Re-entering a bit at random, but responding here seems as good a
point as any to do it. I'm aware this is rather scattergunned than
reasoned, but . . .
To start with, Pierre's comment about Celan, that "he insists on
blasphemy as an essential need for him." I'd wonder to what degree
blasphemy can be in any way essential without belief, of some sort,
in what one is blaspheming against. Maybe that connects with Alison's
point about the atheists as among the best recent writers on G/god (I
distort, reduce, no doubt; tired, late, distracted; if it matters,
call me on it).
Would it be too wild a jump from that to Kierkegaard's complaint
(summarised from memory) that since everyone in Copenhagen was
already a Christian, no-one ever became one?
Anyway, I'm cutting corners because the original question was posed
partly in terms of 'believers'. So, what's a believer? Must one
believe unequivocally in the existence of the Ultimate Signified to
qualify, or is it enough to sense the force-traces still residual in
language and action, sensing how much was invested in that U.S., and
abolished with it? In my binary phase, the latter seems a more
interesting route.
Best,
T
>Good questions, to which there's probably no answer except that the
>categories have porous boundaries. But I assumed that the original query
>was precisely about devotional poems (using the term broadly, to include,
>say, The Divine Comedy), otherwise there would have been no
>perceived sparsity.
>
>Mark
>
>At 10:11 AM 3/7/2004 +1100, Alison Croggon wrote:
>>On 7/3/04 9:57 AM, "Mark Weiss" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>
>>> 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.
>>
>>Yes, I quite see that. Though now I'm getting confused - how does one not
>>conflate religious with the spiritual? If aspects of formal religion are
>>integrated into poems about profound spiritual experience, how are those
>>poems are not (no doubt in a qualified sense) religious? Or are we only
>>talking about devotional books (which being a non-believer myself I find of
>>minimal interest...)
>>
>>In another tack - RS Thomas (a priest, and so presumably a believer) has
>>written some interesting and anguished poems about the absence of God, and
>>the attentive space that absence creates, which in some ways are as negative
>>as Celan's. Are his religious simply by virtue of his being a believer? Or
>>is the religious interest in the struggles inherent in the poems?
>>
>>Best
>>
>>A
>>
>>
>>Alison Croggon
>>
>>Editor, Masthead
>>http://www.masthead.net.au
>>
>>Home page
>>http://www.alisoncroggon.com
>>
>>Blog
>>http://alisoncroggon.blogspot.com
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