The Territory Is Not the Map
The Territory Is Not the Map
Or, “Petty and Pedantic and Unreal”
C.S. Lewis was giving one of his talks on theology at the Royal Air Force, probably in sometime the 30s.
An old, grizzled WWI vet stood up and said, “I’ve no use for all that stuff…. I know there’s a God. I’ve felt him: out alone in the desert at night: the tremendous mystery. And that’s just why I don’t believe all your neat little dogmas and formulas about Him. To anyone who’s met the real thing they all see so petty and pedantic and unreal!”
You know, I like the cut of that guy’s jib. When I was growing up, I found my church to be petty and pedantic and unreal. So, I decided I didn’t believe any of it when I was 16.
Later in my life, I had more direct experiences of the divine. I thought, “THIS is the real thing!” Religious structures sometimes seem like a sad replacement for people who are too afraid to go to the desert and see the face of God. In fact, Carl Jung said that the reason religions exist is to prevent people from having religious experiences.
That’s funny. Also, as it happens, it’s one of the few times Jung was completely wrong (at least in this context).
As Lewis puts it, God is like a glorious vista of the ocean. Religion is like a map of the coastline. Yes, the ocean is much more glorious than a little flat paper representation. But the important thing about the map is that 1) it was compiled by thousands of people who have actually traversed that ocean, and 2) it can tell you where to stand to have a better vista.
As petty, pedantic, and unreal as religion can be, it is not there to prevent people from having a direct experience of God. The direct experience of God is the territory, sure. But religion is the map.
As many spiritual-types have pointed out, “the map is not the territory.” Yes. The map is not meant to be the territory. The map, obviously, is an abstraction; not just for the sake of abstraction. It's there so that you can orient yourself. Let’s flip that: the territory is not the map. Don’t think a direct experience with reality is a reason burn all maps.
What is that grizzled vet supposed to do with his rapturous experience of God? What does it actually tell him about how to live? Not much. If we live for beautiful vistas alone, we will become hopelessly lost and starve.
A lot of people talk about God as some abstract thing—some experience that they had while on psychedelics, from music or art, or during a near-death experience. That's better than nothing. Also, they universally report it was “more real” than “normal life.” If you have gone your entire life thinking that maps are the territory, you are going to be pretty pissed when you finally look up and see a sunset.
Still, however banal and imperfect the map is, it’s completely necessary. When we read the great books, we see there are imperfections (from our vista, anyway). Privately disappointed (but too afraid to say anything about it), we may poke our heads in the local church: the music is not as rapturous as we wanted, or the iconography is not as striking as we hoped, or we wish the pastor would conform more to what we think God is.
We’re like starving people who crawl away from a restaurant because the decorations are too kitsch.
If you’re lost (and more people are lost than are willing to admit it), try a map; at least long enough to see if it gets you closer to where you want to go.
It’s a mystery of secular materialism (which is neither the map nor the territory—more like a map masquerading as the territory) why, for example, the only thing that seems to cure addiction (which is the modern way of talking about sin, in case you hadn’t noticed) is admitting powerlessness to a higher power, conforming to a religious map, and then having a spiritual transformation as a result of that. Well, that’s just how it works. Sweep it under the rug, if you like.
Most people (even atheists) have had an experience of the divine. If you haven’t, this will all sound like nonsense—it’s not for you. To everyone else, I say: that was real. But, what are you going to do about it?
You can hope for more rapture. When you get it, you’re lucky. Yet, even if maps are petty and pedantic and unreal, we need them to help us live good lives and, yes, even find more instances of rapture.
The more I humble myself to the map, the more I’m in awe of how many brilliant people have contributed to it, and the better I am able to get where I want to go. Then, I’m struck by how unlikely it is that I would draw a map from scratch in my lifetime that is 1% of what they achieved.
