Two books which I read last summer that really pissed me off were GK Chesterton's Orthodoxy and C.S. Lewis' The Pilgrim's Regress. I have not been able to put my finger on exactly what it is about them which made me throw them across the room and spit their taste from my mouth, until now.
To begin with, both books are concerned with development. They discuss the idea of the development of the soul, the former philosophically, the latter allegorically. A few weeks ago I wrote a post called "fuck being a dirty word that comes out clean". It was concerned with some of my thoughts on dialectical development. I have not been able to put together my frustration with the aforementioned books with my thoughts on dialectics. I have now.
The conclusions of both books is that no matter what you learn, no matter what "new" thoughts you may have, you will always end up at the same place, ie submission to God and Orthodoxy. Chesterton's metaphor is of a man who goes sailing from the caost of Wales, gets lost in a storm and land back at Wales thinking that he has discovered a new land, only to find out that it is only Wales. Lewis follows the growth of a young man named John who seeks a far-off and mysterious island, but finds that it is only the grim mountains of God which he had fled. Both stories conclude that human life is cyclical. There is however; an important difference between the Christian notion of seeking the end and finding the beginning and a true dialectical development.
The problem with both Chesterton and Lewis (or perhaps popular understanding of them) is that the motion of their cycle is flat, it doesn't rise up on the y axis, let alone find z and the rest of the alphabet. Their conclusions are essentially saying "oh it is ok to go off and explore the rest of reality, but make sure you are back in your pew on Sunday". It is as if perpetual submission, shameful return from an upstartish journey and constantly being refaced with ones sinfulness is the limit of their dialectic.
A friend once told me that "there is no going back to your pew, only figuring out where to go from where you have travelled so far." The Welsh sailor does not return to the shores of Wales, he finds himself instead floating above the surface of the ground. Then, everytime he goes out to sea, he is highter and higher, until he is so high up that he can see the other side of Britain, then Europe, then the whole Earth, then the galaxy, then the Universe. How then can dialectical development ever bring one back to the same spot, kneeling before the same cross. If our perspective of reality has not shifted at all through a spiral of learning then we have not learned anything at all. To not progress above where you were is to be truly in a state of arrested development. Thank you Sigmund Freud!
I wonder where I am...
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3 comments:
But perhaps there is something with what Chestertons and Lewis say that is not understood by most. in regards to your latter example of dialectical development, Id argue that we still come back to the same place, we live in the same world, the same situations; but it is instead our mind that perceives the whole thing newly.
post someone...please
I would agree, we may come back to the same place, but our view of it is so entirely shifted that it looks nothing like where we were before. I think it is kinda like I used to live on a house where there is now a mall being built. I can see in my mind where everything was when I stand in the same spots, but none of it exists anymore.
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