Nature of Spiritual Writings

When doing your writing see what feelings you get and does it lead to:

• a decrease in unwholesome states and/or increase in wholesome states
• an increase in unwholesome states and/or decrease in wholesome states

“What now, bhikshus, haven’t you known me to have taught the Dharma in this way:

• THE 2 KINDS OF PLEASANT FEELINGS.
  • Here, when one feels a certain kind of pleasant feeling, unwholesome states grow in him and wholesome states lessen;
  • but when one feels another kind of pleasant feeling, unwholesome states lessen in him and wholesome states grow.
• THE 2 KINDS OF PAINFUL FEELINGS.
  • Here, when one feels a certain kind of painful feeling, unwholesome states grow in him and wholesome states lessen;
  • but when one feels another kind of painful feeling, unwholesome states lessen in him and wholesome states grow.
• THE 2 KINDS OF NEUTRAL FEELINGS.
  • Here, when one feels a certain kind of neutral feeling, unwholesome states grow in him and wholesome states lessen;
  • but when one feels another kind of neutral feeling, unwholesome states lessen in him and wholesome states grow.’?”

... [more detail description of the above follows in the Sutta]

Kīṭā,giri Sutta

If what you write increases lust, fantasy/delusion, greed, etc. then this is unwholesome.

Since ou writing is spiritual it might be wholesome if you write is in line with the Dhamma.

One way to discern how unwholesome states arise is as follows:

(1) the latent tendency to lust reinforced by being attached to pleasant feelings;

(2) the latent tendency to aversion reinforced by rejecting painful feelings;

(3) the latent tendency to ignorance reinforced by ignoring neutral feelings;

Pahāna Sutta

Dealing with sensations at a more granular level can be found in: Sal,āyatana Vibhanga Sutta

I don't know what spiritual writing you're talking about, of course.

From my own experience, text[s] like Speaking of Siva (translations of devotional poetry from Bhakti saints) is attractive -- similarly Gibran's The Prophet -- actually I've read a lot of literature, my Dad used to read to me before I could even read for myself -- it's attractive, I find it attractive and engaging, it engages a part, a vocal part, a 'talky' and somewhat rhythmic part of my mind, my brain. I'm not sure it's especially 'spiritual'? It's entertaining and engaging.

Maybe I'm a 'sucker' for literature (as well as friendly speech) -- you mentioned Beauty, for example -- I even get hung up on how well authors like Tolkien use punctuation marks in their dialog.

So I guess it's like music, it's kind of harmless as a hobby -- and the suttas don't recommend music, do they, see also the seventh precept -- though Buddhist literature itself apparently uses a lot of poetic metre (the Dhammapada).

You might also/alternatively want to experiment with what is in a sense 'liberating' -- with not 'engaging' the mind; and perhaps with what's overtly ethical -- perhaps just practical, perhaps generous, etc.

It's not only rhythm that's attractive, perhaps it's also the familiar -- if you "delighted in it" in your first exposure then you may want to seek it out or to recreate that experience again -- almost the very definition of attachment. So vocabulary, like Beauty but also even Ethics, might be hollow.

Here is a famous Christian saying, on approximately that subject (I don't know an equivalent Buddhist one):

Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.

Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil; etc.

It's often read as a text at weddings.

Anyway, and leaving aside the topic of "Christian love" compared with any Buddhist ideals, I think its point is that "speaking with the tongue of angels" isn't of itself a virtue.

This quote from Margaret Fell suggests a similar problem:

We are all thieves, we are all thieves, we have taken the Scriptures in words and know nothing of them in ourselves

A Buddhist-tradition equivalent might be "the finger pointing at the moon" ("the finger" being words, and "the moon" enlightenment).