If you have on your personal bucket list the thought that you should read one novel by John Updike before you die, what one should that be?
The Rabbit series is over-rated.
The best single Updike, in my opinion, is Roger's Version.
Amazon's "most helpful" review, by someone calling himself "Outside Looking In," captures a nice moment from the book. The protagonist, Roger Lambert, is thinking about ancient Jews and contemporary Protestants.
"How did those Israelites get their hooks into us so deeply, sticking us with their frightful black Bible and it imprecations while their modern descendants treat the matter as a family joke, filling their own lives with violin music and clear-eyed, Godless science? L'Chaim! Compared with the Jews we protestants do indeed dwell in the valley of death."
In essence, Lambert is a Barthian. His "rascally pet" as he says at one point, is the great Swiss Reformed theologian Karl Barth (1886-1968). What he most admires in Barth is the utter Otherness of Barth's God, the rejection of even an "analogic" relationship between God's Being and our own being. God is essentially a hidden God.
Updike pits this Barthianism against the seemingly more naive views of a younger man, Dale, who believes that contemporary physics is making God visible, and who believes he can complete that uncovering of God through computer science.
Lambert helps Dale get the grant for his project, but in subtler ways undermines both that project and Dale's faith.
As to the reviewers, David Wisehart thinks the book "both fascinating and frustrating."
David Lodge, writing in The New York Times, speaks of its "richness and viruosity," and says he finished it with "renewed respect for one of the most intelligent and resourceful of contemporary novelists."
Mark Athitakis, writing for Critical Mass, admires the way Updike "smoothly embeds dense scientific discussion into his narrative, anticipating the controversy over Intelligent Design more than a decade before it became a mainstream issue."
Not everyone liked it, though. In The New York Review of Books, Frederick Crews spoke of "the growth of a belligerent, almost hysterical callousness" in Updike's career generally, which he sees as epitomized here.
I don't see what Crews thinks he sees.
Showing posts with label Protestantism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Protestantism. Show all posts
04 December 2011
28 August 2011
Rothbard on Bryan
Murray Rothbard on the rise of William Jennings Bryan and Bryanism in the Democratic Party.
"Poor Grover Cleveland, a hard-money laissez-faire Democrat, was blamed for the panic of 1893, and many leading Cleveland Democrats lost their gubernatorial and senatorial posts in the 1894 elections. The Cleveland Democrats were temporarily weak, and the Southern-Mountain coalition was ready to hand. Seeing this opportunity, William Jennings Bryan and his pietist coalition seized control of the Democratic Party at the momentous convention of 1896. The Democratic Party was never to be the same again."
That may require some explanation. The notion of a "pietist coalition" is key to Rothbard's understanding of US political history. The pietists were and are a certain subset of Protestant groups -- generally from those denominations that see themselves as most fiercely anti-papist, anti-hierarchal, etc. -- and they believe Christians must prepare the way for the coming of the Lord by creating just social conditions first, i.e. Jesus' return shall be "postmillennial." Thus, the state (as Rothbard conveys the pietists' view of it) must be controlled by pious folks and so organized as to hasten that glorious day.
The era of Andrew Jackson -- the President that Rothbard sees as most embodying his own laissez-faire ideas -- was also the era of the Second Great Awakening -- the revivalist movement that brought pietism in this form to the US in a big way. Pietists wanted to control both people's personal lives (through the prohibition of alcohol and Sunday closing laws for example) and the counrtry's economic life, through control of the money supply and tariffs on foreign trade. The great political divide was then, between the Democrats, who were laissez-faire on both personal and economic matters, and the Whigs or later Republicans, who were statist on both sets of matters.
Cleveland is the last figure in US political history to whom Rothbard extends any sympathy. The rise of Bryan meant the pietists had taken over both parties, and everything has been pretty steadily downhill ever since.
"Poor Grover Cleveland, a hard-money laissez-faire Democrat, was blamed for the panic of 1893, and many leading Cleveland Democrats lost their gubernatorial and senatorial posts in the 1894 elections. The Cleveland Democrats were temporarily weak, and the Southern-Mountain coalition was ready to hand. Seeing this opportunity, William Jennings Bryan and his pietist coalition seized control of the Democratic Party at the momentous convention of 1896. The Democratic Party was never to be the same again."
That may require some explanation. The notion of a "pietist coalition" is key to Rothbard's understanding of US political history. The pietists were and are a certain subset of Protestant groups -- generally from those denominations that see themselves as most fiercely anti-papist, anti-hierarchal, etc. -- and they believe Christians must prepare the way for the coming of the Lord by creating just social conditions first, i.e. Jesus' return shall be "postmillennial." Thus, the state (as Rothbard conveys the pietists' view of it) must be controlled by pious folks and so organized as to hasten that glorious day.
The era of Andrew Jackson -- the President that Rothbard sees as most embodying his own laissez-faire ideas -- was also the era of the Second Great Awakening -- the revivalist movement that brought pietism in this form to the US in a big way. Pietists wanted to control both people's personal lives (through the prohibition of alcohol and Sunday closing laws for example) and the counrtry's economic life, through control of the money supply and tariffs on foreign trade. The great political divide was then, between the Democrats, who were laissez-faire on both personal and economic matters, and the Whigs or later Republicans, who were statist on both sets of matters.
Cleveland is the last figure in US political history to whom Rothbard extends any sympathy. The rise of Bryan meant the pietists had taken over both parties, and everything has been pretty steadily downhill ever since.
06 September 2009
Apocryphal doesn't mean "phony"
In terms of its origin, it just means "hidden." Of course, Protestants in their rebellion against what they saw as the Catholic distortion of Holy Scripture rejected the "Apocryphal" books, and in their polemical rejection they gave the term, with a small "a," the significance of "phony" or "unreliable."
I regret that. I have no interest in participating in post-Reformation apologetics, but it does seem to me that saying a story is "apocryphal" gives a phoney veneer of sophistication to saying, simply, "I don't believe it," or "this can't be trusted."
Just a thought for the day. Loosely inspired by: this.
Enjoy the remains of the Labor Day weekend. In the northeastern United States, it has been a wonderful stretch of days.
I regret that. I have no interest in participating in post-Reformation apologetics, but it does seem to me that saying a story is "apocryphal" gives a phoney veneer of sophistication to saying, simply, "I don't believe it," or "this can't be trusted."
Just a thought for the day. Loosely inspired by: this.
Enjoy the remains of the Labor Day weekend. In the northeastern United States, it has been a wonderful stretch of days.
16 August 2009
The Reformation in Scotland
Next year will be the 450th anniversary of the Protestant reformation in Scotland, a fact to which Kevin McKenna has drawn our attention here.
England and Scotland were under separate crowns in 1560 of course, with the Tudors south of the border and the Stuarts to the north. Scotland had been spared the long drama of England's Reformation -- the drama of Henry VIII's contentious break with Katherine of Aragorn, and as a consequence with the Church of Rome, or for that matter the shifting ecclesiastical politics of his subsequent marriages. Scotland had been spared, too, the brief reign of Edward, who encouraged Calvinist tendencies in the newly established Church, then the retrograde movement under bloody Mary, who sought to return to the Roman fold, while inventing a cocktail named for hersef.
No, in 1560 Elizabeth was new to the crown, and she would over time reverse her sister's reversal of her father's revolution, but give Protestantism a distinctive non-Genevan twist in the process. And it was in 1560 that the Scottish Parliament set up a "Committee of the Articles" that after three weeks of deliberation recommended the condemnation of the doctrines of transubstantiation, justification by works, indulgences, purgatory, and papal authority. The full Parliament agreed, on August 17th of that year -- 449 years ago tomorow.
McKenna, then, is getting a jump on the 450th celebration with his own essay, which starts out with his own (Catholic) childhood and youth, and rather oddly focuses not on any of ther issues the old Scottish Parliament found decisively offensive, but on the controversy over graven images. In his case, his tendency to venerate a particular image appears to have been mingled with Mariolatry as well.
I'll reproduce his touching first two paragraphs here, allowing you to follow the above link for the rest:
Our Lady of Maryhill was three feet tall with a beatific countenance, her head encircled by a halo of golden stars. Under her dainty feet, which were supported by a grey plinth, lay a crushed serpent. She had been with me from childhood and had seen action in various north Glasgow dwellings as well as the Protestant stronghold of Kilwinning in Ayrshire.
On those occasions when I returned home for the weekend, my student flatmate would ask politely if he could commandeer my room for the purposes of entertaining women. As he was an incorrigible atheist and thus knew no better, I readily assented to his fell requests. There was only one condition. That he gently place my madonna inside the top drawer of my dresser during his assignations. Thus she would be spared the regrettable scenes of prenuptial houghmagandy taking place before her.
Houghmagandy? the word is new to me, although its meaning in context is not mysterious.
England and Scotland were under separate crowns in 1560 of course, with the Tudors south of the border and the Stuarts to the north. Scotland had been spared the long drama of England's Reformation -- the drama of Henry VIII's contentious break with Katherine of Aragorn, and as a consequence with the Church of Rome, or for that matter the shifting ecclesiastical politics of his subsequent marriages. Scotland had been spared, too, the brief reign of Edward, who encouraged Calvinist tendencies in the newly established Church, then the retrograde movement under bloody Mary, who sought to return to the Roman fold, while inventing a cocktail named for hersef.
No, in 1560 Elizabeth was new to the crown, and she would over time reverse her sister's reversal of her father's revolution, but give Protestantism a distinctive non-Genevan twist in the process. And it was in 1560 that the Scottish Parliament set up a "Committee of the Articles" that after three weeks of deliberation recommended the condemnation of the doctrines of transubstantiation, justification by works, indulgences, purgatory, and papal authority. The full Parliament agreed, on August 17th of that year -- 449 years ago tomorow.
McKenna, then, is getting a jump on the 450th celebration with his own essay, which starts out with his own (Catholic) childhood and youth, and rather oddly focuses not on any of ther issues the old Scottish Parliament found decisively offensive, but on the controversy over graven images. In his case, his tendency to venerate a particular image appears to have been mingled with Mariolatry as well.
I'll reproduce his touching first two paragraphs here, allowing you to follow the above link for the rest:
Our Lady of Maryhill was three feet tall with a beatific countenance, her head encircled by a halo of golden stars. Under her dainty feet, which were supported by a grey plinth, lay a crushed serpent. She had been with me from childhood and had seen action in various north Glasgow dwellings as well as the Protestant stronghold of Kilwinning in Ayrshire.
On those occasions when I returned home for the weekend, my student flatmate would ask politely if he could commandeer my room for the purposes of entertaining women. As he was an incorrigible atheist and thus knew no better, I readily assented to his fell requests. There was only one condition. That he gently place my madonna inside the top drawer of my dresser during his assignations. Thus she would be spared the regrettable scenes of prenuptial houghmagandy taking place before her.
Houghmagandy? the word is new to me, although its meaning in context is not mysterious.
09 November 2008
A passage from Updike
I'm leafing today for no good reason through the Updike novel SEEK MY FACE (2002). The action of the novel consists entirely of a day-long interview. The only two characters, then, in the novel's present tense are an elderly artist, Hope, and a young reporter.
In this passage, about one-quarter of the way into the book, Hope is showing Kathryn her studio.
"Photographs of herself with others in other times goingback to Ardmore in the 'twenties, framed certificates of graduation and commendation ... the hideous trophies of crystal and painted metal one gets as tokens of recognition and public gratitude (the most ungainly of them handed to her sheepishly by the first President Bush, a tall and boyish Connecticut gent apparently as pleasantly surprised to find himself in the White House as she was; at lunch afterward, seated beside her, he pointed out for Hope to admire the daily flowers, the elegantly clad Marine guards, the splendidly imposing punctilio which momentarily surrounded them, two proper children of the fading Protestant hegemony): these souvenirs, still in the hasty order of an afternoon's arranging when the studio was newly built, attract Kathryn's attention less than Hope exected. Only the old photographs tempt the interloper to move closer, her neck craned forward in that unbecoming way: 'How pretty you were.'"
I love that. But in my lazy-Sunday fashion, I won't bother enumerating why.
In this passage, about one-quarter of the way into the book, Hope is showing Kathryn her studio.
"Photographs of herself with others in other times goingback to Ardmore in the 'twenties, framed certificates of graduation and commendation ... the hideous trophies of crystal and painted metal one gets as tokens of recognition and public gratitude (the most ungainly of them handed to her sheepishly by the first President Bush, a tall and boyish Connecticut gent apparently as pleasantly surprised to find himself in the White House as she was; at lunch afterward, seated beside her, he pointed out for Hope to admire the daily flowers, the elegantly clad Marine guards, the splendidly imposing punctilio which momentarily surrounded them, two proper children of the fading Protestant hegemony): these souvenirs, still in the hasty order of an afternoon's arranging when the studio was newly built, attract Kathryn's attention less than Hope exected. Only the old photographs tempt the interloper to move closer, her neck craned forward in that unbecoming way: 'How pretty you were.'"
I love that. But in my lazy-Sunday fashion, I won't bother enumerating why.
05 October 2008
Pentacostalism
Pentecostalism is newly in the news, with both a Sarah Palin connection and a "subprime lending" connection.
Such news items have exposed my own ignorance of such practices as the "dedication" of a baby. In the background in which I was raised, an infant was baptised. I early became aware, of course, that there are Christian churches that don't believe in infant baptism, but that they have what seems a sociological substitute, the practice of dedication, is new to me.
This is a ceremony at which the parents ask for the congregation's help in raising their child.
Okay, live and learn.
A Newsweek article on Palin said that she doesn't consider herself a Pentacostalist, that her Church in Wasilla is "most remarkable for being unremarkable," but that she attends a Pentacostal church in Juneau when she's there -- doing Gubernatorial stuff.
It makes no difference to me, no more than Mitt Romney's Mormonism. I mention it because I can't help but consider the "speaking in tongues" phenomenon characteristic of that denomination a sociological/psychological oddity. Still, one is entitled to one's sociological oddities on a Sunday morning.
What about the subprime mortgage connection? That is expounded by David Van Biema in TIME, in a piece called, "Maybe We Should Blame God for the Subprime Mess."
Mr. Van Biema attributes this connection to Jonathan Walton, of the University of California at Riverside.
Again: live and learn.
Such news items have exposed my own ignorance of such practices as the "dedication" of a baby. In the background in which I was raised, an infant was baptised. I early became aware, of course, that there are Christian churches that don't believe in infant baptism, but that they have what seems a sociological substitute, the practice of dedication, is new to me.
This is a ceremony at which the parents ask for the congregation's help in raising their child.
Okay, live and learn.
A Newsweek article on Palin said that she doesn't consider herself a Pentacostalist, that her Church in Wasilla is "most remarkable for being unremarkable," but that she attends a Pentacostal church in Juneau when she's there -- doing Gubernatorial stuff.
It makes no difference to me, no more than Mitt Romney's Mormonism. I mention it because I can't help but consider the "speaking in tongues" phenomenon characteristic of that denomination a sociological/psychological oddity. Still, one is entitled to one's sociological oddities on a Sunday morning.
What about the subprime mortgage connection? That is expounded by David Van Biema in TIME, in a piece called, "Maybe We Should Blame God for the Subprime Mess."
Mr. Van Biema attributes this connection to Jonathan Walton, of the University of California at Riverside.
Again: live and learn.
16 July 2007
Latin American Reformation
I see in an Associated Press package of news briefs that Roman Catholic bishops in Latin America are concerned that they no longer have an exclusive claim to the religious loyalties of that huge region.
In a 136 page plan, the bishops said that evangelical Protestants have made inroads, and blamed the rise of "individualism and a mentality of relativism in ethics and religion."
Irritating as (some) evangelical Protestants can be, I have to say that if the Reformation has at last arrived in Latin America the fact deserves at least a brief cheer.
Anything that breaks down the link between spirituality and hierarchy is a positive bit of news for humanity, for if you're in the habit of looking for instructions from the person above you in the organizational flow chart, the muscles of freedom will atrophy.
In a 136 page plan, the bishops said that evangelical Protestants have made inroads, and blamed the rise of "individualism and a mentality of relativism in ethics and religion."
Irritating as (some) evangelical Protestants can be, I have to say that if the Reformation has at last arrived in Latin America the fact deserves at least a brief cheer.
Anything that breaks down the link between spirituality and hierarchy is a positive bit of news for humanity, for if you're in the habit of looking for instructions from the person above you in the organizational flow chart, the muscles of freedom will atrophy.
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