Lewis and the X-files
Jeffrey of Heidkamp
It's either in Screwtape or That Hideous Strength (or both?) where Lewis
discusses the idea that while demons are currently employing a strategy of
hiddenness in the west, there may be some time in the future where they
would be able to operate more openly among people who still maintain a
fundamentally naturalistic worldview.
I don't know if you are familiar with the TV show X-files. The basic
premise is a pair of American FBI agents who investigate the paranormal.
Whether or not the supernatural actually exists is a constant theme of the
show. The show is wildly popular, at lest on my college campus. The
slogan of the show is also intersting- "the truth is out there".
I wonder if this is some of what Lewis had in mind- encounters with the
paranormal which don't raise any significant question about the actual
relationship between deity and humans.
Or am I just an undergrad who thinks too much? :)
j
(btw, i've been reading this group for about two years now, more or less
quietly, and have thoroughly enjoyed it. particularly the contributions
of non-Christians such as Joshua Burton.)
==============================================================================
Jeff Heidkamp URH 246 Scott "The call is to community, the impoverished
202 E. Peabody Champaign, IL 61820 power that sets the soul free..."
(217)332-1464 jhei...@uiuc.edu -Michael Card
b...@dragontree.com
On Fri, 1 May 1998 18:48:45 -0500,
Jeffrey of Heidkamp
<jhei...@students.uiuc.edu> wrote:
>It's either in Screwtape
Screwtape was talking about Shaw and
people like that.
BD
tmo...@hotmail.com
In article <Pine.SOL.3.96.980501...@ux5.cso.uiuc.edu>#1/1,
Jeffrey of Heidkamp <jhei...@students.uiuc.edu> wrote:
[snip]
>
> I wonder if this is some of what Lewis had in mind- encounters with the
> paranormal which don't raise any significant question about the actual
> relationship between deity and humans.
>
One might say that the paranormal becomes a "God-substitute" in many cases
(of course, so do lots of other things...) Why, tho', should the paranormal
be _expected_ to raise the "significant question" you speak of? Any _more_,
that is, than the "normal"? From a Christian viewpoint, the paranormal, if it
exists, is nothing special -- just "more nature"... Whittaker Chambers came
to belief in God while contemplating his child's ears; some come to God
through physics -- or a sunset... Others never come to God, no matter how
many equations, ears, or sunsets it is given to them to ponder... there isn't
any reason why the paranormal should be any more (or less) effective in
raising the "God question" --
best,
tm
-----== Posted via Deja News, The Leader in Internet Discussion ==-----
http://www.dejanews.com/ Now offering spam-free web-based newsreading
Jeffrey of Heidkamp
>
> >I wonder if this is some of what Lewis had in mind- encounters with the
> >paranormal which don't raise any significant question about the actual
> >relationship between deity and humans.
>
> the world, Shaw, scientific humanism, Life Force, etc.? What was the
> danger of all of this, according to Lewis?
Well, no, I can't. But the danger seems to be this. Satan has generally
used one of two strategies. Either attack viciously, or hide himself and
play mind games with humans. One leads to the occult and demon possesion,
the second to naturalism and maybe even (please don't hurt me)
postmodernism.
I don't know what "scientific humanism" is, but if I were to guess based
on the quote from Screwtape on Shaw, I would say its Satan's attempt to
combine strategies. Somehow get people fascinated with the supernatural,
into a position where he can control them more directly, but don't
thouroughly betray the existence of a massive warfare in the universe
between good and evil. See, the only weakness in Satan's current plan is
that he can't do the kind of open, direct damage against God and humans
that he would like to. This new strategy enables him to act more
directly, without betraying the cosmic battle he would rather hide.
?
AJA
>It's either in Screwtape or That Hideous Strength (or both?) where Lewis
>discusses the idea that while demons are currently employing a strategy of
>hiddenness in the west, there may be some time in the future where they
>would be able to operate more openly among people who still maintain a
>fundamentally naturalistic worldview.
>
>I don't know if you are familiar with the TV show X-files. The basic
>premise is a pair of American FBI agents who investigate the paranormal.
>Whether or not the supernatural actually exists is a constant theme of the
>show. The show is wildly popular, at lest on my college campus. The
>slogan of the show is also intersting- "the truth is out there".
Same with my high school campus. Intriguing that search for truth,
no?
>I wonder if this is some of what Lewis had in mind- encounters with the
>paranormal which don't raise any significant question about the actual
>relationship between deity and humans.
Can you say more about this?
>
>Or am I just an undergrad who thinks too much? :)
No such animal!
>
>(btw, i've been reading this group for about two years now, more or less
>quietly, and have thoroughly enjoyed it. particularly the contributions
>of non-Christians such as Joshua Burton.)
Me too. Still crazy after all these years.
>==============================================================================
>Jeff Heidkamp URH 246 Scott "The call is to community, the impoverished
>202 E. Peabody Champaign, IL 61820 power that sets the soul free..."
>(217)332-1464 jhei...@uiuc.edu -Michael Card
>
The reference to Shaw, that Mary mentioned, in Screwtape:
"A more modern writer--someone with a name like Pshaw--has, however,
grasped the truth. Transformation proceeds from within and is a
glorious manifestation of that Life Force which Our Father would
worship if he worshipped anything but himself. In my present form I
feel even more anxious to see you, to unite you to myself in an
indissoluble embrace.
(Signed) TOADPIPE"
I think I 'get' this, but I'd like to hear more about the 'difficulty'
that CSL had with Shaw. He writes, August 1942: "Of course Shaw is
not a scientist and the attack is not on science as such. But there is
a sort of creed which might be called 'scientific humanism'..." He
mentions Shaw, Wells, and Olaf Stapelton in this connection. Lewis
cites Shaw's Lilith's 'Beyond' with Haldane p. 309: "It is possible
that under the conditions of life on the outer planets the human brain
my alter in such a way as to open up possibilities inconceivable to
our own minds." Lewis notes that (p. 303) one of these possibilities,
the elimination of pity, had already occurred. The footnote says
Lewis is referring to "The Last Judgement" in J. B. S. Haldane's
_Possible Worlds and Other Essays_, the Phoenix Library edition, 1930.
Can someone tie this all together: demons operating more openly in
the world, Shaw, scientific humanism, Life Force, etc.? What was the
danger of all of this, according to Lewis?
All the best,
Ann
Stephen Dunning
>It's either in Screwtape or That Hideous Strength (or both?) where Lewis
>discusses the idea that while demons are currently employing a strategy of
>hiddenness in the west, there may be some time in the future where they
>would be able to operate more openly among people who still maintain a
>fundamentally naturalistic worldview.
>
>I don't know if you are familiar with the TV show X-files. The basic
>premise is a pair of American FBI agents who investigate the paranormal.
>Whether or not the supernatural actually exists is a constant theme of the
>show. The show is wildly popular, at lest on my college campus. The
>slogan of the show is also intersting- "the truth is out there".
>
>I wonder if this is some of what Lewis had in mind- encounters with the
>paranormal which don't raise any significant question about the actual
>relationship between deity and humans.
>
>Or am I just an undergrad who thinks too much? :)
I have a gut feeling that you are on to something, but then I am just
a postgrad who thinks too little.
Seriously, though, I think that the popularity of the X-Files should
tell us something, perhaps something to do with a genuine longing for
transcendence and a false answer to that longing. I suspect that
Lewis might have been able to work this into A Pilgrim's Regress, had
he been writing it today.
Keep thinking, eh? (as we say in Canada, where they used to shoot the
X-Files. :)
Stephen
Andrew Rilstone
In article <Pine.SOL.3.96.980501...@ux5.cso.uiuc.edu>,
Jeffrey of Heidkamp <jhei...@students.uiuc.edu> writes
>I wonder if this is some of what Lewis had in mind- encounters with the
>paranormal which don't raise any significant question about the actual
>relationship between deity and humans.
He *might* have done. On the other hand, he not infrequently says things
like "If I were ever to see a ghost" or "If there were really such
things as fairies" or "If there is life on other planets" or "I suppose
such and such could have been telepathy": that is, he doesn't seem to
regard the paranormal as in itself a Bad Thing.
I think that the materialist magician is more likely to be found in the
pages of the middle-brow newspapers. You know--the ones which print
editorials lamenting the fact that wicked trendy sixties feminist left
wing hippy vegetarian teachers have destroyed our Traditional Christian
Way of Life, and then print centre page features on things like "The
Tarot as a guide to investing in the stock market" "Meditation as a
means of dieting" "How your child's guardian angel can help him pass his
GCSEs" and "Did secret mathematical codes in the Bible predict the death
of Princess Di." This seems very close to advocating the practice of
"magic" without actually believing in it.
--
Andrew Rilstone and...@aslan.demon.co.uk http://www.aslan.demon.co.uk/
*******************************************************************************
"At last, the 1998 show."
*******************************************************************************
Andrew Rilstone
In article <Pine.SOL.3.96.980501...@ux9.cso.uiuc.edu>,
>the second to naturalism and maybe even (please don't hurt me)
>postmodernism.
I shan't hurt you. But I always ask anyone who seems to know what
postmodernism is to define it for me. I hope in this way to eventually
reach enlightenment.
>
>I don't know what "scientific humanism" is, but if I were to guess based
>on the quote from Screwtape on Shaw, I would say its Satan's attempt to
>combine strategies. Somehow get people fascinated with the supernatural,
>into a position where he can control them more directly, but don't
>thouroughly betray the existence of a massive warfare in the universe
>between good and evil. See, the only weakness in Satan's current plan is
>that he can't do the kind of open, direct damage against God and humans
>that he would like to. This new strategy enables him to act more
>directly, without betraying the cosmic battle he would rather hide.
I think that we could be confusing two different things here.
Shaw's "scientific humanism" has much more in common with, say, "liberal
theology" than with "materialist magicians". The theory, from what
little I have read, is that God does not literally exist, but that a
process called Creative Evolution or The Life Force in some sense guides
the human race. When religions talk about God, they are really talking
about this Life Force. So, for example, he says (in his preface) that St
Joan was not literally visited by the Archangel Michael or inspired by
the Holy Spirit--but she was a vessel or tool of Creative Evolution,
pushing the human race in the right direction.
Presumably, if one believes in the Devil, then any incorrect belief is
to some extent diabolically inspired: the belief that you can lower
unemployment without taking any steps to create more jobs is as much "of
the devil" as the belief that you can ensure a good harvest by
sacrifcing your son to Moloch. To that extent, Shaw's theory could be
said to be "diabolical". But we should be careful of construct great
diabolical conspiracy theories, where every intellectual movement is
part of Satan's scheme to do such and such. (Ever read a Jack Chick
tract?)
I think that Lewis's idea of the "sub-Christian" is good value here.
Someone who believes in a great Life Force pushing the human race in the
right direction and obligating us to do the Right thing rather than the
Wrong thing is much closer to being a Christian than someone who
believes in a neutral, amoral universe. Shaw Creative Evolution could be
said to be Sub-Christian rather than Anti-Christian.
tmo...@hotmail.com
In article <Pine.SOL.3.96.980501...@ux9.cso.uiuc.edu>#1/1,
Jeffrey of Heidkamp <jhei...@students.uiuc.edu> wrote:
[snip]
> [...] Satan's attempt to
> combine strategies. Somehow get people fascinated with the supernatural,
> into a position where he can control them more directly[...]
[snip]
Here again, my difficulty is with the idea that the "supernatural" (as used
here) has anything _especially_ to do with the war between God and Satan...
It's worth noting that, in Christian theology, the term supernatural refers
_only_ to (1) the inner Life of Uncreated Persons; and (2) that which leads
_created_ persons to participation in that Life -- _everything_ else is
"natural"...
The problem with much contemporary thought on this topic is that it leads
people away from consideration of the "diabolical" in the interpersonal and
sociopolitical/economic realms into (in many cases) a privatized fantasy
world -- I've known people who've seemed far more concerned with a teenager's
album or book collection, or her choice of posters, than with the meanness,
spitefulness, and violence that were part of her daily family life...
Or, how about the "prayer warrior" ("doing battle on the spiritual plane"
with some local coven or New Age group --) I don't see him or his little band
doing any (say) prison-visiting (still less, agitating for prison reform...)
best to all,
t
b...@dragontree.com
On Sat, 2 May 1998 17:01:39 +0100,
Andrew Rilstone
<and...@aslan.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>In article <Pine.SOL.3.96.980501...@ux5.cso.uiuc.edu>,
>Jeffrey of Heidkamp <jhei...@students.uiuc.edu> writes
>>I wonder if this is some of what Lewis had in mind- encounters with the
>>paranormal which don't raise any significant question about the actual
>>relationship between deity and humans.
>
>He *might* have done. On the other hand, he not infrequently says things
>like "If I were ever to see a ghost" or "If there were really such
>things as fairies" or "If there is life on other planets" or "I suppose
>such and such could have been telepathy": that is, he doesn't seem to
>regard the paranormal as in itself a Bad Thing.
Right. Of course it had different names
in those days. There's something
sinister about putting a leprecaun in
the paranormal lab.... :-) Of course, he
won't produce any solid evidence, if
that's any comfort.
> "The
>Tarot as a guide to investing in the stock market" "Meditation as a
>means of dieting" "How your child's guardian angel can help him pass his
>GCSEs" /snip/ This seems very close to advocating the practice of
>"magic" without actually believing in it.
I thought the 'materialist magician' was
supposed to believe in something without
actually practicing it.
BD
b...@dragontree.com
In article
<Pine.SOL.3.96.980501...@ux5.cso.uiuc.edu>,
>Jeffrey of Heidkamp <jhei...@students.uiuc.edu> writes
>>I wonder if this is some of what Lewis had in mind- encounters with the
>>paranormal which don't raise any significant question about the actual
>>relationship between deity and humans.
Anyone for synchronicity? I just ran
across an odd quote from Lewis.
May not qualify, as these things might
raise questions Jeffrey would call
significant. :-)
<<<<<<<<<<
One way of summarizing it would be to
say that I sometimes wonder whether we
shall not have to re-convert men to real
Paganism as a preliminary to converting
them to Chrhistianity. If they were
Stoics, Orphics, Mithraists, or (better
still) peasants worshipping the Earth,
our task might be easier. That is why I
do not regard contemporary Paganisms
(Theosophy, Anthroposophy, etc.) as a
wholly bad symptom.
>>>>>>>>
From p. 60 of /Present Concerns/,
"Modern Man and his CAtegories of
Thought". Unpublished essay dated Oct.
1946, written for teh Study DEpt of the
World Council of Churches.
Dunno if there's enough plot in this
sort of thing to get them into the X
Files, anyway.
BD
ma...@sonic.net
Oh, bother. Maybe I'm confusing passages. I /don't/ want to dig through
Screwtape.
My memory says Screwtape said somehwere "materialist magician -- not using,
but veritably worshipping, 'Forces' etc". I took this as meaning Shaw's "Life
Force" and Lawrence's "great heave" and such. And I connected it with MC p.
35: <<< ….Life-Force philosophy, or Creative Evolution, or Emergent
Evolution. …. Bernard Shaw…. Bergson …. great mysterious Force rolling on
through the centuries…." >>>
Also with /Miracles/ Ch. XI, "Chrisitanty and Religion", which talks about
Lewis' old tapioca bug-bear 'Pantheism' and makes fun of:
<<<<<<
… a God who is simply the indwelling principle of [ beauty, truth, and
goodness ] … a great spiritual force pervading all things … a pool of
generalised spirituality to which we can all flow…. A kind of God who
obviously would not do miracles, or indeed anything else. …this "religion" is
held to be a more profound, more spiritual, and more enlightened belief than
Christianity. …. Theosophy and the worship of the life-force are both forms of
it …. hailed as the last word in novelty and emancipation.
>>>>>>
from /Miracles/ p. 81-82
IMO Screwtape's point was that his "materialist magician" was to have the
worst of both worlds: worshipping/serving a dull semi-abstraction -- expecting
nothing back. ("Better style," as Screwtape said in another connection.) Just
the opposite of the schoolmistress who believed "nothing but what was
exciting", or such.
I mean, even if Shaw was vegetarian, I just don't think he was into Tarot or
astrology. :-) (Tho he'd probably put them in /Maharishi Barbara/…)
In Lewis' time, IMO, these were opposite errors, one for high-brows, the other
for low-brows, and never overlapped.
It's taken us Lucas/Sai-Baba New Agers to overlap them, maybe. Producing,
IMO, the best of both worlds. : -) < g, d, and float away >
BD
(Btw, does anyone know how to reconcile /Miracles/ p. 81 with PoP p. 18 etc re
all those local Numens?)
----------------
AJA wrote:
>The reference to Shaw, that Mary mentioned,
Woops, wrong book, maybe. I'd forgotten the transformation bit. : -) Is that
all Screwtape said about Life-Force and/or Shaw? I was thinking he'd said
something like the MC passage.
> in Screwtape:
>"A more modern writer--someone with a name like Pshaw--has, however,
>grasped the truth. Transformation proceeds from within and is a
>glorious manifestation of that Life Force which Our Father would
>worship if he worshipped anything but himself. In my present form I
>feel even more anxious to see you, to unite you to myself in an
>indissoluble embrace.
> (Signed) TOADPIPE"
-----== Posted via Deja News, The Leader in Internet Discussion ==-----
Joshua W. Burton
> >or less quietly, and have thoroughly enjoyed it. particularly
> >the contributions of non-Christians such as Joshua Burton.)
>
> Me too. Still crazy after all these years.
Oh, dear---I'm never going to live that one down, am I? Fortunately,
`entirely sane' is not something I ever greatly aspired to. :-)
> The reference to Shaw, that Mary mentioned, in Screwtape:
> "A more modern writer--someone with a name like Pshaw--has, however,
> grasped the truth. Transformation proceeds from within and is a
> glorious manifestation of that Life Force which Our Father would
> worship if he worshipped anything but himself. In my present form I
> feel even more anxious to see you, to unite you to myself in an
> indissoluble embrace.
> (Signed) TOADPIPE"
>
> I think I 'get' this, but I'd like to hear more about the 'difficulty'
> that CSL had with Shaw. He writes, August 1942: "Of course Shaw is
> not a scientist and the attack is not on science as such. But there is
> a sort of creed which might be called 'scientific humanism'..." He
> mentions Shaw, Wells, and Olaf Stapelton in this connection. Lewis
> cites Shaw's Lilith's 'Beyond' with Haldane p. 309: "It is possible
> that under the conditions of life on the outer planets the human brain
> my alter in such a way as to open up possibilities inconceivable to
> our own minds." Lewis notes that (p. 303) one of these possibilities,
> the elimination of pity, had already occurred. The footnote says
> Lewis is referring to "The Last Judgement" in J. B. S. Haldane's
> _Possible Worlds and Other Essays_, the Phoenix Library edition, 1930.
>
>
> Can someone tie this all together: demons operating more openly in
> the world, Shaw, scientific humanism, Life Force, etc.? What was the
> danger of all of this, according to Lewis?
Lewis is fairly explicit about it in Perelandra, where Weston is his
mouthpiece for parodying Shaw and Haldane. (In Silent_Planet, Weston
is more concerned with parodying Wells, and in fact I think I can
pinpoint the exact Wells speech he is attacking. I'll even retype it,
given a bit of encouragement---I think it's one of the most moving
orations of the Edwardian era, and not even Lewis's cruel send-up of
Weston in pidgin Malacandrian has completely ruined it for me.) The
problem Lewis had with the Shavian/Bergsonian doctrine of Creative
Evolution and the Life Force was (1) that it is a rather venerable
Christian heresy---the Socinian heresy, if I'm not mistaken---to
assert that the spiritual flowering of the universe creates God,
instead of vice versa; (2) that the modern advocates of this heresy
find it a very convenient way to have an active spiritual principle
_without_ all that rot about Good and Evil, a compromise that Lewis
considered more dangerous than atheism; (3) that by asserting a moral
imperative (and an unChristian and inhumane one at that) the Creative
Evolution doctrine was assuming the full role of a (to Lewis, false)
religion, and deserved to be attacked as such, rather than as a mere
quasi-scientific parlor speculation.
Shaw's "masterpiece", as he considered it, on this topic was a cycle
of plays entitled Back_to_Methuselah. It's out in a Penguin paperback,
and (as with most Shaw plays) the preface is much the best part. He
covered most of the same points in a much better play a quarter of a
century earlier, with Man_and_Superman. It's interesting that Shaw
himself saw the Darwinists, rather than the Christians, as the real
opponents of his Creative Evolution. Since his thinking was profoundly
neo-Lamarckian, and since nowadays there are Darwinists and die-hard
fundies, but hardly a Lamarckian to be found, Shaw's polemics can be
a bit disorienting to a reader who isn't sufficiently forewarned of
the history-of-science context.
``The vice of tobacco brings into the state +------------------------------+
coffers one hundred millions of francs each | Joshua Burton (847)677-3902 |
year. I shall ban it at once, if any virtue | jbu...@nwu.edu |
be found half so patriotic.'' - Napoleon III +------------------------------+
AJA
On 3 May 1998 03:56:10 GMT, jbu...@nwu.edu (Joshua W. Burton) wrote:
>ahne...@cybernex.net (AJA) wrote:
>> Me too. Still crazy after all these years.
>
>Oh, dear---I'm never going to live that one down, am I? Fortunately,
>`entirely sane' is not something I ever greatly aspired to. :-)
Wouldn't have it any other way!
>> Can someone tie this all together: demons operating more openly in
>> the world, Shaw, scientific humanism, Life Force, etc.? What was the
>> danger of all of this, according to Lewis?
>
>Lewis is fairly explicit about it in Perelandra, where Weston is his
>mouthpiece for parodying Shaw and Haldane. (In Silent_Planet, Weston
>is more concerned with parodying Wells, and in fact I think I can
>pinpoint the exact Wells speech he is attacking. I'll even retype it,
>given a bit of encouragement---I think it's one of the most moving
>orations of the Edwardian era, and not even Lewis's cruel send-up of
>Weston in pidgin Malacandrian has completely ruined it for me.)
Please send along the Wells oration. Now, _this_ thread has a
distinctly pleasant aroma. Thanks, Jeff, for pointing us to more
fruitful fields.
Best,
Ann
AJA
>In article
><Pine.SOL.3.96.980501...@ux5.cso.uiuc.edu>,
>>Jeffrey of Heidkamp <jhei...@students.uiuc.edu> writes
>>>I wonder if this is some of what Lewis had in mind- encounters with the
>>>paranormal which don't raise any significant question about the actual
>>>relationship between deity and humans.
>
>
>Anyone for synchronicity? I just ran
>across an odd quote from Lewis.
Of course. It's all One, n'est-ce pas? :-)
>
>May not qualify, as these things might
>raise questions Jeffrey would call
>significant. :-)
>
><<<<<<<<<<
>One way of summarizing it would be to
>say that I sometimes wonder whether we
>shall not have to re-convert men to real
>Paganism as a preliminary to converting
>them to Chrhistianity. If they were
>Stoics, Orphics, Mithraists, or (better
>still) peasants worshipping the Earth,
>our task might be easier. That is why I
>do not regard contemporary Paganisms
>(Theosophy, Anthroposophy, etc.) as a
>wholly bad symptom.
>>>>>>>>>
>From p. 60 of /Present Concerns/,
>"Modern Man and his CAtegories of
>Thought". Unpublished essay dated Oct.
>1946, written for teh Study DEpt of the
>World Council of Churches.
This is good! So typical of Lewis, not to be frightened or outraged
into seeing the devil lurking behind every god or goddess. Says a lot
about a man who has truly examined the old wineskin. Mary, tell more
about how to get 'unpublished' Lewis gems like this!
>
>
>Dunno if there's enough plot in this
>sort of thing to get them into the X
>Files, anyway.
>
>
>BD
>
There would be, if someone was smart enough. How about a script,
Mary? By the way, in these parts at least around the coffee urn on
Monday, the episode last week (?) of the X Files that Jeff may be
referring to, was the most watched and talked about episode ever- at
least among adults who are mostly given to discussions about mundane
stuff like curricula, etc.
All the best,
Ann
b...@dragontree.com
>
>Or, how about the "prayer warrior" ("doing battle on the spiritual plane"
>with some local coven or New Age group --)
You wouldn't mean he's saying the name
of the Devil more often.... :-)
Of course my NA reaction is, probably
it's good exercise for him, can't
hurt.... :-)
BD
b...@dragontree.com
>On Sat, 02 May 1998 23:02:15 GMT, b...@dragontree.com
>(b...@dragontree.com) wrote:
>
>>Anyone for synchronicity? I just ran
>>across an odd quote from Lewis.
>
>Of course. It's all One, n'est-ce pas? :-)
The entire Lewis corpus, you mean?
Positively holographic. :-)
>><<<<<<<<<<
>>One way of summarizing it would be to
>>say that I sometimes wonder whether we
>>shall not have to re-convert men to real
>>Paganism as a preliminary to converting
>>them to Chrhistianity. If they were
>>Stoics, Orphics, Mithraists, or (better
>>still) peasants worshipping the Earth,
>>our task might be easier. That is why I
>>do not regard contemporary Paganisms
>>(Theosophy, Anthroposophy, etc.) as a
>>wholly bad symptom.
>>>>>>>>>>
>>From p. 60 of /Present Concerns/,
>>"Modern Man and his CAtegories of
>>Thought". Unpublished essay dated Oct.
>>1946, written for teh Study DEpt of the
>>World Council of Churches.
>
>This is good! So typical of Lewis, not to be frightened or outraged
>into seeing the devil lurking behind every god or goddess. Says a lot
>about a man who has truly examined the old wineskin.
That poem seems very important,
somehow... Something to do with my
leprecauns, I think.
The creatures called 'imaginary' ...
that seem to cavort in our
'imaginations' ... and yet have a nature
and habits of their own....
Is it possible that it didn't occur to
Lewis to consider these as religious
figures? Because he was born and bred in
the laurel? A pegasus in its own
pagus.... But that when the people who
know not the wine happen to meet one....
> Mary, tell more
>about how to get 'unpublished' Lewis gems like this!
:-)))) I have no intention of
explaining how the essay which I have
offered to the public fell into my hand.
There are two equal and opposite errors
into which our race can fall about
WAlter Hooper.... :-)
Best,
Mary
Joshua W. Burton
ahne...@cybernex.net (AJA) wrote:
> Please send along the Wells oration. Now, _this_ thread has a
> distinctly pleasant aroma. Thanks, Jeff, for pointing us to more
> fruitful fields.
I'll do one better, by quoting it as I first encountered it, at the
beginning of a magnificent essay by Freeman Dyson. In what follows,
Dyson is the speaker---he'll let you know when we get to Wells.
-----
My mother was nineteen years old when the South African war began in
1899, and she lived to see the Americans defeated in Vietnam. She
often told me that her memories of England during the South African
war made it easy for her to understand what the Vietnam war had done
to America. The South African war was for England not just a military
and political disaster; it was a collapse of a whole system of values.
To my mother and her generation, brought up in the tradition of
liberal imperialism, the deepest psychological trauma came not from
seeing the great British Empire outwitted and outmaneuvered by the
two minuscule Boer republics, but from seeing the British Empire
starve the Boers into submission by scorching their earth and herding
their women and children into concentration camps. Some of my mother's
friends were secretly pro-Boer. To be openly pro-Boer required as
much courage as to be openly for Ho Chi Minh in the America of 1965.
The war divided families and called loyalties into question. It came
suddenly, out of a blue sky, at the end of the long summer of Victorian
progress and prosperity.
The worst year was 1901. The old queen died in January, and her death
symbolized the passing of the comfortable certainties that English
people had come to accept during the sixty-three years of her reign.
Through 1901 the war dragged on, as ugly and as inconclusive as the
war in Vietnam. England came to the end of 1901 and moved into 1902
with the Boers still fighting and their families still dying of
dysentery in the concentration camps. Victorian optimism was gone
forever. Doom and gloom were in the air.
At that moment, on Friday, January 24, 1902, six years after writing
The_Island_of_Doctor_Moreau, H. G. Wells gave a lecture at the Royal
Institution in London with the title `The Discovery of the Future.'
Now that the shallow optimism of his countrymen had been replaced by
an equally shallow despair, Wells decided that the time had come to
tell a story as different from Doctor_Moreau as it is possible to
imagine. This is the way his lecture ended:
Do not misunderstand me when I speak of the greatness of human
destiny. If I may speak quite openly to you, I will confess
that, considered as a final product, I do not think very much
of myself or (saving your presence) my fellow creatures. I do
not think I could possibly join in the worship of humanity with
any gravity or sincerity. Think of it. Think of the positive
facts. There are surely moods for all of us when one can feel
Swift's amazement that such a being should deal in pride. There
are moods when one can join in the laughter of Democritus; and
they would come oftener were not the spectacle of human littleness
so abundantly shot with pain. But it is not only with pain that
the world is shot---it is shot with promise. Small as our vanity
and carnality makes us, there has been a day of still smaller
things. It is the long ascent of the past that gives the lie
to our despair. We know now that all the blood and passion of
our life was represented in the Carboniferous time by something---
something, perhaps, cold-blooded and with a clammy skin, that
lurked between air and water, and fled before the giant amphibia
of those days. For all the folly, blindness and pain of our
lives, we have come some way from that. And the distance we
have traveled gives us some earnest of the way we have yet to go....
It is possible to believe that all the past is but the beginning
of a beginning, and that all that is and has been is but the
twilight of the dawn. It is possible to believe that all the
human mind has ever accomplished is but the dream before the
awakening. We cannot see, there is no need for us to see, what
this world will be like when the day has fully come. We are
creatures of the twilight. But it is out of our race and lineage
that minds will spring, that will reach back to us in our
littleness to know us better than we know ourselves, and that
will reach forward fearlessly to comprehend this future that
defeats our eyes. All this world is heavy with the promise of
greater things, and a day will come, one day in the unending
succession of days, when beings, beings who are now latent in
our thoughts and hidden in our loins, shall stand upon this earth
as one stands upon a footstool, and shall laugh and reach out
their hands amidst the stars.
Forty-five years later, at the end of a bigger and even more brutal
war, the poet Robinson Jeffers succinctly put the case against Wells's
vision of the future:
Names foul in the mouthing.
The human race is bound to defile, I've often noticed it,
Whatever they can reach or name, they'd shit on the morning star
If they could reach....
The awful power that feeds the life of the stars has been tricked down
Into the common stews and shambles....
A day will come when the earth will scratch herself and smile
and rub off humanity.
Wells and Jeffers are both right. Humanity is provisional and contemptible,
big with promise and with mischief. Our path into the future will not be
simple and easy. Wells never said it would be. The fact that men are ugly
does not mean that the universe is ugly. Jeffers never said it was.
-----
It's hard to stop, but I don't want to spoil it for you. _Anyone_ bored?
`Moral indignation is |====================================================
jealousy with a halo.' | Joshua W. Burton (847)677-3902 jbu...@nwu.edu
-- H. G. Wells |====================================================
AJA
On 4 May 1998 00:41:05 GMT, jbu...@nwu.edu (Joshua W. Burton) wrote:
>I'll do one better, by quoting it as I first encountered it, at the
>beginning of a magnificent essay by Freeman Dyson. In what follows,
>Dyson is the speaker---he'll let you know when we get to Wells.
/magnificent essay snipped/
>Wells and Jeffers are both right. Humanity is provisional and contemptible,
>big with promise and with mischief. Our path into the future will not be
>simple and easy. Wells never said it would be. The fact that men are ugly
>does not mean that the universe is ugly. Jeffers never said it was.
>
>-----
>
>It's hard to stop, but I don't want to spoil it for you. _Anyone_ bored?
>
>`Moral indignation is |====================================================
>jealousy with a halo.' | Joshua W. Burton (847)677-3902 jbu...@nwu.edu
> -- H. G. Wells |====================================================
Not in the least! And Lewis himself said one must finally realize
one's condition. There _is_ hope and help for that condition, of
course. (Psalm 42) I'm thankful to be reminded of that over and over.
All the best,
Ann
b...@dragontree.com
>I'll do one better, by quoting it as I first encountered it, at the
>beginning of a magnificent essay by Freeman Dyson. In what follows,
>Dyson is the speaker---he'll let you know when we get to Wells.
It certainly reads better in that
(snipped) context!
I think Carpenter said of Lewis, "It is
his images which carry conviction." I
once posted that in some bits perhaps we
ought to try keeping the images and
rewriting the logical connectors.
Wilthout the connectors, Wells' images
look a bit like the Medaeval Model etc.
The good old nourishing images, with
different labels. Kind of like the
Golden Ladder laid horizontally, through
time.
> the spectacle of human littleness
> so abundantly shot with pain. But it is not only with pain that
> the world is shot---it is shot with promise.
> Small as our vanity
> and carnality makes us,
> still smaller things.
> something, perhaps, cold-blooded and with a clammy skin,
> the folly, blindness and pain of our
> lives, ... some way from that. And the distance ... gives us some earnest of the way ... to go....
>
> It is possible to believe that all the
> human mind has ever accomplished is but ... dream ....
> the awakening. We cannot see, there is no need for us to see, ... the day. We are
> creatures of the twilight.
> to know us better than we know ourselves,
> All this world is heavy with the promise of
> greater things,
> beings ... stand upon this earth
> as one stands upon a footstool, and ... laugh and reach out
> their hands amidst the stars.
Sounds like the Oyarse.... :-)
I wonder sometimes at the stars of the
sci-fi poets. Do we actually get a
better view from the Mir?
If not an Oyarsa sort (father of men, in
Plato, I think) reaching out giant hands
to play with glowing stars ... perhaps
they mean we will find some Perelandrian
Bermudas there, for reaching smaller
hands to each other? But where do 'the
stars' come into that? It would be just
another atmosphere to see them through.
>It's hard to stop, but I don't want to spoil it for you. _Anyone_ bored?
Very sad to find. When they sat down to
reason, took their stand nor swerved...?
I feel chilly and grown old.
All ... long long ago and far far away.
I hope.
Mary
-------------------------------------------------------------
While I triumph o'er a secret wrung from
nature's close reserve,
In you come with your cold music till I
creep through every nerve.
-- Browning
Jon Tollerton
It seems to me that he felt that knowledge of the society plays a key role
in this determination. The fascination with Merlin as Pagan-Christian in
_That Hideous Strength_ seems to indicate this. After Merlin is
re-awakened, Ransom absolutely forbids him from practicing his magic in a
military manner, saying that such action would be evil in the current world.
IMHO the only thing that he felt made Merlin's actions pardonable was
Christianity's relatively recent introduction to Britain. With a fuller
understanding of nature and nature's God came a responsibility to leave the
supernatural for those who really were above the natural. Merlin seemed to
be the only one who could safely bridge that gap and accomplish the
destruction of the complex.
Andrew Rilstone wrote in message <$7LENLAj...@aslan.demon.co.uk>...
>In article <Pine.SOL.3.96.980501...@ux5.cso.uiuc.edu>,
>Jeffrey of Heidkamp <jhei...@students.uiuc.edu> writes
>>I wonder if this is some of what Lewis had in mind- encounters with the
>>paranormal which don't raise any significant question about the actual
>>relationship between deity and humans.
>
>He *might* have done. On the other hand, he not infrequently says things
>like "If I were ever to see a ghost" or "If there were really such
>things as fairies" or "If there is life on other planets" or "I suppose
>such and such could have been telepathy": that is, he doesn't seem to
>regard the paranormal as in itself a Bad Thing.
>
<snipped>
Mycroft
Andrew Rilstone wrote in message ...
>In article <Pine.SOL.3.96.980501...@ux9.cso.uiuc.edu>,
>Jeffrey of Heidkamp <jhei...@students.uiuc.edu> writes
>>One leads to the occult and demon possesion,
>>the second to naturalism and maybe even (please don't hurt me)
>>postmodernism.
>
>I shan't hurt you. But I always ask anyone who seems to know what
>postmodernism is to define it for me. I hope in this way to eventually
>reach enlightenment.
>
>>
My understanding of post-modernism is that it is a hyper-self-conscious and
self-referential way of viewing the world. It also sees symbology as
pointing to other symbols and not to meaning. All seems to be "surface"
without depth.
Thus, a film like "Pulp Fiction," say, refers to other films for its primary
meaning, and not to any central or transcendant meaning.
Language cannot refer to reality because it is just an arbitrary system of
symbols and metaphors which merely refer back to the human using it and not
to anything which is "real."
And Christianity, then, is merely a system of symbols and signs which refer
to each other and not to a real, transcendant God.
I, myself, find all this sterile and narcissistic. One of the symptoms of
the despair of the modern era.
Just my take on it.
--
Mycroft
"All fanaticism is a strategy to prevent doubt from becoming conscious."
-H. A. Williams (Anglican Priest)
Andrew Rilstone
In article <6j0qps$b...@suriname.earthlink.net>, Mycroft
<shol...@hotmail.com> writes
>My understanding of post-modernism is that it is a hyper-self-conscious and
>self-referential way of viewing the world. It also sees symbology as
>pointing to other symbols and not to meaning. All seems to be "surface"
>without depth.
Are you absolutely certain that you don't mean "deconstruction" or
"post-structuralism" here?
Mycroft
No, post-modernism occurs mainly withing the arts.
Of course, it makes use of the theory of de-constructionism.
--
Mycroft
"All fanaticism is a strategy to prevent doubt from becoming conscious."
-H. A. Williams (Anglican Priest)
Andrew Rilstone wrote in message ...
Andrew Rilstone
In article <6j663f$r...@ecuador.earthlink.net>, Mycroft
<shol...@hotmail.com> writes
>No, post-modernism occurs mainly withing the arts.
>Of course, it makes use of the theory of de-constructionism.
Well; your definition of post-modernism as "belief that symbols only
refer to other symbols" sounds a lot like what we called post-
structualism when I was at college, millions of years ago in the
eighties. (It's certainly what Lacan seemed to be saying for the twenty
minutes when I thought I might understand him.)
My point, really, is that either:
a: Post-modernism, modernism, deconstruction, structuralism, post-
structuralism are fairly tecnical terms with fairly specific meanings,
and we should be careful of saying "post-modern" when me mean "humanist,
materialist, relativist". (It is worryingly common for people to say
"deconstruct" when they mean either "debunk" or "over-analyse".)
b: Post-modernism etc are terms which don't really mean very much, and
we should be careful of using them at all.
You recall Lewis's complain about misuse of technical vocabulary? When
"sadism" becomes a useless synonym for "cruelty" then what word do we
use when we want to refer the unusual and exotic perversion which really
afflicted M. De Sade? (Of course, nowadays "sadism" or at any rate
"sadomasochism" means "a liking for black plastic fashion accesseries"
but there you go...)
Incidentally: am I alone in thinking that there is a good deal of
deconstruction in Lewis's "Experiment in Criticism"? I'm thinking
particularly of the "death of the author" side of things. We tend to
assume that fogey-Lewis would have hate the growth of "theory" in modern
literature departments; but he was quite enthusiastic about I.A Richards
"Practical Criticism"--the first serious attempt to write a theory of
literary experience since Aristotle, he called it--even though he didn't
agree with its conclusions. So one wonders if he might have had some
time for Deiridda (sp?) et al, even though I am sure he would have
deplored many of their disciples.
b...@dragontree.com
On Mon, 11 May 1998 08:24:43 +0100,
Andrew Rilstone
<and...@aslan.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>My point, really, is that either:
>
>a: Post-modernism, modernism, deconstruction, structuralism, post-
>structuralism are fairly tecnical terms with fairly specific meanings,
>and we should be careful of saying "post-modern" when me mean "humanist,
>materialist, relativist". (It is worryingly common for people to say
>"deconstruct" when they mean either "debunk" or "over-analyse".)
>
>b: Post-modernism etc are terms which don't really mean very much, and
>we should be careful of using them at all.
>
>You recall Lewis's complain about misuse of technical vocabulary? When
>"sadism" becomes a useless synonym for "cruelty" then what word do we
>use when we want to refer the unusual and exotic perversion which really
>afflicted M. De Sade? (Of course, nowadays "sadism" or at any rate
>"sadomasochism" means "a liking for black plastic fashion accesseries"
>but there you go...)
I wonder ... I know I grab for an overly
specific word, scientific or such ...
when I'm floundering around and don't
really know what I'm trying to say.
Grasping for some solid hook to hang an
arm-wave on, some word that has a lot of
solidly-defined meanings attached to it
-- hoping there's an analogy in there
somewhere.
Kind of like the Flatlanders' Sphere and
All That, maybe. :-)
Hardly ever see Lewis arm-waving. The
only place I recall is in /Aboliton/
around page 89-90:
<<<<<
Is it, then, possible to imagine a new
Natural Philosohy, continually conscious
that the 'natural object' produced by
analysis and abstraction is not reality
but only a view, and always correcting
the abstraction? I hardlly know waht I
am asking for. .... While studying the
/It/ it would not lose what Martin Buber
call the /Thou/-situation.
>>>>>>
Maybe because most of the time he was
writing to explain something already
defined by experts (such as
Christianity :-).
But I wonder if maybe the old style of
writing had enough structure and
precision -- not to need such hooks?
Even if you were expressing uncertainty
about something -- you could do it in no
uncertain terms.... :-)
While I was typing up a quote on a
different post -- "A man cut open is, so
far, not a man: and if you did not sew
him up speedily" -- I thought that
saying something quite that clearly now,
might sound rude, or at least
over-emphatic....
Any thoughts????
Mary
tmo...@hotmail.com
In article <sl6gaLA7...@aslan.demon.co.uk>,
Andrew Rilstone <and...@aslan.demon.co.uk> wrote:
[...]
> b: Post-modernism etc are terms which don't really mean very much, and
> we should be careful of using them at all.
I'd agree, tho' it'd be nice to have a way to talk about the realization that
_something_ (which we might as well call the modern] has come to an end in
many ways; probably no word ending in "ism" would do here... David Reynolds
(I think] refers to his theological project as "constructive postmodernism"
but I don't see this term becoming widespread -- there are people whom I
could call postmoderns (or, would, if it wouldn't cause endless confusion)
who are not at all nihilistic (or whatever...) whose work has a way of making
certain older debates and polarizations seem tinny and unreal --
As for relativism, it all depends on _what's_ being relativized... remember
Peter Berger on "debunking the debunkers"? (In _A Rumor of Angels_)
Postmodern will probably live on as a word tho', even if it only refers to
certain ways of using a videocamera and Being Ironic About Everything...
> Incidentally: am I alone in thinking that there is a good deal of
> deconstruction in Lewis's "Experiment in Criticism"?
Certainly not alone. No names come to mind, but this has been pointed out by
some acute (IMO) observers. I 've sometimes wondered whether anyone has
caught on to -- or caught up with -- what L was doing in this book. Do you
know of anyone who even simply mentions the book more than once or twice?
> We tend to
> assume that fogey-Lewis would have hate the growth of "theory" in modern
> literature departments;
The word "theory" _in a way_ might do duty as a word for everything CSL
disliked in literary studies -- I see him as being in many ways quite
"hedonistic", and far more out of sympathy with the projects -- and the
rhetoric -- of "Great Books Humanists" than many people realize... in this
way, too, he'd be more in tune with some modern critics than we might think
--
> but he was quite enthusiastic about I.A Richards
> "Practical Criticism"--the first serious attempt to write a theory of
> literary experience since Aristotle, he called it--even though he didn't
> agree with its conclusions.
Hmmm... what you say is quite true; I think tho' that Richards is pretty much
the "Antilewis" in the realm of literary studies -- CSL was always very
generous in his praise of him, nonetheless.
> So one wonders if he might have had some
> time for Deiridda (sp?) et al, even though I am sure he would have
> deplored many of their disciples.
An interesting question.
cheers,
t
b...@dragontree.com
On 3 May 1998 03:56:10 GMT,
>The
>problem Lewis had with the Shavian/Bergsonian doctrine of Creative
>Evolution and the Life Force was (1) that it is a rather venerable
>Christian heresy---the Socinian heresy, if I'm not mistaken---to
>assert that the spiritual flowering of the universe creates God,
>instead of vice versa;
Just found a great source on this and
other Lewis stuff: A. O. Lovejoy's /The
Great Chain of Being/. (James lectures
c. 1936, iirc)
Very close also to Ch. 2 of PoP. Lewis
footnoted Lovejoy in /Discarded/, iirc.
Very well-written, too.
>(2) that the modern advocates of this heresy
>find it a very convenient way to have an active spiritual principle
>_without_ all that rot about Good and Evil, a compromise that Lewis
>considered more dangerous than atheism;
Yes, that's how I read most of Lewis'
published references to it. (The
unpublished 'make them pagans first' was
an exception dug out of the wastebasket,
perhaps never intended for publication.)
Mary
b...@dragontree.com
>In article <sl6gaLA7...@aslan.demon.co.uk>,
> Andrew Rilstone <and...@aslan.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
>[...]
>> b: Post-modernism etc are terms which don't really mean very much, and
>> we should be careful of using them at all.
>
>I'd agree, tho' it'd be nice to have a way to talk about the realization that
>_something_ (which we might as well call the modern]
Post-whatever-date-it-was? (As
distinguished from play-date, of course.
:-)
> has come to an end in
>many ways; probably no word ending in "ism" would do here... David Reynolds
>(I think] refers to his theological project as "constructive postmodernism"
I really just :-) mistrust anyone who
would label anything of their own that
way.
'Modern' used to mean 'current', or
'current as different from previous'.
IE, now computers are modern and 1940
typewriters are old-fashioned.
This is a kind of definition that I
think Lewis called 'word's meaning'
(SIW). Well, at least some words'
meaning.
Don't think Richards defined it, oddly,
or I've forgotten. Some people probably
call it 'denotation'. I'd call it
'relational' or 'systemic' meaning. IE
how the word relates to other words to
make up a system. 'Modern' vs
'old-fashioned', 'supper' vs 'breakfast'
and 'lunch', 'president' vs 'congress'
etc.
So this system of words sort of moves
with us, like the marks on the
viewfinder of a camera. If we pin a
relational word like 'modern' to a
certain thing that happened to be
modern=current at a particular time ...
ie, to one particular referent....
That would be like pinning the word
'president' to Bush or someone, and
speaking of Clinton not as post-Bush but
post-president. :-)
Obviously this sort of pinning-down
would lose a lot of good words. Rather
worse with 'post'. Whatever comes after
Reynolds, what are they going to call
it? 'Post-post-modernism'?
/snip/
>Postmodern will probably live on as a word tho', even if it only refers to
>certain ways of using a videocamera and Being Ironic About Everything...
Well, now, that could be ... oh, damn,
what's a term for the meaning equivalent
of onamatopeia?
Would anyone settle for fin de siecle
and a green carnation?
>> Incidentally: am I alone in thinking that there is a good deal of
>> deconstruction in Lewis's "Experiment in Criticism"?
>
>Certainly not alone. No names come to mind, but this has been pointed out by
>some acute (IMO) observers. I 've sometimes wondered whether anyone has
>caught on to -- or caught up with -- what L was doing in this book. Do you
>know of anyone who even simply mentions the book more than once or twice?
Or, for that matter, /Abolition/? Does
anyone :-) mention it at all?
Kind of a hazard, putting new ideas into
old simple style, and not providing a
catchword handle....
Hm, here's an experiment of the vaguely
Richards sort. Take bits of EiC or AoM
and translate them into, er, orientate
style, and ....
Cheers,
Mary
Andrew Rilstone
In article <355d2c11...@news.sonic.net>, "b...@dragontree.com"
<b...@dragontree.com> writes
>'Modern' used to mean 'current', or
>'current as different from previous'.
>IE, now computers are modern and 1940
>typewriters are old-fashioned.
>This is a kind of definition that I
>think Lewis called 'word's meaning'
>(SIW). Well, at least some words'
>meaning.
Note: "modernism" is used to refer to a definite period in the arts,
circa the 1920s, I think: T.S Eliot's "The Wasteland" is a key modernist
poem. I take it that "post-modernism" meant "that which extends,
develops and to some extent responds to the modernists".
tmo...@hotmail.com
In article <355d2c11...@news.sonic.net>,
b...@dragontree.com wrote:
>
> tmoran wrote:
> >[...]David Reynolds
> >(I think] refers to his theological project as "constructive postmodernism"
>
> I really just :-) mistrust anyone who
> would label anything of their own that
> way.
>
I'm out of sympathy in many ways with Reynold's project, but I simply don't
understand your criticism here --
re the rest of your post, I'd agree (that is, if I'm catching your drift
correctly) that, since modern can mean simply "contemporary", many confusions
are quite possible --
Nonetheless, given the way the intellectual landscape is _de facto_
configured, one can speak _intelligibly_ of:
The modern. Modernism. And mean: A more or less triumphant set of
certainties, deriving from the Enlightenment project and from 19th Cent.
scientific and rationalist successes and critiques, in which all -- or at
least large tracts of -- what has been taken for the "immemorial wisdom of
mankind" is "swept away" -- All or most traditions are on the defensive, if
not taken to be decisively discredited. (I'm not esp. clear as to the
relation between all this, and the _literary_ movement known as
"modernism"...).
"Contemporary 'pre-moderns'". Meaning: there have been, over the past couple
of centuries and into our own day, a set of -- often brilliant and
perspicacious -- critics of the entire project. What yokes them together in
my view, is, that at the end of the day -- and in spite of their passionate
and often prescient brilliance as critics -- they can all be taken (more or
less) as advocating a simple _return_ to a premodern system as the cure for
all our woes... Which one, can vary widely: sometimes it's the Vedanta, or a
generic "Wisdom of the East"; sometimes it's Aristotelianism (or Thomism, or
Neoplatonism); sometimes it's shamanism; or Tridentine (or, 13th Cent.)
Catholicism; or "mythical consciousness"; or (an idealised) pre-Civil War
South etc, etc... There's also much variation in the choice of "villains" --
Was it the Nominalists? The Enlightenment thinkers? The Protestant Reformers?
depends who you ask...
Then there's the "post-modernists" -- that is, those of whom everyone thinks
when this term is used -- whether the influence is Heidegger, Nietzche,
Derrida, these fellers cast a jaundiced eye on _all_ certainties: those of
the scientific rationalist as well as those of the Thomist... They are widely
perceived, rightly or wrongly, as being relativist, nihilist, etc, etc...
What I would maintain is that there are thinkers, _who may, without doing
violence to current usage_, be -- intelligibly -- described as "post-modern";
without their being assimilated to the last-named camp. What characterises
their work is that -- on my view -- they have pointed the way for us to take
up again many (or at least some) of the values of "pre-modern" thought, and
to see it as freshly relevant to our own problems, _without_ advocating a
simple return to a pre-modern system _in toto_. _Some_ achievements of
modernity are taken to be desirable, and the many of the "re-valorising"
arguments and perceptions are based on modern science, philosophy, and
historical scholarship.
I mean people like: Ricouer, Polanyi, Voegelin, Lonergan, Girard, Bachelard,
Barfield, John Lukacs, A. Macintyre, Bateson, Whitehead, Gadamer, Louis
Dupre, Eric Gans...
I would include among "older" thinkers: the Newman of _A Grammar of Assent_,
the later Royce, C.S. Peirce, many aspects of Coleridge's thought...
This is a rough 'n' ready line of argument, open on many fronts to many sorts
of attack and counter-example (I would, f'rinstance, put Maritain --
decisively -- among my "pre-moderns"; yet he was very alive to some positive
aspects of modernity, etc...) yet I think it _works_, by and large...
(Also, my estimates of the values and disvalues of the projects of some of
the thinkers I have named would vary widely...)
I'd say, further, that once one has "gotten hip" to the "constructive"
postmoderns, that watching -- to choose two very different examples --
Garrigou-Lagrange, or Guenon, denouncing (however brilliantly) "modern errors
and confusions" gets rather tiresome pretty quickly... (And so, of course,
does watching the Prometheus Press Debater's Handbook type denouncing "the
tyranny of religion" -- ho hum...)
Lastly, I'd say that while a fair bit of CSL (and nearly all of "the way CSL
is taken") belongs in the "revive the pre-modern" line of country, there are
intriguing hints here and there of a "post-modern" (in my "good" -- or
"constructive" -- sense) C.S. Lewis...
> >[...]
> >Do you
> >know of anyone who even simply mentions [EiC] more than once or twice?
>
> Or, for that matter, /Abolition/? Does
> anyone :-) mention it at all?
>
Since -- on my view -- AoM is classic (tho' brilliant) Lewis, this is --
again on my view -- tantamount to asking "Does anyone mention Lewis?"... That
is to say, I do not find AoM to be one of those "intriguing hints of the
post-modern" writings (such as EiC and some essays and scattered passages) so
I don't think we're really asking the same question...
Daryl Gene
>: Andrew Rilstone <and...@aslan.demon.co.uk>wrote:
>>, "b...@dragontree.com"
><b...@dragontree.com> writes
>>'Modern' used to mean 'current', or
>>'current as different from previous'.
>>IE, now computers are modern and 1940
>>typewriters are old-fashioned.
>>This is a kind of definition that I
>>think Lewis called 'word's meaning'
>>(SIW). Well, at least some words'
>>meaning.
>
>Note: "modernism" is used to refer to a definite period in the arts,
>circa the 1920s, I think: T.S Eliot's "The Wasteland" is a key modernist
>poem. I take it that "post-modernism" meant "that which extends,
>develops and to some extent responds to the modernists".
Much in the way that "Classical" music once meant Beethoven, and Hayden
and their contemporaries so neo-classical was a return to/extension of their
style of composition. But as time passes things get confusing. Witness the
world of fashion where a 90's fashion reflects a 70's fashion, reflects a 40's
fashion etc. And music, which now has neo-Romantics,after the post-romantics.
Frankly, If you are not very, very current on these things, It is easy to get
lost.
Daryl
"Settle yourself in solitude.
and you will come upon God in yourself"
Teresa of Avila
ma...@sonic.net
In article <bpBtpBAar2W1Ewd$@aslan.demon.co.uk>,
Andrew Rilstone <and...@aslan.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
> In article <355d2c11...@news.sonic.net>, "b...@dragontree.com"
> >'Modern' used to mean 'current', or
> >'current as different from previous'.
> >This is a kind of definition that I
> >think Lewis called 'word's meaning'
> >(SIW). Well, at least some words'
> >meaning.
>
> Note: "modernism" is used to refer to a definite period in the arts,
As in Conrad Aiken's /Modern American Poetry/?
> circa the 1920s, I think: T.S Eliot's "The Wasteland" is a key modernist
> poem.
Didn't know it was so definite a thing. Supposed it was only slightly more
solid than Thoroughly Modern Millie. :-)
> I take it that "post-modernism" meant "that which extends,
> develops and to some extent responds to the modernists".
> --
> Andrew Rilstone and...@aslan.demon.co.uk
http://www.aslan.demon.co.uk/
===========================================================
Another post, from Moran:
In article <6ji6rp$1dk$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>,
tmo...@hotmail.com wrote:
>
> In article <355d2c11...@news.sonic.net>,
> b...@dragontree.com wrote:
> >
> > tmoran wrote:
>
> > >[...]David Reynolds
> > >(I think] refers to his theological project as "constructive
postmodernism"
> >
> > I really just :-) mistrust anyone who
> > would label anything of their own that
> > way.
> >
>
> I'm out of sympathy in many ways with Reynold's project, but I simply don't
> understand your criticism here --
Ignorance, Sir, simple ignorance. Mine, that is.
But still ... scarcely sounds like he was naming it for the ages. Defined by
what it is not ... which would be outdated soon anyway....
Still, Aristotle got unexpected mileage with 'metaphysics'. :-) But that was
in another country, and besides, great Greek is dead.
Really???? You're kidding. Restore Tara....
What I don't understand from you Barfield curmudgeons :-), is, why bother with
"We can't go back"? I mean, why bother with "we'd better not" when the fact is
we really can not?
This makes some sense re Thomism or something that's well-documented and
presumably survives unbroken here and there ... people probably could try
retracing their steps to such, with enough documentation to get in trouble....
:-)
But when it's pre-historic wood nymphs ... how could any attempt we'd make,
possibly be 100% whatever pre-Hesiod was doing? Our very best try at accuracy
-- must still come out wildly different. (At least that's the statistical
probabililty. :-)
IMO, some of Gimbutas' readers are trying too hard to reconstruct details of
something that wasn't perfect in the first place, even if we did have all the
details. :-) Better to take the good bits and fill in the gaps with, er,
whatever seems nicest. :-)
/long snip/
>
> Lastly, I'd say that while a fair bit of CSL (and nearly all of "the way CSL
> is taken") belongs in the "revive the pre-modern" line of country, there are
> intriguing hints here and there of a "post-modern" (in my "good" -- or
> "constructive" -- sense) C.S. Lewis...
/Present Concerns/ includes a resounding endorsement of D. E. Harding's /The
Heirarchy of Heaven and Earth: A New Diagram of Man in
the Universe /, 1952, which my library doesn't list.
Amazon lists as out of print:
The Hierarchy of Heaven and Earth : A New Diagram of Man in
the Universe
Douglas Edison Harding / Published 1979
Lewis, p. 85:
<<<<<<<<
In emptying out the dryads and the gods (which, admittedly, "would not do"
just as they stood) we appear to have thrown out the whole universe, ourselves
included. We must go back and begin over again: this time with a better chance
of success....
>>>>>>>
>
> > >[...]
> > >Do you
> > >know of anyone who even simply mentions [EiC] more than once or twice?
> >
> > Or, for that matter, /Abolition/? Does
> > anyone :-) mention it at all?
> >
>
> Since -- on my view -- AoM is classic (tho' brilliant) Lewis, this is --
> again on my view -- tantamount to asking "Does anyone mention Lewis?"...
That
> is to say, I do not find AoM to be one of those "intriguing hints of the
> post-modern" writings (such as EiC and some essays and scattered passages)
so
> I don't think we're really asking the same question...
I meant, the peers of the same "anyone's" you were talking about. :-)
BD
tmo...@hotmail.com
In article <6jl7lt$t7u$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>,
ma...@sonic.net wrote:
[...]
> Ignorance, Sir, simple ignorance. Mine, that is.
>
OK, Sam... :)
> But still ... scarcely sounds like [Reynolds] was naming it for the ages.
Who does, though? See below.
> Defined by
> what it is not ... which would be outdated soon anyway....
>
Sure. But I'm reminded of something Lewis or Sayers said, about how we just
have to do our best work, and not worry about what our place in posterity
is... (Can't know, anyway!). Reynolds has just got to situate his project
intelligibly with respect to the _de facto_ landscape _now_: whether future
historians deem the late XXth Cent. to be the "age of Reynoldsism" (or
whatever) is not his worry...
[...]
> >(an idealised) pre-Civil War
> > South etc, etc...
>
> Really???? You're kidding. Restore Tara....
>
The Southern Agrarians, _I'll Take My Stand_,
etc...
> What I don't understand from you Barfield curmudgeons :-), is, why bother with
> "We can't go back"? I mean, why bother with "we'd better not" when the fact is
> we really can not?
Really a debater's point, I think. Sure, we can never _really be_ Leninists
or Thomists again, as the entire historical context has altered completely,
but this ignores what people are actually doing when they warn against "a
return to" Leninism or whatever --
For consider: if I were deeply convinced that (say) Mary's Pro-Wood Nymph
Campaign was gravely mischievous, and just generally a threat to the Good,
the True, the Beautiful, and several of the Platonic Solids, what I would be
warning humanity about would be the evil consequences of the moves you were
making to achieve your sinister goal -- I _could_ be right about those
consequences, even if the heckler, who shouts up at me on my soapbox, "But
you _can't_ _really_ succeed in reviving mythical consciousness..." is right
_too_ --
Or again: we've travelled back in time, and are listening to someone telling
his listeners that he thinks the Crusades are a _very bad idea_ -- "Don't
worry," we tell him, "the Crusades aren't going to succeed anyway!"... :)
(Interesting question: do _any_ [long-term] human initiatives "succeed"?...
yet, in spite of the law of unintended consequences, and the mist in which we
grope, we still must act -- and advocate some courses, condemn others, and
attempt to persuade our fellows --)
>
> But when it's pre-historic wood nymphs ... how could any attempt we'd make,
> possibly be 100% whatever pre-Hesiod was doing? Our very best try at accuracy
> -- must still come out wildly different.
There's the rub. We _don't really know_ whether we can "go back" or not --
or, if we did go back, we wouldn't (couldn't) know that we actually had... :)
_Or_ we could argue endlessly about just what "going back" means -- the best
we can achieve in this area are gestures which -- potentially at least --
help us to help our fellow mortals see what we are meaning when we advocate
(or warn against) particular courses...
>
> IMO, some of Gimbutas' readers are trying too hard to reconstruct details of
> something that wasn't perfect in the first place, even if we did have all the
> details.
Well, there you are. Some of those people have a very specific agenda which
should (at least some of the time) be discussed on its own merits, apart from
whether we _can_ restore matriarchy, or ban chariots, or whatever... :) Mind
you, as I say, doses of this sort of romanticism (and, of course,
anti-romanticism) can be very helpful (or at least, very effective) in our
dialogues with each other -- (A lot of what got written about "the Celts" was
pure BS, but it _did_ help form modern Irish nationhood... etc.)
> Better to take the good bits and fill in the gaps with, er,
> whatever seems nicest. :-)
Agreed. But what we say and do _after_ we've agreed to _that_, is where it
gets interesting...
It's worth pointing out that we (non-controversially) _can_ "go back" in the
sense of losing our grip on what are (at least arguably) genuine achievements
-- this happens over and over again in human history -- and that there are
always those who (at least, seem to) suggest that we just _let go_ our grip
on some particular thing... _if_ (say) democracy is a genuine achievement, I
think its enemies are best answered with a "we _oughtn't_ to...", rather than
with a "well, we _can't_ anyway"... It may be impossible to square the
circle, but an awful lot of havoc can be wrought while someone is _trying_ to
do the impossible --
> /Present Concerns/ includes a resounding endorsement of D. E. Harding's /The
> Heirarchy of Heaven and Earth: A New Diagram of Man in
> the Universe /[...]
I've already snipped the quote, but where L says (roughly) "of course, the
dryads won't do _just as they were_", do you agree, disagree, or think it a
moot point?
(Another interesting passage -- which, come to think of it, is from AoM
[which, come to think of it, means I may have been <wwrrrng> in the last
para. of my recent post :) ] is one I think you've quoted: where he says "I
hardly know what I am asking for..." and then goes on to mention Whitehead
[and, for that matter, Steiner...])
>
> Amazon lists as out of print:
> The Hierarchy of Heaven and Earth : A New Diagram of Man in
> the Universe
> Douglas Edison Harding [...]
It pops up on the used market now and then -- this is the same fellow, btw,
who wrote the little book _On Having No Head_, which you can usually find in
them thar New Age bookstores ;-) (I _think_ there may have been a recent
anthology of some shorter writings too --)
best,
t
b...@dragontree.com
On Fri, 01 May 1998 23:50:00 -0600,
tmo...@hotmail.com wrote:
>In article <Pine.SOL.3.96.980501...@ux5.cso.uiuc.edu>#1/1,
> Jeffrey of Heidkamp <jhei...@students.uiuc.edu> wrote:
>
>[snip]
>>
>> I wonder if this is some of what Lewis had in mind- encounters with the
>> paranormal which don't raise any significant question about the actual
>> relationship between deity and humans.
>>
>/snip/ Why, tho', should the paranormal
>be _expected_ to raise the "significant question" you speak of? Any _more_,
>that is, than the "normal"? From a Christian viewpoint, the paranormal, if it
>exists, is nothing special -- just "more nature".../snip/
> there isn't
>any reason why the paranormal should be any more (or less) effective in
>raising the "God question" --
From /Present Concerns/ (a post-humous
Lewis collection):
<<<<<<<
p. 101
The conception of a "liberal" curiosity
... is one we owe to Aristotle.
[ And which Pistol's style eliminates,
imo. :-) ]
... pursued not for some end beyond
itself but for its own sake....
Of course this conception (Aristotle
meant it only for freemen) has always
been baffling and repellant to certain
minds. ...
[ too lazy to type in a lot about
studies discarded because not useful for
some particular -- as we would, say,
'agenda' ]
p. 29
The true aim of litrary studies is to
lift the student out of his
provincialism by making him the "teh
spectator", if not of all, yet of much
"time and existence". The student, or
even the schoolboy, who has been brought
by good (and therefore mutually
disagreeing) teachers to meet the past
where alone the past still lives, is
taken out of the narrowness of his own
age and class into a more public world.
....most liberal -- and liberating --
discipline....
>>>>>>>
BD
Lirazel
>(Interesting question: do _any_ [long-term] human initiatives "succeed"?...
>yet, in spite of the law of unintended consequences, and the mist in which we
>grope, we still must act -- and advocate some courses, condemn others, and
>attempt to persuade our fellows --)
...[said Legolas]..."The works of Men will outlast us, Gimli."
"Yet come to naught but might-have-beens, I guess,"said the dwarf.
"To that the Elves know not the answer."
--J.R.R. Tolkien, *The Return of the
King*
Lirazel
b...@dragontree.com
>In article <6jl7lt$t7u$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>,
> ma...@sonic.net wrote:
>
Mary wrote:
>> What I don't understand from you Barfield curmudgeons :-), is, why bother with
>> "We can't go back"? I mean, why bother with "we'd better not" when the fact is
>> we really can not?
tmoran wrote:
>Really a debater's point, I think. Sure, we can never _really be_ Leninists
>or Thomists again, as the entire historical context has altered completely,
>but this ignores what people are actually doing when they warn against "a
>return to" Leninism or whatever --
I've often wondered.
>
>For consider: if I were deeply convinced that (say) Mary's Pro-Wood Nymph
>Campaign was gravely mischievous,
Oh, surely not gravely.
>and just generally a threat to the Good,
>the True, the Beautiful, and several of the Platonic Solids, what I would be
>warning humanity about would be the evil consequences of the moves you were
>making to achieve your sinister goal -- I _could_ be right about those
>consequences, even if the heckler, who shouts up at me on my soapbox, "But
>you _can't_ _really_ succeed in reviving mythical consciousness..." is right
>_too_ --
Mmmmm, you mean, to travel back
hopefully, may be worse than to arrive?
>Or again: we've travelled back in time, and are listening to someone telling
>his listeners that he thinks the Crusades are a _very bad idea_ -- "Don't
>worry," we tell him, "the Crusades aren't going to succeed anyway!"... :)
Well, when Wolfe said "You can't go home
again", he meant, when you get there you
don't like it. But this seems more like,
the first step in that direction is the
danger.
>
>(Interesting question: do _any_ [long-term] human initiatives "succeed"?...
>yet, in spite of the law of unintended consequences, and the mist in which we
>grope, we still must act -- and advocate some courses, condemn others, and
>attempt to persuade our fellows --)
Mm. It is usually easier to steer for
the Dog Star, than to watch where you're
putting each foot. Even if it means
changing stars quite often.
Still, it seems a bit odd to say
"Perelandra is too hot and humid, don't
go there", if what they really mean is
"The first mile of the road west is too
icy."
Or do they mean a Generation Ship sort
of project? Collective 'we' extended
over several generations? Rather than
just each of us (who want to) zooming
straight up there each night?
>
>>
>> But when it's pre-historic wood nymphs ... how could any attempt we'd make,
>> possibly be 100% whatever pre-Hesiod was doing? Our very best try at accuracy
>> -- must still come out wildly different.
>
>There's the rub. We _don't really know_ whether we can "go back" or not --
>or, if we did go back, we wouldn't (couldn't) know that we actually had... :)
Right! If you couldn't read the Chinese
menu, how do you know whether they bring
what you ordered?
>_Or_ we could argue endlessly about just what "going back" means -- the best
>we can achieve in this area are gestures which -- potentially at least --
>help us to help our fellow mortals see what we are meaning when we advocate
>(or warn against) particular courses...
>
>>
>> IMO, some of Gimbutas' readers are trying too hard to reconstruct details of
>> something that wasn't perfect in the first place, even if we did have all the
>> details.
>
>Well, there you are. Some of those people have a very specific agenda which
>should (at least some of the time) be discussed on its own merits,
Mm, agenda meaning what to do this year?
Three steps in the direction of the Dog
STar?
>apart from
>whether we _can_ restore matriarchy, or ban chariots, or whatever... :)
Well, of course, this sort goes not out
but by magic, anyway.
> Mind
>you, as I say, doses of this sort of romanticism (and, of course,
>anti-romanticism) can be very helpful (or at least, very effective) in our
>dialogues with each other -- (A lot of what got written about "the Celts" was
>pure BS, but it _did_ help form modern Irish nationhood... etc.)
Very likely. Anohter thing I know little
about. Yeats?
But without Gimbutas and the Etruscans
etc etc -- the vision sort of falls
apart. Like a picture that needs clouds
or tea leaves to be seen in.... Or a
tarot spread....
Hm ... I wonder. Are some people using a
vison of the (far) future ... as others
use a vision of the (unknown) past?
As tho ... those of us who go ahead and
use astrology and tea leaves and the
Atlantean Matriarchy ... don't need such
a vivid detailed picture of the year
2525?
"Restore matriarchy".... (Assuming it is
not necessary to invent it. :-))) Most
of the people I know who are into that
... aren't really pinning their hopes to
some future political system for our
great-grandchildren. We're interested
(maybe this is what you mean?) in:
1. Legal improvement in all the obvious
boring ways right now.
2. Feeling ourselves connected with ...
some sort of idealized magical
matriarchy, which should :-) exist
independent of anything we do. Like
Narnia or Deep Heaven. That it's "out
there" somewhere, "before the Fall and
beyond teh Moon...."
Not, "we're going to campaign for family
leave so our 2525 people can do Y", but
"so we next year will have more time to
do X, and we're drawing on the strength
of the Empress Over Sea to do the
campaigning...."
>
>> Better to take the good bits and fill in the gaps with, er,
>> whatever seems nicest. :-)
>
>Agreed. But what we say and do _after_ we've agreed to _that_, is where it
>gets interesting...
Very likely! Elaborate?
>
>It's worth pointing out that we (non-controversially) _can_ "go back" in the
>sense of losing our grip on what are (at least arguably) genuine achievements
>-- this happens over and over again in human history
Mm, but not land in the same place as
before, I think. After the Revolution
lost its grip, they got Napoleon, not
another Louis.
I take it that's what you mean?
>-- and that there are
>always those who (at least, seem to) suggest that we just _let go_ our grip
>on some particular thing... _if_ (say) democracy is a genuine achievement, I
>think its enemies are best answered with a "we _oughtn't_ to...",
Right.
>rather than
>with a "well, we _can't_ anyway"
Or a plain "We can't" ? :-)
>... It may be impossible to square the
>circle, but an awful lot of havoc
> can be wrought while someone is _trying_ to
>do the impossible --
Doing the improbable got us teflon. :-)
A matter of how one attempts, maybe.
Starting by building some telescopes is
more likely to have good fallout than
starting by guillotining all the
aristocrats.
>> /Present Concerns/ includes a resounding endorsement of D. E. Harding's /The
>> Heirarchy of Heaven and Earth: A New Diagram of Man in
>> the Universe /[...]
>
>I've already snipped the quote, but where L says (roughly) "of course, the
>dryads won't do _just as they were_", do you agree, disagree, or think it a
>moot point?
I don't know what he meant. I would like
to ask him, "Which dryads? Do what?"
More on this later, maybe.
>
>(Another interesting passage -- which, come to think of it, is from AoM
>[which, come to think of it, means I may have been <wwrrrng> in the last
>para. of my recent post :) ] is one I think you've quoted: where he says "I
>hardly know what I am asking for..." and then goes on to mention Whitehead
Not Whitehead, but Martin Buber.
Shockingly 1980ish passage for Lewis.
(Should have saved it for an Ossian
Lite.) Well, Pre-New-Age, maybe. :-)
>[and, for that matter, Steiner...])
>
>>
>> Amazon lists as out of print:
>> The Hierarchy of Heaven and Earth : A New Diagram of Man in
>> the Universe
>> Douglas Edison Harding [...]
>
>It pops up on the used market now and then
Did you read it? Like it?
> -- this is the same fellow, btw,
>who wrote the little book _On Having No Head_,
Read that, or something that started off
with the same idea. Deikman???? LOng
ago.
Kind of clear-headed :-))) -- but I was
never sure what you were supposed to do
without it. I mean, once rolled back,
why not see other worlds round every
corner?
Which I'm for, of course. :-) But I
don't think that author was.
BD