Bible and truth
Once again, I find myself pointing out something that Elliot posted about first. They do say that imitation is the greatest form of flattery...
Madeleine L'Engle talks about faith and truth and fact and story in an interview you can read here (don't worry, it's pretty short). I agree with pretty much everything she says. One thing I might not have said is that God is a sh*t, but I would agree with her basic idea that God's not always a jolly old barrel full of monkeys.
I like the way she talks about the Bible being truth but not fact. This is something I learned best from Neil Gaiman and his Sandman series of graphic novels. There are a whole bunch of wacky stories in there, and it's hard to tell if they're actually happening to the characters or if it's all just a hallucination, or maybe both. But the point is that it doesn't so much matter if things actually happened or not, rather, the point is that the stories are true, and you'd better take that seriously!
I would like to add that I believe most of the stuff in the Bible actually happened, and that it has been retold truly but perhaps not entirely factually. That's the way oral history works. Things happen, and then their significance gets interpreted and retold in a meaningful way.
The one thing that I would absolutely insist actually (factually) happened is the life, death and resurrection of Christ. That's the whole point of God's story. The Word became flesh and lived among us. He really, truly died and then beat death and became really, truly alive again.
Maybe I'm making some logistical error in this balance between fact, myth, truth and such, but I kind of think that's the point. It's all in tension and really weird to figure out (I mean, seriously, God becomes a physical, vulnerable, mortal human?!?), but it's really really really true. Thus endeth my spazz.
7 comments:
Amen! I agree with you.
I think Madeline L'Engle is sometimes a little off the mark, though. She says that Harry Potter has "nothing underneath". Maybe it doesn't have as much underneath as Wrinkle in Time does, but to say there's NOTHING underneath just seems blind to me. And she likes the Da Vinci Code. And thinks that we're all psychic but society teaches us not to be. I say ...meh.
I read that article a while ago and thought similarly in terms of truth vs. fact, and also God is a *. And on the topic of Harry, he may be low on the chain for spirituality, but (this is university talking) he whomps Wrinkle in terms of cultural truths. Maybe I'll post about it on my blog sometime, cause it's a big long rant.
footnote: do you get times where the word verification is just rediculous? it is right now.
verification? no, why? and isn't it spelled "ridiculous"? I've seen so many people spelling it "rediculous" lately that I'm not sure anymore...
oh wait, do you mean the way any word starts sounding weird when you say it too much? where did the word "verification" come into this whole thing anyway? okay, this is the part where all my roomies and Aaron tell me "shhhhhhhhhhh!"
I concur! I concur heartily! I like your point about the gap between an event and when its significance gets interpreted.
I agree that Harry Potter doesn't seem that deep. Particularly not the early ones, which is all L'Engle read. But it's one of those stories where the deeper symbols don't usually surface until you're talking it over with someone else. So there is a 'there' there.
As for us all being a little psychic - I think that kind of unusual awareness happens pretty often. I don't know if I'd call it psychic exactly - maybe uncanny intuition. One half of our culture takes it as proof of psychic powers, and the other half dismisses it all as coincidence. I think the truth is somewhere in the middle.
As for her liking the Da Vinci Code - that's stupid. Though I guess she's doing the mainline church thing and agreeing with what she can rather than condemning. It's still kinda dumb.
So what's this about cultural truths?
ridiculous - absurd: incongruous; inviting ridicule.
I think amp means that sometimes the word you have to type in order to get your comment posted is sometimes crazy.
And I think it's "ridiculous"
Ohh, that kind of word verification! Yes, it is kinda nuts. It's not fair when even a literate human being cannot figure out what the letters are!
But I'm keeping it anyway because it means only literate human beings can post. I hope that's okay. If the word is ever too ridiculous, just mess it up and try the next word they give you instead.
For example, to post this "ipsin", and it's quite legible!
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