A Way of Knowledge

An unknown TV scriptwriter wrote, “Nietzsche believed that most culture exists purely to distract us from the truth.” I don’t know a lot about what Nietzsche believed, but it sounds exactly like something Yaqui Indian brujo don Juan Matus would have said. Not about Nietzshe, but about the reason culture exists.

In anthropologist Carlos Castaneda’s book The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge, don Juan says:

“For me there is only the traveling on the paths that have a HEART.. And the only worthwhile challenge is to traverse its full length. And, there I travel, looking, looking, breathlessly.”

Scholars have debated whether don Juan is a real person and whether the tales of the Yaqui brujo are fictional. A realist would insist that the books are fictional because many events in the books defy reality as we understand it. A believer in the Yaqui way of knowledge would say, of course these events defy our reality, because reality is far greater than what our culture comprehends—that is the whole point of the books.

Our culture becomes a fortress to protect us from forces and energies that we do not understand and cannot control. This makes sense, for even in the “real world” we have different cultures that can barely comprehend each other’s reality.

It seems to me that is what is occurring in our modern-day America. Republicans and Democrats, Red states and Blue states, Conservatives and Liberals, call them what you will, are firmly wedded to their own worldviews, to the extent that they can’t understand any other worldview. Disagreement is one thing; inability to grasp, tolerate, or accept, is very much another problem.

People should keep in mind that it’s possible that they are wrong. But for most people, that is “a bridge too far.” They can’t be wrong. Their entire worldview is built around a set of “facts” that they are certain are correct.

But then, maybe I’m wrong.