Tuesday, May 25, 2010

Hearing is not Hearing

As I not so subtly remarked in an earlier brief post. I find the biblical phrase ears to hear maddening. And I maintain that it quickly likely is supposed to be. So I have often wondered just what it is that our ears are doing when they are not hearing. Today something became clear. Our hearing is not hearing. Our hearing is speaking. What we call hearing is an already filtered, processed, and constructed account of reality. So to take a step back without knowing where the next step might come if at all I would suggest that biblical hearing is actually a vibration, a movement, a contact with flesh. This may well be a phenomenological account but I don't know enough about that to make any claims. In any event I will leave at that for now. No small realization for me at any rate.

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