Living Wittily

Amazon Book Searches - A Quick Way to Become a Polymath :)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I went looking on Amazon for a recent monograph on Paul’s great charter of freedom and equality before God in Galatians 3.28. I found it, and it costs £66 – looks like inter-library loan time.

No Longer Male and Female: Interpreting Galatians 3:28 in Early Christianity (Library of New Testament Studies) Pauline Hogan (2008)

However the first page of hits for the simple search phrase “male and female in Paul” brought up some titles grippingly irrelevant for my purposes. Here’s three of them.....

A growth study of young lambs: comparing male and female Southdown, Suffolk and Cotswold cross lambs intensively reared on a barley diet fed at two different levels by Paul William Knapman (1976)

Pay Differences Among the Highly Paid: the Male-Female Earnings Gap in Lawyers' Salaries (Discussion paper / Institute of Public Policy Studies, University of Michigan) by Robert G. Wood, Mary E. Corcoran and Paul N. Courant (Paperback - 1991)

"Other People's Money": An Empirical Examination of the Motivational Differences Between Male and Female White Collar Offenders. by Paul Michael Klenowski (2 Sep 2011)

I took the photo in Glen Dye - it's a Scottish blackface sheep reared on a grass and bracken diet fed quite high up the hill!

Charity Book Shops, Machiavellian Tactics, and the Mess We Are IN!

The other day I was in a charity shop having a good natured exchange with one of the staff who was trying to get me to buy books. You'd think that would be easy. Getting me to buy books is like encouraging me to eat chocolate. But it was gardening books she wanted me to buy, and I'd asked about art books, then it was celeb biographies when I asked about poetry. Eventually I found something, having decided she had tried so hard it would be discouraging for her if I walked out without buying anything!

A pocket sized mordern edition, mint condition, of Machiavelli's, The Prince! Now this isn't a book about spirituality I know - though that week I was preparing a sermon on Jacob the self-interested cynical manipulator, and there seemed something appropriate, if not meant! No this is a book about bare-faced cynicism in the application of tactics of power, political survival, and developing skills of manipulation and getting your own way. It combines wisdom and ruthlessness, calculated risk with playing the percentage shots, distilled study of power, how it is gained and lost, while at the same time forming the inner habits, even an instinct, for personal advantage. Actually if you wanted a description of Jacob before Jabbok that just about does it!

The book is an education in self-interest, cynical exploitation of those least able to resist, acting ruthlessly against those who might resist in order to preserve a personal power base, anticipating an opponent's next moves and subverting them, using power to make the powerful stronger, and generally excluding or eliminating anything that might hinder the exercise and retention of power, including considerations of compassion, justice, and overriding moral imperatives. I'm thinking that much of that mentality is abroad in the political and economic attitudes of recession haunted Governments.

The word Machiavellian, which sums up all this ruthless, cyncial power hunting, is a bit unfair on Machiavelli. He was a Renaissance humanist. His book was written as a Power for Dummies,intended to win the favour of Renaissance Princes seeking to cling to power in the dangerous courts and corridors of 15th Century Italian Courts. But, as I say, it does raise for me the question of how far the word Machiavellian applies to the approaches and policies of the current Governement. 

That's another post perhaps - but Granny Tax I, the mooted Granny Tax 2, the pastry tax, the capping of charitable donations, the rhetoric but non-action against Tax avoidance by the wealthy, the comprehenesive and unsympathetic re-configuring of criteria for Benefits but little progress on reining in bonuses and extravagant salaries, the change to VAT criteria for churches.These are the mere headlines of an approach that seeks economic prosperity by risking being morally bankrupt. Alongside The Prince, I suggest a reading of the Prophet Amos, who had a few things to say about Machiavellian politics - I know, the anachronism is blatant. But the history of power as morally ambiguous and dependent on the moral character of those who exercise it, is a history that cannot be dismissed so easily. Whether it's the privileged rich selling the poor for the price of a pair of sandals in ancient Israel, or the privileged powerful of a Renaissance Court doing whatever is necessary to cling to power, or the social impact of the policies of a modern democratic Government hard-wired to an economics of global growth, the result is the same and the same two non Machiavellian questions remain. Compassion? Justice?

 So anyway, I asked how much? Which side of the shelf was it on, she asked. I showed her the gap and said 'There'. That OK she said. That's 50p - if it had been further along it would have been £1. Then in true Machiavellian fashion she said, But you could just pay the £1 - which I did!! Oh, and inside the front cover is a label that says Happy Birthday - now was the gift intended to cement a friendship, bribe a colleague, a veiled apology, an act of crawling......oh stop it! And get a life...

Stating the obvious - reading is good for the soul.

I wonder how many readers of this blog know the names and some of the books of Nels F S Ferre, A W Tozer, Elton Trueblood, Baron Friedrich Von Hugel, Evelyn Underhill, Alexander Whyte, Samuel Chadwick, Lesslie Newbigin, and more familiarly, C S Lewis?

What they have in common is entirely arbitrary, and I discovered it only because I happen to have read certain works of theirs over the years. They each recommend choosing one or two authors of substantial fare who should become lifelong conversation partners.

Ferre urged students to become an expert on one particular theologian or philosopher and use that knowledge as a benchmark, a critical measurement of everything else they read and thought.

Tozer, passionate evangelical that he was, enthusiastically read several Catholic books of devotion regularly and commended that practice to those serious about 'the knowledge of the Holy'.

Trueblood, a philosopher Quaker far too much forgotten today, recommended identifying several books as lifelong companions, including A' Kempis' Imitation of Christ, William Law's Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life, Augustine's Confessions, Fenelon's Letters.

Von Hugel read Thomas a Kempis for 15 minutes every day, and one of the most complex and teutonic style philosopher theologians became intellectually docile and receptive to deeper truth.

Evelyn Underhill positively revelled in the writings of the Christian mystical tradition, her favourites being Van Ruysbreck, The Cloud of Unknowing and Augustine Baker's Holy Wisdom.

Alexander Whyte, Free Church of Scotland minister with a noble ecumenical sympathy was happy with the entire Christian tradition, from puritans to Carmelites, and from Boehme to Newman.

Samuel Chadwick, Methodist evangelist and College Principal and Bible Conference preacher and teacher of Christian holiness and perfection, had a classic Catholic devotional book always on his desk during Lent and Passion Week, and so soaked in the classics of Christian devotion.

Lesslie Newbigin in a little known book on ministry, The Good Shepherd, urges a similar regular discipline of exposure to biblical text, 'always having biblical work going with a scholarly commentary'.

C S Lewis in his introduction to Athanasius' The Incarnation, rebukes that chronological snobbery that thinks new books are preferable to old, and insists the reading of old books is essential for Christians to catch the scent of another and heavenly country.

With the advent of Kindle, there are a lot of these devotional, spiritual and theological classics available free or for very little. I'm currently working through The Imitation of Christ. Wonder if that saintly and stern Thomas would approve his meticulously written treatise being read on an electronic screen while travelling on the train, waiting at the dentists, or having a coffee in the favourite coffee place....

Hmmm...

Reading Dickens at Christmas

Instead of reading one of Dickens' novels this Christmas, I read Claire Tomalin's biography. There are pluses and minuses in that - those who enjoy reading Dickens know well enough the humour, the acute and astute observation of human behaviour, the use and abuse of caricature and pathos, the contrived plots which would embarrass most moderate versions of the doctrine of providence, and the narrative drive frequently interrupted by long descriptive passages, some of which are the most closely documented and vivid descritpions of early and mid Victorian London.

The real gain of reading Tomalin's biography is that it is precisely these prominent features of Dickens' genius and perennial appeal that are traced to their living context in Dickens' life experience. That experience was assimilated, reconstructed and written into the characters, plots and landscapes of his novels. Most of what I learned from reading Tomalin is the significance of such contextualising both as explanation of his immediate appeal to his readers, and as exploration of how a writer's own life experience can be transmuted into fiction without losing its connectedness to the author. Dickens' experience of poverty, of thwarted ambition, his struggle to find his way, and the appearance in his novels of characters and human characteristics traceable to those he knew and observed, are all shown to be woven into Dickens' Victorian tapestries. 

The biography reads well, Tomalin's research is meticulous and seldom pedantically paraded, at times she speculates about motive and argues from silence, not always convincingly, but she is in control of the content of Dickens' novels and well versed in the secondary literature. Her earlier work on Nelly Ternan, The Silent Woman, is well exploited in reconstructing the astonishing feat of secrecy and deception required to keep hidden the real relationship between Dickens and Nelly Ternan. This is told with care, understanding, but without excusing Dickens' behaviour and treatment of others in pursuing an alternative, even parallel existence, away from the public eye.

Each of the major novels is discussed and commented on from this same contextual perspective, and much light shed on the birthing process of each novel. That he wrote so much while living a life of self-consuming intensity is testimony to levels of energy and industry that at times defy belief - and adequate explanation. Today we might use the term driven, but even that diminishes Dickens' achievement, for there was undoubtedly an iron will, an obsessive determination to exact from each day of life the maximum quantity of productive experience.

Buit I finished this biography better understanding this complex and contradictory man, at times pitiless to those who thwarted him, yet capable of immense compassion and extraordinary generosity; capable of loving with utter devotion and yet equally capable of cauterising feelings and moving on without a backward glance. It's a sign of Tomalin's achievement that you read her book and have a much less romanticised view of Dickens - he is both increased and diminished in stature, because this is no hagiography, nor is it a piece of literary hatchet swinging. It is a life told mainly according to the evidence, and where there is speculation it is never unfounded. And we are left to wonder at this storytelling genius, who plays on human emotion like a virtuoso musician, bringing a country to a tearful crescendo at the death of little Nell, but who did not attend his own brother's funeral nor send an acknowledgement of his death.

The new Aberdeen University Library is stunning!

This afternoon I sauntered down Old Aberdeen enjoying the bustle of students, the autumn colours, a chill North Sea breeze, and the sunlight and shadows on the old buildings. And in the middle of this back in time olde worlde community sit several large modern buildings built over the years as the campus has expanded.

The latest one, the new library building looks like this!

When it was being built I was skeptical, harrumphing with disapproval at this immense greenhouse.

 I was wrong. This is a stunning building, a statement of confidence, an architectural art form that asserts the importance of knowledge and the central, crucial role of a library in any University. Walking towards it I was excited and moved by the sheer sheen of sunlight and sky reflecting outwards and downwards upon those coming under its shadow.

I think it's great such bold creativity is invested in making space attractive and surprising, the building exceptional in concept, and a powerful affirmation of the importance of space dedicated to learning, understanding and contributing to the intellectual and social capital that enriches us all. On the way back to the car I played with words and eventually formed a dedicatory haiku, or two!

Propagation of Thought

      Glazed green grass blades shine,

growing towards sun and sky;

greenhouse of wisdom.

The foyer brings you straight into the cafe so the place of learnin g and culture has one of its most  important departments in the front window - good coffee, light ambience and a buzz of stuff going on.

Then you look up and this is what you see! I took the photo with the permission of the library staff who love the place. Can see why.





 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Intellectual Discovery

Mind's aspiration:

thoughts beyond known horizons,

spiralling upwards.

 

This is a place I will want to come to, and come back to, again, and again.

 

 

 

 

 

Acknowledging Life Enhancing Debts

Every now and again as a reader, thinker, theologian and writer I sit and list in my mind those who have helped me to read, think, do theology and write. Intellectual indebtedness is one of the most enriching forms of being in another's debt. Throughout the years as I have been reading and preaching, thinking and sharing, praying and talking, writing and listening, a number of voices have become familiar, known, trusted, and therefore significant to the point of defining of the way I now think and talk about what I believe.

The list grows, as does the debt. Walter Brueggemann, Jean Vanier, Thomas Merton, P T Forsyth, Evelyn Underhill, Jurgen Moltmann, Abraham Joshua Heschel, Dorothy Day, Cicely Saunders, James Dunn, Jonathan Sacks, Hans Urs Von Balthasar, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Hans Kung, Julian of Norwich, Karl Barth, Lesslie Newbigin, Dorothee Soelle, Frederick Copleston; poets like Denise Levertov, R S Thomas, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Elizabeth Jennings, Seamus Heaney, Emily Dickinson, novelists too many to mention or even remember. And biographies or remarkable people, not because they were famous and therefore great, but because they lived lives of exemplary human complexity, in frailty and strength, with courage and sometimes fear, now making right decisions then wrong, but not always because the choices were clear or morally straightforward. Biography is theology enfleshed, embodied conviction, faith evidenced by life. 

And amongst those to whom I acknowledge a long indebtedness, intellectual and spiritual, is Frederick Buechner, whose writings include novels, essays and sermons. This is the year of publsished sermons for me. So Brueggemann's volume will appear and Fred Craddock's is already out. Buechner has preached since 1959 and the volume Secrets in the Dark is his selection of sermons, preached and written, over 50 years. The first, and still remarkable for its unabashed faithfulness to the God crucified in Christ, was entitled 'The Magnificent Defeat'. In an age of internet borrowed material and power point illustrated 'teaching', and rigidly pragamatic and practical applied preaching, this stands as a masterpiece of contradiction to all forms of homiletic dumbed-downness. This is rhetorical passion and biblical imagination, theological courage and pastoral honesty that will not short change the listener who comes to hear a Word from God. And throughout this book there are moments of revelation, and sometimes what we learn of the love of God comes through the preacher's own acknowledged frailties and needs. 

Late in the book is a sermon entitled "Waiting". Tomorrow and Sunday I'll quote a few paragraphs. Then maybe you'll believe the blurb above!

This was written while listening to Beethoven's Violin Concerto - there too there is tenderness, vision, playfulness, rumbustious confidence, tension and gentleness, force and movement, and all expressed with the virtuosity of the concert level performer - there are no homiletical concerts, but if there were Buechner would be on stage!

The Enduring Melody - the fellowship of joy and of suffering

My friend Geoff Colmer - whom I see about once a year at a UK Baptist conference, has gently encouraged me for some time to read The Enduring Melody by Michael Mayne. I first encountered the work of Michael Mayne in his volume This Sunrise of Wonder, which I consider one of the most life affirming and theologically literate books I've ever read. So my slowness in getting to The Enduring Melody is only because other things were pressing, and I know a book of such richness isn't one to skim, cram in, flick through or read dutifully. It should be read - and the verb to read means something much more than mere perusal or hurried shopping down the supermarket aisles grabbing what my limited time allows to throw into the mental trolley.

So for a week now I've been reading The Enduring Melody, and found myself in the company of faith, courage, beauty, wonder, loss, love, pain, anxiety, enjoyment and much else that is expressed in a book that alternates between very personal journal and beautifully crafted essay. In that sense there are two books - the diary of an illness that proves terminal, and essays on some the things that made up the enduring melody of Michael Mayne's life as a Church of England priest, a vocation lived with the classic pastoral genius of Anglican spirituality at its most inquisitively affirming.

The only other published Journal that comes near this for honest spiritual search, human and humane longing, wise reflection on the meaning of this person's life, regret that life is shortening but gladness for what it has been and still is, are the two volumes of Philip Toynbee, Part of a Journey, and End of a Journey. I remember very clearly reading them, the time in my life and the places I was when I did read them. And I remember too some of the moments when I simply nodded in mute but sincere recognition of those deep undercurrents of faith and fellowship that enable us to say I believe in the communion of saints. I'll write more about Toynbee soon.

Over the next week or so I'll write about The Enduring Melody. Not a book review, more reports of conversations between pilgrims who know, you've got to walk that lonesome valley, you've got to walk there by yourself. But pilgrims who also know that you don't ever walk by yourself, even if that is the way it feels. You walk with the company, felt or unfelt, of the One whose rod and staff comort; and you walk with those friends and companions in life who also walk their road and ours; and you walk, or run, surrounded by the great cloud of witnesses, with perseverance looking to Jesus.

Van Gogh, Thomas Merton and Rowan Williams - and the connection is?

Had a good day yesterday when important things have been done, said and enjoyed.  Journeyed to Glendoick to meet my friend Ken where we spent several hours at the garden centre. In the taciturn and occasionally nasty summer we're having the day was sunny, clear views for miles and the roads still quietish at the end of the school holidays. We don't get the chance to meet often so we tend to make a meal of it. This time we made two meals of it, a bacon and egg roll and a pot of tea, an hour's walk, then Carrot and orange soup with herb scones.

We've been friends more than half our lives and though we'd planned another bookshop crawl in Edinburgh, a civilised conversation over good food for three hours was much to be preferred.

Got home and listened to Albinoni's Oboe Concerto in D Minor while writing and reading, and gloating (no other word will do) over recently bought books. The slow movement of this concerto should be played quietly while reading one of the great narratives of divine and human tenderness in the gospels - for me the encounter of Mary Magdalene with Jesus in the garden.

Of the books being gloated over the one I read next will be The Yellow House, Martin Gayford, (Penguin) is the account of Van Gogh, Gaugin and nine turbulent weeks in Arles. Two geniuses with all their psychological complexities, artists at the zenith of their talent and the extremes of innovation, both eager for friendship but encountering in each other the greatest obstacle to mutual friendship! While working on the Sunflowers tapestry I'm keeping in touch with Vincent in different ways - not trying to understand him, which I think is neither possible nor necessary. But to know the whence of the chaos and the wherefore of the genius, to accept and respect the relationship between his illness and inner turmoil and the immense achievements of his art, and to have an emotional context out of which to work an impression of his favourite painting, and the focus of his desperate longing for sunlight, hope and inner rest.  

 

One of the traits of the bibliophile is gloating over a forthcoming book yet to be printed! This one brings together the Christian whose writing has shaped my own spirituality and thinking in ways decisive for my view of ministry, myself, human relationships, the nature of prayer and the paradoxical imperatives of community, silence and solitude as places and times where and when God is to be found. Ever since I read The Seven Storey Mountain, followed by Thoughts in Solitude I have never had a year when I haven't read Merton's writing. This forthcoming book is by Rowan Williams, and I can't think of someone I'd rather have exploring and reflecting on Merton's continuing relevance in a world where the things Merton made deep concerns remain deeply concerning - cultural conflicts, violence, consumer greed, cultural superficiality and human creativity turned against human interests and flourishing. Merton's great insight that the contemplative was a necessary presence in a world in desperate need of redemption, righteousness, peace and justice remains a major portion of his legacy that is of enduring value. He spoke into the cultural urgencies and reconfigurations of the 50's and 60's and much that he wrote remains valid half a century later. Is that because human nature, our profligacy and pretensions, our anger, angst and anxiety, our propensity for self-preservation and self-harm, remain humanity's greatest threat? And thus a great and fallible human being like Merton can bring together the contemplative and the active, the promise of divine grace enabling human goodness, the monk as holy person in whose prayers are gathered up the broken pieces of a God loved world?

Confessions of a Bibliophile - The Hound and the Falcon

I was recently asked to look through several boxes of books which came from  a house being cleared. If there was anything there I wanted just feel free to take it!

That's a hard ask then, isn't it?

Could I  make an appointment to come and browse them?

Yes - how about this evening I said.

Now the problem with browsing several boxes of books, any one or any hundred of which you are free to take, is that you begin to have daft ideas that you have enough time in life to read everything. Or if that unreasonable rationalisation isn't convincing, you begin to see each book as a possible masterpiece you have just overlooked so far for lack of opportunity - no matter that it is brown, cracked, smells musty and dusty and looks rusty. So there's a need for the fruit of the spirit which is self control, and a reminder that greed and acquisitiveness, possessiveness and an all embracing yes to intellectual appetite is indeed a work of the flesh.

So from those five boxes I only took half a dozen, and three of those were novels which will find their way soon to one of the far too many charity bags now coming through the letter box. Another was one I knew someone else would like, Wild Swans, (in bookseller speak, ' nice fresh copy, hardback, binding solid, dustcover very good and unclipped). The other two I have kept. C S Lewis once said the sign of the well read person  is one who looks over the gathered miscellanea on the second hand book barrows in the market (O for such events and literary adventures to return alongside the book chains and Amazon) - anyway to look and find something you haven't read and now want to. And though you don't know the book you now have an instinct for that which is mentally nutritious, emotionally satisfying, and promisingly interesting - and this previously non-existent book now presents itself and demands to be read.

The Hound and the Falcon, by Antonia White answers all three criteria, and I'm nearly finished it. Not a novel, but the letters she wrote to someone called Peter in 1940,41 during the London Blitz. The letters are intense, regular accounts of a woman struggling to return to and hold on to her Catholic faith. At times searingly honest, she is both a profound critic of her Church and a conscientious practising Catholic. But for her practice is more important than dogma, and what she does and who she is matters more than the specific articulations of what she believes. In mind and conscience, in her spirit and emotions she collides with much popular piety and official dogma, and the result is a glimpse into the inner life of one who genuinely loves God and struggles with the institutions which claim to represent God on earth.

Amongst her heroes (of whom she is also critical) is Baron Friedrich Von Hugel, whose letters are a strange mixture of teutonic reasoning and spiritual insight, stern doctrine and compassionate understanding of spiritual struggle. I've only read a few other books in which the authentic and costly struggle for integrity in spiritual life is so movingly recorded, so convincingly honest, and articulated in such penetrating yet personal prose to a friend she clearly had come to love and trust.

They only ever met twice. The correspondence is one sided as Peter's letters are not extant. But she responds so fully and frankly that it's possible to piece together some of the content of the letters she answers. But it is her own search and struggle that is of interest here. Reading these letters from a woman impatient with metaphysics but who reads Aquinas, highly intelligent and likely to tear a strip off me for pointing that out as if that were unusual, devoted to the Gospel but sharply critical of the Church, Catholic to the core without buying into much she saw as superfluous or unnecessarily obstructive to faith, I have come away once again aware of two things.

First, the letter is a magnificent lens into a person's heart and mind. The combination of personal relationship and inner journey is ideal for the articulation of faith. An exchange of letters is a thoughtful, considered dialogue. Some of the finest theological and spiritual writing is woven into correspondence. Second, the journey of the soul towards God, the longing for intimacy and belonging, the search for truth that can be lived, the love of beauty that can be adored, the yearning for goodness in ourselves and in others, the desire for God and the love of learning, - these are the signs of a soul alive, the evidence of spiritual awareness, the result of life received as gift so not taken for granted, but taken as granted, from God. Over the years I have met many in the communion of saints, which has absolutely no denominational barriers, who have so enriched my own faith and helped my own life, by the honest telling of their story.

Books come into our lives by accident, by providence, by chance - who knows? And what does it matter? The Hound and the Falconis one of a number of special books on my shelves which could be labelled 'serendipity'. I choose to believe that the Holy Spirit is the bringer of possibility, the Divine opportunist whose nudges and pushes are as far as divine coercion will go, but whose wisdom is unsearchable yet searches us to the core of our being, and speaks truth. Maybe that's what Jesus meant when he spoke of the Paraclete who leads into the truth, but taking the things of Jesus and explaining them to those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, the pure in heart, the meek, the person for whom Beatitude is to be found in God.

Lovers of Discord because Lovers of Truth?

Lovers of Discord is one of Keith Clements' best books, though I guess not all that well known now. Published 23 years ago it is a critical but appreicative account of some of the theological bust ups in England in the 20th Century. Whether or not he agreed with the theological speculations, aberrations and protestations, he clearly admired those who were too faithful to the truth to silence awkward questions, or settle for partial and unconvincing arguments, or put up with dogmatic pronouncements disguised as conviction but in reality strident certitudes scared stiff of hesitation, uncertainty and doubt. On the last page he quotes the well repeated lines about the Lord having yet more light and truth to break forth from his word, and uses it the way most people do - as a warning against ever thinking we have God sussed, or that our views have some kind of secure finality, or that our view of the Bible is the biblical one and other people who differ are, well, unbiblical.

But then on the last page he writes some reflections that could only come from someone whose spirit is ecumenical, whose faith is evangelical, whose theology is liberal in the sense of generous, and whose mind remains open to the Spirit of truth who takes the things of Jesus and makes them known to the intellect, the heart and those secret places within us where truth gains its purchase on our deepest motives, inciters our most passionate longings, and sustains our most persistent hopes. Here is Clements' final words in this book:

"There is a looking back to the past for authoritative reassurance, rather than  an anticipation of some new thing, a continual desire to return and check the tomb is empty before taking the road to jerusalem to wherever Christ is to be met anew....We may believe in an ultimate unity of truth, though not apprehended as yet, and only seen in a glass darkly. The resolution of theological conflict is a hope and it will be fulfilled only when there is no more to be taught us by the Spirit of truth."  (Page 242)

The book is available used on Amazon for 1p - which just goes to show you can't tell a book by looking at its price! The image is from Hubble - and is included here just to remind us of our size, our place, and our insignificance if we are considered apart from the eternal purposeful Love that moves the sun and other stars.