Kappelman's thesis indeed sounds pretty flaky.

Dissidens declares, "I will say it again: if you have any place in your soul for the good, the true and the beautiful, the (entire) evangelical church will be a place of darkness and weekly torment. What is true for you from Monday morning to Saturday night we be suspended the next day in favor of half-wit, gimcrack prattle designed to make you feel good about being bad, false and ugly."

Fair enough. If permitted by the indulgent hosts of this blog, I will say THIS again, but this time in the form of declarative sentences, rather than the questions that went unanswered in a previous post (http://remonstrans.net/index.php/2005/07/30/point_of_clarification#c554):

1. This critique exaggerates the importance of the arts to the essence of Christianity.

2. This critique reflects an un-Christian preference for the worldly wise, the mighty, the noble, the educated, and an un-Christian disdain for the foolish, the weak, the base (cf. 1 Cor. 1).

3. This critique reflects an excessive loyalty to post-Renaissance European music, and an arbitrary disfavoring of other cultures.

4. This critique misunderstands the way in which time (through popular appreciation) judges and sifts out the good and enduring from the unworkable and unsatisfying, so that (a) the critique falsely imagines a golden age when all music was excellent, all preaching was good, and all the churches were above average, and (b) the critique unduly criticizes the present day for having what is in fact only its due share (i.e., a typically enormous share) of mediocrities.

5. To the extent it is critical of current (and recent) "pop" culture in its Christian manifestations (whether Amy Grant or Fanny Crosby), this critique (a) fails to distinguish music good for the car radio from music appropriate for the Mass, and (b) fails to welcome the expression of the Gospel in every convert's own native modes and genres, however subjectively unpleasant or objectively inferior they may be to the critic.

6. This critique wrongly imagines a perfectionist God, Who is pleased only with perfection, and Who considers the imperfect to be abominable and offensive.

7. This critique has unduly narrow horizons, which exclude many doctrinally orthodox churches whose Christian culture is actually quite good.

Within this blog's critique of Christian culture, there are insights aplenty from which that culture could indeed benefit, and which in many instances it sorely needs. But these insights are offered not as fraternal correction but as an indictment and judgment. As such, they are uncharitable, unhelpful, unhopeful, and fundamentally incorrect.

Aww, please, you're making me blush.

Dissidens,

Since film came up again, I have a question, the answer to which I have still not nailed down in my brain. In your view, theater is wrong because it is cathartic, and it is cathartic because it is the imitation of an action. If my summary of your view is correct, what is it about viewing the imitation of an action that causes catharsis? I'm trying to figure out exactly why theater is cathartic, but fiction, for example, is not.

I have another question that's rattling around in my brain also. It is somewhat related to the above. If all art is mimesis, and theater is the imitation of an action,what do music and fiction, respectively, imitate?

Actually, you don’t quite have my sense of it. It is not the catharsis that is objectionable. It’s not objectionable to me, and my sense is that it was not objectionable to the church. It was how that catharsis was achieved that worried the Church. It was hard for people who’d read St. Paul (or the wisdom literature, for that matter) to think that exciting the passions, exercising them, indulging them, would ever result in a cleansing of any sort.

(Incidentally, when Augustine addresses this whole question in Confessions, he adds an interesting wrinkle. It’s slightly off the point I am making in citing Aristotle so I’ve not brought it up till now, but it is worth the Christian’s giving some thought to. He clearly agrees that the theater incited in him unholy passions, he calls them open sores, as I recall; in this he agrees with Aristotle as to the purpose and affect of plays. He goes one step further to note that there was something questionable in having these passions incited in him over events that were not real and over which he could not exercise the Christian virtues. He faults himself for not being moved to compassion, for instance, in the midst of real suffering, (where Christian good works would play a part in obedience to a sovereign God who organized these occasions for Christian charity) but then will take his pleasure in exercising pity toward an imaginary plight. [The analogy is not Augustine’s, but I rather imagine it struck him as a sort of aesthetic masturbation.] Again, it’s not the main point here, but it demonstrates how the Fathers understood Aristotle’s point. And it does raise a good question about the Christian virtues.)

Aristotle never elaborated on what it was music sought to mimic. He clearly called all art mimesis; how that worked out—for the other arts—is less clear. I think the best clue is in his over-arching view that a) mimesis is fundamental to human nature, that b) it is the beginning of all human learning, and c) humans take pleasure in mimesis in the acts of “learning and inference”. The focus of Poetics was literary mimesis. What we have is his general aesthetic theory and its basis in human nature; he never fleshed out the entire doctrine to cover all the arts.

diss,

Yours, Augustine's and Luther's consciences, doubtless, all suffer(ed) from the same self-inflicted ("masturbated", ala above usage) torture. Happly for you, however, the antidote of a good dosage of Pauline justifiation might just be the panacea. I suspect if you'd inquire of Luther and Augustine (along with Calvin), they'd tell you to relax and enjoy ALL the good things created for you (I'll spare you of the list). This is not to question your standing; rather, it is to urge you to live in it.

You don't have exist in perpetual angst over yours and church's existential situation. Alas, true freedom is indeed a delightful catharsis, especially in cases where fixation on virtue has become an idol. Rest in the Gospel and not your own ideas. For all who do less, they are bound to come to grief.

So...capdoctor, are you saying that since we are justified we are allowed to indulge in unholy passions?

"What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? God forbid." Rom. 6:1-2

I'll just go ahead and tear Romans 14 out of my Bible then, shall I, cap?

Cap
You should really take some time to think before you write these comments up. : )

Joe

Dissidens,

The lightbulb (ever so dim) is beginning to shine. All of a sudden, Aristotle doesn't seem so arbitrary. I do have another question that might help close the circle. What passage or passages from the Wisdom literature do you have in mind that deal with catharsis that is proper for the Christian?

I am familiar with Augustine's argument that the theater produces fake virtue. It is a good argument.

A few threads back, you defined the "Puritan" argument for me. That same argument could be used against a number of other entertainments: e.g., ballet, professional sports, certain parts of the music industry, etc. I don't care a whit for ballet, but I'd sure hate to give up following professional sports.

I didn’t have any specific verses in mind, but the sort of general attitude Solomon had toward what the Greeks called passions; things like Ecc. 7:9.

Yes, I think evangelicals are unbelievably shallow in their consideration of the meaning of their amusements. Nine times out of ten, what is considered “worthwhile” is related to its place in our social order rather than on its relationship to the soul.

Okay, Joe; I'll stand corrected. It seems to me, however, that those who think like you and diss., perhaps, appear to think that everything in the Bible and in life all boil down to either an action, a thought, or an event of either "sin" or 'righteousness." So who isn't thinking? For the cultural elitists types, culturally determined factors are inescapable; those factors all are not matters of either sin or righteousness.

diss., please don't tear any pages out of Romans. Forgive me if I did not exercise love. I did not mean to be unkind. I just find it difficult to equate the passions of Rom. 6 with your interpretation of others' affections for God.

Sorry, cap, I can't pretend I understand a word you are saying. I said nothing about Romans 6 and I don't recall interpreting other people's affections for anything.

I think maybe you are very, very smart and are only acting like a dunce in order to amuse.

hat-tip diss....as I look back up the thread, I must agree that I was a little quick on the attribution draw there. Guess it is better afer all to keep the fingers still and be thought a fool rather than type and remove all doubt...cheers:)

Tell me something, cap. I'm just really curious: Do you ever aspire to be taken seriously?

Dissidens,

This is unrelated to the thread, but I tried to e-mail you offline and evidently don't know what address to use.

Recently I reread the discussion concerning Morimur and thought you probably had an opinion regarding the best CD of Bach's solo violin partitas and sonatas (besides Morimur, that is). My son just requested this for his birthday. I could look on Amazon.com for a favorite violinist, but I'd like your opinion. Thanks.

P.S. If you don't want to take up space here, you can e-mail me off site.

Hmmm....Sic et Non, diss., because I am a not-so-important, intellectual bumpkin fighting for truth, justice and the American way: just like superman. Main difference is that I am bullet AND kryptonite proof. Let's suppose, however, you conclude that I am not to be taken seriously. How would diss. propose that CD become a serious minded person that would satisfy diss.'s requirements?

Let's have lunch: it'll be my treat, and we can dialog about my plight. I would hate to continue wearing the epithet that J.D. Scotus gave to the world and you hung on me, unless I indeed deserve it. I am about to say "uncle," and admit that I've met my match. My fate is in your fingers, literally.

EC:

Wow. That is a hard question to answer.

I would start by saying first, these works are serious, about as serious as you can get. That is an obstacle for some people. They are masterpieces of the pinnacle of baroque. Aside from the Pachelbel canon, some slow movements from Vivaldi and a movement or two from Albinoni, baroque is not all that accessible for many people. They are for solo, polyphonic violin; also not everyone’s cup of tea. So, there are three strikes against them to start with: they have “boring” written all over them.

Let me put all the performers into four classes. This is subjective, of course, but maybe it will be helpful.

Into the lowest class I would put the run-of-the-mill violinist still trying to make a career for himself.

Into the second class I would put the mature and experienced violinist, Grumiaux, Szeryng, Stern, Zukerman, Kremer, Mintz, Shaham, Accardo, Perlman…

Into the third class I would put the greats: Menuhin, Szigeti, Milstein, Heifetz…

Into the fourth class I would put the “baroque violinists”, a new generation of violinists who concentrate their efforts on studying the performance practice of the baroque violin. There has been a renaissance of interest among luthiers, bowmakers and performers who’ve benefited from modern scholarship, and make very interesting music. I would put into that class “guys” like Rachel Podger, Sergiu Luca, Giuliano Carmignola, Andrew Manze…

If it were me, I would ignore everyone in class I; let’s start our listening with the good stuff. Any of those I mention in the second class are good (bear in mind that I listed these people off the top of my head; I don’t even recall seeing a recording of the solo Bach by Accardo, for instance).

Those in the third class are always worth a hearing (in my opinion). I do not like Heifetz, but that is personal taste. I always thought of Menuhin as a favorite, but his career took something of a mid-life nose-dive, and I don’t think my recording of his solo Bach is up to his standard, but, again, that’s subjective. He was always a great artist and your son might love him.

I would give serious thought to the baroque fiddlers. They have a kind of free, confident and experimental quality about them and, I think, the sound qualities of the baroque violin add to my enjoyment of the sonatas. Again, I have never seen an Andrew Manze recording of these sonatas, but he has a kind of wild, exuberant, almost adolescent interpretation of other baroque works, I wait to see if he will record the solo Bach. I very much like his accompanied Bach sonatas.

Now, that’s a lot of gas, I don’t know how much lift you can get out of it, but it might help you eliminate what is least attractive to you.

Thanks, Dissidens. "Boring" baroque violin is right up our (especially my son's) alley. He is 14 going on 15 and has been studying the violin since he was 6. We are now working on developing his ear so he can discriminate between good and great violinists. He is already leagues ahead of his dad.

EC:

Great!

Who is his current favorite? and can he say why?

capdoc:

Well, let me ask you this; after all our exchanges what do you object to:

> the notion that God requires worship
> the notion that God demands perfection
> the notion that our languages have meaning
> the notion that that meaning has some bearing on what we offer God as praise
> the notion that what amuses us is not necessarily fitting worship, or
> the notion that our forbears have important things to say about what is fitting?

Or do you object to something else altogether?

I'll follow your rhetorical scheme but with numbering.

1. Negative: no objection, right on!

2. Nicht: but only Jesus has met the standard; however, I agree it is still the standard.

3. 0uk: but that is THE issue, and I simply don't have time to discuss here the metaphorical, analogical, polysemous nature of it at the phonological, grammatical and semantic, let alone, theological levels. Sure you don't want to have lunch over this one?

4. Non: but that proposition carries an almost infinite amount of cultural freight.

5. ne.....pas but you seem to too heavily presuppose that most other xrns only want entertainment and amusement: not sincere, honest, true, spiritual worship, in the best way they know how. I'll grant that N. Postman's metaphor fits; one cannot do philosophy with smoke signals. The medium (form) should fit the message (if indeed worship is somehow communication).

6. lo-(Hebrew form)...but other minds (your authorities) are not Jesus'. I know he had nothing explicitly to say about the internet, computers, or hymn books as such. So, what did he say about art, culture and music? Better yet: I'll accept your stab at it from any of the canonical books of Scripture. You can even interpret or paraphrase.

The "something else altogther" I am looking for is a robust, biblical theology (not word studies either) which lays out for us a distinctly xrn, philosophic worldview of culture, art and music vis-a'-vis ancient mediterraean Greek religion or Medieval for that matter. By the way, I do have certain affinities for a theonomic culture. Don't you? Care to share your eschatological view?

Diss., I think we have more in common at the ideal level than you may think. The rub is what it looks, feels or sounds like in 2005? How would a sincere desirer of an authentic universal form of worship experience be being appeared to in a reasonably normal congitive state of mind and in a fairly normal situation? I apologize for the convoluted question, but I have asked you this nine ways to Sunday, and I have yet to follow your answer.

Keep on flossing:)

Aha! You fell right into my cunningly laid trap.

So, what is this “cultural freight” you so glibly speak of? I know you are just repeating words you’ve heard grown-ups use, but tell me what that phrase means to you.

And, by the way, we have far less in common than you suppose, but that will become apparent when you answer my question.

Dissidens,

We have more CD's of Itzhak Perlman and Gil Shaham than anyone else, so I suppose it is natural that he likes one of the two best, which is the case. He likes Shaham because Shaham plays with strength--he has more oomph. Interestingly, he doesn't really care for Menuhin because Menuhin plays "too wishy-washy." Part of this may be his teacher's influence: a Bulgarian from Soviet days.

As I say, he is only beginning to develop tastes in violinists, and as we are able to get him different and better teachers, his tastes should evolve. Also, we need to get more of a wider selection of violinists playing the same pieces.

Diss., have you posted a universally agreed upon definition of culture somewhere here? I could have sworn you had. Perhaps it was one to which just those most well educated in occidentalism would agree?

You keep making these bogus charges, I keep waiting for an example. C'mon, quote me! I'll wait right here.

Hope you did not hold your breath, because I have been amusing myself this morning in my place of worship which we choose to call a church. My apologies for offending you, but I was asking a serious question. If you have not posted a definition, then could you provide either a formal or an informal one? It makes no difference.

EC:

I got your note after a delay; I've responded, but let me know if you don't get it in a day or two.

cap:

No need to apologize: you haven’t offended me.

I asked you if you objected to the notion that “meaning has some bearing on what we offer God as praise”, to which you responded, “that proposition carries an almost infinite amount of cultural freight”.

I asked: “So, what is this ‘cultural freight’?…tell me what that phrase means to you.”

That’s where we stand. Care to answer?

Sure, so long as you'll give me your def. of culture first. I think out of courtesy and xrn charity--and ok intellecutal fairness: co'mon sort of level the field, diss.-- you should do that.

Nonsense!

You made the comment/accusation; tell us what you mean. What is the "almost infinite amount of cultural freight" my proposition carries?

Dissidens: There's plenty to say against the theater (and movies and TV), and from time to time that discussion starts up here. But it never gets anywhere, because--if I may speak frankly-- you don't follow through with the discussion. You have borrowed a definition of drama/theater from Aristotle in order to put a very non-Aristotelian, allegedly Christian ban on the thing, but you decline to answer any of the obvious follow-up questions. E.g., what's wrong with "exciting the passions"? You immediately switch the discussion to "UNHOLY passions", as if all passions were unholy, but leaving us to wonder what could possibly be wrong with a play that excited HOLY passions (fear of God, gratitude, revulsion against sin, whatever). BTW, by an allusion to Eccl. 7:9 you rightly identify "anger" as one of the things the Greeks would have called "passions", but ALL of the passions (including the irascible passions like anger as well as the concupiscible passions) are potentially good OR evil. As Aquinas puts it in the SUMMA, "The passions of the soul, in so far as they are contrary to the order of reason, incline us to sin: but in so far as they are controlled by reason, they pertain to virtue." http://www.newadvent.org/summa/202402.htm

I find very thought-provoking Augustine's self-critical observation that (in your words) "there [is] something questionable in having these passions incited in him over events that were not real and over which he could not exercise the Christian virtues." I can well imagine that this moral distraction is a danger of the theater. However, it is also an apparent danger of the novel, and the epic poem, and the oratorio; but you have been completely silent (notwithstanding questions) as to how drama could be inherently evil but the other art forms that have equivalent effects are not under the same judgment. Maybe there are answers, but I gather we'll never hear them here. That's too bad, because I'd like to think that this anti-theater point, which recurs here so often, is something more than an attempt to use Aristotelian labels to rehabilitate the Fundamentalist prohibition of the picture show.

If anyone does want to enter seriously into the field of Christian literary criticism, then one could well begin with a discussion very relevant to what we've been trying to discuss here--i.e., Sir Philip Sidney's "Defense of Poesie". http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~rbear/defence.html. In this context, "poesie" means not just poetry but imaginative literature broadly--"fiction", we might say. For Sidney, the purpose of fiction is to teach and to delight. I don't remember him talking about indulging or purging passions. Maybe (and I'd be interested to learn if this is valid or not) Sidney would reject Aristotle's analysis of the function of drama and would instead state that purpose in more didactic Christian terms. This happens to coincide with my own rusty intuition. If so, then maybe Aristotle is NOT a good place for a Christian to find the definitions he would use to determine whether drama is licit.

CD: Here in the blog that strains to be "serious" about "culture", one waits and will wait in vain for a definition of "culture"--or, for that matter, a definition of "serious". (And, BTW, the working definition of "serious" may be nothing more than a frowning facial expression of the sort that Daddy used to wear and that we can emulate in the mirror). One repeatedly asks here for definitions of terms, for explanations of radical assertions, or for responses to obvious objections, but one usually gets the sorts of things that you have gotten in this thread ("I think maybe you are very, very smart and are only acting like a dunce in order to amuse"; "Do you ever aspire to be taken seriously?"; "I know you are just repeating words you’ve heard grown-ups use"). And every once in a while, you'll get one of these elliptical quasi-arguments, like "I'll just go ahead and tear Romans 14 out of my Bible then, shall I, cap?" This latter evidently means, "Something in what you have written contradicts something that I think is taught in Romans 14, and everyone should assume by my back-handed and dismissive tone that this is all obvious and that you are ignorant". I think the moral of the story is simply: Beware those who self-identify as "serious".

Diss.....anybody home? Besides wearing a mask, as the Lone Ranger, indeed, there are responsibilities: You can't just gitty-up with a "hi-ho Silver, Away!" Tonto is waiting for you to come and help resist the bad guys:)

Once again you are incorrect , DGus. I suggest you actually read Sidney. Sometimes a person is not well served by skimming a text and then wondering. Do you imagine that the poetry Sidney defends is the same thing as the tragedy that Aristotle defines? Based on what statements? Quote them.

I suspect you cannot because you yourself say, “Maybe (and I'd be interested to learn if this is valid or not) Sidney would reject Aristotle's analysis…”

Exactly so, maybe.

It’s so easy to wonder how Sidney might differ with Aristotle. Wonder is a lovely thing. It’s not exactly an intellectual discipline, though.

We could then wonder about something else; we could wonder if Sidney was right and Aristotle was wrong or if Aristotle was right and Sidney was wrong. That would bring us back to an examination of what they said, what it is each was talking about, and what those things meant.

But I suspect that would just give you more occasions to wonder if they meant something else altogether.

Capdoc:

Ok, let’s review.

I asked if you aspired to be taken seriously. You said: “sic et non”, you said: “I would hate to continue wearing the epithet that J.D. Scotus gave to the world and you hung on me”.

I invited you to tell me at what point you disagreed with me. You said: my “proposition carries an almost infinite amount of cultural freight”. I asked you what that phrase meant to you.

You said you would tell me if I defined culture. So I gather that your words meant as little to you as they do to me, and that I must define culture before you can explain what you meant by your own words: “that proposition carries an almost infinite amount of cultural freight”.

I gave you a second chance to clarify on 08/28/05 @ 19:41 and a third chance on 08/29/05 @ 06:29. Your response is to call me the Lone Ranger.

See, it’s very easy to drop names like Derrida and Scotus and Postman, and other dumb people might be impressed because they have no clue as to how irrelevant all that was. But, as we have seen demonstrated here, it is much more difficult to say something meaningful which you can actually explain, let alone defend.

So I’m going with my first impression that you are not to be taken seriously, and I will take this last exchange as evidence that you have no aspirations in that direction.

Which brings me to the last observation. You and I have very little in common. For men to understand the world they live in they must observe, weigh and judge. To do this they use words. Words that have meaning, capdoc. And then when they want to convey their thoughts to their fellowman, they must again use words. Words that have meaning, capdoc. Statements that can be observed, weighed, and judged for truth and validity. Your words don’t bear that sort of weight. Even with you.

The only alternative is to sit in some sort of internet circle and call one another the Lone Ranger.

We live in different worlds, capdoc.

Dissidens: You point out--aha!--that I didn't give an analysis of Sidney. Only, I didn't pretend to. (I would suggest that readers here take up a conventional Christian literary criticism (and see Aristotle's place in it), but I don't pretend to have determined what the conclusion would be.) Your stating the obvious on this point was evidently easier than addressing my (fifth iteration of? sixth iteration of?) the questions you are perennially unable to answer--

What's specifically wrong with exciting "passions"?

How is theater/drama/tragedy different from other art forms (novels, oratorios, epic poems), so that it is inherently wrong but the others are potentially OK?

If it was doubtful before, it is now clear that this anti-theater position of yours is just one more crotchet in your Big Bundle of Random Crotchets. I've been searching for the substance underlying your position, but I now admit that this search is pointless, and I give up.

Promise?

Do I promise not to try to find the supposed substance underlying your position? Yep. I'm done with that.

About Sidney: he certainly defends good old-fashioned "Tragedie" in a good old-fashioned Aristotelian framework (arguing for the unities, for example), so the suggestion that he might have been defending something OTHER than drama as Aristotle conceived it would be ludicrous. However, despite Sidney's explicit treatment of Aristotle as an authority, I szee nothing in the "Defense" about catharsis or purging. Rather, as I said before, Sidney insists (in a very Christian way) that the purpose of all art (including tragedy) is to delight and to teach. This seems to suggest (as I said) that Sidney did not treat catharsis as the purpose of drama, but one cannot tell from the Defense whether that is because he consciously rejected the notion of exciting and purging passions. My hunch is that he did or would, but to know for certain whether he consciously did, one would have to be able to read the Defense more subtly than I can (e.g., is it possible that "to delight" includes catharsis, for Sidney?), or would have to know more than I do about Sidney's other writing, or about Aristotle's poetics. On the thought that YOU might, I put the question out in #31; but I see now that THAT thought was rather wide of the mark.

What is absolutely certain (if this is your question) is that Sidney had no thought of disputing Aristotle in the Defense. Rather, Sidney saw Aristotle as an authority who could be cited to APPROVE of "poesie" (including "Tragedie"), and he therefore cited him. I don't assume you are trying to line up Aristotle in your corner as against Sidney. Unlike you, they both approved of going to the show--if it was a good show (and Sophocles gets favorable mention by both). Sidney did not resist (allegedly) "Aristotelian" [sic] arguments against the theater but rather resisted what you have (fairly) labeled "Puritan" arguments.

And I now invite all to conclude that the only important arguments to consider against the theater are the "Puritan" arguments.

Diss,

Beauty may only be skin deep, but ugly is always all the way to the bone, and your sophistry is really ugly! You have alluded to my being a dunce (JDS), ignorant, not to be taken seriously, a name dropper and a few other ad hominem arguments too many to name. As for my being seriously taken? With your cavil and demeaning cultural elitism spewing out like a busted Iraqi oil well, how can I not connect you with Postman and the Lone Ranger? As for Derrida, whether you admit it or not, your avoidance and little midget-minded, language games are clear to anyone with half-a-brain. Dissidens, I have never taken myself too seriously; you should not either. Either fish or cut bait. I suggest you know who you are tussling with before you wade in way over your head. I have been nice, but if you want to pee with the big dogs, bring it on big boy!

I'm sorry capdoc, did I miss the post where it is acceptable for you to do the very things you are now accusing dissidens of doing? If you do not like the way we conduct things on this blog, please move on to another.

Wow, there are other big dogs?

Maybe one of them knows what your words mean. You should ask around.

Ink,

No sir, (respectfully) you did not miss the post. Further, you don't have to use mitigation; you can just be honest and say you did not like what I said or the way I said it. I would suggest your reading of this blog and now your gentle rebuke are both selective and arbitrary.

peace!

I think you are all mated or stark mad.

"Mated" in what sense?

"Mated" in the elizabethan sense of confused or confounded.

I must beg your forgiveness, though. I must have forgotten where I was posting. That line was from Shakespeare (Comedy of Errors, Act V). I trust I haven't excited anyone's passions. It was cathartic!