Creativity and Creation

March 24, 2002

Truth and Beauty

The Sunday of Orthodoxy appears at first sight to be a religious feast that exclusively concerns that segment of Christians, who belong to the Orthodox Church. A more detailed examination, however, persuades us that it is essentially a universal feast during which truth – as the supreme desire and ambition of the human spirit – is honored. Naturally, the variety of human conceptions of truth is such, that we cannot say that we approaching a unified and universal understanding of truth. Nevertheless, we are able to proclaim with conviction that the appreciation that all of us, and almost all people, have about truth is common, given and established. In this respect, Christ’s words, that “you shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free,” are universally accepted, irrespective of the particular religious faith, knowledge and philosophical stance of each person.

Even skeptics and all manner of agnostics, and in general all those who deny the human potential to approach and experience truth, cannot deny the Aristotelian assertion that humanity naturally thirsts for knowledge. They cannot deny the fact that such a natural attraction toward knowledge reflects or depicts a deeper and innate universal desire to achieve perfect and infallible knowledge of all things. This desire is what we otherwise call the knowledge of truth.

Behold, therefore, we are celebrating today a feast of Orthodox Christians, the feast of Orthodoxy. It is a feast of true opinion, or rather of true knowledge. It is not simply a feast concerning the secular triumph of one segment of people, who believe in certain truths. Rather, it is a universal feast, which emphasizes that any prevalence of a true opinion, or of a true knowledge, is universally profitable and worthy of more general celebration.

More particularly, from a narrow Christian perspective, the predominance of the opinion that the depiction of tangible reality is permissible today becomes a universal possession. For, the transmission of knowledge and the progress of science are not possible today without a form or picture or realistic representation, which the natural world assumes and through which we conceive the same natural world. Of course, we respect and even agree with the religious prohibitions against depicting the invisible Divinity. For, we do not permit imagination to substitute tangible perception. However, we are celebrating to day the possibility of depicting this tangibly perceived reality. In any case, through such depiction, we are able to communicate with one another and to convey knowledge and sentiments to each other.

It is precisely this purpose that is fulfilled by today’s musical reception. Through the universally accepted means of the musical harmony of notes and rhythms, the select composers and performers of the musical creations are conveying to us the truth that all of us share a potential for the common enjoyment of cosmic harmony. We can all enjoy and be grateful for this music. All people are able to delight in common. Therefore, the conception that the joy of wealth of one must correspond to the sorrow or deprivation of another is a delusion that is far removed from truth.

Music and Beauty

Naturally, the narrow-mindedness and greediness of so many people will not comprehend how participation in joy only increases this joy, while the sharing of sorrow only diminishes the sorrow. Yet, the present musical enjoyment confirms that the joy of one person among us can never constitute a hindrance in the joy of another. Indeed, our joint participation in this enjoyment extends the pleasure that we experience, inasmuch as it strikes chords deep within the heart. These chords produce sounds of interpersonal harmony and love, and which also reveal the deeper and archetypal truth that all people are created to coexist, to share in joy and gladness, to live in peace and harmonious co0rdination.

Consequently, the Feast of Orthodoxy reveals to us its universal significance as a celebration of truth. Furthermore, this feast celebrates the affirmation of creation as being very good, inviting us to an understanding of the world that shares in the overall divine harmony and is detached from any dissonance and lack of harmony that result from an extreme and partial emphasis of only certain isolated elements. The natural and environmental balance is necessary for the survival of the world’s ecosystems; but it also leads to a moral balance between individualistic and communal ambitions, which are necessary for the smooth development of social systems.

The truth that sets us free indicates, through this music, that the harmony of our spiritual chords and rhythms is a necessary condition for the audience and delight of social, spiritual and universal harmony. It is for this harmony that we were created and intended. The Great Regulator of this universal harmony, according to whose rhythm the myriad of enormous galaxies as well as the boundless multitude of minuscule cells move, invites us to join in the harmony of the excellent unity of peace, love and truth which it suggests. Let us obey in order to hear ineffable otherworldly words on earth, words heard only by the chosen that ascend to the heavens.