Grace again. Misc.

[Mark Kohut]

Yes, he riffs "imprecisely" all over the pages: we can start with the
concept of V in that novel if we want to use an early great example.

...Empson's meaning of ambiguity is massive associative connections,
resonances linked like a Kekulean knot,
like a daisy chain orgy, like more of this verbiage, 'precise' only in the
aggregate --to state oxymoronically. One might analogize
to Wittgenstein's concept of "family resemblance".

Besides theological meanings of Grace, P's sense of history--and in the
case of Luther and 'em--say, partly formed
by Weber in his classic book, explores the ideational 'paradoxes' as Morris
notes them, and effects on and by religious belief and resulting human
action
in Western history.

I suggest Prof Krafft's clear definition of Grace is one major meaning for
Pynchon and thereby a way to offer transcendence
in the fiction from the historical baggage. Lew experiences it and we
remember all that stuff about Lew feeling a huge
sense of inadequacy,  of guilt over nothing he knew of, sin if you will
(maybe a sense of 'original sin"?).


Anyway, since this is the next day of recommending good novels, I will
recommend a very relevant one for this thread---but not much to Pynchon
overall.  A recent
novel called HIS BLOODY PROJECT. The relevance is in the buildup to the
physical violence as the smarter-than-rest-of-family young protagonist
 and his poor Calvinist-raised family,--dad, sister now--all think aloud
and he on the page
and rationalize God's will as manifested to them, sinners, and their
actions. With notions of fatalism
and self-justification that twist the mind--theirs---and ours poignantly,
heartbreakingly, bafflingly, paradoxically.
The way they each feel they were good folk, then something happens, not
always by their own intentional actions and
now their felt damnation, sins, --injustice as their felt justice is
...moving, insightful.

Influenced by a Scottish classic of such human paradoxes, the great *The
Confessions of a Self-Justified Sinner.* Presages Raskolnikov
in CRIME & PUNISHMENT, some POE demons, The Screwtape Letters--one of DFW's
faves--and like that. I'm rereading it.

Another surefooted strength of HIS BLOODY PROJECT is the writer's
presentation of the hopelessness of the poor working life of the family...
steadily mistreated by the only embodiment of authority over their
impoverished sharecropper--crofting-- kind of life. The visceral feel of
very hard almost useless work. Growing some stuff from unaccommodating soil
and climate. (When they are refused the seaweed they always got and
everyone else gets) I found this section hard to
read steadily, the pain and effective imprisonment so hopelessly real.
Fanon's wretched, slaves and historians of slavery, others who wrote
nonfiction
about such inhuman oppression and the question of

*a violent response*, recounted, in this superb novel by an unreliable
narrator.  ...

O yeah, and sexual repression (Calvinism again) and (maybe) psychic
blindness because of.

The End.








On Tue, Aug 1, 2017 at 8:49 AM, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com> wrote:

> I think that Pynchon riffs on words and concepts.  He isn't precise
> because he is always playing.
>
> On Tue, Aug 1, 2017 at 1:09 AM, Kai Frederik Lorentzen <
> lorentzen at hotmail.de> wrote:
>
>>
>> Yes, but the question is whether Pynchon's use of the word is, perhaps,
>> closer to Luther's teaching on Grace than it is to the other ones that were
>> mentioned in this thread.
>>
>> Is there a theologian on board?
>>
>>
>>
>> Am 31.07.2017 um 12:56 schrieb David Morris:
>>
>> Luther's revolution was born of his concept of Grace.  Say "grace," hear
>> Luther.
>>
>> David Morris
>>
>> On Mon, Jul 31, 2017 at 2:32 AM Kai Frederik Lorentzen <
>> lorentzen at hotmail.de> wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> Could it be that Pynchon's understanding of Grace is Lutheran?
>>>
>>> > ... Martin Luther’s theology can be fundamentally construed as the
>>> development of his thought regarding the nature of grace, the nature of
>>> God’s favor and blessing bestowed upon undeserving human beings. The many
>>> dimensions of Luther’s biblical teaching and theological reflection have,
>>> in the background a desire to understand God’s grace most fully revealed in
>>> Jesus Christ. As such, Luther’s concepts of the righteousness of God,
>>> justification by faith, the bound will, the distinction of law and gospel,
>>> the new obedience, the “happy exchange,” and many related concepts are, at
>>> heart, attempts to describe what it is to have a God of grace.
>>> Most interpreters have rightly understood that in Luther’s view, to have
>>> a gracious God means to have a God who does not require human beings to
>>> fulfill a set of prerequisites in order to receive God’s gift in Christ or
>>> to reciprocate God’s giving in order to continue receiving Christ and his
>>> benefits. For Luther, to have a God of grace means to believe and trust
>>> that through Jesus Christ, God has already met all prerequisites and
>>> fulfilled all reciprocations. On this point, Luther found himself breaking
>>> new ground (or recovering lost ground) in the understanding of divine
>>> grace. Luther “broke” with those theological forebears who taught that
>>> divine grace was, in one way or another, partly dependent on human willing
>>> and doing. For Luther, God graciously wills and works “all in all.”
>>> Nevertheless, when Luther’s many descriptions of what it is to “have a
>>> gracious God” are analyzed, a more nuanced understanding of the
>>> relationship between the One giving the gift and the ones receiving it
>>> begins to reveal itself. For Luther, faith—that gracious means through
>>> which God graciously bestows the righteousness of Christ—creates a dynamic
>>> rather than static experience of possessing and being possessed of a God of
>>> grace ... <
>>>
>>> http://religion.oxfordre.com/view/10.1093/acrefore/978019934
>>> 0378.001.0001/acrefore-9780199340378-e-335
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Am 30.07.2017 um 13:58 schrieb Mark Kohut:
>>>
>>> In Calvinism and other religious traditions, grace gets earned--or
>>> shown-- by human free will choices.
>>>
>>> if grace is not earned or shown-- by free will human choices, then grace
>>> as Pynchon uses it, is unearned, totally unexpected (by Lew and in the
>>> text) and is somehow a function of the cosmos. Chance or otherwise. No?
>>>
>>> On Sun, Jul 30, 2017 at 7:41 AM, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> If Free Will replaces Grace, then it is it's equal, not its opposite.
>>>>
>>>> David Morris
>>>>
>>>> On Sun, Jul 30, 2017 at 5:27 AM Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com>
>>>> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Now THAT'S an answer I did not expect---nor really know (although I
>>>>> know some of that shit from that tradition).
>>>>> Another theologian rendered into the dustbin of churchyards because
>>>>> of
>>>>> Augustine's dominance.
>>>>>
>>>>> A heretic, P's tradition. One might say a theological preterite,
>>>>> analogously speaking? As Bailey alludes, and Morris fills in:
>>>>> a kind of theological shlemiel, maybe? Profane Pelagius.
>>>>>
>>>>> I'm going to suggest that as Pynchon transformed the concept of Grace
>>>>> within the religious tradition, for him
>>>>> in the fiction, it became like "the free will" of the cosmos---which
>>>>> might all be predetermined, of course, per your observation---
>>>>> when Lew experienced it unexpectedly.....when Against the Day ends....
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> On Sat, Jul 29, 2017 at 5:16 PM, Paul Mackin <mackin.paul at gmail.com>
>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> In the way back, Pelagius (St Agustine's antagonist) thought we
>>>>>> didn't need Grace--that our free will was sufficient to overcome sin. So,
>>>>>> the opposite of Grace is Free Will.  Which science now says doesn't exist.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> On Sat, Jul 29, 2017 at 4:03 PM, Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com>
>>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> From the wayback (but eternal?) religious uses, the opposite might
>>>>>>> be damnation.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> What might it be in Pynchon's transformation of the meaning of the
>>>>>>> word?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> On Sat, Jul 29, 2017 at 3:28 PM, Jochen Stremmel <
>>>>>>> jstremmel at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> You are the native speaker, Mark, but I would say it's bullshit if
>>>>>>>> you don't provide context. What kind of grace? You have disgrace, you have
>>>>>>>> clumsiness, I'm sure you have more opposites of grace.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> 2017-07-29 21:11 GMT+02:00 Erik T. Burns <eburns at gmail.com>:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> I suggest "trump"
>>>>>>>>> ------------------------------
>>>>>>>>> From: Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com>
>>>>>>>>> Sent: ‎7/‎29/‎2017 20:06
>>>>>>>>> To: pynchon -l <pynchon-l at waste.org>
>>>>>>>>> Subject: Grace again. Misc.
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> Gracelessness is an absence of grace, but the English language
>>>>>>>>> lacks a word for the opposite of grace.--Cass Sunstein, very
>>>>>>>>> recent essay.
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>
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