“It seems to me to trust something like an oral tradition could be potentially very dangerous” wrote Jennifer.
Baba Rampuri
It IS very dangerous.
I would recommend not to trust it. In the frontispiece of my book I quoted Avadhut Gita, “It is only by the grace of God that one yearns for union with Him, and escapes serious danger.” All ideas are dangerous, the safer ideas are perhaps even more dangerous, almost guaranteed failure. All faith is dangerous. But to trust an abstract, which in your case is an “oral tradition”, is like trusting something that doesn’t exist, at least doesn’t exist the way you imagine it to exist.
We are much more interested in deconstructing ideologies and beliefs rather than acquiring new ones. By listening to my voice does not put you in an oral tradition, even if my voice is largely informed by an oral tradition.
The oral tradition doesn’t have a doctrine or a version, it’s a means transporting culture, learning, knowledge, and information through time, but generally not geography. It’s transmission takes place in intimacy, it’s not something to subscribe to or believe in.
What’s very striking about oral tradition for the very few of us “moderns” or even “post-moderns” who have had a substantial engagement, is there are really different things happening, that cause us to have greater critical thinking about ourselves.
