Holy Books
Jun. 2nd, 2026 07:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
poliphilo They want to set up an learning/study group at the Meeting House. Great idea. I'm in favour of all such initiatives.
An initial suggestion is that the group should study Faith and Practice- the Bible-sized tome I think of as The Big Red Book- as distinguished from Advices and Queries which I think of as The Little Red Book.
I express approval.
"But you hate Faith and Practice" says Ailz who is sitting beside me.
"Well, yes, but...."
Jacob comes to my resue. "It's rather prescriptive." he says.
"Yes, exactly...."
"So do you have any favourite Quaker books we could look at..." he suggests. Ever so kindly.
I'm on the back foot now. Can I think of any? No I can't. "I don't read Quaker books," I say. And that's true. I don't.
"That's very odd," he says, still kindly (he's a psychotherapist).
"Yes," I agree. "It is odd......"
Had I been all bright and sparkly instead of tired and tongue-tied I might have said- turning a negative into a positive- "But it's one of the things I love about Quakers. that they're not a people of the Book."
Holy books are such a drag. They calcify past movements of the spirit, turning insight into law. I love the story of the newly appointed Zen abbot who was handed the monastery's greatest treasure- an irreplaceable manuscript book in which previous abbots had written their deepest thoughts- and threw it straight on the fire....
An initial suggestion is that the group should study Faith and Practice- the Bible-sized tome I think of as The Big Red Book- as distinguished from Advices and Queries which I think of as The Little Red Book.
I express approval.
"But you hate Faith and Practice" says Ailz who is sitting beside me.
"Well, yes, but...."
Jacob comes to my resue. "It's rather prescriptive." he says.
"Yes, exactly...."
"So do you have any favourite Quaker books we could look at..." he suggests. Ever so kindly.
I'm on the back foot now. Can I think of any? No I can't. "I don't read Quaker books," I say. And that's true. I don't.
"That's very odd," he says, still kindly (he's a psychotherapist).
"Yes," I agree. "It is odd......"
Had I been all bright and sparkly instead of tired and tongue-tied I might have said- turning a negative into a positive- "But it's one of the things I love about Quakers. that they're not a people of the Book."
Holy books are such a drag. They calcify past movements of the spirit, turning insight into law. I love the story of the newly appointed Zen abbot who was handed the monastery's greatest treasure- an irreplaceable manuscript book in which previous abbots had written their deepest thoughts- and threw it straight on the fire....
