Christianity and Pynchon

[Paul Mackin]

Penny is so right here IMHO.   Pynchon's sympathy for the downtrodden, and
his using "preterite" to mean those passed over on earth rather than those
rejected by heaven, do a pretty adequate job in covering  the Christian
bases.  The meaning reversal  is in no way arbitrary.  Certain strains of
Protestantism saw lack of worldly success as a sign of coming Salvation
and worldly failure as the opposite.  Pynchon is as much as saying, No,
this has to be  backwards. Whether or not he is any kind of Believer.

N.B.  My use of the word "Christian does not refer to the worldly
institution but to the deal including love one another.

P.


Jeff & Penny Harper wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> Though I can tell I'm fighting well out of my class intellectually, I'm
> fascinated by this discussion and would like to introduce the
> following points:
>
>  - The whole idea of Preterite and Elect, of course, fits neatly
>     into the Christian ethos -- Jesus' entourage (even in the stripped-
>     down Jesus Seminar version) consisted almost entirely of the
>     Preterite of the day, and his enemies were the Elect.
>
>  -  Had I but world enough and time I would do a text search on
>     "kindness" -- this quality illuminates some of the most moving
>      passages of Pynchon's writing, and is of the essence of Jesus'
>      single commandment "Love one another."
>
> Penny