On Greatness, Again

In spite of the many accounts of historians and biographers, there is no chain of choices and explanations for a particular man's rise to power, or his technological invention, or scientific discovery, or work of art. Great men act according to obligation: the mysterious obligation of a lineage, both genetic, historical and divine.

 

Verily, greatness is a destiny thrust upon men by gods and it will more often destroy men than make them memorable. For divine destiny is more often a fatal, life-shortening curse, than a gift. For the few who have their achievements remembered, there are multitudes of similarly disposed talents who through some sort of bad luck died early—struck down by angrier gods—or succeeded but were not acknowledged (e.g. Wallace who theorized about evolution contemporaneously with Darwin; or Tesla and Edison; the list of painters and writers is a longer one; the list of warriors and hunters still longer).

 

But in this, the Epoch of Middle-Class Equality, of scholarship and domestication, greatness is peddled as achievable by all. Universities teach men and women to be creative in the arts (MFAs) and in business (MBAs). Self-help books abound. Middle class men call themselves alpha men, and women proclaim themselves the equals of men. Drugs and surgeries improve their bodies and computers provide assistance and reminders.

 

The divinity inherent in greatness, its wellspring in mystery, its terrifying irrationality, is subsequently repudiated through the reasoning of lesser men, through their scholarship and history telling. Greatness, they argue, can be reduced to charts and 10 step programs. The great man of history appears as someone who was manufactured and that other men can replicate.

 

In the historical post-mortem of the great man the scholar makes no acknowledgement of the terrifying and irrational and the great man's courage before it, his lack of hesitation, his grace, his inability to see any choice, or probability of success. For in greatness there is no calculation, there is no cost-benefit analysis, no weighing of alternatives for and against. Greatness is the push beyond measure, a man alone obligated to trespass upon divine lands.

Fear The Gods

my iglu after the rain

 

1. The prideful man declares in what and in whom he believes. But the gods are only to be feared. What is mysterious and powerful and beyond men are facts he must simply accept. To believe is to impose upon the gods. Do not believe in gods. Fear them.

2. Understanding, even dignity, begins in fear.

3. Nuannaarpoq (Inuit): to take extravagant pleasure in being alive

Tragedy

60. In this epoch of the absent gods, the deaths of unexceptional men are called tragedies by other unexceptional men. In this age of democracy every man is called a hero and every incident is “amazing.”

64. Greatness is only measured against the gods. And it is only to a great man that the gods will allow a tragedy to happen. Verily, tragedy is the gift of the gods to great men.

A Tiny Crystal

The Peruvian hippie on the malecon at Huanchaco held a tiny quartz crystal. He placed the tiny crystal in my hand.

 

“This will bring you what you need,” he told me.

 

“What do I need?”

 

“It will bring you money.”

 

“I do not need money.”

 

“It will bring you love.”

 

“Look at that Colombian woman over there.” I pointed at Ines. “Mira, parce. You can see that I do not need love.”

 

“It will bring you security in your travels.”

 

“I make my own security, parce. A knife works better than a tiny crystal.”

"Then you will not buy this tiny crystal from me? Even for a favor?"

"I have no need for your tiny crystal. I would only lose it and regret giving you soles for it. Sell it to he who has the need."
 

It stunned him that I needed nothing, that his tiny crystal meant nothing to me. South Americans were constantly wishing or praying for something to happen for them. Peru in particular was filled with witch doctors and brujeria. It was an attitude that I didn’t understand. If you wanted something to happen you made it happen. Certainly there was luck. But luck ran good and bad and you could not do anything about it. Luck was a mystery. And no man could summon it from a tiny crystal.

My Message for Suscal

I met Alberto in the small park near my hotel as I walked up the hill for breakfast. We talked for awhile and then Alberto asked me to prepare a message for the people of Suscal and to deliver this message during the evening church service. I agreed to do it.

 

I thought I would make remarks about the simple beauty of their mountain culture and the strength of their religious beliefs and how this made their happiness. This I would contrast with the unhappiness of my country and its conspicuous consumption and rejection of religion.

 

But as the day progressed and I thought more about speaking to these indigenous people, I realized I knew nothing about them. I was only presuming they were happy. I knew nothing of their lives. They wore black wide-brimmed hats and the women had purple or pink handmade dresses and they were all very short and dark and Indian looking. That was all I knew of them. I didn’t understand them in any deep way. Not like I knew America. America I knew well. America I could speak about. But why should I tell these people about America? Why not leave America where it is and leave these Andean mountain people to themselves? Indeed, I had come to South America to receive messages, not to deliver them.

 

I realized I could not address the congregation. I knew this would disappoint Alberto. I would not know how to explain it to him. I decided it would be better just to miss our meeting at 6pm. If I ran into him before I left I would say I had fallen asleep. I had disappointed people before and I would certainly do it again.

 

It was better this way. To not make these people any more interested in America than they might already be. I carried with me an intoxicating and dangerous poison and I did not want to spread it. The Spanish had come and changed these people and American culture could easily finish them off. I had not come here to encourage it.

 

With or without me these people were being changed. In Suscal I saw as many internet shops as food shops, each filled with young people going online. Facebook and videos and games were what they looked at. It wasn’t any different than in Western countries.

 

After speaking with Alberto I ate breakfast on the avenida principal and a boy and girl at another table watched me as I ate. Neither of them wore the traditional clothing. The young man was dressed in baggy, hip-hop style jeans and the girl in a t-shirt and jeans. When I spoke with the woman who ran the restaurant the boy and girl laughed. My Spanish is of the Colombian north coast and it no doubt was a surprise to hear a strange, long-haired, blue-eyed man speaking it. I thought to myself: though they dress as gringos at least they are not so knowledgeable of gringos as to no longer stare and laugh at them. Verily, when the young can no longer stare and laugh at a foreigner Suscal will have been altogether lost.

God of the Mountains

 

I had been traveling with a woman. I had been paying other men for shelter and to prepare my food and I had been moving around the country in buses. I had made myself a tourist.

 

sacrificial area for the mountain god

 

But standing before the sacrificial alter of the Moche people and looking up at the great mountain above their pyramid, the mountain in which dwelled their highest god, the god of the mountains, I was reminded of sacrifice and my own sacrifices to the god of the mountains. The Moche elder slit the throats of the bound and naked men and drained their blood from the jugular into a golden chalice that was then brought to the Moche priest for the high offering and the blessing of the god of the mountains.

 

Moche representations of the god of the mountains

 

I had offered my blood too. I had given sweat and much pain and blood to that self-same god. I had gone up into the god's mountains alone and found him. I had traveled up under my own power and carried my house upon a bicycle, asking nothing of other men and bringing my own food and cooking it. I was far from it now, using buses and taxis and hotels and paying other men to cook for me. But I could get back to it again. I needed to get back to it again. I had payed men to be skillful for me for too long. I had lived among men for too long. I needed to ride back up to the mountain god and make a new offering.

On Solitude

It is in solitary living that he opens himself to the first experience of the world, without the derivative and all-too-human notions of subjectivity or consciousness or science or religion. Solitude does not mean living in a little room in a city and avoiding one’s friends and family. It does not necessarily mean living on a mountaintop either. Solitude is removing oneself physically to a wholly other world, a different world than one knows. Different language, customs, topography, animals, food, the weather, the sun and stars, the love of a foreign woman, the seasons, buildings, trees, and gods and rivers. In such a place a man lives entirely alone. He has little to grab onto, or that grabs onto him. There is no longer the familiar. This is solitude.

As a result of the surrounding novelty, he has the experience of the world in its glory and wonder. He becomes as the child. He makes the discovery of the world as gift.

If he is traveling by bicycle or on foot his solitude is even purer. He lives in concern for his need of food and water and shelter. He asks that no one other than the food sellers be skillful for him. He addresses this new world with his own skills. He lives nearer to the world’s mystery and thereby awakens the gods to care for him.

Indeed, gifts from the gods may be bestowed upon this solitary man. Ideas and visions and new ways of life as mysterious in origin as the world itself.

The End of Happiness

“Do not fear making babies. Even in a dying world there can be happiness.”

“But won’t it be too hard?”

“It was always too hard. What is too hard changes for the generations.”

“But won’t the end be the hardest?”

“The end? Have you then discovered the beginning that you should inquire about the end?”

“Perhaps you're right.”

“He that would know the end would also know the beginning."

"Yes."

"For very long now men have expected the end. But even if it should end, why should it not end happily?”

Seven Years Old

“Mom, how old will I be in heaven?”

“You’ll be whatever age you choose to be.”

“And I’ll be that age forever and ever?”

“Forever and ever. Any age you choose.”

He remembered that conversation with his mother. He was five years old then and had decided he would be eternally five when he went to heaven. Then, during his sixth year, he realized being six years old was even better and decided he would be eternally six when he went to heaven. But now, in this his seventh year, it was going so well that he decided to be seven eternally. He could not imagine any year going any better and he promised himself that however good being eight seemed he was not going to change his mind. Seven years old was it. He was going to be seven years old for eternity.

But then he thought of a problem. What if his friends chose different ages? What if they chose to be much older in heaven? They wouldn’t be able to play together. What if there were no other seven year olds? He would have no friends and nobody to play with for eternity. The problem began to really scare him. He needed his friends to agree to be seven years old eternally with him. It couldn’t be that hard. He had already gotten his friends to agree to become astronauts and go to space with him. Before that they had agreed to be cowboys with him. He had good friends and he wasn’t worried. They would all go to heaven and be the same age together forever and ever and everything would go on eternally for as good as he was having it now, in this, his seventh and best year on the earth.

To Gods, To Men

1. The gods have withdrawn because of boredom. Men no longer interest them. Only great men and those who attempt a greatness can awaken the slumbering divinities.

2. Who among you would live enough so that the gods would be in conflict over you? That some of the divinities would side with you while others would seek your destruction?

Miracles

“But was the spirit of the soil his friend? The plant that is cut down one year, yet grows again the next — did this miracle make him religious and silent? The stones, and the heather, and the branches of trees, and the grass, and the woods, and the wind, and the great heaven of all the universe — were these his friends?”—Hamsun, Look Back on Happiness

“But what then does it mean to be aware of the world as a miracle at some times and not at others?” —Wittgenstein, Lecture on Ethics

50. Man lives in denial of so many miracles. That the plant that sustains him grows again after he has harvested from it. That the world exists. Instead he turns these miracles into facts, items for textbooks and academic journals; facts to be assembled into theories. The facts of science deny the world its miracle and thereby remove man’s responsibility to it. The plant becomes a resource and not a mysterious gift. The plant becomes a source of income, a way to place himself higher in the economic typology of men.

51. That man should feel religiously about the world is the most important fact of all. It is the fact that destroys all other facts. It is the fact for which there is no science. But for science to exist it is the first fact that must ignored.

59. The gods required man to remark upon the miraculous, to be in awe of it. Without man there is no one to admire the miracle, to give thanks, and to make great art to celebrate it. Without man the gods are lonely. That men are bound to the world is a miracle, and it is only through the gods that they are so bound.

65. Science removes man from the world. Science destroys its miracle. And science is never silent: it is always boasting of what it has explained and will explain. Through science man divests himself of responsibility for the world, for man’s responsibility for the world is itself miraculous.

The Last Philosophers

These aphorisms are dedicated to the great quitters of Denver, Colorado, USA. May these men use their newfound freedom for strength.

“Science rushes headlong, without selectivity, without “taste,” at whatever is knowable, in the blind desire to know all at any cost. Philosophic thinking, on the other hand, is ever on the scent of those things which are most worth knowing, the great and important insights.”--Nietzsche, Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks

100. The mists are gathering. The gods thought to have long ago perished are in slow return. To guide man’s return back into the darkness of myth, that is the proper task of philosophy today. To prepare him properly for the experience of the divine.

101. The first philosophers looked out from the mist; the last philosophers will be forced to look back into it. It will require the courage of new eyes, eyes that do not turn away or shut when confronted by great suffering and madness; eyes ever open to protect what is reasonable in man from being overrun. And out of this darkness, should man emerge, may these last philosophers have shown him how to live: neither strictly the subject of gods nor strictly the subject of Reason and technology.

103. To see as the first philosopher saw, standing at the threshold of myth and reason, so will the last philosopher. But while the first philosopher envisioned Reason from the vantage point of myth, the last philosopher will grasp myth from the vantage point of Reason.

109. Philosophy was born of myth, but then turned back upon myth and annihilated it. The mythical origins of Reason have today been fully covered over. Reason is believed to be man’s discovery. The gods are silent and withdrawn. The philosopher, like the scientist, no longer listens for them. The gods, despite their power, could not be protected from man.

113. Philosophy’s task, though deeply misunderstood, was to protect the gods from men. In this it failed, with philosophy being progressively drawn towards the scientific and its model of inquiry and explanation. The mythical, for which there is no explanation, was thereby rejected. Scientific successes further confirmed this rejection. Philosophy now sits alongside science and models itself upon it, instead of being that which mediates between science and myth.

119. It began with Plato and the ejection of the tragic poets from the city. He argued the ideal city is one that does not call for the gods through the ritual of tragedy. Indeed, the tragic poet was made an enemy of the State. Yet one day, when Reason has wrecked itself and the godless cities are in disarray, is it not inconceivable to imagine that the task of a new sort of philosopher will be to protect science and Reason from the gods.

125. Philosophy appeared to the Greeks at a time of strength and maturity and health. Philosophy (as that which mediates between Reason and the gods) will now reappear during an epoch of weakness. Who among today’s men is strong enough to hear the god’s call? To understand it? The philosopher is rightly the oracle of the gods.

The Will of God

202. When faced with cruelty or suffering, the strength of a person or a culture is measured by how readily it invokes the ‘will of God’ rather than attempting an explanation of its own. An even healthier culture credits its happiness and success to the ‘will of God.’

204. “Everything happens for a reason” has replaced “It was God’s will” as a response to suffering. The weakness of the former, an appeal to an explanation that has not yet been made, versus the stolid acceptance that puts an end to reasoning and the compulsion to explain.

208. A less robust culture is one built upon a foundation of explanation. The extreme vanity of the West consists in its refusal to accept any sort of mystery, to accept that explanation must come to an end. And where the sacred might still have a place, Western man explains: “Science just hasn’t solved that yet.”

209. To construct a culture upon the ideas of rationality and objectivity is to construct a fortress upon a flood plain. Though it may prove impregnable to other men, eventually comes the great flood to wash it away. 'The will of God', by contrast, is absolute and enduring safety.

220. In the presence of mystery men are made strong.

224. The 'will of God' has its opposite in the vanity of men. To accept mystery and the sacred over theory and the laws of nature arguably makes for stronger men (e.g. Muslims).*

239. The decline of Rome produced a Dark Age. What might a decline of the West produce? The West is significantly more reliant upon systems, and significantly less religious.

____________________________________________________________

* It is today something of a pragmatic choice for a Western man to be religious. But there is no element of pragmatism or choice in the religious life of the Muslim. Hence their religiosity, their strength.

Gods

The man who wanders knows the divinities.
The man who sits causes the divinities to withdraw.

Mystery

“Can one learn this knowledge? Yes; some can. Not, however, by taking a course in it, but through ‘experience’. ― Can someone else be a man’s teacher in this? Certainly. From time to time he gives him the right tip. ― This is what ‘learning’ and ‘teaching’ are like here. ― What one acquires here in not a technique; one learns correct judgments. There are also rules, but they do not form a system and only experienced people can apply them right. Unlike calculating rules.” ― Wittgenstein

1. The problem with the objective stance (where Reason is thought to reside) is it supposes man might subtract himself from experience. It supposes he might uncover what is truthful by not being a part of it. Indeed, the idea of scientific objectivity goes against the idea of engagement in the world (even of there being a world ― there are only components and causal relationships). Truth, the objective man surmises, exists solely with man and his special vantage point upon the world: from beyond it. Man attempts to make himself world-less, without direct experience in the world, studying it from afar, and in doing so he claims to know it.

2. This leads him to undermine the question of how to live. One who can truly ask this question is one who begins by examining the idea of how he is worldly. Only when man can grasp his worldliness can he begin to ask in what manner he should act in the world.

9. By being reasonable man risks losing the world.

12. One begins to grasp at truth when one stops looking for the formula. Indeed, it is where systematic description begins to fail. It is as if he were trying to retell a dream ― the chasm between the dream images and feeling, and the words he uses to recount it is vast. He feels in recounting the dream the limitation of his language, its insufficiency.

16. His technological inventions show him the correctness of his scientific method. He believes that the same reasonableness he uses to control the world may be put to use in his own life. But this same method when applied to himself entirely misses the mark. Problems and method pass each other by.

22. Poets and religious men disappeared at the same time.

41. How unfortunate that his religious belief has been limited to appeals made during hardship. The man who loses his child to accident laments, “Everything happens for a reason.”

42. It is as if the man said, there is a reason for this and I summon God to provide it. Surely it did not happen accidentally, or by bad luck. This mystery shall be solved. The child was too important. There is the assumption that despite the horror of the child’s death it will finally in the future lead to something better. The child will be redeemed. The father will look back at the child’s death and say “That is why it happened.” The man’s appeal is to reason and not to God.

45. What is religious is only a placeholder until a reasonable explanation can be made.

49. The difference of this age from another is in the following statements: “Everything happens for a reason” and “Everything happens by the grace of God.” The former implies the reasonableness of God’s plan, that it can be made clear by men. The latter leaves it all to God: what is mysterious to men is accepted as mysterious.

57. The inability to explain cruelty and suffering brings into existence the gods. The gods dwell in this place of mystery. It is where reason cannot go.

63. The Muslims are a more religious ― and stronger ― people because of their comfort living within God’s mystery. They feel no need to explain their suffering.

88. What of the time when explanation began and ended with the gods? When a man who was physically blinded was understood to truly see?

Discarded Alternate Version

This story might also have gone this way:

“Gentlemen, is it true that a Jehovah’s Witness gains Heaven through good works?”

“Yes. That is true.”

“And these good works have a sort of point system attached to them?”

The older man paused. “Sort of. Yes.”

“And often it is good works performed in the face of adversity that garner the higher point values?”

“That can be true,” nodded the older man.

“Given these facts I would like you gentlemen to rake my lawn.”

“What do you mean?” said the younger man.

“Using rakes I want you to gather up the many leaves on this lawn.”

“It is the middle of summer,” said the young man. “There are no leaves.”

“Surely you see the leaves? The leaves are everywhere. Are not Jehovah’s Witnesses men of imagination?”

The young man appeared angry.

“We’ll rake your lawn,” said the older man. He was trying to smile. Clearly he was imagining the points this would earn him.

I went to the garage and brought back one rake.

“Where’s my rake?” the young man said.

“I want you to pull up that bamboo,” I said. “It's taking over the yard.”

The young man wasn’t smiling. “I don’t see bamboo anywhere.”

“It’s there, there and there. And make sure to get the root systems out entirely. They are deep and invasive.”

The Jehovah's Witnesses took off their sport jackets and I watched them work for awhile. Later on I offered them some imaginary lemonade.

A Cost-Benefit Analysis

I opened the door to 2 smartly dressed men in suits, the younger one standing behind the older. They were Jehovah’s Witnesses the older one said, and they were both smiling. These were very friendly men. They handed me their pamphlet, an invitation to a question and answer session at their church. I would be helped with questions I might have about God and Christ and Heaven. I listened and then I asked them:

“Gentlemen, do you know what a cost-benefit analysis is?”

They nodded. Of course they did. These men were wearing suits. These were professional men and Jehovah’s Witnesses.

“Gentlemen, it will performed in this way. Will being an active Jehovah’s Witness and believing in its tenents get me into Heaven?”

“It will certainly do that,” said the older man.

“Are Jehovah’s Witnesses required to tithe some amount to their church?”

The older man paused. The younger stopped smiling. “There is no requirement that you give money.”

“But does the church ever receive money from its members?”

“It does. Like most churches,” added the older man.

“And would it also be possible to not be a Jehovah’s Witness and to read the Bible and accept Christ as my savior and also be granted the eternal life? And to do this by studying on my own, without any church?”

The older man paused again. “Yes. I suppose it would be.”

“Then why join your church when at some point I might feel pressure to contribute to it with a portion of my income? Why would I choose to possibly have to pay for eternal life when I could access it without ever having even the thought of paying for it?”

“That is a very cynical view you have,” said the younger man. He did not like this line of questioning at all.

“Furthermore, gentlemen, maybe it is time we rethought the whole idea of worldly payments for an eternity with Christ. Maybe it is time to rethink the idea of physical churches?”

“I think you should come to our meeting,” the older man was smiling again.

I handed his pamphlet back to him. “Who paid for this pamphlet?”

“The church did.”

“I assume by that you mean its membership.”

“Yes.”

“Can you guarantee I will never be asked for money or hear about tithing should I become a Jehovah’s Witness?”

“No, we can’t,” interjected the younger man. He had a disgusted look on his face.

“Gentlemen, it appears that this cost-benefit analysis of your religion is complete. I must unfortunately not accept your invitation. There are less costly ways by which I can access Heaven. In fact, I believe I can do it for free, without a single payment. Again, gentlemen, I wish you the best of luck on your recruitment trip and I look forward to meeting up again in Heaven should I choose it as a final destination.”

With that I shut the door and returned to looking at some recently discovered internet porn of a very high quality that I wasn‘t paying for either.