omar’s description of the nature of liberation in Islam is interesting for many reasons: “being just implies in the Qur’anic sense being so in all spheres of life, especially in social dealings. Hoarding of wealth is considered a serious act of injustice toward the underprivileged and the disadvantaged” (p. 103). Because a spiritual entity exists beyond the experience of any individual, a general ethic of common value resonates: “there is no justification for one human being’s exploitation, subjugation, or oppression of another human being on the basis of claims of superiority in any respect” (p. 102). As an ultimate ethical judgment lies beyond this sphere, Omar describes crusades for poverty as part of Islam’s normative tradition.
In Hinduism, Rambachan cites a spiritual leader and mentor as saying, “there is no suffering in the world as great as poverty” (p. 119); Rambachan adds that “the Hindu tradition has never glorified involuntary poverty” (p. 119), describing the attainment of material wealth as to some extent necessary in attaining the four ends (artha, kama, dharma, and moksha). The attainment of our ‘human ends’ and the legitimization of wealth concur and abide with a search for dharma, as “the attainment of wealth and pleasure by inflicting suffering on others, or by denying them the opportunities to freely attain these ends, is opposed to dharma” (p. 122). As in Islamic liberation, one’s attainment of food, clothing, and shelter is a prominent and important spiritual act, and actions and systems that impede individuals from gathering these resources run against any commonality.
Rambachan is careful to describe Hinduism as “not antimaterialist,” but seeking a good-natured attainment of person, place, and property for all. Ellis’ discussion of Judaism is a complicated essay regarding the state of Israel and the nature of Jewish identity, seeking a more clear understanding of where and when spiritual liberation has, will, and continues to take place. Following contextualization of Jewish identity following the Holocaust—including insightful interpretation of Weisel’s work—Ellis discusses how ethical, social, and political dimensions of Judaism may exist in the 21st century. “Surely the naming of God is less important than action on behalf of justice” (p. 85); and, citing Irving Greenberg in 1977, “the victims ask us above all not to allow the creation of another matrix of values that might sustain another attempt at genocide” (p. 82). Ellis’ contribution to the nature of Jewish identity here is important, as he addresses directly the problem of the displaced Palestinian people. Furthering my understanding of recent headlines, including a proposed United Nations’ vote on Palestinian statehood, I appreciate Ellis’ discussion, including the progressive and changing nature of what Greenberg called a “matrix of values;” I take such a matrix to be what’s under discussion most in this country, including within the rhetoric of the Occupy movement.
As Ellis identifies liberatory theologians across a religious spectrum as being “in exile from their own communities” (p. 89), Zevon’s ‘vast indifference of heaven’ remains beyond our language (“as if our own naming was the naming” (p. 87)). Puntarigvivat’s discussion of Buddhism is quick to criticize those who pursue meditation as an exile, and individualistic retreat, not paying “sufficient attention to the way the society in which they live is organized” (p. 131-132). Citing historical and modern examples of ways in which Buddhists may reach beyond transcendence of suffering and into liberation from systems of oppression, Puntarigvivat cites Buddhadasa as promoting an ethical and natural harmonic state, in which “no being, whatever form it has, hoards surplus for its own sake […] According to Buddhadasa, human beings can and should produce a surplus, but the surplus should be distributed for the well-being of everyone” (p. 149). This may account for any bloody, dramatic and carnivorous footage of the animal kingdom one’s ever seen, but stops short of any tendencies of social Darwinism: as we evolved creatures have the capacity to, we should busy ourselves working to insure the well-being of all individuals, as such well-being is critical, its insurance serving as an individual’s spiritual activity.
What stands apart from these threads of concern and care for the poor in liberation across world religions? Rieger’s summation of Protestantism offers an awkward notion of concern for the poor, one in which individuals’ salvation is linked to all, no matter what they hoard or how: “God’s option for the poor, the marginalized, the hurt […] does not mean that God does not care about the wealthy and the powerful who inflict pain often without being aware of it” (p. 44). While Protestantism’s function in providing one a justification and understanding of liberation extends to a variety of denominational contexts, economic liberation and concern for the poor appears two steps away from manifestation in Rieger’s description: “Liberation theologies thus search for the best interests of all, seeking the liberation of both oppressors and oppressed by paying attention to where the pain is greatest. If this is seen, the rest of theology can no longer continue with business as usual” (p. 47). Liberation in Protestantism is, unlike other world religions discussed in this essay, unable to accept any ‘vast indifference,’ but seeks to establish and nurture individuals’ relationships with a higher entity, “from the bottom up” (p. 49). Liberation, as described by Rieger, comes through acceptance of a salvation; Rieger seeks to defend the universal availability of this spiritual decision, against “Latin American liberation theologians” who “have made famous the idea of a ‘preferential option for the poor’” (p. 40).
Among the religions discussed in this essay, Protestantism appears least likely to accept Zevon’s lyrics that describe an Other misnaming the quality of our time: “they tell us “these are the good times”/they don’t live around here” (Zevon) rings least with Rieger’s notions of spirituality as a means for individual’s liberation (“the point of departure of [Protestant, Christian] liberation theology is not primarily social ethics […] or general political or economic assumptions about the common good; the point of departure and the very heart of the enterprise is a new vision of God” (p. 40)). Should we be revealed some glimpse of the ‘vast indifference of heaven,’ and gain a liberatory new conceptualization of our existence, to what extent will we acknowledge and entreat our attention to the poor, the disadvantaged, the downtrodden? Or, to what extent shall we proceed on, as stoic individuals, whose spiritual liberation extends not to our bank accounts or holdings? In my digestion of De La Torre’s anthology, I have gained new appreciation for the Occupy movement, as individuals critiquing a “matrix of values,” seeking liberation from an oppressive system.
Time marches on
Time stands still
Time on my hands
Time to kill
blood on my hands
my hands in the till
down at the Seven Eleven…
-- Warren Zevon, “Vast Indifference of Heaven”
De La Torre, M., ed. (2008). The Hope for Liberation in World Religions. Waco: Baylor.
Will, G. (2011). "Can Occupy Wall Street give progressives a lift?" Washington Post. October 13. Retrieved from http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/can-occupy-wall-street-give-liberals-a-lift/2011/10/11/gIQA8GyCgL_story.html
Zevon, W. (1993). “Vast Indifference of Heaven.” Learning to Flinch. Vinyl. Burbank: Warner Brothers. Available at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SaDOnOWX7Yc&feature=related

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