Is it simply a conflation?
I think the conflation is out there already, as it is with sensual / sexual
I have been thinking on this thread and did join in, but managed to write
b-c through inattention
now's as good a time as any to say that I was thinking of this word
"spiritual"
and wondering what one does - I have some suggestions - about those who
start out with statements like "I am a very spiritual person"....
I am ahead of myself - I heard in recent weeks someone say on the radio "I
am a very religious person; well, more than that I am a spiritual person"
somewhere in the bits of my memories which were populated and programmed in
my youth a shocked voice said "Strike her down, God"
but I also thought of "when people believe nothing then they will believe
anything" - who said that?
& by association Joyce's Portrait: Will you become a Protestant Stephen - I
said I had lost the faith, not myself respect
Surely all we can do with a term like religious is to apply it were someone
is seriously concerned about their relationship with God
Where it gets interesting for me is when the poets try to get round the
rules or argue with them. There's nothing so boring as agreement with the
party line.
It's the doubt and the quibbling that's much of the interest. Fake or
assumed spirituality just winds me up. I got caught up in an odd
conversation during the week about _Celtic ruins_ which lumped together a
celtic church baptistry and the merry maidens and enjoyed the smoke screen
that went up when I insisted that they are quite separate things
The smoke screen was largely that there is so much we don't know and that
putting flowers on stones that will allow that is a pretty spiritual act and
might be what our ancestors - given an invasion or two and a clearance or
three - would have done
-----Original Message-----
From: Rebecca Seiferle <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
Date: 06 March 2004 19:13
Subject: Re: God and Religion? Religion and God?
Thanks, Pierre, for this post and including the translations
and also too for mentioning Celan's letters to Nelly Sachs.
Someone at the beginning of this thread, I think (and if
I'm wrong, please pardon my memory) mentioned
Dickinson as a 'religious' poet, and I think the same
qualifications should be extended toward her work. That
many of her poems as well are arguments with
"the supposed 'God'" of her time, and that she was
often deliberately, in a variety of poetic stances, "heretical."
I don't know whether such poets should be called
"religious." If by "religious" is meant an engagement
with religious terms, views, and realities, yes, even
if the engagement is a pained or blasphemous one.
If by "religious" is meant an acceptance of those
terms etc, then perhaps no.
Though I should note in saying this, that there are obvious
differences in Dickinson's and Celan's poetic engagement
with God, as well as differences in the "God" they had to
deal with,
Best,
Rebecca
Rebecca Seiferle
www.thedrunkenboat.com
-----Original Message-----
From: Pierre Joris <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Mar 6, 2004 6:00 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: God and Religion? Religion and God?
Dear Alison,
I don't think we should call Celan a "religious" poet -- he is a
non-believer who has strong arguments with the supposed "God" of the
Jews who permitted the Shoa to happen. His working through the Jewish
esoteric tradition (Kabbala, Shekina, etc.) I see more as an
investigation of cultural roots than a reference to belief structures.
As in the following poem:
Tenebrae
Nigh are we, Lord,
-----Original Message-----
From: Mark Weiss <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
Date: 06 March 2004 22:57
Subject: Re: God and Religion? Religion and God?
>If one conflates spiritual with religious the category becomes
>meaningless--probably the majority of poems ever written contain moments
>that one or another reader would call "spiritual." Something akin to
>conflating "sensual" and "sexual."
>
>If one calls religious any poem in which terms associated with a religious
>tradition are significantly included, then the poem I just translated by
>the thoroughly atheist Jewish poet Jose Kozer would have to be called
>Catholic. To add slightly to Pierre's comment, in the case of Celan and
>Jews in general terms of religion are equally terms of secular Jewish
identity.
>
>Mark
>
>At 09:11 AM 3/7/2004 +1100, Alison Croggon wrote:
>>Hi Pierre
>>
>>Thanks for that poem - and far be it from me to argue with you on this!
>>Still, in Celan's particular negations I have found some dare I say
>>profoundly spiritual moments (Psalm, say) - and this quality of
"attention"
>>- does one have to be a believer to write a religious poem?
>>
>>Best
>>
>>A
>>
>> On 7/3/04 12:00 AM, "Pierre Joris" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>
>> > Dear Alison,
>> >
>> > I don't think we should call Celan a "religious" poet -- he is a
>> > non-believer who has strong arguments with the supposed "God" of the
>> > Jews who permitted the Shoa to happen. His working through the Jewish
>> > esoteric tradition (Kabbala, Shekina, etc.) I see more as an
>> > investigation of cultural roots than a reference to belief structures.
>>
>>
>>
>>Alison Croggon
>>
>>Editor, Masthead
>>http://www.masthead.net.au
>>
>>Home page
>>http://www.alisoncroggon.com
>>
>>Blog
>>http://alisoncroggon.blogspot.com
>
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