14AR19-19

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Apologia Report 19:19 (1,202)

June 18, 2014

Subject: The non-legendary Jesus

In this issue:

APOLOGETICS - "legend" as the common voice of Bart Ehrman and Reza Aslan

CULTURE - confession as a reality-entertainment venue

YOGA - if it's not religious, why recommend a mantra?

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PLEASE NOTE: Our office will be closed this week. Look for AR to resume the week of June 29.

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APOLOGETICS

"The Gospel Truth of Jesus" by Tom Gilson (National Field Director, Ratio Christi) who asks: "What happens to apologetics if we add 'legend' to the Trilemma [made famous by C.S. Lewis] 'Liar, Lunatic, or Lord'?" Gilson explains: "The questions have changed since Lewis wrote ... and it's less common these days to hear Jesus honored as a great moral teacher by those who doubt his deity. Today's skepticism runs deeper than that. The skeptics' line now is that Jesus probably never claimed to be God at all, that the whole story of Jesus, or at least significant portions of it, is nothing more than legend." Lewis "delineates the Gospels as true 'reportage' rather than fable, and concludes, 'The reader who doesn't see this has simply not learned to read.'

"It seems to me that the legend hypothesis can be rebutted in a similar way - a way that requires little technical knowledge of the Gospel manuscripts, their dating, and so on, but calls instead for something like Lewis's having 'learned to read.'"

Gilson describes how he applies this in his interaction with non-Christians. He reviews how a number of questions about human nature and the nature of Jesus found in Scripture can be used.

Gilson also examines the popular sources of today's legend perspective. "Notable among those who adhere to the legend hypothesis are Bart Ehrman ... and the ironically named [for Lewis fans] Reza Aslan.... These two authors speak with essentially one voice." Yet another example of simple, creative, biblical thinking from Touchstone (May/Jun '14, pp35-40). A nice piece of work. <www.ow.ly/y3PdI>

CULTURE

Writing for Time magazine (Jun 2 '14, pp50-52), Lisa Abend profiles "Norway's Proust," author Karl Ove Knausgaard, whose third entry in a truly massive planned six-volume self-focused novel, My Struggle [1], has just been published in the U.S. With it, Knausgaard introduces the literary world to what his editor has called "hysterical self-confession." This confession dumps all religious underpinnings in its service to entertain.

"Reviewing the first volume for The New Yorker <www.ow.ly/y76aJ>, critic James Wood placed Knausgaard in the same circle as Leo Tolstoy and Walter Benjamin." Asked for an opinion, a writing student "struggled to convey Knausgaard's appeal: 'He writes so honestly about his life.' ...

"Knausgaard unflinchingly portrays a life - his life, though he says it isn't autobiography - in banal detail. ... Though [My Struggle] is told in artless language, the work's power lies in its accumulation of detail" (3,600 pages of it - RP). "That none of this comes across as boring is difficult even for Knausgaard to explain. ...

"In the first volume, Knausgaard combines a narrative about his adolescence, marked by his father's frequent rage and unpredictable cruelty, with one set more than a decade later, when he and his brother learn of their father's squalid death from alcoholism and prepare for his funeral. Although the second volume focuses on less scandalous events, the author's second marriage and the birth of his children, his depictions of this relationship, in both its glorious beginnings and its sulky, resentful midlife, go far beyond the boundaries of normal propriety. ...

"Nearly as controversial as his willingness to expose his family and friends to scrutiny is the light he turns on his own dark corners...."

That is what drives Knausgaard. "He seeks the liberation it offers, even while he hates himself for it. 'It's like you come in the open, just let down all your guards, stand naked, not afraid of anything. You're free.' ...

"'I was never after representing episodes from my life, which an autobiography does,' he says, 'but rather to search a life for meaning. My life was just the raw material.' ...

"'I'm not a happy person, but I can write,' he says. 'While I'm writing, I'm selfless, I'm balanced. Self-medicating is a good word for it. Just like my father did with his drinking.'" <www.ow.ly/y3DOI >

What is this? Having rejected its Judaeo-Christian heritage, Western culture's quest for "reality" and meaning uncovers conflict and confusion over its complexities. No doubt Knausgaard's acquaintances, who have not yet been exploited in the first three volumes, are growing ever more nervous. Confession doesn't seem to be the right word. It comes across more like selfishly ambitious indiscretion.

For another take on Knausgaard, see <www.ow.ly/y76kt>

YOGA

Once again, Yoga Journal links yoga to religious practice. In the short sidebar "3 Easy Steps to Start Meditating" (Jun '14, p22, no byline), Step Two reads: "Choose a Mantra. Select one word or phrase, called a mantra, to repeat and focus on during meditation. An ideal mantra contains only a few words or syllables, for easy repetition."

Wikipedia begins its entry on the topic thus: "Mantra means a sacred utterance, numinous sound, or a syllable, word, phonemes, or group of words believed by some to have psychological and spiritual power. Mantra may or may not be syntactic or have literal meaning; the spiritual value of mantra comes when it is audible, visible, or present in thought.

"Earliest mantras were composed in Vedic times by Hindus in India, and those are at least 3000 years old. Mantras are now found in various schools of Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism. ...

"The use, structure, function, importance and types of mantras vary according to the school and philosophy of Hinduism and of Buddhism." <www.ow.ly/y3L1p>

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SOURCES: Monographs

1 - My Struggle: Book Three, by Karl Ove Knausgaard (Archipelago, 2014, hardcover, 432 pages) <www.ow.ly/y3PYA>

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