from Northrop Fry: Fearful Symmetry

[Kevin Christensen]

Fry is an important scholar of the Bible and literature. His career took flight with the publication of his first book, Fearful Symmetry: A Study of William Blake. His later important works include The Anatomy of Criticism, The Great Code: The Bible and Literature, and Words with Power: Being a Second Study of the Bible and Literature.

Anyway, I decided to re-read Fearful Symmetry and came upon this gem, in a chapter title "Beyond Good and Evil."

Is is in the God of official Christianity, however, invented as a homeopathic cure for the teachings of Jesus, that state religion produced its masterpiece. This God is good and we are evil; though he created us,he is somehow or other not responsible for our being evil, though he would consider it blasphemous either to assert that he is, or deny his omnipotence. All calamities and miseries are his will, and to that will we must be absolutely resigned, even in thought and desire. The powers that be are ordained of him, and all might is divine right. The visions of artists and prophets are of little importance to him: he did not ordain those, but an invariable ritual and a set of immovable dogmas, which are more in keeping with his ideas of order. Both of these are deep mysteries, to be entrusted to a specially initiated class of servants. He keeps a grim watch over everything men do, and will finally put most of them in a hell to scream eternally in torment, eternally meaning, of course, endlessly in time. A few however, who have done as they have been told, will be granted an immortality of the pie in the sky variety.

It is easy to call this popular misunderstanding, but perhaps harder to deny that orthodox religion is founded on a compromise with it. (Fry, Fearful Symmetry, 61-62.)

I do think it would have been interesting for Blake to have read the Book of Mormon. (He died in 1827, speaking of angels as he went.) Or Fry.

Kevin Christensen

Bethel Park, PA

[e=mc2]

Very good! Thanks for this Kevin. Heh, I am now reading up on a lot of materials for my video commentary because I have reached Laban. And it is facinating how Northrop Frye is used by Eugene England to discuss why Nephi killed Laban! That is in the Nibley Festschrift. I have a few of Frye's books, and need to re-read them. Thanks for the reminder.

[Kevin Christensen]

You're welcome Kerry.

I think it was Gene England that alerted me to Fry. And that one of my English teachers at SJSU had us read Anatomy of Criticism. I still feel a bit like and ant crawling across an encyclopedia when I read him. That same England essay on Why Nephi Killed Laban essay introduced me to Rene Girard, who is also very much worth exploring.

It would be easier to use Fry's work towards Book of Mormon reading if I could do it full time for a few years. I always feel as though I'm nibbling at a feast too large for me to fully consume in the time I have.

Kevin Christensen

Pittsburgh, PA

[e=mc2]

You're welcome Kerry.

I think it was Gene England that alerted me to Fry. And that one of my English teachers at SJSU had us read Anatomy of Criticism. I still feel a bit like and ant crawling across an encyclopedia when I read him. That same England essay on Why Nephi Killed Laban essay introduced me to Rene Girard, who is also very much worth exploring.

It would be easier to use Fry's work towards Book of Mormon reading if I could do it full time for a few years. I always feel as though I'm nibbling at a feast too large for me to fully consume in the time I have.

Kevin Christensen

Pittsburgh, PA

YES! England has convinced me that I need to read Girard now also. Ain't this fun, I mean ain't this FUN?!?

[Zemah]

I do think it would have been interesting for Blake to have read the Book of Mormon. (He died in 1827, speaking of angels as he went.) Or Fry.

Kevin Christensen

Bethel Park, PA

Your excerpt fits well into the idea that Christians were indeed in an apostasy of misunderstanding God and our purpose in Him.

I cannot agree with the quote: â??The visions ofâ?¦prophets are of little importance to (God).â? The words of the prophets are either Godâ??s word and important in regards to obedience and exaltation or are the words of men (false prophets) and so are important in regards to the judgment of that man by his fellow man.

Zemah