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The Way of the Heart : Journeys of Transformation

I am the Way, the Truth and the Life

Paul Beirne Talk 3

In September 2006 I journeyed to South Korea on a research grant to put the final touches on my book on Su-un. While I was there, it came to me that I really had to go and visit the spot where Su-un experienced his ecstatic encounter with the Lord of Heaven. I travelled down to Gyeong-ju and met my friend, Choe Cheong-day, a successful business man and Liaison Officer for the Cheondo-gyo church, and the great grandson of the second leader of the Donghaks, Choe Si-Hyeong, Haewol, who was responsible for preserving Su-un’s teachings through the publication of his Scriptures, and through his tireless effort to promote them. (Mr Choe and I had worked for several years in a three person team with a Buddhist scholar, Dr Frank Tedesco, to translate the Donghak/Cheondo-gyo scriptures in to English.)

Mr Choe drove me out to Mt Kumi, to the Cheondo-gyo Spiritual Practice Centre and introduced me to the Honorable Master Pak Nam-song who administered to the Centre, and to his wife, Kim Jeong-ja. Mr Choe and I then walked up a winding path to an exquisite jewel of a building, the Yongdam (Dragon Pool) Pavilion (pictured), built on the spot where Su-un experienced his epiphany, which one approached over a stone bridge built over a tumbling mountain stream. We spoke for a while, and he left me there. Venerable Pak had given me the keys to the Pavilion, and said, “The mountain is yours, but join us for dinner at sunset, if you wish.” I stayed in this beautiful spot for four days. My only contact during this time was with Venerable Pak and Mrs Kim when we shared a simple meal from their vegetable garden. You see, I had come to this holy place to experience Su-un at the place where he was told by the Lord of Heaven that they shared the same heart --a seminal moment in the religious, social and political history of Korea.

I meditated on Su-un’s writings, and sat for hour after hour at the spot in front of his portrait where he encountered the Lord of Heaven, wanting something to happen. And of course, it didn’t. Finally, on the fifth day, I gave up. I left the Pavilion, walked across the bridge, and instead of taking the path down to the retreat centre, I headed up the stream into the woods and sat at the base of a waterfall under an ancient fir tree. I closed my eyes in the warm sunshine and for a few minutes chanted

the first verses of the Chumen, the Sacred Chant, Chi Ki Kum Chi—ultimate energy being now within. . . and then just let go.

All that I can remember of that time, however long it lasted, was being present completely, as if suspended in time, to the sounds of the waterfall and the song of the cicadas that played in the background. Conscious of no thing, and of everything.   Obviously words fail in this context—as you would understand. When I came out of this trance - let’s call it that - I felt intrinsically and completely connected to, and in harmony with, everything around me, the waterfall, the bubbling stream, its pools of clear water, the sunlight, the trees with their dappled leaves, the rocks and tiny frogs - and at complete peace with and in them.

I knew instinctively then that I had had to move out of the Pavilion and to leave all my careful plans behind in order to ‘find’ Su-un, or more importantly, what Su-un stood for, and what he had experienced.
Later that day, when I was about to leave this sanctuary in the mountains, I went for a walk with Honorable Pak. He enquired about my time on Kumi Mountain, and I somewhat sheepishly recounted for him my experience of the morning. As I soon as I had finished my story he grasped me by the hand, looked my directly into my eyes and said excitedly—“This place is not about Su-un; don’t come here looking for him--he died 150 years ago. This place, and anywhere you are, is about being filled with Ryeong, the Spirit; of being of one heart with the Lord of Heaven; of showing utmost respect to all humans, to all creatures and to all creation. For this is where the Lord of Heaven resides, in your and in the heart of all that exists.

  

Your journey here to Yongdam on Mt Kumi was not to discover Su-un, but to find yourself.”O sim cheuk yeo sim: My heart is your heart" (How can humankind know this?)

On my return to Seoul, the day before I was to return home, I received an invitation to the Cheondo-gyo Central Headquarters in Insa-dong, Seoul, to meet the Venerable Kim Dong-hwan, the Supreme Leader of the Cheondo-gyo religion. I sat opposite Venerable Kim in his office on the tenth floor of the administration building, and after inquiring about my time in Korea, he said “Tell me why you, a foreigner, are studying and writing about our native religion Donghak/Cheondo-gyo?” This question caught me off guard, and wasn’t sure how to answer. Then I noticed a copy of the Cheondo-gyo Scriptures on the desk between us. I picked it up, turned to Nonhak-mun Chapter 6, and read the words: O Sim chuk Yeo Sim: My heart is your heart. “That is why” I said.

As with Honorable Master Pak Nam-song, the Supreme Leader of the Cheondo-gyo reached over and grasped my hands and said: “Yes. Yes. That is the core of our religion. I am so very happy that you understand this.” He then gave me a beautiful present, a delicate bowl inlaid with the Chinese character Sim: heart, which belonged to him, and which, he told me, he filled with pure water every evening and chanted the Jumun, the Sacred Incantation, one hundred times with his family to be aware together of the presence of the Lord of Heaven in their hearts.

I wish to say at this point that I have been profoundly blessed to have had the opportunity to explore at ever deeper levels the profound truths which reside in the Dao, the Way; in the Sip-u-do, the Ten Oxherding Pictures; and in the Donghak/Cheondo-gyo religion and the Way of the Heart central to their belief. I believe these truths and these experiences have had a profoundly formative effect on my life, precisely because I did not seek them for any other reason than to understand and to respect them. And I believe I am a better person and a better Christian for it.

I will not do a disservice to your experience and knowledge of these traditions and of the extraordinarily rich Christian tradition which you and I are committed to following.   But I will point out that for me, my trip to Yongdam, Mt Kumi, put me in touch again with Mary of Magdalene when she ran to the tomb to find Jesus and said to the Gardener, who asked her: “Who are you looking for?” and she replied: “If you have taken him away, tell me where you me where you have laid him and I will go and remove him?” and the Gardener replied: “Mary”, and then said to her: “Do not cling to me. . .I am ascending to my Father and to your Father, to my God and your God.”

And it put me in touch again, with a deeper understanding, with the two disciples who conversed with a man on the road to Emmaus, who recognized the Lord in the breaking of the bread, and then he vanished from their sight.

What is the Christian Way, for you?

You have discovered it, and are discovering it on your journeys.
The Dao de Jing says:
The Way that can be spoken of is not the constant Way.
This may be true of the Dao.

But the Christian Way does have a name and it can be spoken. I  am the Way, the Truth and the Life.  No one comes to the Father except through me.  We know this from the Gospel of John, Ch 14, verse 6:
I  am the Way, the Truth and the Life.  No one comes to the Father except through me.

In Jesus, the Way is personified and incarnated.

We have travelled through various meanings of the Way, and in doing so, I hope that when we hear the words: I am the Way, the Truth and the Life; they will have a more profound depth of meaning for each of us.  What do they mean to you, and for you, and in you, now at this moment?
Granted, we have heard this verse so often. Perhaps we need to hear it afresh, in symbolic, poetic language; language which depicts a dusty, well-travelled figure, who wanders into the marketplace of our hearts, and all its trees blossom at his presence.

In conclusion, I quote from  W H Auden:

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