Clarion: Journal of Spirituality and Justice

Hermann Hesse's "The Journey to the East" (Part 2) - by Ron Dart

Hesse’s two works of these crucial years—Journey to the East composed in 1930 andThe Glass Bead Game, written between 1931 and 1942—were deeply political  books in a sense quite different from the previous novels. --Ralph Freedman, Hermann Hesse: Pilgrim of Crises: A Biography p. 339           

Ron Dart in Hesse's home, 2012

There has been, gratefully so, a Phoenix-like resurrection in the last decade in the life and writings of Hermann Hesse. Hesse was, in many ways, a rite of passage must-read author in the counter-culture of the late 1950s-1960s-1970s. Sadly so, he was, mostly, misread by those who misunderstood his layered inward and outer journey as a writer steeped in the best of the European literary and cultural, religious and political ethos and tradition. As the counter-culture of the mid-20^thcentury moved on, Hesse seemed to disappear with it, his fate and future too linked with such a period of history. But, a more mature, subtle and sophisticated read of Hesse is afoot these days, and as such a return to Hesse occurs, much gold is to be mined in Hesse’s perennial insights and wisdom.

I have been fortunate to spend time at Hesse’s home in Montagnola in southern Switzerland and have lingered long with his writings and sensitive and often troubled life journey. I posted an initial reflection on one of Hesse’s shorter novels, The Journey to the East, and this will be a companion to that article. The title of the book, in some ways, misrepresents the content of the book. Many who merely read the title falsely assume that the book is about a journey to the East in a spiritual way as a counterpoint to the decadent and unspiritual west. There is an unfortunate and somewhat superficial approach by many on a conscious contemplative journey to idealize and romanticize various types of Oriental religions and spirituality and caricature Western culture as secular, too beholden to science and religiously agnostic,  atheistic or superficially religious (lacking a contemplative and meditative depth). This means that a journey to the east must be taken to recover or refind what is longed for at the centre and fount of the soul and spirit. But, Hesse, was much too bright and wise to slip into such a simplistic dualism and either-or approach to the religious crises of our age and ethos.

How might we read The Journey to the East in its context and for our troubled times? There are five points I want to briefly mention as pointers into understanding this superb classic of a book.

First,The Journey to the East was written and published in the early 1930s and, as such, nationalism was very much on the rise in Germany (Hesse had strong German connections but he consciously chose to live in neutral Switzerland). The rising nationalism in Germany in the late 1920s-1930s held the attention and hearts of many Germans. The notion of a people regaining and recovering their damaged reputation in the midst of both economic depression and the failure of capitalism and communism motivated many. It is in this context that significant leadership in the church (certainly not the best or all) linked the fate of the church with National Socialism—the state and religion had a symbiotic relationship. It is essential to note, though, many were the German Christians that opposed such a dysfunctional relationship of sorts. Hesse was acutely aware of such a reality and, in many ways, The Journey to the East, is a political rebuttal to such a notion, Hesse’s vision of “The League” upping the spiritual and political ideal to a higher and more demanding unity than nationhood or race, the “Great War” ever the backdrop to this novel.

Second, how did Hesse deal with the two types of communities that confronted him at the time? If the German race and nation was an option that held many and became an absolute centre of commitment, were there higher ideals that transcended such a questionable vision?

The League of spiritual searchers, as I mentioned above, brought together men and women (past and present) who acted as countervailing thinkers and activists, beacons of inspiring light and life that would not be taken captive by the blood and race ethos of the time. Most of those on such a quest in the League had a symbiotic relationship of sorts with those in the past who lived well and wisely—they were, in many ways, icons and mentors to the searchers, teachers who stood in opposition to Hitler and tribe. Most of the names and times Hesse mentions in The Journey to the East are unknown and foreign to most readers, but this speaks much about the literary and cultural illiteracy of our age and ethos, memoricide a dominant disease we live with. But, for Hesse (and others), such names and times offered an alternate vision to live by, a counter-culture to heed and live into. Who did Hesse point to as a model contra the wille zur macht of the 1930s?

Third, the narrator of the novel begins his journey and continues such a quest in a utopian community of sorts, the League consciously committed to living a deeper and more meaningful faith journey, heeding and hearing the best and wisest from history and diverse faith traditions, the “Great War” as mentioned above the ominous canvass on which this beauty of a text was painted.   But, in time, the League fragments and dissipates. The main protagonist in the tale reflects back on such a significant phase in his journey and wonders why and how such a thing occurred, the best of intentions deteriorating into failed hopes and dreams, despair his growing companion. It seems, as the novel unfolds, the age of innocence now past, the age of experience pointing in two directions: cynicism and despair or the quest for deeper insight and wisdom the guiding light. It is significant to note that for Hesse the East is, in a deeper sense, the “Home of Light” and “towards home”. This is the challenge of the narrator--which internal and external voices will he listen to and why? Is there a commonwealth of spirituality and the virtues that transcend time, place, space, race and nation? Such a question is very much with us these days as peoples and borders are being drawn to keep foreigners out. 

Fourth, the north star of sorts in the novel is Leo. The League was held together, for the most part, when Leo, the seemingly innocuous servant, was present. Most in the League ignored Leo even though they appreciated his quiet, consistent and servant-like commitment to those on the quest. The animals saw Leo for who he truly was but the irony of the tale was those who seemed to be the most conscious in their quest did not see the deeper meaning of their quest, Leo, servant-like, in their midst. Hesse had written, earlier in his life, a short biography of St. Francis and Francis figures prominently, in his first successful novel, Peter Camenzind. Hesse, being the poet and myth embodier that he was, tapped into the significance of Leo both as Francis’ dearest friend and supporter and the myth of Leo the Lion (passions and strength transformed into generous service and kindness). When Leo slipped away from the League, the deeper meaning of the League vanished and the spiritual questers lost their ability to both remain together and find their way. Obviously, in such insights, Hesse is speaking much about the deeper meaning of spirituality, politics and identity. The narrator of the novel discovers, as his journey matures that, in fact, Leo is the head of the League and, as such, clarifies the more significant meaning of the East (light, home, rising of the sun and day).    

Fifth, if Hesse in The Journey to the East was questioning and undermining the political ethos of the time with a vastly different understanding of community and leadership (spiritual insights of the best of history and religious traditions an antidote to nationalism, blood and race-----such is very much with us again today), Hesse was also engaging, at a deeper level, probably, a thinker he had grappled with most of his life: Nietzsche. It is virtually impossible to read Hesse’s novels without Nietzsche appearing on front stage again and again. Leo, of course, can be the powerful lion whose will shapes and makes the world, who dominates and faces into the tragic and, again and again, wills an overcoming of sorts. It is significant to note that the lion is at the beginning of Thus Spoke Zarathustra in “On the Three Metamorphoses”. Hesse’s Leo as model and mentor of the new being is an alternate to Nietzsche’s Zarathustra. Hesse was, of course, not only dealing with the obvious political turmoil of the 1930s but he also saw beyond such a period of time the issue of ‘identity” and “human nature” in the West would become a contested issue----Leo or Zarathustra? Which and why? It is somewhat interesting that Nietzsche has held court for many a decade but Hesse has been ignored and yet Hesse is, probably, when understood aright, one of the best and finest dialogue partners of Nietzsche. Those who are seriously interested in a thoughtful engagement with Nietzsche do need to immerse themselves in Hesse’s life long dialogue and dance with Nietzsche.

The Journey to the East is, therefore, a counter political novel to both the overt nationalism of the 1930s in Germany and Europe (offering a higher ethic) in which identity is defined by political power (and who has it) and an emerging notion of personal power in which identity, Nietzsche style, is about making and willing into reality, in a creative and constructive manner, against much cultural opposition and odds, the self-creating new being. Hesse offered, in his many novels, from Peter Camenzindto Siddhartha to The Journey to the East and culminating in The Glass Bead Game the notion of the self as a kindly and thoughtful servant of civilization and culture as an antidote to both the political power mongering of the 1930s and the questionable Nietzschean notion of willing into being an ever making self. Hesse’s novel, Narcissus and Goldmund, in many ways, highlights how the faithful Narcissus (Hesse’s deeper probes into the meaning of the word) was the real builder and preserver of all this is good and beautiful in a cultural way that only the creative Goldmund understands at the end of his all too human journey---much the same theme is played out in a rawer and more graphic manner in Demian and Steppenwolf.

The Journey to the East does need to be set both within the context of Hesse’s larger literary vision and the historic times in which he lived—often neither is done, hence the book is misread. And, to conclude, there is a significant if indirect political dimension at the core and centre of The Journey to the East that is often missed also. Hopefully, this missive might correct some obvious omissions and oversights in a reading of this timely (than and new) beauty of a book.

Ron Dart        

Ron Dart with Paul VanderKlay on Jordan Peterson, CS Lewis, Thomas Merton, Hermann Hesse

Paul VanderKlay's third conversation with Ron Dart. Ron is editing a book on Jordan Peterson. In this conversation they talk about three mid-20th century authors: CS Lewis, Thomas Merton and Hermann Hesse in relation to the shaping of faith in the modern world.

Craig Allert's "Early Christian Readings of Genesis One" - Review by Ron Dart

Craig Allert, Patristic Exegesis and Literal Interpretation. IVP Academic, 2018.                                             

There has been, gratefully so, in the last few decades, a questioning of the reformed, evangelical and charismatic approach to how the Bible should be read, interpreted and applied. This larger question transcends the protestant tendencies and ethos, but it is a bugaboo of sorts for those whose approach to the Bible tends to be excessively focused on a more literal, grammatical, historic and linguistic approach to the text (with usually some moral and devotional application to rescue the book from an excessive scholarly attitude or simply museum culture). The turn to a more catholic exegetical (catholic in the Patristic sense) approach to Scripture has been growing in momentum and commitment the last few years, and such an approach is being applied to various and varied content issues within the Bible.

The sheer bounty of Allert’s recent book, Early Christian Readings of Genesis One, is the way he applies Patristic reads of early chapters of Genesis to the creation accounts. Needless to say, this is a heated topic (often more heat than light) for those who tend to read the creation accounts in both a literal and young earth way and manner. Such an approach needlessly collides with many reads of science and alternate ways of reading Genesis that are classical, hence cannot be easily dismissed as liberal. The careful and historic turn by Allert to the layered exegetical means by which the Fathers of the Church read the early chapters of Genesis illuminates for the curious and honest faith seeker that there is more to the Bible than has often revealed by a more reductionistic and one dimensional approach by many within the evangelical and evangelical-reformed tribes.

Ron Dart on Jordan Peterson, Francis Schaeffer and Community - with Paul VanderKlay

Walter J. Burghardt's "Long Have I Loved You" - Review by Ron Dart

Walter J. Burghardt, Long Have I Loved You: A Theologian Reflects on His Church (Orbis Books, 2000).

There is, gratefully so, a movement afoot these days to return to the classical and Patristic form of contemplative theology (important to note the fact Hans Boersma won the theology book of the year award from Christianity Today, Boersma’s most recent books dealing with Patristic theology). There is, also, a counterforce towards a confessional and exegetical reformed and neo-Calvinist agenda (the recent publication by Iain Provan, The Reformation and the Right Reading of Scripture, speaks its own telling message, Provan turning on Boersma). The danger, of course, when such cultural cross-currents occur is that one side of the tension is idealized and the other either demonized, caricatured or subordinated. There are books worth the reading many times on such topics, and a favourite of mine is Walter Burghardt’s Long Have I Loved You: A Theologian Reflects on His Church (obviously a riff off Augustine’s “Late Have I Loved You”).

There were few in the 20^thcentury that had Burghardt’s depth and range in Patristic theology (he studied with the best of the scholars in the area), but he never unduly idealized, romanticized or froze such a period in history as the golden age in which the purest and finest phase of theology was done (the rest of history but a commentary on such a high season of theology). The 14 chapters in Long Have I Loved You discuss, in much depth and detail, both the appeal and limitations of the Patristic vision and ethos and the need for a mature theology to be in conversation with each phase and season of the epic faith journey as thought and imagination seeks to know God and the relationship of God to humanity and nature. Burghardt knows of what he speaks given the fact he was front and centre in the revival and renewal of the Patristic vision of contemplative theology and his many publications as listed in the lengthy “Appendix” testify to such a fact.

Burghardt often lamented that many forms, types and intellectual interpretations of Christianity are not much more than “homiletic pap and bromides”. The turn to responsible thinking was at the core and centre of Burghardt’s many years of teaching and multiple publications, Long Have I Loved You a literary and theological overview, with decided pastoral implications, for contemporary Christians. Certainly, in this era of ours in which a certain approach to the Patristics is either idealized or denigrated (the past being the best and most mature from which a decline has set in or a more progressive notion of history in which the past is seen as a more immature) Berghardt can offer a more dialogical and interactive approach in doing theology as theology has been done through the centuries of Christian thought and life.

I am often asked if I was marooned on an island for a few years, what books I would want by my side. Long Have I Loved You is certainly on the upper shelf for me--a read of this full-bodied tome will certainly reveal a way of doing theology that is dynamic and critical, contemplative and pastoral, fully committed to the historic life of the church (midst many reasons not to be). Indeed, it takes a mature mind and soul to stay the course and do so in a loyal and critical manner, always being guided by love.

May you all have a meaningful Advent-Christmas-Epiphany season.

Amor Vincit Omnia

Ron Dart      

Carla D. Sunberg's, "The Cappadocian Mothers" - review by Ron Dart

Carla D. Sunberg, The Cappadocian Mothers: Deification Exemplified in the Writings of Basil, Gregory and Gregory (Pickwick Publications, 2017).                               

Every student of Christian theology, even if only a dilettante, has heard of the Cappadocian Fathers. But who were the Cappadocian Mothers? Thomas Noble

There has been a desperate need, for many a longing decade, to bring to the fore the immense contributions of the mothers and sisters of the classical Cappadocian theologians (certainly some of the most sophisticated and nuanced in the history of Christian contemplative theology). The sheer beauty and bounty of The Cappadocian Mothers is the way Carla Sunberg has woven together, in the finest of a tapestry, the insights and layered ways of thinking and living the faith journey and impact on their immediate and extended families (each who articulated a mature theology). The way Sunberg, rightly and legitimately so, connects the needful dots between theology and deification makes this primer of a book a must purchase and worthy of multiple meditative reads.

The Cappadocian Mothers has 9 compact chapters and the “Foreward” by T.A. Noble makes for a lovely pointer into the content of the book. Each of the chapters have much solid information packed into their few yet inviting chapters: 1) Introduction, 2) The Christianization of Deification, 3) Christocentric Development, 4) The Development of Monasticism and the Role of Virginity in the Cappadocian Understanding of Theosis, 5) The Fallen Virgin, 6) Married Women as the New Eve: Nonna and Gorgonia, 7) Macrina, The Perfect Virgin Bride, 8) Practical Implications for Life and Ministry: Macrina the Elder, Emmelia, and Theosebia and 10) The Mothers Exemplify Deification. 

Each of these incisive and finely tuned chapters walks the inquisitive reader into the wisdom and contemplative way of the past (and its deification ending) and the role significant women (Nonna, Gorgonia, Macrina the Elder and Younger, Emmelia, and Theosebia) played in shaping, deepening and enriching the theological visions and conclusion of their siblings and children. There is, of course, something perennial about the Cappadocian Mothers-Fathers and the unique way they lived and thought through their faith pilgrimages. Needless to say, as substantive questions are being raised about the limitations of modern and postmodern approaches to our all too human journey, the fullness of the classical way is being brought to the fore once again. The post-reformation tendency has been either to caricature the classical past or ignore it--such approaches now seem thin and vapid, not worthy of serious consideration. This means there is a turn to the classical tradition of Christianity, and, in such a turn, we cannot miss the nuanced approach of the mothers and sisters of the Cappadocian contemplative theologians. In short, and sum, The Cappadocian Mothers reveals much that has been concealed by inadequate and superficial reads of Western and Christian history--do read and inwardly digest this bounty and beauty of a key in the ignition classic in the making of sorts--a fullness of the faith will definitely be birthed in the process.

Ron Dart  

Merton Pasternak and Zhivago: "Disputed Questions" & Disputing Merton

Ron Dart completes his series on Merton and Pasternak by challenging simplistic readings of Dr. Zhivago that either moralize or idealize, then explores a few blind spots in Merton's own interpretation of this epic tale.

Thomas Merton and Boris Pasternak/Dr. Zhivago: “The Candle on the Table Burned”

Part 1 - Thomas Merton and Boris Pasternak/Dr. Zhivago: “The Candle on the Table Burned”

Part 2 - Thomas Merton's Prometheus: Two Visions - Ron Dart

UFV Live Forum: Pasternak's "Dr. Zhivago" with Larissa Horne, Ron Dart & Alan Cameron

Is Jordan Peterson More Luther or Erasmus? Ron Dart interview by Paul VanderKlay

Ron Dart sees similarities between Jordan Peterson and Erasmus, the "Prince of the Humanists". As we talked I began to think he's more like Luther. The Internet connection wasn't great so the sound dropped in and out. We did the best we could. Next time we talk we'll discuss Peterson and Francis Schaeffer.

Dr. Zhivago (III): the Poems--Comedy & Tragedy - Ron Dart

In the third installment of Ron Dart's series on Dr. Zhivago, he discusses the poetry at the end of the novel, from Hamlet through Gethsemane to Fairy Tales. 

Part 1 (Dr. Zhivago and Sound of Music) can be viewed HERE and Part 2 (Dr. Zhivago, the Novel) is available HERE. 

See the poem, Hamlet, below the video.

Dr. Zhivago (II): the Novel--Themes & Characters - Ron Dart

The series began with Part 1: Dr. Zhivago & the Sound of Music: Two Worldviews 

 In this episode, part 2, Ron discusses the novel's underlying themes and seven main characters.

Pasternak's Dr Zhivago (pt 1) - Zhivago & Sound of Music: 2 World Views - Ron Dart

Review of David C. Downing's "Into the Region of Awe: Mysticism in C.S. Lewis" by Ron Dart

Review of David C. Downing, Into the Region of Awe: Mysticism in C.S. Lewis (InterVarsity Press, Downers Grove Illinois, 2005).

There are a variety of portals into reading and interpreting the life and varied publications of C.S. Lewis. There has been an unfortunate tendency to equate Lewis with variations of evangelical Christianity (such a misread), but Lewis was much more a catholic Anglican. Then, there are those who argue Lewis is more of a rationalist (makes for a good Christian apologist). Or, there is Lewis the romantic or the rationalist-romantic. Is there more to Lewis, though?

There sheer beauty and strength of David C. Downing’s Into the Region of Awe: Mysticism in C.S. Lewis is the way he convincingly highlights how Lewis is much more than a rationalist or romantic or some combination thereof—in short, Lewis is at core and centre a mystic. And, to the pertinent point, who are the writers Lewis was most indebted to? Downing suggests there are three writers that have had a substantive impact on Lewis’s mystical vision: George MacDonald, William R. Inge and of prime importance Evelyn Underhill. Underhill is referenced more than any other writer in Into the Region of Aweas directly and indirectly influencing Lewis’s notion of mysticism. It is also worthy of note to remember Underhill-Lewis corresponded for a few years before Underhill’s death, the correspondence initiated by Underhill as a result of reading Lewis’sOut of the Silent Planet.

 

Into the Region of Awe is divided into ten compact, succinct and insightful chapters: 1) Introduction: The Overlooked Lewis, 2) The Mystique of Mysticism, 3) Mystical Elements in Lewis’ Life, 4) Christian Mysticism as Lewis Knew it, 5) The Mystical Way in the Space Trilogy, 6) Finding Words to Explore the Mind of God, 7) Mystical Elements in the Narnia Chronicles, 8) Lewis’ Critique of Mysticism, 9) Learning from the Mystical Way and 10) A Brief Timeline of Christian Mystics. It is significant that Underhill is on front stage in most of the chapters and referenced many times in the compact missive by Downing. The fact that Downing has focussed, in his read of Lewis and mysticism, on the Space Trilogy and Chronicles of Narnia speaks much about how Lewis did some of his best theology via literature and, more to the point, his mystical writings emerged through the genre of literature (albeit his Space Trilogy and seemingly children’s literature, although the Chronicles can be read at different layers and levels). Needless to say, Underhill had a literary bent also.

Evelyn Underhill, like Inge and MacDonald, were a generation older than Lewis and each of them matured in an age and ethos that tended to be both suspicious and cynical about religion and mysticism. But, it was Underhill and Inge, in their different ways, who challenged the reign of positivist philosophy and a certain notion of science that tended to be reductionistic. Underhill, Inge and MacDonald realized that the mystical way, once banished, left the human soul bereft of deeper sources of meaning and purpose---they were, in many ways, the heralds of the mystical way. Lewis read and inwardly digested their writings and his, wisely articulated by Downing, carries forward the fullness of the mystical way—such is the contribution of Downing to Lewis’s full renaissance notion of the all too human journey.

Ron Dart

           

Review of Stan Paterson’s, ICE MAN - by Ron Dart

Review of Stan Paterson’s, ICE MAN: The Making of a Glaciologist. Papyngay Press, Oregon, 2013.  Review by Ron Dart

I have had an abiding interest in glacier trekking and glaciers for many a decade. Many tend to see the multiple receding and melting glaciers as climate canaries of sorts, alerting us to the obvious shifts and changes in global temperatures. Needless to say, the political right and left tend to differ rather graphically and how they interpret the causes and reasons for global warming. But, there can be no doubt we are living through the midst of a very real transition environmentally and the implications are not yet fully with us. There are, of course, the predictable henny-penny catastrophic types and, their inevitable counterparts, the deniers of the problem. Those who have lingered with glaciers for many years or, more importantly, viewed their life and research on glaciers as a vocation, Ice Man: The Making of a Glaciologist is a must-read primer.

There can be no doubt that Stan Paterson has lived the glaciologist vocation and Ice Man is a must read page turner that recounts and records Paterson’s journey, in 15 ample chapters, from the early 1950s  when Paterson was involved with the British North Greenland expedition to the Canadian Arctic, Alps and BC Coast Range. The vocation of a glaciologist presupposes a range of mountaineering skills and Paterson’s well-told tale threads together, in exquisite detail, his mountaineering and glacier life. The publication of his standard text, The Physics of Glaciers, has gone through a variety of changes since it was initially published in 1969 and its most recent edition (4^th) in 2011.

Paterson was given a PhD from UBC in 1962 for his pioneering work and in 2012, rightly so, he was honoured with the Richardson Medal of the International Glaciological Society.

The Preface by I.H.M. Smart, Introduction by David Fisher and the charming Forward by Myrtle Simpson (“Mountaineering with Stan Paterson”) make for a generous foray into Paterson’s well lived life as a mountaineer and glaciologist. Those who are keen to follow the unfolding journey of Paterson should take their time to savour each chapter as his life matures and his experience makes him one of the leading authorities in the world of glaciers. The fact Paterson worked for the Polar Shelf Project from 1962-1980 positioned him well for in-depth research on glaciers. Those who have less patience for the long and twisting path (chapters are short and informative, though) taken by Paterson in his mountaineering and glacier journey should turn to the final chapter, “Summing Up” (15), although much will be missed by such a shortcut.

There can be no doubt that Ice Man is a superb aerial overview of one of the most significant glaciologists of the 20^thcentury, and the fact his journey from Scotland to Canada opened up such possibilities for him in an area that is now front and centre for much research in our growing ecological crises.

montani semper liberi

Ron Dart              

 

Hope and the Tragic: Robinson Jeffers’ Alpine Christ, Milosz and Merton - Ron Dart

 

Jeffers room at Detjeen’s Big Sur

My wife (Karin) and I took, for our 40^thanniversary, to the Ucluelet/Tofino area on the West Coast of Canada. The waves from the ocean continually rose in thick white foams, crested, then crashed on the shoreline. Rocks and waves waged their ongoing, day by day, week by week, month and year by year contest, the craggy and rugged rocks momentarily protected we humans from being overwhelmed and swallowed up by the ocean, the tragic always nearby.

I was rereading the correspondence between Thomas Merton and Czeslaw Milosz when on our 40^th, the correspondence lasting from 1958 until Merton’s death in 1968 (2018 being the 50^thyear since Merton’s death and 60^thsince his probing and animated correspondence with Milosz began). I was taken by Milosz’s respect for Robinson Jeffers and the way Jeffers dared to gaze into the obstinate reality of the tragic and not flinch from going to such places---Jeffers and Milosz had suffered much in their lives and they had lived through a period of Western history in which much sadness and tragedy abounded. It was not that Merton did not want to face the tragic in the same way Milosz and Jeffers did (Merton followed Camus in such a trajectory), but in the inevitable tension between tragedy and hope, Merton leaned more to the hope side of the tension (while never negating the tragic) and Jeffers-Milosz tended to heed and hear the tragic and were slower in embracing hope. The perennial tension between the tragic and hope is foundational to minimal responsible thought in the area of spirituality, theology, philosophy, literature and political thought—the aberrations are naïve optimism and a form of realism that knows no hope.

It is 100 years this year since Robinson Jeffers The Alpine Christ was written (1918-2018). The date, of course, is significant. WWI had seen Western Civilization turn on itself, millions were killed or injured and, at a more personal level, Jeffers father (who he much admired) had died—in short, tragedy was in abundance. The waves of war had, like a Tsunami, overwhelmed the rocks and flooded the West in much pain and war. The Alpine Christ is not an easy poem to read but it does raise all the larger questions about the seeming absence, silence, eclipse of God in the midst of carnage and brutality. Such questions are asked often in more benign and secure historic moments and contexts but they become more pressing and intense when deaths mount and there seems no end to war (and the long-term implications of it). The Alpine Christ is set in Europe and the metaphor of the Alps (mountains) means the vision and view will be seen from a large and spacious one, a looking down into the valley of history, time and war (and the larger intellectual and practical implications of it). There are few who have dared to engage, in a significant way, Jeffers poetic power, but William Everson (a friend of Merton) did so more than most.

The sheer intellectual and poetic power of Jeffers, Everson, Merton and Milosz must be lived into if even a minimally mature notion of Christian faith is ever to be salvaged and lived from with some integrity and authenticity—tragedy and hopes—how are such tensions to be lived into and from?—naïve optimism is silly and a paralysing realism will not do. How can Everson, Merton, Jeffers, and Milosz point the way forward on this challenge to one and all on their all too human journey? The Alpine Christ is no Walt Disney ending but if Disney will not do, who can be trusted with such questions? What might be the limitations, even, of the cruciform, kenotic and suffering servant Christ as a way to answer such questions—Jeffers certainly pondered this in The Alpine Christ with his Christ-like figure of Manuel. It is these larger questions that we find attempts to answer in Greek tragedy, Shakespeare, Hardy, Nietzsche, Camus and Jeffers that need deeper and further pondering. 

Amor Vincit Omnia

Ron Dart    

"Searching for Tao Canyon" - Book Review by Ron Dart

Pat Morrow, Jeremy Schmidt, Art Twomey, Searching for Tao Canyon (Rocky Mountain Books Ltd., 2018).

“The idea of wilderness needs no defense, it only needs defenders.”
–Edward Abbey

My wife (Karin) and I have spent some challenging moments in slot canyons, sunlight teasing varied hues off rocks, wading through water knee and waist deep to reach dry ground and ledges, ever wary of flash floods. So, it came as a sheer delight when Searching for Tao Canyon came my way to review. It should be noted, at the outset, that this lavish book with exquisite photographs is, in many ways, a much delayed and necessary homage to the pioneering work of Art Twomey (a BC mountaineering legend of sorts who died tragically in the Purcell Mountains in 1997).

Twomey had his mentors of sorts but Searching for Tao Canyon is as much about a more meaningful way to live as it is about slot canyons and an artistic way of photographing their compelling and time shaped beauty. The book ends of this must read tantalizer and beauty of a book poignantly describe and discuss the early origins of slot canyon treks, the many challenges faced in reaching and photographing such sacred sites and some of those on such trips. Needless to say, the text is worth many a meditative read for a historic background into the rather new wilderness trekking in slot canyons of “fun-hogs” (not to be understood in a silly or narcissistic manner). Many of the best of the “fun-hogs” have been at the forefront of conservation and preservation, wilderness and wildness efforts.

The textual part of Searching for Tao Canyon is but the primer to the not to be missed photographs of various approaches to slot canyons and varied types of slot canyons. The colours, shapes and sizes of such canyons cannot but hold the curious for moments and hours, the wonderment within seeking such places of rare and often hidden bounties of nature. Gratefully so, the authors decided not to name or note the places in which some of the photographs were taken—tourists have predictable ways of destroying, in time, the very wildness they seek to see in their otherwise cabin’d, cribb’d and confin’d urban existence. 

The language of “Tao” was appropriately chosen as the title for this masterpiece of sorts, the Tao being the metaphor for the way and “that which is”—searching for the Tao is as much about being still, not searching, quiet enough to see what is not often seen. But, such an approach does also involve work to get to places where the hidden becomes revealed to the ardent and committed searcher and seeker. Both the written text and amply illustrated photographs illuminate such realities again and again. It is impossible to, in many ways, put this genius and pages turner of a book down—each lavish page is a portal into mysterious and often missed secrets of the rocks and rivers, weather and wildness. Each page can hold the attentive reader for rapt moments of invitational insight. Photographs of rappelling down into narrow canyon depths, mixed light playing off rocks, animals that dwell in such confines, narrow ledges to straddle, night skies and brilliant blue skies above, waterfalls and naked dives, showers and simple food in canyons all tell their compelling visual tale.

The “Contents” of Searching for Tao Canyon (fast moving text by Jeremy Schmidt) are divided into five nicely shaped sections: 1) Dedication: Art Twomey, 2) Preface: Heads Up, Fellow Desert Rats, 3) In the Jaw of the Dragon, 4) Tao Canyon and 5) Epilogue. Each of the accessible and readable sections are short and the reader cannot but be keen to know much more about such slot canyon grails that offer such superb photographs.Searching for Tao Canyon is brought to a close with two short pages on “Books We Like” and “Environmental Organizations”—merely entrees but worth the primer.      

There can be no doubt that in the last decade plus canyoneering and slot canyon trekking have become more prominent. Searching for Tao Canyon offers an informed, insightful and engaged way into how to truly seek, in a sustainable way, the ever elusive Tao that often remains hidden both in slot canyons and the slot canyons of the soul and life itself.  Many are the books published each year and few are the books that remain near and dear to that which remains—Searching for Tao Canyon definitely and decidedly remains in the latter class far from the transience of the former class—a must buy for soul and sanity.

Ron Dart        

Obadiah - Ron Dart

I have, over the last few decades, been taken and held by the fine life and writings of Thomas Merton, Dorothy Day and Dan Berrigan. I have a lengthy correspondence with Dan’s brother, Phil Berrigan. I have pondered, for decades, the points of similarity yet also difference between Merton, Day and Berrigan. Jim Forest (a friend) and closer friend with Merton, Day and Berrigan (having written biographies of all three) has gone further than most on telling their pilgrimages and highlighting their trail intersections.

Jim’s recent biography of Dan Berrigan, At Play in the Lion’s Den: A Biography and Memoir of Daniel Berrigan (2017) is a tome worth the reading and doing so many times. I was taken, though, by the fact that, for about 20 years (1990-2010) Dan wrote a variety of poetic exegetical books on the Hebrew prophets (minor and major) in the Hebrew Canon or Old Testament. Many who are keen on heeding prophetic literature (and its relevance for our time) often turn to the more academic genre of Walter Wink or Walter Brueggemann. But, Dan Berrigan has potency in his reading and application of the Hebrew prophets that goes beyond Wink and Brueggemann. And, to answer an earlier question, Dan Berrigan wrote much more, in an explicit way, on the Jewish prophetic and historical books than did Thomas Merton or Dorothy Day—this is one area in which they had different commitments.

I have been slowly working through Berrigan’s Minor Prophets, Major Themes (1995) the last few weeks. Berrigan illuminates the writings and insights of the 12 Minor Prophets in varied depth and detail, lingering longer with some, shorter with others. The reading, interpretation and political application of the prophets cannot be missed. There is no doubt that Minor Prophets, Major Themes is a must read for a mature understanding of the prophets from an ethical, historical and political perspective. Obadiah is the shortest of the minor prophetic books but the themes cannot be missed----Edom-Esau is a ruthless and violent nation, injustice rules the realm and God’s people have often been the victims of such cruelty (the tale continues today, the Holocaust the fuller version). But God will rise up, like a warrior, and defend his nation and people, Edom-Esau will be conquered and defeated in a not to be forgotten way: eye for eye, tooth for tooth, pound of flesh for pound of flesh. Obadiah is, in many ways, a forerunner of what we today would call Christian Zionism and a sort of right-wing just war theory. And, God is used by Obadiah to justify such a position. How did Dan Berrigan interact with such a prophet?

Needless to say, Berrigan is ill at ease with Obadiah’s warlike and hawkish tendencies. How does such a position square with the Sermon on the Mount and the Beatitudes? Has Obadiah truly heard and interpreted God aright? Or, like Jonah, does he see the Jewish god as a tribal god who exists for the Jews and to punish those who dare oppose the Jews? Jonah experienced a temporary and transient conversion of sorts but, by book’s end, he has slipped into a pout and pity me party.

There is more to Jonah than Obadiah, but Berrigan’s final paragraph on this thin and single page book is worth the pondering.

     Obadiah, like most of us, is in great need of Bible study.

     He has God all wrong, a God cut to his own cloth, his proclivity to ire,

 his lacerating need of a vindication that borders on vengeance.

     And then his strength.  He knows the principality of empire, and its

 hardly fetching ways, so accurately, so truthfully!

     Shall we say of him—part prophet, part darkness?

Dan Berrigan could be seen as a 20^thcentury Christian prophet. Obadiah is viewed as a minor Jewish prophet. Berrigan has dared to question both text and prophet from a higher ethic, an ethic that transcends ethnicity, nation and land, an ethic that is not about war and violence, vindictiveness and vengeance. Whom shall we hear and why? There are those who heed and follow both trails and tendencies—such pathways do lead to different destinations—one to the God of Jesus Christ (this being Trinity Sunday), the other to a Molech of sorts.

Amor Vincit Omnia

Ron Dart              

Abp. Lazar Puhalo w/ Ron Dart in Conversation —Theological, Pastoral, Prophetic & Political

See Table of Contents below for topics and time discussed.

I. Theology (O:01)

• Bulgakov (St. Sergius in Paris, the Sophianists) vs Florovsky (St. Vlads in NA, the Patristic Revival)
• 5:00  Patristic Revival of Liturgy contra the Scholastics, reviving liturgy as a work of the people
• 6:45 Acquaintance with / mentoring under Romanides
• 7:45 Dostoevsky - co-suffering love for the healing of another soul
• 8:15 Metropolitan Khrapovitsky contra Original Sin
• 9:15 Romanides' (and Puhalo's) critique of Augustine
• 10:20  Schmemann (in mold of Florovksy)
• 11:40 Romanides on Ancestral Sin
• 12:15 Khrapivitzky on the Moral Idea of the Dogmas of the Faith contra Kant

II. Faith and Science (12:40)  

• 12:40 Scientific reality/facts and theological truth are not opposed
• 14:45 The moral meaning of Genesis & origins of Judaism in Babylon
• 16:45 Fundamentalist ideology (not faith) vs science
• 18:55 The fall narrative as the birth of ego

III. Pastoral and Theological Collision with the Toll-Houses (20:20)

• 20:45 St. Justin Popović on the Toll-houses
• 21:20 Pastoral backstory: Seraphim Rose' journal series & Williamsville, NY (aftermath of 14-year-old's death)
• 23:00 Encouragement of Holy Transfiguration Monastery (Boston) / proofing by Monastery of Holy Archangels
• 25:15 Orthodox doctrine of the afterlife - St. Mark of Ephesus at Council of Florence refutes Catholic purgatory

IV. Pastoral Response to Transgenderism: Science & Suicide (27:30)

V. Response to Evangelical/Orthodox Trumpism (35:30)

• 35:30 Republicanism from Nixon to Trump 
• 40:50 Trump Republicanism's moral failure
• 41:50 Jerusalem and the deadly Christian mythologies of Israel

Review of James Karman's "Robinson Jeffers: Poet and Prophet" - by Ron Dart

 

Jeffers room at Deetjen’s Inn in Big Sur

Review of James Karman, Robinson Jeffers: Poet and Prophet (Stanford University Press, 2015).

Lee Masters, Frost and Robinson Jeffers all really have something to say and some real art. – C.S. Lewis, Letter to Bede Griffiths (April 22, 1954)

Robinson Jeffers is, probably, one of the finest poets of the tragic in the American literary canon. My wife (Karin) and I make an annual pilgrimage (usually in April) to the Big Sur area in California when the high ridge and low land flowers are in abundant display and profuse colour. We walk the ridge of Santa Lucia Mountain with the ocean thousands of feet below us, nighttime replete with many lanterns in the sky. It was in Carmel by the Sea (Northern Big Sur) where Robinson and Una Jeffers lived much of their lives. Tor House and Hawk Tower (where the Jeffers’ lived) are sights worth the seeing, perched as they once were on a rock protrusion facing into the varied seasons and temperament of Nature and the foaming ocean waves. Needless to say, Jeffers was no naïve Nature romantic—he was, in fact, a poetic realist about Nature, Humanity, Civilization and Culture.

The publication by one of the finest Jeffers scholars, James Karman, Robinson Jeffers: Poet and Prophet, does Jeffers proud. The biography of sorts tracks Jeffers’ literary and personal life in a chronological way, noting both the waxing and waning of Jeffers and his perennial poetic message (certainly not for the sentimental or faint of heart). Each of the four major sections probes well and wisely into Robinson and Una’s layered journey: 1) Wild Honey: 1887-1915), 2) Tides of Fire: 1915-1930, 3) The Whirlwind’s Heart: 1930-1945, and 4) Eagle and Hawk: 1945-1962. Jeffers had an uncanny way of cutting to the core and centre of the human heart, culture and empires—he saw the rise and fall (like ocean waves) of civilizations and the sheer indifference of Nature to Humanity. This led Jeffers to the notion of “Inhumanism”, that is, a position in which Nature has the final Say. Humanity might build, create, extol and spread the artifacts of the human will and making, but when Nature decides enough is enough, Humpty Dumpty will come tumbling down.

The tough, relentless and rigorous questions that Jeffers raises about theology, the church and God must be faced and pondered with all honesty. The fact that Jeffers heeded well the Greek tragic tradition tends to be rare for Americans who tend to either fawn before the assured results of the American empire or some form of progressivism—Jeffers lingered with the tragic and would not leave such a place. How then can the tragic and hope dwell in the human heart, mind and imagination without one silencing the other? Such was the transparent honesty of Jeffers that he dwelt with these hard and not to be denied questions, tensions and issues.

Karman, to his judicious and faithful decades-long Jeffers research and writing, has offered the reader a superb primer into the life and writing of Jeffers (a must read for those who see the all too human journey in all its layered complexity). Robinson Jeffers: Poet and Prophet has an uncanny way of articulating what it means to be both a fine and mature poet and, also, hints and tendencies towards the prophetic—most rare indeed. It is significant that C.S. Lewis had such a respect for Jeffers.

Ron Dart