“SEK is SAK: All is Sacred”
Photograph by John Diamond, M.D.
The very essence of Confucius, as propounded by Herbert Fingarette, is “The Secular as Sacred.”*
Our word sacred is from the root SAK, to make holy – hence also sanctify, sanctuary and saint.
Our word secular, defined as “worldly rather than spiritual,” is not given a deep origin but I do wonder (amateur etymology!) if it could be from the root SEK, to cut – hence section, segment, dissect, sickle and scythe.
It certainly does seem that we regard the secular as cut off from the sacred. To be reunited by Confucius and others, becoming also the basis of Tendai.
SEK is SAK
and SAK is SEK;
All is Sacred,
for there’s no not-God.
* Confucius: The Secular as Sacred (New York: Harper & Row, 1972).
