--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "Marek Reavis" <reavisma...@...> wrote: > > Richard, the phrase "in need of a kneel" got me laughing > so hard -- thanks for that. > > Kneeling is such an intentional posture; and the idea > that it's just a posture, merely equivalent with any other, > and that a person would assume that pose immediately > following a religious(-type) ceremony (and on cue from the > instructor), and not draw the immediate conclusion that the > whole thing is religion-based is absurd.
The point, of course, is that the person kneeling is the one who imputes meaning to it. There's nothing *inherently* religious about kneeling (e.g., one kneels in the garden to plant bulbs and pull weeds). Of course specific contexts narrow the possible meanings for the individual who kneels. But there's still a range. When I was initiated, I assumed the gesture to kneel had to do with showing respect for my teacher, to whom the ceremony was pretty obviously important. But I didn't see it as any different from the way Christians will don a yarmulke when they attend a Jewish ceremony of ome kind, or the way Obama made a very low bow to the Saudi king recently--sort of a "When in Rome..." attitude. It would never have occurred to me in a million years that I would have been committing myself to worship Guru Dev or the teachers of the "Holy Tradition" if I had knelt. That wouldn't have been what *I* meant by it. If the teacher was religious, that was OK with me, but I had no intention of joining his religion, if that's what it was. As it happens, I respectfully declined to kneel just on general principles, and that appeared to be fine with the teacher. If he'd *insisted* that I kneel, on the other hand, I probably would have walked out. That it was voluntary confirmed to me that he respected my autonomy amd wasn't trying to convert me to anything.
