Blicero

[Terrance F. Flaherty]

rj wrote:
> 
> TF
> > No more satanic and sadistic than the christian myth?
> 
> Being nailed to a stake and liking it? An omnipotent and wrathful god?
> Sacrifice of a/the Son, His Word made flesh? Transcendence, apotheosis,
> and vicarious salvation for the faithful?

These are great questions by the way, but I think they need
to be rephrased so we can use them. For example, will rj
reconsider the word "like"? 


> 
> Same books, different readings.
> 
> best

OK, same books different reading. Lets start from this and
see if we can have a serious discussion and at the same time
not fly too far away from the common discussion--grgr. I am
convinced that the attempt to establish one "true" reading
of GR or we might say one "true" philosophy by refuting all
others is a futile exercise. This is partly due to the fact
that each person's refutation of all other
readings/philosophies depends on interpreting others in the
terms of their own reading/philosophy, and this exposes one
to the danger of the fallacy known to philosophers as
IGNORATIO ELENCHI, or ignorance of what refutation is. O
Rocks Terrance, tell us in plain words. OK, refutation of
what has not been asserted. Lots of times I post something
to this list and as others begin to reply my assertions are
lost. I cannot defend what I have not asserted. Often, the
discussion evolves and attempts to repair, correct, clarify,
and so on, only complicate matters. These disagreements,
based on miscommunication, then often become  part of the
general discussion and we get fixed in what I think is
frustrating to many here, in what we might call polarities
of confused disagreement. No one, I think, is to blame for
this and I think this is a solvable problem. However, there
are other problems. Even if we all agreed that any attempt
to refute all other readings/philosophies different from
one's own is futile, we still have communications problems.
These communications problems often involve communication
across different theoretical frameworks. For example, when
one person applies a particular approach to GR. We also have
the problem of how achievements made possible by one
framework can be incorporated into another. For example, I
like to apply Brian McHale's work to a Menippean reading of
GR. Others on the list may apply the achievements of McHale
or Weisenburger or Freud or Frye or Barth, or Bahktin or
Bloom and so on,. either to their own reading or to another
theoretical framework. This is part of the reason why
"lit-crtit" discussions are often fruitless here. What often
happens is that we deal with the conclusions of certain
approaches, for example, Frye's Anatomy, comparing them with
other conclusions without accounting for the different
principles on which these approaches depend. 

That being said, I think this discussion of christianity and
Blicero can be fruitful if we accept the fact that we have
the same books, but different readings, but we need to take
the time to understand the principles on which our
conclusions or different readings depend. Next week I will
post a bunch of stuff on Blicero and Rilke. In those posts I
will address older issues unresolved but related to the
"new"  discussion of christianity and Blicero. For now, I
think it might be helpful if we could discuss what
theoretical frameworks different list members are applying
to the christian myth and the "Blicero myth."

For example, if one person is reading the story of Jesus
from a Freudian framework, while another person is reading
the story of Jesus from an Augustinian framework, they may
in fact agree on a whole lot and they may disagree on a
whole lot, but if the frameworks are not identified and the
principles made clear, the discussion is both unenlightened
and unenlightening.