Take the quick way, driver!

It's a rainy day in winter, a few days shy of the solstice, and it's cold and wet and gloomy here in Canberra.

Lately I've been thinking about Christianity, and by extension every other faith. In particular, fundamentalist, literal interpretations of religion.

When I first became a cab driver, I had an interesting passenger, who got into my cab one rainy afternoon and directed me to the Hackett shops. He had been shopping, and had a number of books with him. Naturally, being a bookseller, I was interested.

He had a copy of the Tao Te Ching, and indicated that this was not his only copy. As I have long been searching for the definitive translation of this book, I asked him how he felt his purchase measured up.

"It's not perfect," he replied, "but it looks very good."

He went on to mention a verse from the bible, and how one could equate it to the famous opening line of the Tao Te Ching: "The way that can be known / Is not the true way."

Jesus told his disciples, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me" (John 14:6).

My passenger told me that in some translations, the two sentences are the same, implying that one begat the other. I couldn't see how the Tao Te Ching could have influenced whoever wrote or translated the early Christian texts, given that congress between China and Europe must have been pretty sketchy at that time.

More to the point, the two sentences, each a foundation stone of a religion, contradict each other. The Tao says that if you know something is a fact, then it likely isn't true. At least not 100% true.

The Tao is a different way of looking at things. Water is more powerful than stone. What's missing is more important than what's present. What is left unsaid outweighs the stated.

So, using the Tao as my guide, I'm here to say that Jesus was speaking through his hat. And Mohammed. And the Buddha. They all said plenty of wise and valuable things, but whenever their statements narrowed down to a single way, take it or leave it, black or white, no alternatives, then that's rubbish.

But of course, that's using the Tao in a dogmatic, dictatorial way. And that, by definition, can't be true.

So my interpretation, and one that feels good to me, is that fundamentalists, whatever their racing colours might be, are full of crap. Those who interpret the Bible literally and take King James as gospel, every word is true, don't know what they are talking about. Those who reckon that if they fly a plane full of people into a skyscraper they'll fly straight into the premium lounge in the afterlife, what a sad and pointless waste.

If there's one thing I've learnt about religion, it is that there are many choices, many visions, and even if one is right, that makes all the rest wrong. It's like saying that out of all the nations in the world, only the USA is correct. So the majority is wrong. And out of all the States in the USA, only Alabama is right. And only Coon County has the right of it, more specifically, Billy-Joe of the Jones family of Hooter Lane in Okra City. There's always something to differ on, some tiny point of Bigendian doctrine.

I'm right, and everyone else is out of step.

I love the Tao Te Ching. It's recursive, full of riddles, full of doorways, full of possibilities. You could spend a lifetime pondering what it all means. It also ties in well with Uncertainty Theory. We are never going to know everything. We can't. Live with it.

"Do you know the back way to the shops?" my passenger asked. "It's a little more direct than going all the way around Maitland."

I confessed that I didn't know the short cut, but I'd get him there.

I dropped him off and pulled out my street directory. Now I know the exact best way.

Going bust

It's one of the problems of taxidriving. Junk food.

There's often no time to sit down and eat proper. A pie on the run, a burger and chips. You'll see the late night fast-food vans here and there around the city, and each one will have a following of taxidrivers, security patrols, truckdrivers, drunks, waiting for their fatty, salty, sugary food to be delivered.

I haven't succumbed yet, but each evening, after the rush has died down, there comes a time when my tummy starts to complain that it's empty. It all depends where I am, and sometimes I'll be within a stone's throw of my home, and I'll wander in and see if there's anything left over from the family dinner.

Other times, it's a matter of convenience, and though I usually choose Subway, with a high fresh vegetable component, sometimes it's the golden arches, or the Southern colonel.

And a little afterwards, one of the drawbacks of being confined in a small space with one or two strangers becomes apparent. Here's a poem I wrote some time back, which illustrates the problem:

Sunday Morning Coming Down and Letting Go
=========================================

After service this morning we lingered, we three,
The reverend Golightly, my dear wife and me.
The sun streamed in as we talked at the door;
The stained glass tinting the old wooden floor.
I relaxed for a moment, and then with a sigh
My breakfast beans blew quietly by.

I thought I’d escaped, and I would have had if
It hadn’t been quite so much of a whiff.
My wife stopped her chatter, sniffed and said “Pooh!”
Then gazed at me sternly. “Was that awful smell you?”
She gave me a Look and my heart gave a lurch,
What, admit before God that I’d farted in church?

“Me, dear? Of course not!” I said without thinking.
Holding my ground as they both stood there blinking.
A moment of hush and the reverend mused
“Oh it must have been me, then. Please do excuse!”