Gregory Bateson | Bob Schwartz

Tag: Gregory Bateson

May 19, 2025

Random Buddhism (or any tradition)

Randomness is one of the most helpful and illuminating elements of life. Gregory Bateson commented that within the holy of holies is a random number table.

The I Ching is one example. It is a book that offers thoughts based on numbers generated in various ways, and additional thoughts on those numbers changing their character. The system is viewed different ways. It may be that the numbers are reflections of the moment and the situation. It may be that the numbers are random, and it is that randomness that makes the thoughts most valuable, given that whatever path is taken, it is changing as we plan and step. Those plans and steps are good but temporary. As physics finds with quanta, or as Shunryu Suzuki said, “It is so, but it is not always so.”

Randomness can be used with any text, not just the I Ching. A cousin of random numbers is bibliomancy, in which a page and passage on that page in a book are randomly selected for advice.

I have used random numbers to explore texts from many traditions; the Tanakh/Hebrew Bible contains 929 chapters, for example. Today I applied it to the Dhammapada, considered the most accessible and most widely-read summary of the Buddha’s teachings. It contains 423 verses. The number generated was 3:

“He abused me, attacked me,
Defeated me, robbed me!”
For those carrying on like this,
Hatred does not end.

“She abused me, attacked me,
Defeated me, robbed me!”
For those not carrying on like this,
Hatred ends.

Dhammapada, Chapter 1 – Dichotomies, translated by Gil Fronsdal

November 24, 2014

Random Beads

Random Beads - Bob Schwartz

Every picture supposedly tells a story. Actually, every picture is a story.

Beading is a glorious craft. In the hands of a talented artist, the results can be beautiful and enlightening.

But like all art, it can be a messy business. In the case of beads, this can mean tiny items underfoot, and with bits of wire, pretty painful ones. Particularly where barefoot is the custom.

A quick post-beading cleanup led to quite a collection of such detritus, like shells on a beach. Tossed in a white bowl, they looked like something. And so the photo above.

If you are a fan of randomness—and we should all be—you will see in this totally spontaneous display any number of things. Gregory Bateson said, “I am going to build a church someday. It will have a holy of holies and a holy of holy of holies, and in that ultimate box will be a random number table.” Exactly.

Here is a beader in her natural habitat, the largest bead store in New York. It is filled with beads mostly from China which, as in most things, is able to provide whatever we want or need in seemingly infinite supply. So it is all together: geopolitics, economics, ancient tradition, minerals, pottery, glass, color, art, craft, and, of course, beauty. Note, however, that in this emporium, the beauty of the beader outshines all of the beads.

Bead Store