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or On Images |
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Today was my second day of work at the Catholic book store, and it led me to something of an epiphany. Nothing earth-shattering, mind you, just significant in its small way. Dear reader, forgive my digression as I set the stage before discussing the theological implications of my gnosis, but image, as you will come to see, plays a very important role in this. Alba House is not simply a book store, although books comprise a large portion of our inventory. We also sell religious goods - chalices, vestments, candles, medallions, photos of the Pope and important figures like Mother Theresa, little cards with pictures of the Saints on them with appropriate prayers on the back, and framed paintings of important religious figures and scenes such as the Last Supper and the Crucifixion. There is a great deal of merchandise in a very small shop, and it can be a tad claustrophobic. Every inch of the walls is covered with framed pictures, mostly of Jesus and the Virgin Mary, whose sad, dolorous eyes follow you around the crowded store, and there is a large glass cabinet full of statues of every shape and size, arranged in orderly lines like an army in parade. About three or four spinning racks are crammed full of the prayer cards, and the front counter is laden with religious medals. As the day wore on the weight of all of these faces and figures began to grow heavy upon my spirit. It was like finding one's self in a sea of people, pressing, and pushing, and jostling for space in the cramped quarters, and I could almost hear them whispering quietly when my back was turned. Everywhere I looked there was something human: bodies contorted in pain as the Saints received Martyrdom; Lazarus with his emaciated frame perched on his crutches as he hobbled through the desert; Damien healing lepers who clutched at his robes; little children kneeling in prayer before the beautiful apparition of the Virgin of Guadalupe; Jesus' broken and battered frame contorted on the cross as he breathed out his last; or gloriously risen and pointing at his Sacred Heart crowned with thorns and burning with the brilliant flame of the Holy Spirit. My eyes could find nothing peaceful or simple to rest upon: everything was loud, garish, colourful, and human. Finally, through the window I caught sight of a tree growing by the edge of the sidewalk, its leaves rustling in the slight breeze that blew, and for the first time that day, I felt truly at peace, as if my spirit had touched something truly divine, and I received nourishment from it. Which isn't to say that I didn't sense the divinity within the images that surrounded me - it just wasn't my divinity. My soul is Pagan, and it responds to that part of divinity which is wild and natural and fundamentally Other. Trees and mountains and grass breaking through the sidewalk; the stars and moon and sun and the whole vault of the heavens stretched overhead; wind and rain and sudden summer thunderstorms; black crows flying across a clear blue sky and great cats stalking the desert wastes. Here is where I find divinity. True, I also find it in the human realm as well: in clear thinking and eloquent words; in mighty deeds and the nobility of sacrifice; in intense emotional states such as joy and fear, anger and contentment; in dancing and raw fucking; in birth and death and the simple, perfect beauty of the human form. Yes, I see divinity in all of this - but only when something of the Wildness, Primalness, and Otherness remains. But this is very different from how Christians see things. For them, God was made flesh, divinity incarnated in the human form, and nowhere else. When Yahweh speaks to Moses, his voice comes from the burning bush - but it is not in it. The world is God's creation, but it remains only a thing, like a clay jug, devoid of his spirit. Only man is made in God's image, worthy of being a vessel for the divine spirit. Otherwise, God is transcendent, completely removed from his creation, No Thing and nothing simultaneously. But such an abstract concept cannot be easily grasped by the vast majority of people, and so when they represent God, they do so in human form - in Jesus Christ on the cross, in his loving, suffering Mother, in the body or congregation of Christian Saints - anthropos, man, the divine creature. But this view of divinity seems so small, so limited, so familiar to me. True, the Greek Gods are depicted as anthropomorphic, embarrassingly so according to Xenophanes, but there is always something else in the depiction. Zeus carries in his hand the lightning-bolt; Dionysos' head is twined with ivy and grape clusters; perched on Athene's shoulder is an owl; Pan has bristly goat legs. This imagery is important because it suggests something about each of the Gods' unique qualities, hinting at the complexity of divinity; it points to a deep connection with nature, the world, wildness, Otherness which the Gods both rule over and derive their being from; its speaks of their powerful epiphanies, which are both immanent and transcendent and take on myriad forms. When we see the divine in only one form - however significant that manifestation may be: and the Christian doctrine of incarnation is both beautiful and profound - we are missing out on its true profundity, making God small and committing idolatry, which is a grave sin indeed. Making images of the divine - even believing the divine to be present within those images - is not idolatry. Idolatry is believing that the divine is this, and only this, that it cannot simultaneously be this and something else. Idolatry is the belief that God is so small that he can be known completely, and that you have the only unique and true understanding of him. Idolatry of this sort - worshipping the divine solely in the form of a man, or an abstract principle divorced from reality, or a book - naturally leads to intolerance, persecution, jihads, crusades, inquisitions, etc. The Divine Will cannot be contained: its essence is naturally fluid - practically all creation accounts assert that life developed out of a moist element - various, familiar and Other simultaneously. We should stand in reverential awe before all of its manifestations, respecting whatever form it takes, learning from how it appears to another individual. This is the essence of true religion as far as I'm concerned. Awe. Respect. Relationship. Seba. Time. Kharis. |
