Auld Lang Syne

Most people think of “time” as something of an absolute construct. The seconds and hours go on and on, irrespective of whatever is happening “in” time. Scientifically speaking, that is not accurate. First, time is essentially a measurement of motion. Whether it is the sun moving across the sky or the gears of a clock, if there is no motion at all anywhere, time effectively “stops.” That is why the religious question “What existed before God created the Universe?” makes no sense. If nothing exists that can move, there is no time, so there is no “before or after.” Albert Einstein put a finer point on this understanding with his “Theory of Relativity,” maintaining that time is not an absolute constant, but “relative” to gravity and space—the more the force of gravity on objects in motion, the slower time moves.  

Of course, this has always been obvious to poets and anyone who has been in love with anyone or anything. When William Blake writes that you can “Hold infinity in the palm of your hand and eternity in an hour,” he is saying that our perception of time is altered by our experience. Lovers, athletes, singers—anyone who can be totally engrossed in any activity will say, albeit only after the fact, that “time stood still” or that they lost all awareness of time.  

In spiritual jargon, this is the difference between the Greek “kronos” and “kairos.” “Kronos,” as in “chronology,” is our usual understanding of time—one moment/day/year after another that we can chronicle in terms of what has happened. “Kairos” is a particularly special moment in which everything is experienced simultaneously as a unity. Self awareness is blurred in this sensation of being “one with everything.” That may sound too bizarre—until one thinks of personal experiences that are just like that. It might be singing in a choir or watching a movie or making love. The great basketball player, Michael Jordan, was once asked how all the noise of the crowd or the pressure of a championship game didn’t distract him from making so many game winning shots. “It is strange.” he said. “When I’m in that situation, there is no crowd…there is no noise…there isn’t even a defender. There is just me and the ball and the hoop. That’s it.” 

That the awareness of self becomes merged into the activity is part of this experience. This may be what Jesus was suggesting with “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it.” (Matthew 16:24-28) In Zen, the thought is even more explicit: “Be dead. Be thoroughly, absolutely dead. Then do what you will. All will be well.” 

Put another way, “kronos” is physical and everything that is physical is temporary. “Kairos” is spiritual and eternal. That which is spiritual is not subject to the inevitable decay of the physical. As C.S. Lewis put it, “Humans are amphibians – half spirit and half animal. As spirits they belong to the eternal world, but as animals they inhabit time.” But maybe that is a little too clinical…too objective about a topic where there is no subject and object. Maybe the poet and preacher, Henry Van Dyke, hits it closer to the mark with: “Time is too slow for those who wait, too swift for those who fear, too long for those who grieve, too short for those who rejoice, but for those who love, time is eternity.” 

Or maybe, just maybe, it is best not to say anything at all and just, say, hold a flower in the palm of your hand.