沈默的雄辯高談 或 沈默的大辯不言
EVERY ONE OF US KNOWS THE SENSATION OF GOING UP, on retreat, to a high place and feeling ourselves so lifted up that we can hardly imagine the circumstances of our usual lives, or all the things that make us fret. In such a place, in such a state, we start to recite the standard litany: that silence is sunshine, where company is clouds; that silence is rapture, where company is doubt; that silence is golden, where company is brass.
大家都知道當我們退隱去攀登高山的那種節節高升感覺, 那種欣然振奮的情緒使我們忘卻了平凡的生活, 或使人煩躁的瑣事。此情此景，促使我們開始吟詠標準的禱文：當喧囂若雲霧迷蒙，沈默是撥雲艷陽；當喧囂若重重迷惑，沈默是欣喜若狂；當喧囂若普通黃銅，沈默是珍貴黃金。
But silence is not so easily won. And before we race off to go prospecting in those hills, we might usefully recall that fool's gold is much more common and that gold has to be panned for, dug out from other substances. "All profound things and emotions of things are preceded and attended by Silence," wrote Herman Melville, one of the loftiest and most eloquent of souls. Working himself up to an ever more thunderous cry of affirmation, he went on, "Silence is the general consecration of the universe. Silence is the invisible laying on of the Divine Pontiff's hands upon the world. Silence is the only Voice of our God." For Melville, though, silence finally meant darkness and hopelessness and self-annihilation. Devastated by the silence that greeted his heartfelt novels, he retired into a public silence from which he did not emerge for more than 30 years. Then, just before his death, he came forth with his final utterance -- the luminous tale of Billy Budd -- and showed that silence is only as worthy as what we can bring back from it.
然而，沈默可不是隨手拈來的。當我們興致勃勃沖向群山尋找它之前，也許應該緊記愚笨的人誤為金子的黃鐵礦是較容易獲取的，而真金卻需要費力淘洗、挖掘才能有所收獲。壹位最傲慢和最能言善辯的作家，Herman Melville 寫道：“壹切精辟深奧的事物以及它們的情感都是受沈默的先導和眷顧。”他繼續激發起更高昂雷鳴般的肯定呼聲寫道：“沈默是宇宙的壹種獻祭。沈默是神聖造物者以無形的按手給予這世界的恩賜。沈默是我們上帝的唯壹聲音。”然而，對 Melville 而言，沈默最終意味黑暗、絕望與自我湮滅。由於他誠摯的作品只得到沈默的反應，使他備受打擊而身心交瘁，從此緘默無聲地退隱長達三十年。隨後，在他溘然長逝之前，他重現身影發出最後的言辭 - 《比利巴德》的光輝故事 – 以此顯示沈默的價值只與我們從中的得益等值。
We have to earn silence, then, to work for it: to make it not an absence but a presence; not emptiness but repletion. Silence is something more than just a pause; it is that enchanted place where space is cleared and time is stayed and the horizon itself expands. In silence, we often say, we can hear ourselves think; but what is truer to say is that in silence we can hear ourselves not think, and so sink below our selves into a place far deeper than mere thought allows. In silence, we might better say, we can hear someone else think.
沈默是需要我們去賺取的；然後要努力爭取讓它存在而不是消失，充實而不是空虛。沈默並非是片刻的靜默；它是壹處引人入勝的迷人地方，在那，有毫無障礙的空間、時間停滯不前、界限自我延伸不斷。我們時常說，沈默讓我們聽到自己的思考；然而更確切的說，沈默使我們聽到的不是思考，而是潛入那超越我們思維所允許的更深刻境界。也許我們更恰當的說，在沈默中，我們能夠聽到別人的思想。
Or simply breathe. For silence is responsiveness, and in silence we can listen to something behind the clamor of the world. "A man who loves God, necessarily loves silence," wrote Thomas Merton, who was, as a Trappist, a connoisseur, a caretaker of silences. It is no coincidence that places of worship are places of silence: if idleness is the devil's playground, silence may be the angels'. It is no surprise that silence is an anagram of license. And it is only right that Quakers all but worship silence, for it is the place where everyone finds his God, however he may express it. Silence is an ecumenical state, beyond the doctrines and divisions created by the mind. If everyone has a spiritual story to tell of his life, everyone has a spiritual silence to preserve.
或者僅僅是其呼吸聲。因為沈默就是壹種響應，沈默讓我們聽到喧囂世界背後的事物。作為強調緘默苦修的特拉比斯教會的信徒, Thomas Merton 就是壹位深諳沈默的行家, 也是沈默的守護者,他曾寫道：“壹個熱愛上帝的人，他必然也喜愛沈默。”所以敬拜上帝的地方即是靜默之地，這顯然並非巧合。如果賦閑是魔鬼的活動場地，那沈默就屬於是天使的。難怪沈默是許可證的變位詞。而貴格會的信徒崇拜沈默就更理所當然了，因為這裏是各人找到他自己上帝的地方。沈默是壹種普世的境界，超越思想所構成的教義和級別。如果每個人都有其可傾訴的人生心靈故事，那每個人就有其可保留的心靈沈默。
So it is that we might almost say silence is the tribute we pay to holiness; we slip off words when we enter a sacred space, just as we slip off shoes. A "moment of silence" is the highest honor we can pay someone; it is the point at which the mind stops and something else takes over (words run out when feelings rush in). A "vow of silence" is for holy men the highest devotional act. We hold our breath, we hold our words; we suspend our chattering selves and let ourselves "fall silent," and fall into the highest place of all.
所以，我們幾乎可以說，沈默是我們向神聖的獻禮；當我們進入壹個神聖空間時，我們會舍棄言語，猶如脫掉鞋子壹樣。“默哀片刻”是我們給予某人的最高榮譽；就在這壹刻我們的思維停止運作，其他東西取而代之（當情感湧入時會導致欲言無語）。“發誓沈默”則是神聖虔誠人的最高奉獻行為。我們屏住呼吸，我們緘默不語，暫停我們喋喋不休的壹面而讓我們“安靜下來”，直臻最高的境界。
It often seems that the world is getting noisier these days: in Japan, which may be a model of our future, cars and buses have voices, doors and elevators speak. The answering machine talks to us, and for us, somewhere above the din of the TV; the Walkman preserves a public silence but ensures that we need never -- in the bathtub, on a mountaintop, even at our desks -- be without the clangor of the world. White noise becomes the aural equivalent of the clash of images, the nonstop blast of fragments that increasingly agitates our minds. As Ben Okri, the young Nigerian novelist, puts it, "When chaos is the god of an era, clamorous music is the deity's chief instrument."
現今世界往往顯得越發喧囂：在日本這個可能成為我們未來生活樣板的國家, 汽車和公交車會發聲, 門和電梯會講話。留言機會向我們說話；而我們是生活在電視機的嘈雜聲之上；盡管隨身聽維護了公***場合的安靜，但它卻保證了我們無論是在浴缸裏、山頂上、甚至在書桌旁，都不能離開這個不絕於耳的世界鏗鏘之聲。白噪音成為在聽覺上相當於形象的沖突，日益不斷煩擾我們頭腦的零星轟鳴。猶如年輕的尼日利亞小說家所說的：“當混亂是壹個時代的上帝時，神靈的主要工具就是吵鬧的音樂。 ”
There is, of course, a place for noise, as there is for daily lives. There is a place for roaring, for the shouting exultation of a baseball game, for hymns and spoken prayers, for orchestras and cries of pleasure. Silence, like all the best things, is best appreciated in its absence: if noise is the signature tune of the world, silence is the music of the other world, the closest thing we know to the harmony of the spheres. But the greatest charm of noise is when it ceases. In silence, suddenly, it seems as if all the windows of the world are thrown open and everything is as clear as on a morning after rain. Silence, ideally, hums. It charges the air. In Tibet, where the silence has a tragic cause, it is still quickened by the fluttering of prayer flags, the tolling of temple bells, the roar of wind across the plains, the memory of chant.
當然，就像日常生活壹樣，噪音也有它的場所。咆哮、棒球賽的狂喜吶喊、聖歌與祈禱、管弦樂和愉快的叫聲，它們都各有其所。沈默，猶如其他最美好的事物，當它不在的時侯才是被最珍惜的時刻；如果說噪音是這世界標誌性的曲調，那沈默就是另壹世界的音樂，是我們已知的最接近宇宙大同的東西。但噪音的最大魅力是在它終止之際；忽然間的寧靜，仿佛世界所有的窗戶都敞開了，萬物皆猶如雨後清晨的清晰可見。沈默，理想的發出嗡嗡之聲，它在為空氣充電。在西藏，沈默有它悲慘的起因，如今經幡的迎風飄揚、寺廟的緩緩鐘鳴、曠野的狂風呼嘯、聖詠的猶新記憶，都還在為它加速進程。
Silence, then, could be said to be the ultimate province of trust: it is the place where we trust ourselves to be alone; where we trust others to understand the things we do not say; where we trust a higher harmony to assert itself. We all know how treacherous are words, and how often we use them to paper over embarrassment, or emptiness, or fear of the larger spaces that silence brings. "Words, words, words" commit us to positions we do not really hold, the imperatives of chatter; words are what we use for lies, false promises and gossip. We babble with strangers; with intimates we can be silent. We "make conversation" when we are at a loss; we unmake it when we are alone, or with those so close to us that we can afford to be alone with them.
因此，沈默可謂是信任的最後領域：在這我們放心地孤身獨處；我們相信別人對某些事情能夠不言而喻，我們對更高層次和諧的自我表現能力充滿信心。我們都知道言語是多麽地靠不住，經常用其掩飾我們的尷尬，或空虛，或是沈默所帶來的更寬闊空間的畏懼。“言語、言語、言語”讓我們陷入不可鞏固的位置以及閑聊的規律；言語是我們用於架謊鑿空、虛假承諾及流言蜚語。我們與陌生人喋喋不休；與密友卻可以恭默守靜。當不知所措時，我們可以閑扯；當我們超然獨處，或者當我們欣然接受與親密關系的人***處壹室時，我們采取沈默。
In love, we are speechless; in awe, we say, words fail us.
墮入愛河，我們相對無言；驚嘆不已，我們頓口無言。
言語牛人團