This is getting more and more intriguing. Another quote this morning from the Scriptures to make the point I've been trying to get my head around this week. This time from the scripture reading during morning prayer. A quote from 2 Corinthians 12: 9-10.
I am most happy then, to be proud of my weaknesses, in order to feel the protection of Christ's power over me. I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and difficulties for Christ's sake.
And then the bombshell...
For when I am weak, then I am strong.
Again the same story: for a Christian this passage, especially the last line wouldn't really be odd or strange. For one who has spent months, and years listening, reading and meditating on this passage, there is no contradiction there. Rather a very consoling reassurance.
But for someone reading it as 'just another regular text', without the background of Christian life and living, the logical conclusion would be, it has to be either weakness or strength. Both of them cannot be said to be true at the same time. It is either-or. They are not compatible in the same breath (same line/same thought).
Cultures and traditions which have a rich history of viewing the inter-relatedness of everything stand at a real advantage here when it comes to language and meaning. When everything is connected to everything else, there is nothing that is explicitly or exclusively true or false. One is more prone to see the underlying network rather than the contradiction and incompatibilities. For instance, the Buddhist notion of Pratityasamutpada.
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