Grace again. Misc.

Sat Aug 5 07:32:46 CDT 2017

Me neither.

But I do care about his vision of human spirituality, religious or
non-religious, in history and in our lives.

On Sat, Aug 5, 2017 at 7:48 AM, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com> wrote:

> I  *really* don't care about what religion Pynchon was or is.  I prefer to
> read his works without him intruding.  His aversion to interviews indicates
> he feels the same way.
>
> David Morris
>
> On Sat, Aug 5, 2017 at 3:47 AM Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Slothrop is, at least, an anti-Puritan.
>>
>> Sent from my iPad
>>
>> > On Aug 4, 2017, at 11:12 PM, Joseph Tracy <brook7 at sover.net> wrote:
>> >
>> >          My intention was to bring some background to the word and its
>> religious roots and changing use .  It is my sense that P has deep historic
>> knowledge of such core words and concepts and this is one of the few areas
>> where I have some knowledge and research to draw on  myself because of my
>> own history.  As far as Pynchon’s beliefs, I wonder if we know that much.
>> It is my memory that he expressed interested in Catholicism as a university
>> student, but I have never heard anything to indicate  that this
>> interest/faith continued through his life or writing career. Do you have
>> something that supports the idea that he remained a Catholic?   He shapes
>> some pretty intense satiric fables pointed at Catholicism and Puritanism in
>> V and GR.  The chums of chance have Christian overtones.
>> >> On Aug 4, 2017, at 8:05 PM, Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:
>> >>
>> >> All interesting, of course.
>> >>
>> >> But Pynchon is Catholic, not Protestant, not Calvinist.
>> >>
>> >> "Puritan" perhaps, as America is/was in his formative years and
>> beyond, and before-- as many have written about.  Roth, The Last Puritan or
>> THE PURITAN MIND, Larzer Ziff for examples, Ziff who tries to subtilize all
>> the paradoxes and their hidden places in America and our minds.
>> >>
>> >> In Weber, Catholic Spain was a Spirit of Capitalism failure, just misc.
>> >>
>> >> Sent from my iPad
>> >>
>> >>> On Aug 4, 2017, at 3:36 PM, Joseph Tracy <brook7 at sover.net> wrote:
>> >>>
>> >>> The earliest appearance in the scriptures of the word has the usage
>> of favor: Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. This use appears
>> several times in Genesis and though some say it means mercy it seems to
>> more specifically mean favor.( hence disgraced means shamed/lost from
>> favor) So there is a Hebrew word( chen)meaning favor that is used
>> frequently in the Torah and is taken up in the new testament
>> >>> by both the gospel writer of the book of John ( the law came by
>> Moses, but grace and truth through Jesus)  and by Paul, who dominates
>> theological interpretation of the life of Jesus( whom he never met, and
>> appeared to know little of his  teachings as presented in the Gospels) .
>> Paul was multi lingual as a preacher to Greeks, Syrians, Romans and was
>> steeped in Hebrew, the scriptures,Phariseeism and probably Aramaic. It
>> seems likely that he was taking the core concept and word from Genesis and
>> giving it a particularly Christian mystical spin. Paul is the source of the
>> concept of predetermination of the destiny of the individual to be either
>> saved or lost.  That concept was challenged at the time by James, the
>> brother of Jesus and leader of the early church in Jerusalem who did not
>> care for Paul’s teachings, but again Paul dominates the churches
>> interpretation  especially among the Protestants. For many protestants
>> grace became the dividing line between salvation and damnation with this
>> idea being most clearly enunciated by Calvin. The Puritans were Calvinists
>> and P’s personal lineage though with an heretical streak..
>> >>>
>> >>> I agree with David Morris that despite this weighty background,
>> Pynchon plays with the linguistic nuances that the word( grace of a dancer,
>> graceful exit, graciuos host)  has acquired including letting  the Puritan
>> heritage play out its role among the characters he creates. One must be
>> careful to not overly connect the language of a pyncho character with his
>> own beliefs or language.
>> >>>
>> >>> Luther and Calvin derive their concept of grace, Luther as a function
>> of loving parental abundance and the" finished work of Christ “ and Calvin
>> more mechanistically as a kind of prearranged divine mathematics, from Paul.
>> >>>
>> >>> I spent a lot of years with the Bible and came away with some
>> knowledge but little love for its sway in human affairs or my own life. The
>> Pauine concept of grace and its theological explication seems diseased to
>> me, a way of giving up agency and justifying powerful bullies. I personally
>> use the word only when it is clear I am talking about elegant flow in art
>> or physical movement. That human experience of the transcendent includes
>> mercy and the renewal that mercy brings seems natural and does not  require
>> a lot of theological pyrotechnics.  We don’t need to spend our lives going
>> back and forth on the same bus going one way then the other. Just get off
>> the bus and live.
>> >>>
>> >>> I see Pynchon as a humane satirist, a chronicler of alternative
>> history from an outsider perspective, and wildly liberated spinner of 3
>> dimensional stories that include mythos, conspracy theory,  colorful but
>> credible fiction, and historic events in fairly equal measure.
>> >>>
>> >>>
>> >>>> On 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
>> >>>> Sent: ‎7/‎29/‎2017 20:06
>> >>>> To: pynchon -l
>> >>>> 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.
>> >>>
>> >>> -
>> >>> Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l
>> >> -
>> >> Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list
>> >
>> > -
>> > Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l
>> -
>> Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?listpynchon-l
>>
>
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