From: David Buchanan (DBuchanan@ClassicalRadio.org)
Date: Mon Apr 14 2003 - 01:26:10 BST
Wim and Sam and y'all:
Wim said:
Needless to say that the book in which he expounds these ideas meets with
a lot of criticism among ordinary believers of his church (and gives others,
who have drifted away from it, some hope again that Calvin's 'semper
reformanda' -keep reforming- is still being taken seriously by some in the
Reformed Churches).
dmb says:
Meets with a lot of criticism? I'm sure he does. Based on what you posted,
Kuitert looks like my favortie kind of theologian. And maybe Sam can rest
easy and end the quest for a Campbellesque theologian here. It looks alot
like mythology to me and if it were a bet, I'd pay up. He's in a little
danger of trading a anthropomorphic god image for an abstract god image, but
mostly I think he;'s right on. .... On the matter of Calvin's 'semper
rerformanda'.... Maybe I'm only reminded and there is no real connection,
but it this idea of continuous reformation seems to serve the evolutionary
process well. It reminds me of a particular image of the hero archetype. I
forget where it came from, probably campbell or jung. In any case, this
image has the hero as one who "continuously shatters the crystalizations of
the moment". Here the hero is sort of a condensed image of the cutting edge
of the evolutionary process itself. In privious times maybe they'd think of
it as shattering the cyrstaline spheres on the journey to the highest
heaven. In our time we might think of it like breaking out into larger and
newer worlds, and as each new world becomes too confining, too much like a
prison instead of a home, the hero shatters that world too.
Wim said:
I fully agree with his plea to demythologize religion and God.
I disagree with his alternative: identifying 'god' via 'spirit' (that
temporarily lives within man) with 'the power of the Word'. According to me
this 'postmodern emptiness' he tries to overcome is created by the very
'power of the word' that is turned against itself, making all meaning of all
words relative and contentious. It is not with words that this emptiness can
be overcome, but by the direct experience itself which these words refer to.
I do capitalize 'God' (or I avoid it by writing about 'divine guidance' if I
expect it to be misunderstood by those I write with), because as proper noun
it refers to (points to the moon of) the highest and most valuable we can
experience: direct, personal, intimate relationships.
DMB says:
Hmmm. I don't think he is identifying god with 'spirit' or 'the power of the
word' so much as you suggest. You seem to suggest that your emphasis on
experience over words is some kind of disagreement with kuitert, but here
are just a few lines from the article that strongly suggest otherwise.
"god should be transcendence or otherwise he isn't god."
"If anyone means with God that we experience transcendence, I agree!"
"trancendence happens, occurs, befalls you in an experience..."
As you can see, he's talking about experience too, not of 'intimate
relationships' though. He's talking about transcendent experience.
Wim said:
It seems to me that his treatment of mythology, theology and transcendence
is very relevant to our discussion whether mythology and theology refer to
social or intellectual patterns of value (or both) and how they relate to
DQ. ...Could Kuitert's 'only real experience that does matter and that is
universal' and his 'transcendence' refer to Pirsig's DQ? ...
His explanation that neither mythology nor theology 'leads one to real
transcendence' fits in with the idea that DQ is not to be found even in the
highest quality intellectual patterns of value. They can never do more than
'point at the moon'.
DMB says:
Yes. I think the experience Kuitert is talking about is what we'd call an
unmediated experience in MOQese. That's why we don't find DQ even at the
highest levels of sq, because those are, by definition, mediated
experiences. What were talking about is a mystical experience, maybe
something like the one Pirsig had in the teepee....
Thanks for your time,
DMB
Ask yourself yourself this question; What would Jesus bomb?
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