Eliade & Boyarin

[Dave Monroe]

Speaking of Eliade, not to mention of those damned
church fathers and their linear history, had occasion
some time back to post at length from ...

Smith, Jonathan Z.  "A Slip in Time Saves Nine:
   Prestigious Origins Again."  Chronotypes:
   The Construction of Time.  Ed. John Bender and
   David E. Wellbery.  Stanford, CA: Stanford UP,
   1991.  67-76

E.g. ...

"... it is long overdue that we set aside the notion
of 'nature mythology' that is at the heart of the
mischievous distinction bewteen 'mythic' (i.e.
cyclical) cults and 'historical' religions.  Such a
notion is based on the old, inadequate idea of myth as
bad science." (pp. 70-1)

"Both the cyclical and linear models of time employed
... under the influence of the Protestant myth reduce
'difference' to a discourse of the 'same.'  The
cyclical model does so by insisting on a notion of
repetition that is held to be either inherently
meaningless (as in Metzger) or meaningful because it
is wholly congruent with its exemplar, that is to say
because it lacks difference (as in Eliade).  The
linear model does so by reducing history to a
succession of meaningless events, identical to one to
the other unless interrupted by or directed toward a
supramundane telos.  By viewing the sacred as 'other'
and the profane as the 'same,' the bulk of studies in
religion have eliminated the complex middle ground of
thought about 'difference' where myth and ritual
live."
(p. 76)

http://waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0008&msg=48508&sort=date

http://waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0008&msg=48509&sort=date

Which is both explicitly to call into question
Eliade's, and, implicitly, Boyarin's, distinctions
here.  Which, of course, is hardly to call into
question Eliade's influence on Pynchon (and I included
Bernstein's Boyarin quote precisely because I figured
it might be of interest here), although, of course,
one might take issue with either on any given subject.
 But, as always, I apreciate that influence just being
identified in the first place, so ...

A personal favorite work on all this, however, is ...

Wilcox, Donald J.  The Measure of Times Past:
   Pre-Newtonian Chronologies and the Rhetoric of
   Relative Time.  Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1989.

Which maybe I'll get to deploy as well in, er, good
time ...

--- Terrance <lycidas2 at earthlink.net> wrote:
>
> Pynchon read Eliade's books and they seem to have
> influenced him quite a lot.  But your right, he's
> hardly the final authority in interpreting religion
> of anything else. 
> 
> Boyarin could be right. I don't know, just adding an
> opposing view from a source we know Pynchon made use
> of is all.


__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! GeoCities - quick and easy web site hosting, just $8.95/month.
http://geocities.yahoo.com/ps/info1