Job’s Friends

Posted on June 24, 2018 by Brian H. Gill

I could swap hard-luck stories with Job, but not for long. When it comes to misfortunes, I’m not in his league. On the other hand, looking over medical records before a recent checkup reminded me that my life hasn’t been perfect.

It could be worse. I might believe that God is smiting me because I’m predestined to a life of misery and eternity of torment. Or because I’ve committed some unspecified sin. Or have friends telling me that God only smites bad guys.

It could be better, too.

I deal with hypertension, diabetes and chronic kidney disease. Also autism spectrum disorder, depression and PTSD. I’m a mess. (March 19, 2018; December 31, 2017)

My psychiatric issues made and make parts of my life excessively interesting. So did being born with defective hips.

On the ‘up’ side, I’ve had many opportunities to think about abilities and their opposites. I’ve felt that ‘it’s not fair,’ but don’t remember believing it. Not for very long, anyway

A Work in Progress

Feeling that I don’t deserve my ailments, or that Christians shouldn’t have problems, wouldn’t do me much good.

Suffering, joy, any experience, can be a reason to pray and rejoice. (1 Thessalonians 5:16–18; Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2648)

Remembering and believing that thanksgiving and joy matter when I’m in a rough patch is hard, at best. But it’s still a good idea.

Disabled or not, I’m a person, a human being: with dignity and responsibilities.1 (Genesis 1:27; Catechism, 357, 1731–1738)

Having disabilities doesn’t make me better or worse than folks who don’t. What’s different are the opportunities and limitations I deal with.

“…Disability is not a punishment; indeed it is a privilege, which God uses to manifest his love and crown all with the glory of the resurrection….”
(“Persons with disabilities: The Image of God and a Place of His Wonders,” Preparation for the Jubilee Day, The Preparatory Committee (March 2, 2000))

“…The lives of those who are handicapped are no less sacred than the lives of those who are not. I know that you share this conviction with me. At the same time, we are also aware that the quality of life of the handicapped is often not in keeping with their own inner worth….”
(“To members of the Very Special Arts International Organization,” St. John Paul II (December 5, 1987))

Thinking of myself as a person isn’t hard. Seeing my disabilities as a “privilege?” That’s a work in progress.

Accepting Life’s Ups, Downs and Nosedives

Job 1:1–5 says he “was a blameless and upright man” with seven sons, three daughters, a large household and more wealth than most.

He was like today’s Jeff Bezos or Bill Gates: pretty much the opposite of destitute.

Until the trouble started.

Several messengers came, telling Job that his financial empire was kaput. That was bad news. But at least he still had his family.

A fourth messenger arrived with more bad news. Job’s children were dead, killed by a freak storm. Then boils — painful sores — covered Job’s skin. All of it. Job was not having a good day.

By the time we get to Job 2:8, Job’s sitting on an ash heap, covered with boils and scraping himself with a potsherd. He gets his first bit of advice:

“Then his wife said to him, ‘Are you still holding to your innocence? Curse God and die!’
“But he said to her, ‘You speak as foolish women do. We accept good things from God; should we not accept evil?’ Through all this, Job did not sin in what he said.”
(Job 2:9–10)

With Friends Like These – – –

You know the rest of the story. Three friends show up with “sympathy and comfort” for Job. (Job 2:11)

All three told Job that he should repent. They figured God rewards good behavior and punishes folks who act badly. That meant Job’s financial and family losses must be his fault.

Job denied doing anything wrong, so they kept telling him.

I think Eliphaz was hitting his stride in the second and third speeches:

“The wicked is in torment all his days,
and limited years are in store for the ruthless;
“The sound of terrors is in his ears;
when all is prosperous, a spoiler comes upon him.”
(Job 15:20–21)

“Is it because of your piety that he reproves you—
that he enters into judgment with you?
“Is not your wickedness great,
your iniquity endless?”
(Job 22:4–5)

Millennia later, some folks still agree with Eliphaz. I don’t.

Wealth and poverty, illness and health aren’t sure signs of virtue or sin. Stuff happens. What matters is what I do with what I’ve got. (1 Timothy 6:10; Hebrews 13:5; Catechism, 828, 1509, 2211, 2288–2291, 2292–2296, 2448, 2540, 2544)

Carrots, Sticks and Me

I think God is large and in charge, and that doing what’s right is a good idea. (Genesis 1:1–2:2; Psalms 115:3; Catechism, 268–269, 279, 301, 1733)

Believing that God smites ‘bad guys’ and rewards ‘good guys’ promptly? Not such a good idea.

Simple ‘carrot and stick’ belief may be easy.

But it’s too close to upholding the moral superiority of the healthy and wealthy for my taste. Or circumstances.

Believing that God pays attention and will reward or punish me is one thing.

Doing ‘good works’ because I expect rewards, or avoiding ‘being bad’ because I fear punishment? That’d make me a mercenary or — as St. Basil put it — a slave. (Catechism, 1021, 1828)

There’s what our Lord said about the man born blind, too. And those folks killed when a tower in Siloam fell. (Luke 13:4–5; John 9:1–3)

The way I see it, God loves us and wants to adopt us. Each of us. (Romans 8:15; Ephesians 1:3–5; Peter 2:3–4; Catechism, 1–3, 27–30, 52, 1825, 1996)

I accepted God’s offer. Since I’m ‘part of the family,’ loving God and acting like I mean it makes sense.

Expecting reward or punishment matters, to an extent. I let myself look forward to God’s ‘Creation 2.0,’ for example. But it’s not at the top of my list of ‘reasons why.’

That’s my opinion about disabilities and being human. Let’s see what a recent pope said:

“…The Psalmist, … is convinced that God will already reward the righteous in this life, giving them a happy old age, and that he will punish evildoers before long.
“Actually, as Job affirmed and Jesus was to teach, history can never be so clearly interpreted. Thus, the Psalmist’s vision becomes a plea to the just God ‘on high for ever’, to enter into the sequence of human events, to judge them and make good shine forth….”
(General Audience, St. John Paul II (September 3, 2003))

“…Job however challenges the truth of the principle that identifies suffering with punishment for sin. And he does this on the basis of his own opinion. For he is aware that he has not deserved such punishment, and in fact he speaks of the good that he has done during his life. In the end, God himself reproves Job’s friends for their accusations and recognizes that Job is not guilty. His suffering is the suffering of someone who is innocent and it must be accepted as a mystery, which the individual is unable to penetrate completely by his own intelligence….”
(“Salvifici Doloris,” St. John Paul II (February 11, 1984))

More of my view of life, death, health, choices and making sense:

1 Dignity, duties and being human:

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Law, Immigrants and Romans 13

Posted on June 17, 2018 by Brian H. Gill

America’s Attorney General apparently said Americans should do what the government tells us to. That’s ‘dog bites man’ news. It’s what government officials do. ‘Man bites dog’ news would be an official telling us to go out and break laws.

This time around, the Attorney General was reminding us that our national government is protecting us from immigrants by taking kids from their families. And that Christian Americans should cooperate because Romans 13 says so. According to him:

Not all Americans think breaking up families is a good idea. Even if they are foreigners:

‘God Agrees With Me?’

The good news, for me, is that America isn’t the ‘Christian nation’ of my youth.

I suspect the Attorney General’s appeal to ‘Biblical’ authority won’t generate much support. Apart from some of America’s fuddy duddy fringe.

That hasn’t always been the case.

William Jennings Bryan’s “Cross of Gold” speech was effective rhetoric in 1896. His audience loved it so much they carried him around on their shoulders after the speech.

The response wasn’t universal. Judge, a satire magazine, showed the great orator standing on hallowed authority. Literally.

Time passed, the bimetallism crisis faded and politicos found new hot buttons to push.

Claiming that ‘God agrees with me’ isn’t new. Folks on all sides of America’s Civil War and Europe’s turf wars did it. (June 1, 2018; September 10, 2017; August 4, 2017)

My youthful memories include ‘good Christian Americans’ acting as if they thought Jesus is an American. And having meltdowns over newfangled ideas. Decades later, I still think they were wrong. But I may understand why they were so upset.

It was the Sixties. Devotion to old customs and beliefs was fading. Their world was crumbling around them. (May 12, 2018; December 31, 2017; July 4, 2017)

Legitimate Authority

Some changes haven’t turned out as well as I hoped. But I see many as long-overdue reforms.

That doesn’t make defenders of the status quo — or ‘those crazy kids’ — villains or heroes in the melodrama sense. Just folks who thought they were doing the right thing. (May 12, 2018; April 11, 2018)

Back to 21st century America and the Bible: Romans 13 talks about authority, among other things:

“Let every person be subordinate to the higher authorities, for there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been established by God.”
(Romans 13:1)

I could stop reading there, say that every ruler’s wishes are “established by God” — and that everyone who doesn’t agree with me is a Satanic agent. I won’t. It’s not that simple.

Like it or not, human societies need authority. Legitimate authority. As a citizen, my responsibilities include respecting legitimate authority. (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1897, 2238-2243)

Legitimate authority rests on principles established by God. The principles aren’t made up by whoever says they’re in charge. And they don’t change to suit current policies. (Matthew 20:25–26; Catechism, 1897-1951, 1954-1960, 2235-2237)

Obeying legitimate authority isn’t blind obedience. “I was only following orders” isn’t a valid excuse. (Catechism, 2313)

“Family” is important, too. So is doing our part as parents and children. (Catechism, 2201-2233)

That doesn’t mean everyone should look and act like the fictional Cleavers. I’ve talked about family, Ephesians, diapers and all that before. (December 31, 2017; May 14, 2017)

Responsibilities

Defending folks is part of a government’s job, or should be. (Catechism, 2263-2267)

That doesn’t mean keeping immigrants out. Nations with room and resources should accept folks who are “in search of the security and the means of livelihood” they can’t find back home. (Catechism, 2241)

I’d be worried if folks stopped trying to settle in America. Particularly folks who come as families. Having a substantial fraction of “low types” as ancestors affects my views. America would be different without the Irish. But I’m not convinced that it’d be better. (April 2, 2017; November 29, 2016)

I don’t know what rationale the Department of Homeland Security has for breaking up some families who try coming to America. I’d like to think there’s a motive that includes concern for people.

Maybe it’s defending our nation’s youth from un-American influences. Or raising the foreign kids to be obedient little Americans. Or seeing foreigners with kids as a real and present danger to national security.

Whatever the motives, what’s happening seems less than wise. Bear in mind that I’m not a ‘regular American’ by some standards. My ancestry is decidedly un-English.

Even worse, I’m a Catholic. One who takes responsibility seriously. But who doesn’t think the United States Attorney General established the world’s unchanging principles.

And that’s another topic:

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Apathy, Angst and Grenfell Tower

Posted on June 13, 2018 by Brian H. Gill

Opportunities for angst and anger abound. Just glance through the headlines. Take your pick from today’s top expert-endorsed, editor-approved crises —

Climate change threatens our cities, the oceans and life itself. Well-intentioned efforts to stop climate change threaten our jobs and our businesses. Lower employment and shuttered businesses would also threaten our cities: a detail that gets lost in the shouting.

If those don’t appeal, just glance through social media’s fringes. I’m pretty sure you’ll find something dreadful —

The Antichrist was elected President. The President is intolerance incarnate. Big burger makes us eat too much. Big government wants to ban burgers. ‘They’ control the newspapers. Or the banks. Or the Internet. Or all of the above.

Other headlines rekindle anger and angst over past tragedies like the Grenfell Tower fire. And, sometimes, reasoned responses.

Viewpoints

For some, our present seems futile and our future grim. That’s nothing new:

“…in ten years all important animal life in the sea will be extinct. Large areas of coastline will have to be evacuated because of the stench of dead fish….”
(Paul Ehrlich, on first Earth Day, (1970))

“…nations and governments have never learned anything from history, or acted upon any lessons they might have drawn from it.”
“Lectures on the Philosophy of History,” Introduction, Georg Hegel (ca. 1830s) Trans. by H. B. Nisbet (1975))

“Ludit in humanis divina potentia rebus,
Et certam præsens vix habet hora fidem.”
“Heaven makes sport of human affairs, and the present hour gives no sure promise of the next.”
(“Epistolæ Ex Ponto,” Ovid, (ca.8-18 AD))

“Nos numerus sumus et fruges consumere nati.”
“We are but numbers, born to consume resources.”
(Epistles, Book I; Horace (20-14 BC))

Apathy starts looking pretty good on days when editors can’t seem to decide which crisis du jour tops the list.

I might be whipping out anguished laments or furious attacks, if I didn’t remember debacles of days gone by.

Not fervently yearning for some imagined ‘good old days’ helps, I think. So does knowing that we’ve had problems before. And occasionally learned from our mistakes. (May 12, 2018)

On the other hand, some of us keep repeating the same mistakes.

“…Time to ‘drop out,’ ‘turn on,’ and ‘tune in.’…”
(“Start your own Religion,” Timothy Leary (1967))

“…on the tenth day we reached the land of the Lotus-eaters…. I sent two of my company to see what manner of men the people of the place might be…. They started at once, and went about among the Lotus-eaters, who did them no hurt, but gave them to eat of the lotus, which was so delicious that those who ate of it left off caring about home, and did not even want to go back and say what had happened to them….”
(“The Odyssey,” Homer (8th century BC) Trans. by Samuel Butler)

Homer’s land of the Lotus-eaters may or may not be a real place. Either way, I figure the poet knew about narcotics and their effect on folks. (May 12, 2018; July 7, 2017)

About Leary’s advice — I didn’t “turn on” in the Sixties, or later when we got more cautious about popping pills: proscribed and prescription. (July 10, 2016)

That’s no great virtue on my part. The way my brain is wired, fluttering past different perspectives is easy. So is relentless pursuit of some random idea or fact.

Focusing on what I’m supposed to be doing: that’s another matter. Looking back, I don’t think a corporate ‘success track’ and someone like me would be a good match.

An academic career might have been nice. But that would have meant staying focused on a single facet of reality. And holding that focus for years.

Diagnosing my psychiatric issues a few decades earlier might have made a difference. Probably would have. But I’ve had an interesting life. (March 19, 2018; January 7, 2018; December 17, 2017)

And that’s not what I was talking about. Let’s see. Apathy. Angst. Attitudes. Right. I’m probably more prone to angst and anger than apathy.

Feeling anxious or angry isn’t good or bad by itself. Emotions happen. They’re a part of human nature. They connect “the life of the senses and the life of the mind.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1764, 1767)

What matters is what I do about my emotions. That’s where reason takes over: or should. (Catechism, 1762–1770, 1777–1782)

Anger and Decisions

Last year’s Grenfell Tower fire is in the news again.

Partly, I think, because it’s about a year since the catastrophe: time for ‘what happened a year ago’ stories. Partly because an inquiry released their early reports.

I was, and am, angry about what I’ve learned. I’d be concerned if I wasn’t.

People died. Many might be alive if they’d ignored “stay put” notices. That lethal policy was just one of many possibly-criminal blunders leading to a record-breaking death toll.

Being angry won’t bring dead families back. Neither will fuming over the injustice of it all. But being angry tells me that something may warrant attention.

I can’t change what happened, or decide how folks in England will act. That’s a good thing, since I don’t have nearly enough information: and wouldn’t want the responsibility. But I can see if there’s something to be learned from the mess.

In a way, the Grenfell Tower fire wasn’t unusual. Or a uniquely English event. Fire hurts people every year. Sometimes people die in fires.

Fires broke out in about 364,300 American homes in 2016. 2,775 people died as a result. 6.6% of those fires started in the kitchen. I don’t like those facts, but they’re real. The trick is doing what’s possible to keep fires from starting. And keeping folks alive when they do.

When a fourth-floor kitchen fire kills residents on the 23rd floor, learning what went wrong matters. A lot.1

Just Another Tuesday in June: Until Midnight

June 13, 2017, wasn’t completely free of noteworthy events.

An accident blocked two London-bound lanes of M4. A three-meter tall Morph appeared outside Bristol Royal Hospital for Children. The Somerset County Council said they wanted to hear what folks thought about proposed road improvements on A358 at West Hatch and the M5.

But the 13th wasn’t much different from any other Tuesday in June. Many folks in London went to work, came home, ate and went to bed.

Someone living on the fourth floor of Grenfell Tower was awake a few minutes after midnight on June 14. He noticed and reported a fire.

Firefighters came and put out the kitchen fire. That took a few minutes, no more. The firefighters packed their gear and left.

At least one of them happened to look back. Fire was spreading up the tower’s side. Fast.

Firefighters returned and started dealing with the new problem.

Quite a few folks living in Grenfell Tower were awake for the pre-dawn meal of suhur, part of Ramadan observances. They started waking their neighbors, helping those who decided to try getting out.

That’s not what they were supposed to do.

The outfit running Grenfell Tower had advice for folks living there. In case of fire, stay put. Shut the door and wait. Many residents did as they’d been instructed. They stayed in their apartments. They waited. Then they died.

Some roasted, others died when smoke and fumes reached them.

Some residents who tried getting out died too. But others survived.

I’ll give emergency responders credit for having sense.

At some point they realized that the ‘stay put’ policy was lethal in something like Grenfell Tower.

They told folks who had been following the rules to get out.

That was the good news. The not-so-good news was that they had this epiphany after the tower was thoroughly ablaze.

Some folks made it out. Others didn’t. We’re still not sure how many died in the fire.

Authorities have their official figures. Folks with family and friends who disappeared during the fire say maybe the numbers aren’t quite right. Authorities say eight made fraudulent claims. Maybe that’s so. At least one was convicted.2

I think folks should be honest. But there’s a gap between “should be” and “is.” And that’s another topic.3

Basically Good Ideas


(From Google Maps, used w/o permission)
(Grenfell Tower and other buildings in Lancaster West Estate, North Kensington, London. As it was before the June 2017 fire, apparently.)

If Lancaster West Estate was in America, it’d be a housing development. It’s in England, so it’s a housing estate.

Today’s North Kensington is no Knightsbridge or Chelsea. But it’s no Victorian Spitalfields either. A former Prime Minister lives there. So do media personalities. Few if any of them lived in the housing estate. It’s mostly for working class folks.

Grenfell Tower’s design wasn’t state-of-the-art architecture in 1967. That wasn’t the goal. I gather that architects more interested in safety and affordable usefulness than good looks and innovative features.

Plans were approved in 1970. The building was finished in 1974. The working design was pretty much like the 1967 proposal. But there were some changes. It had more parking space, for example.

It would be safe. If builders used materials and equipment specified by the architects. And owners did routine maintenance.

Grenfell Tower was mostly concrete, moderately comfortable and affordable for folks who aren’t in society’s high end. It wasn’t the sort of thing you’ll see on a ‘beautiful buildings in England’ tour. But it wasn’t, I think, an eyesore. Bear in mind that I’ve got flexible tastes.

Fast-forward nearly four decades, to 2012. Styles and needs had changed. “Sustainability” was in. Automobiles weren’t as central to everyday routines.

Folks running the housing development decided it was time to upgrade the tower’s insulation, convert some parking spaces to business units, and spruce things up.

Occasionally-misapplied buzzwords like “sustainability” grate on my nerves.

But using resources efficiently seems like a good idea.

I see no problem with prudent design and attractive neighborhoods. Keeping costs down makes sense too. Within reason. Saving money by not recharging fire extinguishers and storing rubbish in escape routes instead of removing it seems imprudent. Or worse.

I haven’t kept up with who said what about the tower’s new cladding. The idea was to get better insulation and a more up-to-date look. That, and not spending more than necessary, seems reasonable. Cutting corners, not so much.

The last I heard, we don’t know exactly how the new cladding caught fire. Or why the fire spread so fast. Or whether architects, builders or bean counters picked the cladding. Or how information about failed safety tests disappeared.4

I’ve taken daft risks in my day. Mostly when I was in the male 16 to 26 demographic.

But even then I don’t think I’d have put pennies behind a fuse. It’s an old money-saving trick. It keeps a fuse from burning out during an overload. It seems thrifty. Until wires overheat and ignite the house.

Grenfell residents had been complaining about safety issues before the fire. It may be years before we get a clear picture of how so much went wrong.

There’s been no shortage of sturm und drang inspired by the Grenfell Tower fire. Some of it is understandable.

Responses, Reasonable and Otherwise


(From ChiralJon, via Wikimedia Commons, used w/o permission)
(Remembering Grenfell Tower fire victims: Bramley Road, London.)

That folks who survived the Grenfell Tower are upset is no surprise. At all. They lost their homes. Many lost family and friends. It wouldn’t seem fair.

November’s official death toll of 71 was raised to 72 in January.

That’s when Maria Del Pilar “Pily” Burton died. She and her husband lived in a 19th floor apartment. She couldn’t walk down the stairs, thanks to an illness. Her husband, 50, couldn’t carry her. So they stayed where they were until firefighters reached them.

We may never know how many died that night. Even without the suhur meal, several folks in a neighborhood that size might have had friends visiting.

Quite a few residents were first-generation immigrants. They may not have had their paperwork in order. Someone without the usual paper trail might have vanished without a trace.

Getting a body — and parts — count wouldn’t tell us how many died in the fire. Some of Grenfell Tower reached 1,000 degrees Celsius and stayed there for “some time,” as Metropolitan Police Deputy Commissioner Craig Mackey said.

Crematorium furnaces burn at between 870 and 980 Celsius. Many bodies in Grenfell Tower may have been reduced to gas, ash, and anonymous fragments.5

What’s impressive, I think, is how many victims have been identified.

I’m not, however, impressed there’s an investigation into what happened last June. Officials often decide they’d better ‘do something’ after a catastrophe.

That’s reasonable, I think.

The all-too-common custom of picking a suitable villain from society’s fringe? That’s not such a good idea.

After London’s big 1666 fire, the folks in charge found a dubiously-smart French watchmaker who claimed credit for torching Westminster. The watchmaker also said he was the Pope’s agent.

Setting Westminster ablaze would have made sense to a Popish terrorist. If the aristocratic neighborhood had burned. Which it hadn’t. Then the watchmaker said he’d torched the bakery in Pudding Lane.

Some folks wondered about his fitness to plead. He was convicted anyway, and executed. Inquiries continued. Someone discovered that the watchmaker had been on a boat in the North Sea when Pudding Lane burned.

Meanwhile, English patriots were looking for more terrorists. Understandably. The Second Anglo-Dutch War was in progress. France was a Dutch ally. I see the conflict as a turf war, and that’s another topic. (April 25, 2018; September 10, 2017; June 25, 2017)

I’m not surprised that folks said a foreigner started the Grenfell Tower conflagration. Many folks living there weren’t, or weren’t quite, English.

Behailu Kebede seemed like the ideal Grenfell scapegoat. He’s from Ethiopia. The fire started in his apartment. His own actions place him at the scene. He made the first call to emergency services. Then he started alerting his neighbors. But he didn’t put out the fire.

British authorities seem to have learned a bit since 1666.

Mr. Kebede was accused or implicated in news media, not English courts. Police took an interest in him, as an important witness. One who had reason to fear an extralegal execution. That’s why they said he should go into their witness protection program.6

Human Nature

I think human nature is the same now as it was in 1618 — when regents, counts and lords ended a meeting by tossing two regents and a secretary out the window. (March 17, 2017)

Or 1792 — when revolutionaries defended their ideals by killing an insane asylum’s inmates. (November 19, 2017)

Or 1914, when the war to end war — didn’t. (November 10, 2017)

Or 32 BC, when Rome’s Senate bungled its way into the Final War of the Roman Republic. Augustus sorted that mess out about a decade later. (May 26, 2017)

I might feel hopeless. But I don’t.

I think human nature hasn’t changed since Ur-Nammu and Hammurabi wrote their law codes. Or survivors of a global war signed the United Nations Charter.

We’re made in the image of God. We can decide to act as if that’s true. Or not. The first of us made a decision with consequences we’ve lived with ever since. But we’re not doomed to act badly. It’s still our choice. (Catechism, 396–406, 1701–1709, 1730)

Still Learning


(From ChiralJon, via Wikimedia Commons, used w/o permission)
(Bramley Road, near Grenfell Tower: volunteers sorting donations for fire victims.)

Staying calm over the Grenfell Tower inquiry is easy. For me. I live in central Minnesota. London’s problems seem comfortably remote from the small rural town I call home.

That’s calm: not apathetic.

I care about the folks who lost their lives, their neighbors and their homes. But being angry about the situation won’t help.

More to the point, holding on to anger is a bad idea. I shouldn’t do it. I’m also obliged to care about those who apparently made decisions that turned a comparatively safe building into a deathtrap. (Matthew 5:22, 43–48; Catechism, 361, 953, 2262, 2608)

Nobody said this was going to be easy.

I can’t do much to help survivors of the Grenfell Tower fire, or folks who are trying to learn what happened and who may be responsible.

What I can do is repeat what I’ve said before. We’re in this together. Mutual respect is a good idea. So is balancing individual and community needs. And acting like truth, justice, solidarity and freedom matter. (Catechism, 1905–1912, 1915, 2239)

We can’t change what’s been done. But we can keep learning from our mistakes. That, I think, is reason for cautious optimism:

1 Learning what went wrong:

2 Numbers and the news:

3 Our world is basically good, so are we, but it’s not perfect:

4 What should have happened, what did happen:

5 Remembering:

6 Responses, then and now:

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Spiritualism, Attitudes

Posted on June 1, 2018 by Brian H. Gill

I’ve read that spiritualism and spiritism started in the 18th or 19th centuries. Folks who take one or both seriously seem to think spiritism isn’t spiritualism. How the ‘isms’ are different depends on who’s talking.

Some say spiritualism is a religion, while spiritism is a social movement. Or spiritism is a science and spiritualism isn’t.1

I’ve seen “spiritualism” used to describe spiritism as practiced by English-speaking folks, particularly Americans. Maybe that’s a common use of the word.

Or maybe it’s just how it’s used in much of what I’ve read.

It’s what I mean by “spiritualism” and “spiritualist.” Usually. Often. Sometimes, anyway. I’m guessing there isn’t a definition that folks on all sides agree on.

I’ve seen several versions of where the beliefs began, too.

Some say they spread from upstate New York’s “burned-over district.” That’d be what started with two kids, an apple and some string. (May 25, 2018)

Whether central and western New York is “burned-over” is debatable. I see what happened as a spiritual hangover after a religious binge episode in the early 1800s. We call it the Second Great Awakening. I don’t know who first used that name or when it caught on.

I’ll be talking about writers and researchers, Salem’s infamous trials and why I think change can be a good idea:

Awakenings and the Morning After

America’s Second Great Awakening began around around 1790 in Kentucky, Tennessee and southern Ohio.

Preachers from assorted denominations affirmed feelings and rejected rationalism. They were enormously popular.

Revivalists revived, postmillennialists predicted the Second Coming. Folks got excited. Very excited. Fervor faded around 1840.

Believers noticed a distinct lack of either End Times or Golden Age.

Charles G. Finney thought folks in central and western New York were through with faith.

Finney, one of the revivalists, said the wild excitement and morning after left many feeling that religion was “a mere delusion.” He called central and western New York a “burnt district.” Maybe he was right. Or not.

Many academics thought he was, at least until recently.

A study published in 1984 said “burned-over district” folks weren’t any more or less religious than most Americans. That’s likely enough. My country had a third and fourth Great Awakening too, at least according to some. And that’s another topic.2

Roots

Folks looking at another slice of history say spiritualism’s beliefs started in Europe.

The idea makes sense, although I think the roots go far deeper.

I see my country’s Spiritualism as a homegrown ornamental, spread from imported cuttings. Sort of like kudzu.

Not exactly like kudzu, of course. Metaphors break down at some point. The trick is spotting the cracks before stepping on them. And that’s yet another topic.

Spiritualism and its European precursors strike me as my civilization’s versions of very ancient beliefs. Current forms started taking shape around the 18th century.

Lyttelton

George, 1st Baron Lyttelton, published his “Dialogues of the Dead” in 1760. He wrote a sequel, “Four New Dialogues of the Dead,” published in 1765.

The 50-something gentleman had been a Member of Parliament, written poetry and designed landscapes.

What I’ve read strongly suggests that Lyttelton’s political career enhanced his reputation as a poet and landscaper designer. By contrast, if nothing else.

He was raised to the peerage as Lord Lyttelton, Baron of Frankley in the County of Worcester in 1756. I don’t know why. Maybe it was a sort of “lifetime achievement” award.

Lyttelton’s “Dialogues” helped set the standard for later spiritism books. That may not be what Lyttelton had in mind. I’m guessing “not.”

I’m pretty sure Lord Lyttelton was thinking about history and human nature when he wrote “Dialogues.”

“…To the last Lord Lyttelton was poet enough to feel true fellowship with poets of his day….

“…Before Lord Lyttelton followed their example, ‘Dialogues of the Dead’ had been written by Lucian, and by Fenelon, and by Fontenelle…. This half-dramatic plan of presenting a man’s own thoughts upon the life of man and characters of men, and on the issues of men’s characters in shaping life, is a way of essay writing pleasant alike to the writer and the reader. Lord Lyttelton was at his best in it….”
(“Dialogues of the Dead,” Introduction; Lord Lyttelton, edited by Henry Morley; 1889 Cassell & Company edition (1889))

Or maybe the Lyttelton believed he was transcribing chats he’d had with spectral visitors. That doesn’t seem likely, since folks who knew him didn’t think he was delusional.

A century and more later, Lord Lyttelton’s “Dialogues” are still in print. I can see the appeal. The first one included celebrity spirits like Peter the Great and Pericles. He recorded chats with Plato, William Penn and a “A North American Savage.”

The names in Lyttelton’s “Dialogues” remind me of a talk-and-variety show’s guest list. Or Steve Allen’s “Meeting of Minds.”

Dialogues of one sort or another are ancient. Rigvedic dialogue hymns and Sumerian disputations predate Socratic dialogues by over a dozen centuries.3

Again, I think Lord Lyttelton saw “Dialogues” as his thoughts on history and humanity: not séance transcripts.

I’m also sure that he wasn’t trying to start a new religion. Lyttelton apparently was a Christian who had ‘done his homework’ after youthful spiritual roving:

“…He had, in the pride of juvenile confidence, with the help of corrupt conversation, entertained doubts of the truth of Christianity; but he thought the time now come when it was no longer fit to doubt or believe by chance, and applied himself seriously to the great question. His studies, being honest, ended in conviction. He found that religion was true….”
“Lives of the Poets: Volume II,” Samuel Johnson (1825))

Folks like Franz Mesmer and Emanuel Swedenborg lived around the same time as Lyttelton. They’re probably much better-known than the British peer.

Mesmer

“Animal magnetism” is how Franz Mesmer’s lebensmagnetismus usually gets translated into English. Maybe “live magnetism” doesn’t have quite the right rhythm for my language.

Mesmer thought he’d found an invisible natural force made by all living beings.

It made more sense in the late 18th century. Humorism was Western medicine’s best theoretical model until well into the 19th century. (May 12, 2017; September 9, 2016)

If “invisible natural force” sounds familiar, it should:

“It’s an energy field created by all living things. It surrounds us and penetrates us. It binds the galaxy together….”
(Obi-Wan Kenobi, in “Star Wars” (1977))

Humorism and Mesmer’s updated hypothesis weren’t a good match with reality. 20-20 hindsight sees Wöhler’s 1828 research as a turning point. Maybe so, but vitalism and humorism were still working hypotheses for another century.

Mesmer’s clinical studies and (much) later studies didn’t support lebensmagnetismus theory. But researchers did learn how mesmerism works. Étienne Félix d’Henin de Cuvillers called it hypnotism 1820. We still do. It isn’t magnetic, but it’s effective.

Animal magnetism and all that also inspired parts of George du Maurier’s “Trilby” and Robert Wiene’s “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari.” And many much-sillier tales. More ridiculous, at any rate. But occasionally entertaining.

Swedenborg

Emanuel Swedenborg’s father, Jesper Swedberg, impressed Sweden’s King, Charles XI, a lot.

Charles XI saw to it that Jesper became professor of theology at Uppsala University and Bishop of Skara.

Then Jesper got interested in Lutheran pietism. He criticized the state religion’s views. His “Book of Hymns” was banned. His belief that angels and spirits can and do interact with us hadn’t helped his reputation.

Emanuel Swedenborg learned a lot from his father. He wrapped up studies at Uppsala in 1709, toured Europe, and published an airship design in 1714.

He asked Charles XII — I think they’re up to Charles XV now — to build an observatory in 1716. The king gave him a job in Sweden’s mining board instead.

Swedenborg was mostly into natural science and engineering for the next two decades. Also anatomy, physiology, cosmology and philosophy. He was right, basically, about quite a bit; including neurons and the nebular hypothesis.

He tried merging philosophy and metallurgy in his 1735 “Opera philosophica et mineralis.” Or maybe it’s “Opera Philosophica et Mineralia.” I’ve seen both titles used for the three-volume set.

My point is that Swedenborg was very smart. Think Elon Musk, Steven Hawking and Ram Dass as one person.

Swedenborg started having strange dreams around 1744. He quit his government job in 1747 and started sharing what he thought about Heaven, Hell and points between. Also what’s arguably the most imaginative End Times story to date. (August 13, 2017)

Quite a few folks liked what he said. Maybe his reputation for being really smart helped. He apparently thought his dreams and subsequent visions were a divine revelation.

Swedenborg wasn’t, probably, trying to start a new religion. But that’s what happened. We’ve still got Swedenborgianism as a Christianity knockoff.4

Alias Allan Kardec

Hippolyte Léon Denizard Rivail was born in 1804. He earned degrees in science and medicine and learned several languages.

He’d been raised in a Catholic family and married in his late 20s.

He sounds a lot like me, except I became a Catholic as an adult and majored in history and English. With as much of everything else I could find on the side.

But I’m not nearly as multilingual as Rivail. And I don’t plan on starting a new religion.

Séances were popular entertainment when Rivail was 50-something.

He got curious, wrote a bunch of books about psychic phenomena and mediums, and got spritism started.

Probably. Quite a few folks say Rivail’s pen name is Allan Kardec.

Kardec apparently wrote “The Spirits Book,” “The Book on Mediums” and the other three books in the Spiritist Codification.5

Heritage and Legacy

I figure Swedenborg, Kardec and others used or were inspired by ideas from Western esotericsim, Christian legends, European folklore and Kabalah. All of which grew out of still older beliefs.

It’s complicated. That’s putting it mildly.6

There’s also a philosophical position called “spiritualism.” And a metaphysical belief.7

I’m a Christian and a Catholic, so I think spirit exists. That makes me a spiritualist in the metaphysical sense.

But I’m not a Spiritist or Spiritualist. I don’t do séances. I think Saul’s trip to Endor was a bad idea. (April 29, 2018)

Starting in the late 19th century, some spiritualists formed churches with well-defined beliefs and procedures. Embarrassments like the Seybert Commission report and Mumler’s fraud trial hadn’t helped their public image.8 (April 11, 2018)

Spiritualists weren’t alone.

“…Satanical Practices”


(From Michele Felice Cornè, via Wikimedia Commons, used w/o permission.)
(Cornè’s “Landing of the Pilgrims.” (ca.1805))

By the mid-19th century, the Puritan image was morphing from paragon of American nobility to fanatical killjoy.

Some truth lay behind both images.

Reality wasn’t, and isn’t, that simple.

“The Obferation of Christmas having been deemed a Sacrilege, the exchanging of Gifts and Greetings, dreffing in Fine Clothing, Feafting and similar Satanical Practices are hereby FORBIDDEN”
(Public notice deeming Christmas illegal. Boston (1659))

“What the Puritans gave the world was not thought, but action.”
(“The Pilgrims” speech, Wendell Phillips (1855))

“Puritanism: The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy.”
(“A Mencken Chrestomathy,” H. L. Menken (1949))

Folks in 17th century New England weren’t, I think, basically different from those living in today’s New York City, Charlemagne’s Aachen or Plato’s Athens.

I’d expect parents in any era to be concerned if their child had trouble breathing, shouted nonsense, or shook uncontrollably. Today’s New Englander might call a doctor or Poison Control Center.

Our ancestors might have consulted a shaman or herbalist. I figure we’re no more or less rational than they were. But we’ve learned a bit over the centuries. Most of us. Which, particularly for folks like me, is a good thing. (March 19, 2018; November 19, 2017)

Puritans in Salem Village didn’t have television, cable or otherwise, in 1691. But they did have books. Prophecy and fortunetelling seem to have been top topics for preteen and teen girls during the winter of 1691-1692.

Salem Village had earned a quarrelsome reputation by that time. They’d argue with each other and folks in Salem Town over property, grazing and church privileges.

They didn’t like Salem Town’s preacher, so they hired their own.

Three times, shortchanging each one. That made finding a fourth hard, which further frayed already-frazzled local nerves.

Reverend Samuel Parris took the job after Salem village added the parsonage and two acres of land to their offer. Then he went hunting for “iniquitous behavior.” And found it.

I gather that his habit of making upright church members do public penance for small infractions wasn’t appreciated.

The Salem Trials

Salem Village’s routine bickering boiled over in February of 1692.

The preacher’s daughter and a niece screamed. They also made strange sounds, threw stuff and crawled under furniture.

A doctor examined the kids. He didn’t find evidence of disease. Other kids started acting the same way.

What I’ve read sounds like kids having Olympic-class temper tantrums. Or getting at the wrong pills.

Or maybe funny fungi. I don’t know if psilocybin mushrooms grew around Salem. I’d expect hemp tea to have different effects, and that’s yet again another topic.

Folks in Salem Village assumed witchcraft was behind the tantrums, convulsions or whatever. Allegations, accusations and arrests followed.

Formal witchcraft trials started in Salem Town on June 2, 1692. Judges considered spectral and other evidence, followed due process and executed 20 people. A few more died while in custody. Some were pardoned, or found not guilty.

I’ll give the judges credit for giving landowners, beggars and servants equal justice.

Giles Corey, an elderly landowner, didn’t survive pre-trial interrogation.

George Burroughs was convicted of practicing witchcraft and conspiring with Satan. Burroughs was one of the shortchanged pastors, and the only minister executed for witchcraft.

John Willard was a constable who stopped fetching accused witches. That’s not what got him killed. Not officially. Willard was hung for using witchcraft to kill someone’s wife and make another villager sick.

The Salem witch trials and executions were unusual, even for the 1690s.9

They were still landmarks in American history when I was in school. Mostly as something we should never let happen again.

The last I heard, we still aren’t sure what went horribly wrong.

I figure the accusations, trials and hangings were what happens when politics, personal grievances and community frictions run amok. Or maybe the “witchcraft” started in a bad batch of pumpernickel. (July 4, 2017)

Human Nature

A few folks may still think the 1692-93 trials were justified.

I’d like to believe that’s not possible.

But I remember McCarthyism, political correctness and Pizzagate. I suspect spotting crazy ideas is easier when it’s someone else’s panic. (September 10, 2017; July 21, 2017)

Some folks apparently believe that the Antichrist held or holds public office, and may see themselves as the only ‘real’ Christians left.

Others believe that Christianity preaches hate and religion kills people. Some truth is behind today’s perceptions, sadly.

But reality isn’t any simpler now than it was during American puritanism’s heyday. And human nature hasn’t changed.

Sometimes we make dubious choices. Like Saul’s incognito trip to Endor and Emperor Wuzong’s confiscation of temple properties. Some are lethal, like the Jonestown deaths and Heaven’s Gate mass suicide.

But sometimes we make lastingly-useful decisions: like Hammurabi’s law code, the Twelve Tables, and Emperor Gaozu’s and Taizong’s Tang Code.10

I could look at humanity’s blunders and decide that we never learn. I prefer remembering that we’ve occasionally reviewed what’s been done — and decided that we can do better. (May 12, 2018)

We can also rely on at least some folks staunchly supporting attitudes that helped make Salem’s famous trials possible.

Slavery, Spiritualism and Satan: 1865


(From Alfred Gales, via Library of Congress, used w/o permission.)
(Alfred Gale’s “Pictorial Illustration of the Cause of the Great Rebellion” and “Pictorial Illustration of Abolitionism.” (ca. 1865))

“…Abolitionism made the war by electing a sectional President on a Sectional Platform. Its avowed object was to take away the rights of the Slave-States expressly guaranteed to them by the Constitution.
“LIBERTY, EQUALITY AND FRATERNITY!…”
(“Pictorial History of the Cause of the Great Rebellion,” Vol. II, Alfred Gale (1865))

Alfred Gale, the chap who published those 1865 broadsides, didn’t like abolitionism. Obviously.

I don’t know why. Maybe because it polarized politics and religion. Or maybe he thought slavery’s legality should be left to state legislators. Or he thought slavery was a fundamental right. My guess is that states’ rights were his main concern.

Maybe he really thought abolitionism was a Satanic conspiracy. I don’t.

Most Americans living north of the Mason-Dixon line call Alfred Gale’s “Great Rebellion” the American Civil War. In large part, I think, because the Union won.

Calling it the War Between the States or Second American Revolution might be more accurate.

I’m pretty sure it’s still a hot-button issue, particularly for folks whose towns and states suffered from the Union’s “total war” policy and post-war carpetbaggers.

The war didn’t settle the states’ rights issue. America is still divided over how to balance state, federal and local rights. I’m not surprised.

About a third of a billion folks live in my country. We’re not particularly conformist. We probably couldn’t agree on anything: even which ice cream flavor is “best.”

State sovereignty wasn’t the only reason the Confederate States of America joined forces in 1861. Americans were divided over technology, tariffs, territorial control — and slavery.11

The Confederacy lost, the Union won, and a century later we were still cleaning up the mess. We still are. What impresses me isn’t so much that slavery was banned: but that it’s become unfashionable. (February 18, 2018)

Alfred Gale’s heavy-handed appeals to traditional American beliefs suggests that he was a Christian. Or was trying to influence Christians.

I don’t know why he apparently believed state rights were more important than human freedom. That isn’t an option for me. Not if I’m going to take my faith seriously.

“Right Reason”

I think slavery is a bad idea: whether it’s legal or not. The same goes for genocide. A few things are just plain wrong. And a few things are always right. (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1954–1960, 2313, 2414)

Universal law, “right reason” that doesn’t change, isn’t a new idea. Or uniquely Catholic.

“Right is right if nobody is right, and wrong is wrong if everybody is wrong.”
(“Life Is Worth Living” (1951-1957), Program 19, The Venerable Fulton J. Sheen, via Wikiquotes)

“…True law is right reason conformable to nature, universal, unchangeable, eternal, whose commands urge us to duty, and whose prohibitions restrain us from evil. … This law cannot be contradicted by any other law, and is not liable either to derogation or abrogation. Neither the senate nor the people can give us any dispensation for not obeying this universal law of justice. It needs no other expositor and interpreter than our own conscience. It is not one thing at Rome, and another at Athens; one thing to-day, and another to-morrow; but in all times and nations this universal law must forever reign, eternal and imperishable….”
(“The Tusculan Disputations,” Cicero (ca. 45 BC) Book V, p. 153; translated chiefly by C. D. Yonge (1877) [emphasis mine)

“Allergic to Change”

“Humans are allergic to change. They love to say, ‘We’ve always done it this way.’ I try to fight that. That’s why I have a clock on my wall that runs counter-clockwise.”
(Grace Hopper; quoted in “The Wit and Wisdom of Grace Hopper,” Philip Schieber, OCLC Newsletter (March/April 1987))

“Change is not made without inconvenience, even from worse to better.”
(Richard Hooker, quoted in Samuel Johnson’s “A Dictionary of the English Language” (1755))

I don’t see a problem with having pet peeves and personal penchants. I’ve got at least my share of both. But I see wisdom in remembering that my preferences may not be “universal law … eternal and imperishable.”

Learning to agree with God makes sense. Imagining that God agrees with me, not so much. (Romans 12:2; Catechism, 562, 1783, 2085, 2745)

If I believed today’s America was perfect, I’d resist any threat to the status quo.

My memory’s too good to believe that.

‘The good old days’ before 1965 — weren’t. They’re not coming back. For which I’m duly grateful.

Nostalgic daydreams aside, we’ve never had a Golden Age. Not since the first of us decided to let “I want” overrule “I should.” We’ve been dealing with consequences of that decision ever since. (February 4, 2018)

Getting off to a bad start hasn’t kept us from remembering that we can do better. Or trying, with varying success, to live up to our potential: instead of down to our worst urges. (May 12, 2018; February 18, 2018)

Our societies, our world, this universe are all “in a state of journeying,” moving toward an ultimate perfection. But we’re not there yet. (Catechism, 302)

Part of our job is keeping what’s right in our societies, and changing what’s not. (Catechism, 1917, 1928–1942, 1825, 1996, 2415; “Laudato si’;” “Gaudium et spes“)

Make that my job. I must work for justice — “as far as possible.” That includes respecting humanity’s “transcendent dignity.” My ongoing inner conversion is important too. (Catechism, 976–980, 1888, 1915, 1929–1933, 2820)

I think Richard Hooker is right: change is inconvenient.

It’s also the only way we will get closer to that ideal society we keep hoping for.

I can’t change the world, or even my nation.

But I can try acting as if I love God and my neighbors. And see everyone my neighbor. Everyone. No exceptions. (Matthew 5:43–44, 22:36–40; Mark 12:28–31; Luke 6:31 10:25–27, 29–37; Catechism, 1789)

It’s simple, and very far from easy. Believing it with all my heart is harder. But I think it’s worth the effort.

So is learning from past progress. And blunders. And that’s still another topic:

1 Distinctions:

2 Awakenings:

3 Dialogs and an author:

4 Research, ideas and dreams:

5 Miscellaneous background:

6 Old ideas:

7 More distinctions:

8 Image and scrutiny, late 1800s:

9 Remembering Salem, 1692-1693:

10 Ideas and efforts, good and otherwise:

11 War and aftermath:

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Mediums

Posted on May 25, 2018 by Brian H. Gill

“Séances date back to the 1800s…. Spirits were manifested, tambourines flew, ectoplasm impossibly erupted from entranced mediums. Then, after forty years of this, rather embarrassed by what they’d started, one of the sisters, Margaret Fox, confessed that they were frauds. The miracles which had started it all off had been a scam. But her confession made very little difference and spiritualism continues to appeal to many people today.”
(“Derren Brown: Séance,” Derren Brown (2004))

‘Chat with the dead’ séances popularized by the Fox sisters are still endemic in American culture. So are religious beliefs and practices they inspired.

Their contribution to my country’s story began with a prank in 1848, when the two younger Fox sisters were living in Wayne County, New York. Kate and Maggie convinced their mother and older sister Leah that they’d made contact with a spirit.

Friends of the Fox family, enthusiastic Quakers, believed the girls: and helped launch spiritualism. Leah took charge as their manager and the girls grew up, enjoying considerable success as mediums. Until their story started unraveling.

Kate and Maggie developed serious drinking problems, denounced spiritualism, and eventually died.1

I suppose a melodrama could be based on their lives. Whether their fictional personas would be victims or villains would depend on an author’s viewpoint.

Either way, I’m pretty sure the Fox sisters faked their séances. Many years later, apparently after a change of heart, Maggie explained how they created their first illusion:

“When we went to bed at night we used to tie an apple to a string and move the string up and down, causing the apple to bump on the floor…. Mother listened to this for a time. She would not understand it and did not suspect us as being capable of a trick because we were so young.”
(Maggie Fox, quoted in New York World (October 21, 1888) (via Wikipedia)

Kate had been 12 and Maggie 15 when they did their ‘apple on a string’ trick. That’s ‘old enough to know better.’ But I suspect we’re looking at an adolescent prank that got seriously out of hand.

I’m quite the Fox sisters knew their spirit rapper was a trick. But I don’t know why they did it. Another question is why their parents and other adults acted as they did.

My guess is that many Americans were looking for an alternative to gloom and predestination. Can’t say that I blame them.2

“…Departing, Leave Behind Us….”

Important as they are in American history, the Fox sisters weren’t the first folks to say they talked with spirits.

We’ve had mediums of one sort or another for upwards of two dozen millennia.3

That’s assuming some of today’s educated guesses about why folks decorated cave walls in Australia and Indonesia are right.

Maybe they are. Or not.

We know that folks left pictures of skulls and bones on cave walls. They painted pigs and dogs, too. And geometric symbols. And hands. Lots and lots of hands.4

Some of the markings were and are hard to reach. The folks who made them almost certainly thought their work was important. We’re not looking at prehistoric doodles.

What we don’t know is why they left those images and symbols.

I think there’s a lesson in what we’ve learned about hieroglyphs and Alcheringa.

Egyptian Hieroglyphs

Egyptian writing from around the 31st to 6th centuries BC used pictures of birds, animals, and objects. Hieroglyphs endured long after folks living in the area forgot their meaning.

Assuming that hieroglyphs were ideograms or pictograms, like today’s “telephone” and “baggage claim” symbols, made sense. Seeing them as ideograms also suggested that ancient Egyptians were very interested in birds, feathers and insects.

In 1799, Napoleon’s troops found a stone tablet, about the size of a movie poster, with hieroglyphic, demotic, and Greek marks on one side. Thomas Young and Jean-François Champollion’s analysis of the Rosetta Stone let scholars start reading hieroglyphs.

Hieroglyphs, it turns out, can be ideograms, phonograms or logograms: depending on context. Ancient Egyptians hadn’t been obsessed by birds, feathers, bugs and more birds.

We’re not sure how, or if, Egyptian hieroglyphs relate to the Greek, Latin and other alphabets we use. But at least now we can read what ancient Egyptians wrote.

Perceptions and Knowledge

We can make educated guesses about why folks left pictures and designs on cave walls in Indonesia, Australia and elsewhere.

But without something like a Rosetta Stone, I strongly suspect we can’t be sure what they meant to their creators.

Even then, we’d have to first understand the artists and their culture. Sometimes that takes time. And rethinking our own perceptions and attitudes.

Baldwin Spencer Gillen learned about the Alcheringa from folks who apparently had tried explaining what we call “the dream times” or “dreamtime” to a foreigner. With very limited success.

Nearly a century later, European scholars were realizing that Alcheringa isn’t what we think of as “fantasy.” (August 4, 2017)

One more example: a ‘hashtag’ symbol cut into a cave wall.

We can be very nearly certain that Neanderthals made it.

Carving it into the wall took time and effort, so it’s there for some reason.

We don’t know what that reason was.

Researchers have suggested plausible answers. Maybe it was the neanderthal equivalent of a coat of arms or medieval hallmark. Or a “no exit/turn around” sign. Or something completely different. For all I know, it could be a very early tic-tac-toe grid. (May 5, 2017)

We’d know more about the ‘hashtag’ and Indonesian cave paintings if we could interview the folks who made them.

But that isn’t an option.

Or is it?

Scholars and Storytellers

I haven’t read about an archeologist whose research included séances.

That’s odd, considering 19th century fascinations with Egyptology and speculative necromancy.

Or maybe not. I get the impression that many serious scholars in the 19th and 20th centuries were trying to distance themselves from pop spirituality.

Storytellers, happily, needn’t stick to “just the facts.” The adventures of an archaeologist-spiritualist duo could make many a rousing tale.

Something along the lines of “The Ghostbreakers” and “Phantom of Chinatown.” Or “Poltergeist” meets “The Mummy.” Or an Iron Man spinoff: “Raiders of the Lost Arc Reactor.” They don’t make movies like that any more. Not quite. And that’s another topic.

Remembering Endor

Endor was an important Canaanite city around the time Seti I was restoring order and stability in Egypt.

The last I heard, we’re still not sure who did what during the religious and social upheavals of Akhenaten’s reign. And that’s yet another topic.

We’re pretty sure Endor was in the Jezreel Valley. The city’s exact location got lost somewhere during the last three millennia.

That’s not surprising. Endor isn’t there any more. Considering what happened during and after the Late Bronze Age Collapse, it’s a wonder we know as much about the city as we do. (May 12, 2018; May 26, 2017)

Folks in my branch of Western civilization probably recognize Endor mainly as the home of a medium. We don’t know her name.

She’s “a woman in Endor” in my Bible’s translation of 1 Samuel 28:3–25. Most English-speaking folks probably think of her as the “witch of Endor:” a more colorful, if less accurate, title.

Whether she’s called a medium, witch, necromancer or ’êšeṯ ba‘ălaṯ-’ōḇ bə-‘Êndōr, consulting ghosts and spirits is a bad idea. (Leviticus 19:31, 20:6, 20:27; Deuteronomy 18:10–11; Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2116)

For one thing, there’s little or no guarantee that you’ve reached the intended person. Not all spiritual beings are ‘good guys.’ (Catechism, 329–330, 391–395, 414)

Noticing that something is a bad idea is one thing. Believing that someone who acts badly is a bad person — is another bad idea. (Catechism, 1776–1794, 1861)

That’s one reason I don’t fling epithets at spiritualists. Or materialists.

I’m sure that Western materialism and America’s Spiritualism — Spiritualist religious beliefs, not the philosophical position — don’t accurately reflect reality.

That doesn’t keep me from accepting that folks can sincerely believe materialist or Spiritualist ideas.

Folks who knowingly fool Spiritualists with fake séances are another matter.

Deliberately presenting something that’s not real as truth is yet another bad idea. (Catechism, 2476, 2482–2484)

But I don’t see a point in going ballistic over fake mediums and wannabe prophets. Or emulating Marlowe’s fictional Faustus:

1 Celebrities and sensations of yesteryear:

2 Free will, God and Holy Willie; my view:

3 Mediums, fortunetelling and all that:

4 Art, artists and understanding:

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