Popalyptic VI: Choose Your Own Apocalyptic Adventure

"To be human we need to experience the end of the world. We need to lose the world, to lose a world, and to discover that there is more than one world and that the world isn't what we think it is. Without that, we know nothing about the mortality and immortality we carry. We don't know we're alive as long as we haven't encountered death: these are banalities that have been erased. And it is an act of grace...loss brings as it takes away."
-Helen Cixous, Three Steps on the Ladder of Writing, p. 10

Adding to the last post, with the helpful thoughts coming from Helen Cixous above, I add a fifth thesis, which is that every person and culture needs some sort of belief concerning how it will all end. This will help lead us into today's post.

Part of the current issue in America is that there are competing eschatologies, with a lot of crossover between different camps. Nobody really knows what or how they believe, and there are a plurality of religious and secular options, many of which are mixed and mingled in a similar fashion as our creation narratives are mashed together.

One apocalyptic message I have been noticing tells us that things are coming to a cataclysmic end. This story is full of fascinating characters, strange events that are both natural and seemingly too fantastic for nature as we know it. There are truly ancient apocalyptic touches to these modern apocalypses, but with one large difference: human beings are in control of how things will end, or even if they will end. This takes us into some fictional worlds.

One of the worst movies I ever had the misfortune of seeing ends up being a good example of this: Armageddon. The name alone is meant to conjure images from Revelation. But it is a modern-day Americanized version. Yes there is the cosmic rock cruising towards earth, which seems very apocalyptic. But then things turn in a different way. With the help of technology and a lot of determination, a group of Americans (of course) are able to stop Armageddon and save the earth. Armageddon, in other words, is avoidable. And all it takes is us and our own strength and ingenuity.

The story lines of movies/books such as Cormac McCarthy's The Road, Mad Max (all of them), and I am Legend are similar (though some are much better than others). We determine how or if things will end. For these storylines, though, the end comes. But not completely. There is a remnant left (we will wait for a later post to discuss the rapture and Mr. Lahaye) who have to survive in conditions that cause some to resort to animal-like behavior and others, like the father in The Road, to choose to be the "good guys."

Of course, we cannot end without also noting Al Gore's Inconvenient Truth, as well as Ken Kesey's Sailor Song, which Kesey literally described as "post-apocalyptic" in an interview. This apocalyptic story-line, which I assume you are familiar with, tells us that the world is ending and we are causing it to do so. If we clean-up our act, perhaps we can still be saved. If not, many will die, and the world could revert in a Mad Max, The Road sort of way. Again, this is a story in which we are in control.

I bring up this variety hoping, beyond anything else, that they will bring out themes and ideas as to what sort of eschatology America is moving into and to decide if any of these stories can be referred to as modern-day apocalyptic literature. If so, our new version really does have very little to do with God and a lot more to do with ourselves. Although they differ as to how and when and if things will end, in all of these it is always about our strength, understanding, and technological powers. Seems very Modern, now that I think about it. I suppose all of this is leading us to the next post where we'll have to see what Tim Lahaye has to say about all of this. Oh boy.

Thoughts? Other titles? Disagreements? Is anybody reading these?

Peace,
Matt

Popalyptic V: Apocalypse Now

Microsoft Word on my computer uses the Encarta dictionary. When asked to define apocalypse, it gives two definitions:
1. the destruction or devastation of something, or an instance of this
2. a revelation made concerning the future
The thesaurus goes on to list words such as disaster, catastrophe, day of reckoning, Judgment Day, end of the world, and destruction. Living in America at this time, I do not find this definition very surprising, though it is more than a little strange when compared to the historic usage of the word that we talked about two posts ago.

I believe a fundamental shift has occurred in how apocalypse is understood and defined in modern-day America. Consequently all apocalyptic literature is often read in a very different way than originally intended, depending upon the reader. The reader’s socio-economic standing, religion, era, and location all make a drastic difference as to how they will read and understand (or not understand) apocalyptic literature. Gadamer said “A person who is trying to understand a text is always projecting.” What is projected onto an apocalypse depends upon the reader. Or, to borrow from post II; when the soup is unveiled, each of us will try to add his or her own seasoning upon it. Some of us will change the taste a lot, while others will change the entire meal. Reading ancient apocalyptic literature across time, continents, and cultures causes us to read it entirely differently than how it was intended. Meanwhile, we begin to change it or even to create our own new stories.

One thesis I would throw out with these posts is that we are beginning to create our own modern American apocalyptic literature, and it is far different from what the ancients wrote, as are the reasons behind the writing. Past apocalypses were by oppressed peoples, with the intention of bringing hope and reminding the powerless that those who find comfort in thier oppresive ways now will find pain, suffering and judgement in the future. This is hard to deal with in a nation that is more often than not the cause of suffering and oppression. So we have simply redefined the word and begun coming up with our own versions.

I suppose a second thesis for these posts, then, is that we have redefined apocalypse in a way, to borrow from liberation theologians, that comforts the comfortable and forgets the afflicted. That means it forgets all about oppression and focuses on destruction and future-telling. Like the Israelites when they began following false prophets, we want to know the future, specifically the future that tells us how blessed we will be because God loves us so. The fact that we ignore what he asks us to do is inconsequential. How does this work? Like this: my third thesis is that we do this by eliminating God and the bible from our eschatology. Sometimes we do this literally, sometimes both make an appearance, but I believe they are more often than not forgotten. I think, for instance, of the man at church who told me how he looks forward to Heaven, where he will ride a Harley around all day, every day. Hmm. So (thesis four), instead of listening to the Bible or believing in God's power within our world, we are the ones who are in control of the future in modern American apocalyptic literature.

I will give some examples and add some meat to this in the next post(s). For now, I ask if there are any questions, clarifying thoughts, or contradictory opinions? Or even better, is there another thesis you would add to these? Please let me know!

Peace,

Matt

Popalyptic IV: Wind in the Fists

Today, before we get to my next post, Apocalypse Now and Later, I want to visit a song I absolutely love from Neko Case. Case, if you don't know, is from The New Pornographers, a band I avoided for years because of its name. But it turns out I like them, love her, and really enjoy her song John Saw that Number (as a sidenote, I just found out she's from Tacoma, near where I grew up, and went to school in Vancouver, near where I went to school...maybe we can be friends). Anyways, here's the lyrics:

Old John the baptist, old John divine
Leather harness round his line
His meat was locust and honey
Wild honey lord, wild honey

John saw that number
Way in the middle of the air
Cryin' holy, holy to the Lord

Old John the baptist, old John divine
Frogs and snakes are gonna get John this time
God told the angel "go see about John"
So he flew from the pit with the moon round his waist
Gathered wind in his fists so the stars round his wrists
Cryin' holy, holy to the lord

Read the revelations, you'll find him there
Third chapter, fourth verse where he said unto me
"There's a beast that rose out of the sea"
Ten crowns, ten crowns
On his horns write "blasphemy"
John couldn't read it (John couldn't read it)
Get on repeat it
John couldn't read it
Holy, holy to the Lord

There was a man, a pharisee
Who came by night to meet him
Said "I know thy teacher came from God cause no man can do such miracles
Without the lord to entreat him

"God told the angel "go see about John"
So he flew from the pit with the moon round his waist
Gathered wind in his fists and the stars round his wrists
Cryin' holy, holy to the Lord
Holy, holy to the Lord
Holy, holy to the Lord...

Aside from her naming John the Baptist as the John of Revelation fame, I do think these lyrics have grasped onto another important part of apocalyptic literature. Case has worked herself into the style of apocalyptic! Listen to these amazing lyrics about "moon round his waist" and "stars round his wrists" and you are suddenly beginning to picture those images that we have let grow stale in books like Revelation and Daniel after too much literalist reading. This is imaginative, even psychadelic, imagery folks!

My desire with today's post was to share that the imagery of past apocalyptic literature can still be celebrated today. I hope lyrics like these brings helps to bring those ancient books back to life for you in the same way they have for me.

In his book In God's Time, Craig Hill brings up what is missing from a Neko Case apocalypse. He says that "Where there is an emperor with divine pretensions, there is need of an apocalypse." Case's apocalypse seems more historical than for the here and now but I'm getting way too far ahead of myself...

Have you seen apocalyptic imagery used or expanded upon anywhere?

Peace,
Matt

Popalyptic III: Dolorean

I can't really contain myself any longer. I want to get into the "pop" part of these blog posts. There may not be a lot of order to them, but I'm going to start unloading some of these, and I don't know where we'll stop. For the moment I do not want to actually try to define pop culture because, honestly, I don't really know where to say it stops anymore. I do know that books, movies, music, and television fit into this category. This of course is what makes it so difficult; where doesn't TV go nowadays? Regardless, we're going to dive in and see where this takes us.

Dolorean

Last Spring I went on a long road trip with my parents and my little brother. He kept telling me to listen to this band on his iPod and I finally consented, and fell in love immediately with Dolorean. Maybe you don't know who they are, or maybe you just aren't into their music, but I really enjoy it. It's pretty mellow with somewhat strong lyrics. I was immediately struck by the obvious faith elements in the songs, though lyricist Al James does not claim to be a Christian. Today's song in particular shows obvious Christian roots, and provides an easy point to jump in to the mixture of pop culture and apocalyptic literature. It is called Violence in the Snowy Fields, and although you can't hear the song, hopefully you can still enjoy these lyrics:

"I’m quittin and givin' up on bein' good enough
My body is bones and blood, my heart is pure
And when the rider comes and tells what I have done
I’ll gladly sing along, won’t change my tune

And in the end St. John says all things shall be revealed
Like violence, like violence
Like violence in the snowy fields

And on a night like this when nothing stirs about
If I hear the hoof beat pounds I will not turn
I will not be afraid of how I spent my days
I may go down in flames but I shall not burn

And in the end St. John says all things shall be revealed
Like violence, like violence
Like violence in the snowy fields

And in the end St. Johns says all things shall be revealed
Like violence, like violence
Like violence in the snowy fields"

What I enjoy about this song, and why I chose to start with it, is that at least in a basic way, they get it! The first four lines are ambiguous, and can be taken a number of ways. Which I enjoy, considering final judgment is not as easily predicted as many in the evangelical world believe it to be. Beyond that, though, is the fact that Dolorean appears to realize that the end is a revealing, as is the book of Revelation in general. It is an unveiling, a show of reality as it really is.

The following comes from an interview done with frontman Al James. You can read the entire interview here. This is an entry point for understanding where he is coming from:

I think that a point of particular interest is your lyrics. You often refer to Biblical themes, and in general I feel a kind of spiritual mood in your words. What about it? How do you consider Christian religion in your life and in our present society?

I am a spiritual person and I was raised in the Christian faith. I don’t really know what I believe right now. I don’t attend church, but I still cling to the teachings of Christ – humility, kindness, love, patience, sacrifice, honesty and generosity. I fear that in general the essence of Christianity that I find in Christ’s teachings has been massively perverted by social-political organizations that claim to be churches. It makes me very, very sad, but I know that this has been happening throughout history. Since I am a spiritually complex person, it seems natural that those themes would appear in my music. I work to avoid alienating anyone by lyrics, but they may hit closer to home for some people. Ultimately I want to make music that connects with people, not divides folks.

What are your ideas about this presumed fight between Muslim culture and Catholic culture that also is generating the war in Iraq? Personally, I think that the only God that the West of the World is trying to safeguard is the Money...

I basically agree with you. I am disappointed by the West’s plans to “democratize” and “Christianize” other cultures. It’s utterly repulsive and makes me sad beyond belief. We’re living in dark times right now and I hope that change comes soon. I agree that money and power continues to be “God” in most cases. Self-righteous western leaders who occupy other countries and promote massive genocide will be accountable for their actions. If not in this lifetime, there will be some sort of spiritual accountability I am convinced of this.

Revealing, future accountability for the powers that be; I would say that Dolorean puts out some lyrics that mix pop and apocalypse, and fortunately, do so in a way that is true to the text.

Your thoughts?

Peace,
Matt

Popalyptic II: Apocalypse Then

First things first, before this post really begins... Effie and I have been updating our daugter's blog if you are interested. She is now three months and cute as usual. Secondly, this strange new site called Bohemian Alien has published an aritle I wrote many months ago on Kafka. You can check that out here. I titled it A Kafka Kick to the Face, so you know it has to be good. Okay, now on to today's post...

Before we can get into the meat of where these posts are going, I feel the definite need to define our terms. Pop and the idea of pop culture will have to be fleshed out in future posts, but of course the most important thing to start with is apocalypse and apocalyptic literature. Although I am not a scholar on this, I do have some understanding that I would like to share and use to move us into the heart of this conversation.

The first for us to do, then is to find some definitions of “apocalypse.” I want to share a variety, look for themes, but leave it somewhat open as to exactly what it is, because I believe what it was historically and what it has become are not necessarily the same thing. Today we will look at apocalyptic literature from history, setting us up for the next post, which will (if all goes according to plan) focus on how our understanding of apocalypse has changed over time. So here goes…

In How to Read the Bible for All it’s Worth, Fee and Stuart list five common characteristics of Apocalyptic literature:
1. “Apocalyptic was born either in persecution or in a time of oppression [for the Bible, think how apocalypse is seen during the exile and during persecution of the early church]. Therefore, its great concern was no longer with God’s activity within history. The apocalyptists looked exclusively forward to a time when God would bring a violent, radical end to history, an end that would mean the triumph of right and the final judgement of evil.”
2. “Apocalypse is a form of literature. It has a particular written structure and form.”
3. “Most frequently the ‘stuff’ of apocalyptic is presented in the form of visions and dreams, and its language is cryptic (having hidden meanings) and symbolic.”
4. “The images of apocalyptic are often forms of fantasy, rather than of reality.”
5. “Because they were literary, most of the apocalypses were very formally stylized [think of the use of numbers, time, neat arrangements of these and more].”

Leland Ryken, in How to Read the Bible as Literature, calls this visionary literature, which “transforms the known world or the present state of things into a situation that at the time of writing is as yet only imagined.” The apocalyptic author writes in such a way because “visionary literature, with its arresting strangeness, breaks through our normal way of thinking and shocks us into seeing things are not as they appear.” Think of how awesome these combined statement are; an apocalyptic writer uses wild imagery for the sake of the readers, so they can have their eyes opened and realize the world is not as everybody around them assumes. As Bob Dylan sang, “There’s something happening here, but you don’t know what it is.” To have eyes opened, the jarring style of apocalypse becomes necessary.

The online etymology dictionary, one of my favorite places to dink around online, points out that the word apocalypse comes from a root that means “to uncover.” The way it was once described to me was that it is similar to coming into a room where somebody is cooking an amazing soup. You can smell it and you are desiring whatever it is that is setting your tastebuds off. Then, suddenly, the cook takes the lid off and lets you see what is inside and, BAM, apocalypse.

Last one, then we will move on. Craig Hill, in his book In God’s Time (which I consider the best book I have ever read about apocalyptic literature), lays out 12 characteristics of apocalyptic literature, which are as follows:
1. Division of History into Old and New Ages.
2. Dualism: full of good and evil, with little in between. Or, as Hill puts it, “short on grays but copiously supplied with black and white.”
3. Determinism: “history is moving forward to its inevitable conclusion.”
4. Exclusivism: there are “few insiders” and “many outsiders.” Guess who gets in.
5. Portrayals of Judgement.
6. Expectations of the End: “to such a mindset, bad news is good news.”
7. Code Words, Numerology, and Cryptic Symbols
8. Means of Revelation: visions, dreams, and archangels reveal God’s plan.
9. Transportation of the Visionary: author taken away, most often to heaven or the heavenly realm.
10. The Heavenly Realm: highly involved with what happens on earth.
11. Exhortations to Endurance.
12. Demonstrations of God’s Justice.

Okay, that’s a lot to ask blog readers, known for their short attention spans, to digest. I hope you can see that even when it comes to reading ancient apocalyptic literature, there is not perfect agreement as to what defines it. We can know what it is when we read it, but it is not so easy to define. Which is what makes it tricky, but also what makes it so wonderful. Eugene Peterson, in his wonderful commentary on Revelation, Reversed Thunder, says that the Christian community needs teachers, apologists and “masters of the imagination… [who] keep us awake and aware before the living God who speaks to us…to remind us that we are living beings who are being spoken to.”

We could go further today, especially to listen to some other scholars and their opinions on apocalyptic literature, but I’d rather let Peterson’s words ring out for us to end on. “We are living beings who are being spoken to.” Let us listen for those words.



Peace,

Matt

Popalyptic

Over the course of a few blog posts I am going to try to do something I have never done before on this blog. First of all, I am planning to keep with one topic for more than one post, rather than commenting on random things from the news and current books I am reading. This will take more discipline than I am used to, but stranger things have happened. Please be reading regular and providing some feedback as I meander towards a point with this series.

So what am I planning on doing? Why, commenting on the popalysm going on today, and seeing where it takes us.

First things first: Popalyptic. Not necessarily the most clever or original combination of the words pop and apocalyptic, but it is functional and I thought of it, so we are going with this as a title. I want to spend some time examining the use of apocalyptic material in pop culture and measure it up against Biblical writings. This is not to point out which are “right” and which have it all “wrong.” It has much more to do with seeing what these movies, books, and songs are telling our society about “end times,” not to mention how God works. I really have no specific intention as far as where this ends up.

I will say right here, at the start of this, that I have my own beliefs about what apocalyptic literature is and have even stronger opinions about what it is not. If you have different ideas, that is fine. Hopefully this will still be interesting for you and the conversations (if any ensue from this) that come out of it will bless both of us greatly. On my next post, which should hopefully come tomorrow, I will write about my understanding of apocalyptic literature, the Apocalypse, End Times, and try to share my limited understanding of how this has been historically read, turning specifically to the U.S. We’ll see if I can do all of that in one post… After that, we’ll turn to the pop part of these posts, which should make all of you who read People and Us happy.

For now, I will leave with two questions that should help me get moving on this (if, that is, anybody responds):

1. What do you, without going to a theological dictionary or any other resource, think apocalyptic literature is? And why is it written?
   
2. Where have you seen intersections between pop culture and apocalyptic ideas?
   
   Peace,
   Matt