A quick aesthetic rant

I'm starting to get a little impatient with the people who automatically dismiss a work of art as soon as they hear it is religious. They associate "Christian art" with "bad art." I'm also impatient with the "Christian artists" whose low standards perpetuate the stereotype.

 

Time to revisit the expectations we used to hold ourselves to.

 

Christian Art

 

Christian Art

 

Christian Art

On reading the great books

One of the most beautiful passages on literature that has crossed my path.

"I had an idea that a Man might pass a very pleasant life in this manner - Let him on a certain day read a certain page of full Poesy or distilled Prose, and let him wander with it, and muse upon it, and reflect from it, and bring home to it, and prophesy upon it, and dream upon it: until it becomes stale - But when will it do so? Never..." 

Keats

The greatness that is Shakespeare

For every person who asks why I still bother to read him:

"Shakespeare is above all writers, at least above all modern writers, the poet of nature; the poet that holds up to his readers a faithful mirror of manners and of life. His characters are not modified by the customs of particular places, unpracticed by the rest of the world; by the peculiarities of studies or professions, which can operate but upon small numbers; or by the accidents of transient fashions or temporary opinions: they are the genuine progeny of common humanity, such as the world will always supply, and observation will always find. His persons act and speak by the influence of those general passions and principles by which all minds are agitated, and the whole system of life is continued in motion. In the writings of other poets a character is too often an individual; in those of Shakespeare is commonly a species."

Samuel Johnson, Preface to Shakespeare 

Reminds me of Cowper

Alexander Pope:

A little learning is a dangerous thing;
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring:
There shallow thoughts intoxicate the brain,
And drinking largely sobers us again.
Fired at first sight with what the Muse imparts,
In fearless youth we tempt the height of arts,
While from the bounded level of our mind
Short views we take, nor see the lengths behind:
But more advanc'd, behold with strange surprise
New distant scenes of endless science rise!

(An Essay on Criticism, 1.15-24)

Every day of my life.

Mind = blown

"...it may be said that the Bible certainly does not proceed on the assumption that the divine decree is inconsistent with the free agency of man. It clearly reveals that God has decreed the free acts of man, but also that the actors are none the less free and therefore responsible for their acts, Gen. 50:19, 20; Acts 2:23; 4:27, 28. It was determined that the Jews should bring about the crucifixion of Jesus; yet they were perfectly free in their wicked course of action, and were held responsible for this crime. There is not a single indication in Scripture that the inspired writers are conscious of a contradiction in connection with these matters. They never make an attempt to harmonize the two. This may well restrain us from assuming a contradiction here, even if we cannot reconcile both truths. 

Moreover, it should be borne in mind that God has not decreed to effectuate by His own direct action whatsoever must come to pass. The divine decree only brings certainty into the events, but does not imply that God will actively effectuate them, so that the question really resolves itself into this, whether previous certainty is consistent with free agency." 

Berkhof, Systematic Theology, p. 106

Calvinism is not determinism. Men are not robots. Once again, God brings together two seemingly discordant ideas and causes them to work in harmony together.

I'm becoming completely enamored of systematic theology. There are so many nuances but they all come together in such an elegant whole. In it we begin "to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses all knowledge..." (Eph. 3:18-19)

More art history

Once again, the school year is about grace us with its presence and as I have another art history class this semester, I am reminded of my aforesaid textbook plans. This time, as selfies are the current film-related craze, I would like to honor them here. I hereby subtitle this post, "Memorable 'But First, Let Me Paint a Selfie' Moments in Art History."

Without further ado:

Van Eyck in The Arnolfini Marriage

Raphael in The School of Athens

Velasquez in Las Meninas

Van Gogh...well, this one is more after the fact. Just making sure everybody's paying attention.

Wait...what?

I read therefore I blog

It's been a while since I've really given this blog any serious attention. Sometimes I wonder if this experiment might be over. Other times I compulsively type up rambling posts on strangely-specific topics plaguing my mind and then delete them right away because I'm emoting rather than saying anything worthwhile.

And then there are the days I think about starting over. The further back I read the more cringe-worthy posts I find. After all, there is no arguing with me in my 15-year old infinite wisdom. Maybe I should go for a clean slate? But then my history major half emerges and advocates for historical accuracy and I figure I should keep building on what is already here, just like we in real life add layers (hopefully of maturity) as each year goes by. 

There's also the fact that nobody knows about this. So basically I'm writing to myself. I guess it'd be fun to talk about the ideas with peeps but I like the anonymity too. It's kind of a little joke. Also this habit probably connects to the existence of the embarrassing posts of yesteryear. I have to make sure my acquaintances keep thinking I'M PERFECTLY WELL-ADJUSTED. (See if I write it in all caps that means it's true.)

One instance of foresight I didn't realize I'd appreciate so much: my choice of blog name. I spent at least a year agonizing over what to call this before I ever went through with making it. At the time, I liked "Ex Libris" because I was a manic bibliophile. Midway through college, I find the phrase has accumulated further meaning. Like C.S. Lewis and the medievals he wrote about, the person I am and the ideas I entertain all come from those who came before me. The older I get, the more my debt to my predecessors grows visible. I am fundamentally a collage of the books I read.

So that's why I keep writing here. It gives me the ability to go back and watch the layers build upon themselves. I want to remember the authors who continue to mold me into a better-rounded individual. It's one of the ways that I can see God working through history into my own life.

"If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." - Isaac Newton

The pietism of America

It looks as if the general consensus is that America, and more broadly, the West, is now a post-Christian culture. Perhaps even a post-religious (in the traditional sense of the word) society. You hear the stories of public prayer being banned in high schools while the same institutions provide rooms for Muslims to practice salat. Fox News cries out in uproar as the Ten Commandments are removed from buildings of state. And while mysticism abounds in pop culture, there is no room for the supernatural in respectable academia.

While I tend to agree with the assessment, I would like to add my own observation. As secular as we seem to be, we are just as religious as we ever were.

In fact, the level of devotion I see around me would make any itinerant evangelist of yore weep for joy. Consistent, undistracted, faithful alliegance to what is held most dearly; fiery opposition when it is threatened.

What am I talking about? All we need to do is watch the calendar.

We westerners remain steadfast to our Judeo-Christian heritage: We worship on the weekend.

The thing that consumes our thoughts, that gets us through the workweek, that brings us the most happiness is the thing we instinctively turn to as soon as we have a spare moment.

Sleep
Friends
Family
Good food
Bad food
Hobbies
Sports
Entertainment
Culture
Pleasure in all of its various forms

Tradition

Christ?

Rabbit trail theology

My honors class is studying Pietism and Puritanism in the seventeenth century, so we recently read Pia Desideria. I thought this was an insightful passage on the need for the right motives in studying theology:

"When men's minds are stuffed with such a theology which, while it preserves the foundation of faith from the Scriptures, builds on it with so much wood, hay, and stubble of human inquisitiveness that the gold can no longer be seen, it becomes exceedingly difficult to grasp and find pleasure in the real simplicity of Christ and his teaching. This is so because men's taste becomes accustomed to the more charming things of reason, and after a while the simplicity of Christ and his teaching appears to be tasteless. Such knowledge, which remains without love, "puffs up" (1 Cor. 8:1). It leaves man in his love of self; indeed, it fosters and strengthens such love more and more. Subtleties unknown to the Scriptures usually have their origin, in the case of those who introduce them, in a desire to exhibit their sagacity and their superiority over others, to have a great reputation, and to derive benefit therefrom in the world. Moreover, these subtleties are themselves of such a nature that they stimulate, in those who deal with them, not a true fear of God but a thirst for honor and other impulses which are unbecoming a true Christian. When people are practiced in such things they begin to have great illusions and introduce them at once into the church of Christ, even if they know little or nothing of the one thing needful, which they hold in little esteem. They can hardly be kept from taking to market what gives them the most pleasure, and they generally concentrate on something that is not very edifying to their hearers who are seeking salvation." (p. 56)

In which I offend all

Hello peep(s),

I return to the blogosphere with this eye-opening conclusion drawn from my current American history class: The American colonists were the original conspiracy theorists. Ok, so there were conspiracy theories before this point in history, but my statement would be a little less interesting if I acknowledged that, now wouldn't it be? The Americans made it a trend.

First, there's the Salem Witch Trials. Do I even need to elaborate on this one?

Next, there's the whole pre-revolution fiasco. Here I'm going to sound very unpatriotic. As Lemony Snicket said, you still have time to stop reading if you're afraid this will disturb you.

Still do.

Stop. Do it.

Ok, you were warned, my social conscience is clear. The way I understand it, the whole time period between the French and Indian War and the 1770's is pretty much a cycle of bad communication:

• The British try to run their empire more efficiently by passing seemingly innocuous bills.
• The Americans see red and convince themselves and others THAT THE BRITS ARE OUT TO GET THEM AND DESTROY THEIR WAY OF LIFE AND MAKE THEM INTO MEDIEVAL SERFS OMG TYRANNY!!! And you think I'm exaggerating.
• The Americans react and pass a bill in a colony's legislature declaring parliament's jurisdiction in the colonies illegal, or, more snazzily, dump a bunch of tea into a harbor.
• The British re-react and pass a more stringent series of "Acts," turning the whole thing into a power play, so, the Americans having created a self-actualizing prophesy, the cycle repeats itself.

Two concessions: Yes, the Americans should have had representation in order for the system to work, and yes, the British did hypocritically do a few things in the colonies that were illegal in Britania itself (I.e. 2nd Quartering Act). But the latter was after the Americans had almost driven them to it - they had to maintain control of their empire otherwise the whole thing would fall apart and actually endanger their lives. Beyond that, the tariffs the Americans had to pay were already in place in the rest of the empire, including the homeland of England herself. What was so special about that part of the empire that made them exempt?

Dare I say it? The colonists were being a liiiiiiitle bit dramatic. Rule #1 of history: Don't trust the propaganda. Case in point: The Boston Massacre, the name of which is even an exaggeration. Look it up, it wasn't what the revolutionaries made it out to be. But if Paul Revere had depicted the "snowball fight" and they'd just called it "The Butt-Kicking Several Smart Aleck Teenagers Got For Taunting An On-Duty Soldier," they probably wouldn't have gotten as many outraged people to join their cause. My reaction to them is fairly similar to the one I have when listening to the Fox News pundits pontificate on Obama's not-so-hidden communist agenda for absolute control of America. Really?

From here, we Americans perfected the art of conspiracy theorizing: JFK's assassination, the moon landing, the 9/11 Truthers....the list goes on and on. 

In the case that some of this information is less than factual, well, maybe there's a conspiracy amongst my professors.

Or maybe I just want you to think that.