Reverential Silence
On a very practical level, think of the times in your life when silence, even mere physical, auditory silence has been prominent or evident. Have you ever been to a funeral? Do you remember how thick, how reverential the silence was, especially near the gravesite before the burial of a friend or a loved one? The silence was probably filled with a lot of emotion, perhaps sorrow, perhaps fear.
Or how about when you had ever fallen in love, do you remember a moment looking in your beloved's eyes? Remember a gaze, eye to eye without speaking a word. Was there silence then? Was that special? What was that?
Or what about the silence during Church, or Synagogue or in a Mosque, or in a temple, or even in a court room? Is there a reason for that silence? Silence is respectful and reverential. Why and how is that? It is in every culture, every faith, every tradition, indeed, every species of life.
Pure Silence has always been there in these events and others, as well. Sometimes the silence is deafening, sometimes very uncomfortable. Imagine yourself at an important gathering or formal meeting, imagine a speaker who stood at the podium, looked up at the audience and did not say anything. I'm sure you would feel very uncomfortable. Most people would. Why? Why in all of the above examples of silence do humans act a certain way? What is it about silence, even the silence of no sound? There must be something to this. Please, for yourself investigate this very well.
Go to some beautiful scene in nature: a mountain, the ocean, a river, the sky; go to any scene and see what is there. Awe and wonder are found in the silence of the moment. It is as if the mountain or ocean or sky actually speak to us in the silence; they speak to us of their beauty, their wonder. You must try this if you have never done this before. You will see what it is I am saying.
Physical silence is a most profound thing and this is only the fringe, the edge, a small facet of that which encompasses even this, that which is Pure Silence itself, that which is the whole itself. That which is is-ness itself.
"Silence is Golden." Is it??? or is it much more than that???