Grace?

[Thomas Eckhardt]

Starting with Laura Kelber's quote from AtD and John M. 
Krafft's reply, here are a few semi-coherent and 
inconclusive thoughts on grace etc. which also pertain to 
what Mark Kohut and others wrote with regard to the 
theological tradition.

Laura Kelber quoted from AtD:

"(...) a condition he had no memory of having sought,
which he later came to think of as grace."

"He understood that things were exactly what they were. It
seemed more than he could bear."

Grace here is related to the ability of seeing or 
understanding things as they are. It is also a state of 
mind that Lew has "no memory of having sought" which, just 
like the use of the term "grace", links it to the ending 
of the novel where "a good unsought and uncompensated" is 
referred to just before the Chums begin their ascent 
"toward grace".

John M. Krafft:

"If observing/perceiving/understanding things to be 
exactly as they are
is grace in AD, compare this passage from the end of GR. 
Surely
Gottfried isn't flying toward grace, is he?

'This ascent will be betrayed to Gravity. But the Rocket 
engine, the
deep cry of combustion that jars the soul, promises 
escape. The
victim, in bondage to falling, rises on a promise, a 
prophecy, of
Escape....
Moving now toward the kind of light where at last the 
apple is
apple-colored. The knife cuts through the apple like a 
knife cutting
an apple. Everything is where it is, no clearer than 
usual, but
certainly more present.'"

With Lew we are talking about the same state of mind that 
Gottfried hopes to achieve before Brennschluss sets in and 
the promise of escape (which includes a not-total escape 
from imperfect human perception) is betrayed. I note that 
whereas grace simply falls upon Lew, Gottfried may be seen 
as actively seeking that peculiar state where everything 
can be perceived as just what it is (which is not called 
"grace" in GR, if I am not mistaken). This is perhaps 
where Puritanism and Calvinism come in.

In theological/philosophical terms, seeing things as they 
are means understanding things in their quiddity or 
"whatness", perceiving their essence and not their outward 
appearance. We know, from his essay on Sloth, that Pynchon 
is familiar with Thomas Aquinas' Summa Theologica (and 
Aquinas turns up in his writings as early as "Mortality 
and Mercy in Vienna").

Cf.:

"But the angelic and the Divine intellect, like all 
incorruptible things, have their perfection at once from 
the beginning. Hence the angelic and the Divine intellect 
have the entire knowledge of a thing at once and 
perfectly; and hence also in knowing the quiddity of a 
thing they know at once whatever we can know by 
composition, division, and reasoning. Therefore the human 
intellect knows by composition, division and reasoning. 
But the Divine intellect and the angelic intellect know, 
indeed, composition, division, and reasoning, not by the 
process itself, but by understanding the simple essence."

Summa Theologica, I, Question 85, Article 5

Against this background, seeing things in their quiddity 
would mean to see things like God or angels do, having 
"the entire knowledge of a thing at once and perfectly". 
Is this not the state of mind (or grace) that befalls Lew 
and that Gottfried aspires to?

We don't know what "flying toward grace" means for the 
Chums, but we know that they have to shield their eyes 
against the revelation (against the day/light?) that is to 
come:

"They will put on smoked goggles for the glory of what is 
coming to part the sky. They fly toward grace." (1085)

As usual, exactly what kind of revelation is to be 
expected remains unsaid -- the blinding Glory of God, 
Rilke's terrifying angels, "the light beyond metaphor" 
(Derek Walcott)...

I also hear echoes of Fausto Majistral's confessions, in 
particular "life's single lesson:  that there is more 
accident to it than a man
can ever admit to in a lifetime and stay sane" and the 
task of the poet to invent "pious metaphor" to cloak the 
isolated and accidental nature of things.

I suspect that Aquinas may also be helpful in 
understanding the "unsought good" becoming "more 
accessible" to us at the end of AtD. There seem to be some 
important theological concepts at play here.
-
Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l