Jesus And Christ

William Underhill reviews Philip Pullman's new novel re-imagining of the Gospels:

According to Pullman's fable, Mary gives birth not to a single son but to twins: Jesus and Christ. Jesus is a firebrand preacher with a revolutionary message but no time for showy miracles. His brother, who serves as his chronicler, is a darker, more introspective figure, ready to provide a distorted version of events that will lay the basis for the Gospels and eventually lead to the foundation of the church. Those looking to find grounds for offense won't be disappointed: the Annunciation in Pullman's story is, in fact, a seduction; the Resurrection is a stunt. To compound the injury, Pullman suggests that in some respects his words may be closer than the Bible's to what Jesus would have actually said.

One motive in writing the book is to shake the faith of believers. He hopes to send readers back to the Gospels to compare his story with the originals. "They will see for themselves how contradictory, how inconsistent, and different the narratives are," he says. And Pullman is not shy about spelling out what he sees as the pernicious consequences of human institutions like the papacy that assume an unquestionable God-given authority. Among them: the Inquisition, witch-burning, the persecution of the Jews, and child abuse by Catholic priests.

The Existential Liberal

Nick Clegg's favorite author is Samuel Beckett! Somehow I cannot imagine a presidential candidate in the US unloading this five days before voting:

My first encounter with Beckett was when I was studying in Minnesota and I acted in a student production of Krapp's Last Tape. Back then I remember images of Beckett making as great an impression on me as his work. He always looked so impressive – that beak-like nose, eyes staring dead into the camera – and he had an austerity to him, even when he was young, that makes it very easy to connect the man to the words.

Since then I must have read Waiting for Godot – of course – a hundred times. Every time I go back to Beckett he seems more subversive, not less; his works make me feel more uncomfortable than they did before. The unsettling idea, most explicit in Godot, that life is habit – that it is all just a series of motions devoid of meaning – never gets

any easier.

It's that willingness to question the things the rest of us take for granted that I admire most about Beckett; the courage to ask questions that are dangerous because, if the traditions and meanings we hold so dear turn out to be false, what do we do then?

But amid the bleakness, there is also humour, and it's no surprise that there are so many comedians among Beckett's fans. His appeal lies in his directness – the sparse, unembellished prose that can make his meticulous stage directions unexpected. He leaves you with a sense that you knew what he meant, even if explaining it back would leave you lost for words. Direct and disturbing – it is impossible to grow tired of Beckett.

Sacrificing Freedom To Gain More

Hilary Bok contributes to a forum on the meaning of freedom. She uses traffic laws to make her essential point:

Normally, the point of driving is to get somewhere. The traffic laws enable us to get where we are going much more quickly and safely than we would if each of us had to decide for him- or herself which side of the street to drive on. The traffic laws do not tell us where to go. They leave the choice of destination, and for that matter the decision whether to drive at all, entirely up to us. They simply tell us which side of the road to drive on, that we should stop at various points, and so forth. By taking away our freedom to drive on the left, or to blast through busy intersections, they grant us much more freedom in the form of a greatly enhanced ability to get wherever we want to go quickly and safely.

Anyone who thinks that the traffic laws enhance our freedom should acknowledge that in some cases, including this one, government action can enhance our freedom, even if that action takes the form of restrictions on what we can and cannot do. An enormous number of questions about which (other) forms of government action might enhance our freedom would remain to be answered, but the fact that some government policy involves either a more active government or new restrictions on our action would not, by itself, imply that it diminishes our freedom.

Quote For The Day

"I repeat the slogan “drill here, drill now” not out of naiveté or disregard for the tragic consequences of oil spills – my family and my state and I know firsthand those consequences. How could I still believe in drilling America’s domestic supply of energy after having seen the devastation of the Exxon-Valdez spill? I continue to believe in it because increased domestic oil production will make us a more secure, prosperous, and peaceful nation,"- Sarah Palin, repeating a slogan.

The History Of Debt

David Graeber thinks it all began with slavery:

In most times and places, slavery is seen as a consequence of war. Sometimes most slaves actually are war captives, sometimes they are not, but almost invariably, war is seen as the foundation and justification of the institution. If you surrender in war, what you surrender is your life; your conqueror has the right to kill you, and often will. If he chooses not to, you literally owe your life to him; a debt conceived as absolute, infinite, irredeemable. He can in principle

extract anything he wants, and all debts – obligations – you may owe to

others (your friends, family, former political allegiances), or that

others owe you, are seen as being absolutely negated. Your debt to your

owner is all that now exists.

He connects this thought to various early societies:

A Babylonian peasant might have paid a handy sum in silver to his wife’s parents to officialise the marriage, but he in no sense owned her. He certainly couldn’t buy or sell the mother of his children. But all that would change if he took out a loan. Were he to default, his creditors could first remove his sheep and furniture, then his house, fields and orchards, and finally take his wife, children, and even himself as debt peons until the matter was settled (which, as his resources vanished, of course became increasingly difficult to do). Debt was the hinge that made it possible to imagine money in anything like the modern sense, and therefore, also, to produce what we like to call the market: an arena where anything can be bought and sold, because all objects are (like slaves) disembedded from their former social relations and exist only in relation to money.

(Hat tip: Kottke)