Boso: All these things plainly show that [the Son] ought to be mortal and to partake of our weaknesses. But all these things are our miseries. Will he then be miserable?
Anselm: No, indeed! For as no advantage which one has apart from his choice constitutes happiness, so there is no misery in choosing to bear a loss, when the choice is a wise one and made without compulsion.
~ St. Anselm, Cur Deus Homo
This is an intriguing little exchange in Anselm's book. Here the suggestion is that weakness, when freely chosen, is not a miserable experience. Indeed, the weakness that is spoken of here is Jesus' suffering and death. So we can suffer to the point of death but, if freely chosen, we do so joyfully. Certainly this seems to be how the characters of the New Testament Church understand their suffering. There is much joy in suffering.
It always makes me wonder about how I understand Christian suffering, and the suffering of love. By coming alongside of 'the least of these' I am often miserable. By entering into their sorrows, their pains, their losses, and their weaknesses, I do experience misery. I don't know much about joy in such things. Where shall I find joy in the rape, murder, and torture of my beloved ones?
I think there is much joy in suffering in the New Testament because there is also much freedom granted by the in-breaking Spirit of God. For as much as the suffering of Christ were present in abundance, so also the resurrection power of Christ was also present in abundance. Sure there were beatings, but demons were being cast out; sure there were imprisonments, but the sick were being healed; sure there were martyrs, but the good news was being proclaimed to the poor and a radical community was being formed. Too often I feel like Christians that are journeying with the marginalised have one without the other. They have the sufferings but not the power of the Spirit who gives new life. Why is this so? I'm not sure, but I suspect is has something to do with the fact that most of the contemporary Canadian church seems to have abandoned the marginalised, and only deepend their sufferings. Perhaps when the Church, as a whole body, returns to the margins, then we will know something of joyful suffering.
Speaking Christianly Article
For those that might be interested I have an article in this month's Stimulus (“The New Zealand Journal of Christian Thought and Practice”) and the article is also available on-line at:
http://www.stimulus.org.nz/index_files/February2006.htm
Click on the title “Speaking Christianly in the midst of Babel” that appears in the Table of Contents.
(Note: I did post a draft of this article about a year ago on my blog.)
Semiotics for Dummies (i.e. me): Part I
Well, between reading George Lindbeck and completing a course on sacramental theology, I’ve been doing more and more reading about linguistics and semiotics (the theory and study of signs and symbols, especially as elements of language and other systems of communication). I am currently working on a paper called: “Theology as Presencing: Speaking Religion with George Lindbeck, Martin Heidegger, and Umberto Eco” and as a part of my research I’m reading Umberto Eco’s book, Semiotics and the Philosophy of Language. His work is decidedly dense — particular for those who don’t “speak the language” of language scholars. So, to help me work through this book, I’ve decided to start a series of posts summarising and reflecting on each chapter. That might not be terribly exciting for those who choose to read this blog but I figure if I can present Eco’s material in a way that makes sense to people not interested in this topic then I’m probably getting what he is talking about. So, if you’re interested, let me know what you think (Rivers? I’m counting on you here!). And if you’re not, well, too bad (that probably means everybody but Rivers). Without further ado:
[0] Introduction
Eco begins his book by stating that there tends to be two objects that are focused upon as the object of a general semiotic approach, and these two objects are generally seen as incompatible. They are:
1. The sign/sign-fuction which is a correlation between a signifier and a signified (i.e. between expression and content) and thus an action between pairs.
2. Semiosis which is not an action between pairs, but an action between three subjcts: a sign, its object, and its interpretant.
Eco’s thesis is that these two approaches are not incompatible. In order to defend this he will argue that the semiosic process of interpretation (emphasised by point 2) is actually also at the core of the concept of “sign” (point 1). Eco attacks the notion of signs as immobile or static notions, but argues that our fundamental approach to signs always involves an act of interpretation.
Having laid out his thesis, Eco then lays out some major themes that will be important throughout the book — and which will become more clear when I get to the chapters in which he addresses the individual themes.
Beginning with a basic principle of interpretation that says, “a sign is something by knowing which we know something more” (he is quoting Peirce at this point) and this implies an infinite process of interpretation. However, Eco argues that, although this process may be infinite in theory, any given text does not have an infinite amount of meanings. This is so because, when approached in light of a given topic (i.e. contextually) there is on a limited number of possible meanings. So Eco rejects the notion that there is not true meaning within a text (or, as Valery puts it, “il n’y a pas de vrai sens d’un texts“).
This means that Eco sees contemporary theories of interpretation on a line between two extremes, x and y.
At x are those who see only one possible way of interpreting the text — according to the author’s original intention.
At y are those who see any possible meaning in the text.
Eco is interested in finding a continuum of intermediate positions between these two points. Thus, his focus on context leads him to argue that between x and y stands “a recorded thesaurus of encyclopedic competence, a social storage of world knowledge” and interpretation is implemented and legitimated by this. The notion of interpretation being an act that is accomplished through an appeal to an encyclopedia of world knowledge is crucial to Eco’s thesis, as will become clear in our summary of chapter two.
Eco then goes on to cover some more introductory type material before getting into the body of his book. First, he explains that he is engaged in a philosophy of language because any general semiotics is a philosophy of language, and good philosophies of language are concerned with semiotics (see the definition of “semiotics” I provided above). Second, he makes a distinction between a specific semiotics and a general semiotics.
A specific semiotics is “the grammar of a particular sign system”. Thus, if one views Christianity as a particular kind of language, Christian theology functions as the grammar of that language — i.e. as a specific semiotics (I’m pulling on George Lindbeck’s work in this example). Thus, a specific semiotic is successful if it describes a given field of communicative phenomena as ruled by a specific system of signification. That is to say, a specific semiotic is successful if it forms a coherent worldview. That is why specific semiotics are used to improve, preserve, or destroy cultures. It is also why they are disciplinary, and they can tell which expressions are acceptable (i.e. grammatical) within that worldview. Thus, something can be empirically tested within a specific semiotics. In this regard, it can be said that specific semiotics is a science, because it has clear rules for how it determines the relevance of empirical data.
A general semiotics asks bigger questions: what does it mean to say, to express meanings, to convey ideas, or to mention states of the world? However, general semiotics will always be comparative, and rely on specific semiotics, since they are inescapable because all of us are contextual interpreters of meaning. We can only study and describe language through language. A general semiotics is not a science, but rather a philosophy because it cannot be empirically tested. This is so because philosophical entities only exist to the extent that they have been philosophically posited — that is to say, they are not ’emic’ (internal) definitions of previously recognisable ‘etic’ (external) data. Such concepts only have unity within their philosophical framework. Thus, a general semiotics has explanatory and practical power but cannot be shown to be true in a scientific sense. Yet this is not to say that such concepts are just figments of our imagination, but they cannot be judged for their truth-value, only for their perspicacity.
Okay… that’s it for the introduction. How’d I do? Clear as mud? Are you sitting there wondering why the hell anybody would want to care about this sort of stuff? Should I write more about why I think it’s interesting/important?
My Dream
I have been using a rosary lately to help me pray more often and to focus my prayers on particular Scriptures, subjects and creeds. I have been thoroughly enjoying this and I could always write a post about how exactly I pray through the rosary, but I only mention it in this post because it plays a crucial role in a dream I had.
I was down in Washington for a course this past weekend, and while I was there I had this dream.
In the dream I was praying, holding the cross on my rosary. However, the edges of the cross were like broken glass, and, as I clenched it in my hand, it sliced my palm open and I started to bleed. Then, looking around me, I realised that I was in the ghetto close to my work and the ground was covered with people laying down, bleeding to death. I went up to the closest person, a man, and thought that maybe the blood that was coming out of my hand could go into his wound and restore him. So I put my hand over his wound and my blood started passing into him. However, as I looked at him I realised that his whole body was covered in wounds and he was losing far more blood out of his body, than he was gaining from my hand. So, I looked around for help and I saw people I knew, Church people/Christians, walking by. I called out to them, told them we needed more help otherwise everybody was going to bleed to death — and I held my rosary out to them. One by one they grabbed on to the cross and had their hands cut open. However, every one of them screamed or yelled when they were cut and ran away until I was the only one left. So, desperate to get more blood into the man I was standing by, I took the cross and lacerated my whole body with it and laid down on top of the man so that my wounds covered his. But even then he was still losing blood faster than he was gaining it. And so we laid there together and slowly bleed to death. As I was losing consciousness I heard a voice saying, “I am the resurrection and the life, no one comes to the Father except through me.”
And then I woke up.
Hatred and Truth-telling
I received an interesting question in response to my last post, and so I thought I would post my response in a new post with the hope that it would spark more discussion on this topic.
Stephen,
If I am understanding you correctly you seem to be objecting to the usage of the word “hate” in the initial quote because hate is implies a “relational” anger. Therefore, you seem to suggest that when we speak the truth with hatred (whether towards “a group of people or a person, some kind of system of authority, or system of living”) people will be distracted or deterred and their hearing will be negatively impacted.
I'm not entirely sure that I agree with you. Mostly because there seems to be a time for hate (as Eccl 3.8 says). Now I'm not talking about hatred of specific people — that seems to be thoroughly done away with after Christ. In the New Testament one is no longer permitted to hate anybody, not even one's enemies, or the enemies of one's loved ones.
However, there does seem to be a place for a hatred in the New Testament — one is to hate evil. The Psalmist tells those who love God to “hate” evil (Ps 5.5), the writer of Proverbs tells us that the fear of the Lord is to “hate” evil (Prov 8.13), and Amos tells us to “hate” evil and love good (Am 5.15). This seems to remain a consistent theme in the NT.
Because one hates evil one should also hate certain evil actions. Thus, we hear Jesus saying, “you hate the deeds of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate” (Rev 2.6). The OT talks about God hating evil actions several times (cf. Deut 12.31, Prov 6.16, Is 61.8, Jer 44.4, Zech 8.17) and the NT gives us no reason to think that such actions should no longer be hated after Christ. Indeed, such hatred seems to be appropriate. Thus, to take one example, God is said to “hate” divorce in Mal 2.6 and Jesus' teachings on divorce seem to confirm this.
Because certain evil actions are to be hated, there is also a place for hating structures which institutionalise those actions. Thus, the prophets continual speak about ways in which violence and injustice have been institutionalised in the structures of Israel (cf. Is 1.14, Am 5.21). Indeed, Israel is sent into exile at least partially because it has not hated structures that institutionalised violence. As Ezekiel says, “since you have not hated bloodshed, therefore bloodshed will pursue you” (Ez 35.6). Again, there is no reason to suppose that this critique does not carry over into the NT. The harsh words that Jesus and John the Baptiser have for the Pharisees et al. and for the Temple cult seem to confirm that this form of hatred carries over into a Christian ethic as well.
Not only that but Jesus suggests that, if we are to follow him faithfully, we may be required to hate seemingly neutral objects that are the building blocks of those institutions. As he suggests in Mt 6.24, “No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other You cannot serve God and wealth.” Perhaps serving God requires us to hate money. I also think it would be appropriate for Christians to hate such objects as guns, crack, nuclear weapons, etc.
So I think that (a) hatred of evil; (b) hatred of evil actions; (c) hatred of structures that institutionalise evil actions; and (d) hatred of objects that support those structures and work against Christianity's goal of universal reconciliation, might all be forms of hatred that are consistent with a Christian ethic.
And, in keeping with the biblical witness, I think that it is okay to use the language of hatred when discussing such things. So, for example, as a Christian I can say (a) I hate evil; (b) I hate murder; (c) I hate States that thrive on war; (d) I hate nuclear weapons.
Or, another example: (a) I hate evil; (b) I hate rape; (c) I hate institutions that make a profit from sexually objectifying women; (d) I hate snuff films.
Note that neither of these examples imply that I hate people. Thus, in the first case I should be able to say that I love (b) murderers, (c) politicians and dictators, and (d) soldiers; and in the second case I should still be able to say that I love (b) rapists, (c) people who work for firms that perpetuate the objectification of women, and (d) people who produce snuff films. No easy task but it is what is required of us.
I'd be curious to hear more thoughts on this… what do y'all think about the notion of “appropriate hatred” and how can we ensure that it remains “appropriate”? I ask this question because I think that catch phrases like, “love the sinner but hate the sin” don't usually work so well in practice.
Anger and Truth
Everett's warnings especially confused me, because I knew he wouldn't lie, but he was so full of anger and hate this his truths just didn't feel true.
~ Irwin, in The Brothers K by David James Duncan
So the question becomes one of truth-telling — or, more accurately, the possibility for a truth told to be received and accepted by any given audience. Must truths be free of anger in order for them to “feel true”? Surely there is a place for anger in truth-telling; after all, anger is often but a manifestation of broken-heartedness. And how can some truths not break our hearts? How can I speak of my people — and what is done to them — without sorrow, and anger, and hope, and delight all intermingled? Must truths told in such a way be rejected because of how they feel? And if they are rejected what hope do we have? For this is the only way that truth can be told truthfully.
I think that this might be why the prophets — those miserable tellers of truth — often have the paradoxical commission of summoning the people to return to the ways of YHWH and of hardening the hearts of the people (even though the prophet will also be broken in that process).
Introductory Reading List
I’ve recently been reading a series of bloggers that have been posting what they consider to be “essential” introductory reading for people who want to enter into theological studies. So, I thought I would post a list of my own and, to the best of my ability, I tried to keep it short and easily readable.
1. Is There Meaning In This Text? by Kevin J. VanHoozer. [Hermeneutics]
2. Christian Origins and the Question of God: Part I (The New Testament and the People of God) and Part II (Jesus and the Victory of God) by N.T. Wright. [NT Intro/Gospels]
3. The Theology of Paul the Apostle by James D.G. Dunn. [Paul]
4. Theology of the Old Testament by Walter Brueggemann. [OT]
5. The Nature of Doctrine by George Lindbeck. [Intro to Theology]
6. The Trinity and the Kingdom by Jurgen Moltmann. [Trinity/Doctrine of God]
7. The Shape of the Church to Come by Karl Rahner. [Ecclesiology]
8. On Being a Christian by Hans Kung. [Anthropology?]
9. The Peaceable Kingdom by Stanley Hauerwas. [Ethics]
10. The Story of Christianity by Justo Gonzalez. [History]
Intimacy in Forsakenness II
she’s not quite as empty
when he moves inside her
puts cash in her pocket
and a point in her arm
he’s not quite so helpless
when he is on top
and she does what he says
to get what he has
and we’re not really thinking
we’re just barely surviving
my friends and my lovers
are all motherfuckers
and who has time to give a damn
yeah who has the time
and why should it matter
to me
it’s fullness and power
it’s a happy disease
it’s a picture of us
unsure if we’re dreaming
it’s the lie that they tell us
that each life is worth living
that each action has meaning
but not these no not these
and we’re not really thinking
we’re just barely surviving
my friends and my lovers
are all motherfuckers
and who has time to give a damn
yeah who has the time
and why should it matter
to me
whether a light that’s too bright
or a darkness too deep
i will place myself here
and not look away
no don’t look away
although it might blind you
don’t look away
though there’s nothing to see
don’t look away
Intimacy in Forsakenness
There are legitimate experiences of absence within this ever-present world of God's grace, but they are forms and modes of love. Such were the experiences of the prophets of the Old Covenant, of the Son of God on the cross and in the darkness of his descent into hell; such are the experiences of all those who, in their several vocations, follow the Son. These are the redemptive paths of love as it traces the foot-steps of sinners in order to catch up with them and bring them home.
~ Hans Urs von Balthasar
Balthasar neatly sums up what I have been trying to say for the last few years now. Yes, godforsakenness is very real — even as an experience of the people of God. But, thanks to the victory won by Christ on the cross, and to the presence of the eschatological Spirit, Christians transform forsakenness into intimacy. We have been saved from hell so that we can now descend freely into the depths of hell to bring God to those who have rejected him. There is such a thing as intimacy in forsakenness — and we are to be the living proof of that.
A Few Eclectic Thoughts…
1. I've been thinking about how Christians that go from the West to the two-thirds world are often struck by the generosity of the people who live there. Here are people who have only enough for each day and yet they are willing to share the only food they have, to part with whatever little items they might own, etc. It is a humbling experience for wealthy Christians who are inclined to horde and accumulate material goods, as well it should be. However, I've also been thinking about how the same type of hospitality exists among communities of homeless drug-users in the inner-city. These are people who have nothing but the clothes on their backs. Yet whenever they get enough for a point of heroin or a $5 crack rock they don't hesitate to share it with their friends. Literally the only thing they have, and the only thing that gives them any sense of joy or peace or ability to survive, and many of them don't even think twice about sharing. This too should humble us.
2. I was watching The Shawshank Redemption the other day while I was reading and this line jumped out at me — “The walls here… at first you hate them, and then you depend on them”. The inmates were talking about how a person gets institutionalised so that they depend on the structures of prison to such a degree that they cannot function outside of it. So that got me thinking about fellows that I knew from the shelter in Toronto that had been institutionalised, but then I started thinking about how the disciplines and “walls” of the Church should perhaps function in this way for Christians. Maybe we too should be institutionalised to the Church so that we cannot survive apart from her. Besides, I think we are only fooling ourselves when we think we can survive apart from her. So should we be institutionalised to the Church? What would that look like? My oh my, how my thinking has changed in the last few years.
3. Another line jumped out at me the other day, this time from an Ani DiFranco song. Ani sings this: “I may never change the entire fucking world, but I can be the million that you'll never make”. Now Ani's singing about not selling out to the man (and good for her for taking that stand) but I got thinking about how Christians would benefit if they adopted a similar attitude. We are continually trying to change “the entire fucking world” and so we try to maximise our efficiency and our profits. However, I wonder if following Jesus on the road of the cross means having an entirely different attitude, one that doesn't seek to “fix” everything by adopting a Western paradigm of efficiency. Maybe we are far more effective if we embrace powerlessness…