The Limits of Language, Part 2
By Jana on Mar 22, 2007
In my previous post, I discussed how language limits our ability to describe our spiritual experiences. I appreciated the responses to my initial query. After I posted my thoughts, I had one of those Doh! forehead-hitting moments where I realized that what makes an event spiritual is its ineffability. If it was a concrete, easily identifiable physical sensation such as tying one’s shoes, well then it wouldn’t really be about the connection to the divine. It’s the inexplicability of an experience that casts it in the realm of the spiritual.
Despite the limitations of language to describe the workings of the Spirit, my desire to do so is still strong. In grappling with this I’ve used various literary techniques to help my audience feel what I describe. As an attempt to share a bit of my effort with you, please consider listening to my short creative nonfiction piece, Pose, which blends the experiences of Mormonism, yoga, cancer, and disability with my urgent desire to connect to the divine. This story appeared in the March 2004 issue of Sunstone.
Listen to Pose.mp3
An experience that we call spiritual may be impossible to describe precisely, but that is not what makes it spiritual. Indeed all of life’s experiences are ineffable to some degree. Take the typical example used by missionaries: the taste of salt is ineffable. I have no way to convey to someone what it tastes like without saying simple that it is salty and relying on their own experiences of the taste of salt to decode the word. Such a mundane experience is not usually thought of as spiritual.
Comment # 1 by Jonathan Blake | Mar 22, 2007 | Reply
Why do missionaries typically use the example of the ineffability of tasting salt?
Comment # 2 by Jana | Mar 22, 2007 | Reply
To illustrate why they have a hard time describing the experience of the Holy Ghost.
Comment # 3 by Jonathan Blake | Mar 22, 2007 | Reply
The salt example is from a talk to mission presidents given by Boyd K. Packer some 15 years ago, called “The Candle of the Lord”. I suspect that for most people, the salt example is what sticks out. However, I have found that talk useful in my life for understanding more about the workings of the spirit. Many times, I find Elder Packer’s talks uncomfortable to listen to, and his thoughts sometimes inflexible, but this one is a standout for me. Not sure how to handle links, but here it is:
Comment # 4 by Kevinf | Mar 22, 2007 | Reply
Well, I told you I wasn’t sure how to handle the link, but I’ll try again
here:
Comment # 5 by Kevinf | Mar 22, 2007 | Reply
Actually, I’ve always found it fairly easy to describe the taste of salt.
it tastes like sweat.
Comment # 6 by Stephen Carter | Mar 23, 2007 | Reply
Stephen:
I think we’re on the same wavelength…I was going to reply that salt tastes like the sea or like my lover’s neck after a particularly steamy-warm afternoon. But yah, sweat does it just fine.
I’m wondering why missionaries use the salt example in teaching investigators about the Spirit? I don’t find it all that hard to dscuss how salt tastes. I find it _really_ difficult to tell someone why I would make an irrational choice based on a ‘feeling’ that I attribute to the Spirit. And even more difficult to describe what that feeling felt like.
Comment # 7 by Jana | Mar 23, 2007 | Reply
Perhaps I wasn’t clear in my first statement of the illustration. Your problem is to communicate how salt tastes to someone who has never tasted salt in any form, an alien from a saltless planet with terrible, bland food for example. By reverencing an experience of sweat or the sea, you are not communicating the experience by words alone. You are relying on your hearer’s own experience using codewords.
That’s also the role of phrases like “still small voice” and “burning in the bosom”: the communicator uses those phrases to remind the listener of experiences which the listener has already had. A listener who has never had that experience will not have the same experience vicariously through words alone. All experience is ineffable because words are not powerful enough.
So again, what does salt taste like?
Are you experienced?—Jimi Hendrix
Comment # 8 by Jonathan Blake | Mar 23, 2007 | Reply
You’ve all hit the proverbial nail on the head, which is that it’s much more of an art than a science. When we first taste salt, someone tells us that it’s salty, and we file that memory away for future reference. After a number of experiences with salty food, we can recognize it, but not explain it well to others, only by using the metaphors like Jana used above. They work with us, because we know that sweat is salty, the sea it salty.
It’s almost as if we need a spiritual feelings coach, to point out to us when we are feeling the spirit. To some extent, I expect that the missionaries try to do this. I know in our stake in the Northwest, we try hard to get new converts to begin to feel the spirit on a regular basis, by getting them to the temple for baptisms for the dead, or by inviting them to meet with the area authorities when they preside at a conference, or the stake president. I’ve learned through my own experience how to recognize those promptings and feelings, but it makes them no easier to explain.
There is also the issue of even taking note that a spiritual experience is taking place, sometimes lessens the impact. I suppose that it’s kind of like the Heisenberg uncertainty principle, as much of it as a liberal arts major like me can understand, that the very act of observation can alter the characteristics or behavior of the object being observed. That’s why so often the spirit sneaks up on us, and generally catches us unaware.
So what does salt (the spirit) taste like to me? Peace, mostly, just a comfortable sense of well being. And on occasions, rare occasions, a sudden leap of the heart, and burst of adrenaline. Unless it’s telling me Not To Do Something, and then it’s the opposite, a sense of anxiety and unsettledness.
My wife dreams dreams that are definitely influenced by the spirit, while my dreams are mostly influenced by the statin drugs I take for high cholestrol. I’ve learned that for me, dreams are not usually an expression of the Holy Ghost. I have on a few occasions suddenly had images pop into my mind, very vivid visual representations.
One example only. When faced with making a decision about a job that entailed a move, and talking on the phone with the individual who would be my boss, I suddenly had an image of a red brick wall appear in my mind, with a large yellow detour sign on it. The message was “don’t go this way”, and once I had made that decision not to accept this offer of employment, I had the sense of peace that I have previously mentioned. Not very articulate, but the verification of peace came immediately, and subsequent events verified the issue for me.
Comment # 9 by kevinf | Mar 23, 2007 | Reply