I am full poetry

I am full poetry
I am excess busting combustation
tainted love righteous lust and still going
seven of everything true and real
every ironic reclaimed feigned Americanism
every neostic neologism coinage
combs of honey-eyed
eagle eyes memories and memoires
notepadded notorities refluxing
fluctuating presently amamnesis in continuity
of the beautiful…

I am again full poetry
comforts miserable memorable melancholia
sucking inhaled swallowed sorrows at no
extra cost (to health body mind soul
spirit)! but pure joyful joyed elastic
sable ecstasy unstable regarding
consistency stable regarding
handling and the purity opposites reconciled
in history in some faux (logic!) line or
“reconciled” in pure maintenance of their own
opposition

I am full poetry
I never myself acted though am I
acted upon and thereby disembodied
disemsouled in the disinterested open
“freedom” of the plummeting it
disrupts ruptures the oesophageal Riccarton
as of yet not disembowelled Sumner
the Burwood the Halswell Quarry
dictating adulthood a dull thood

I am finally again will ever be full poetry
posing posies bless
you hallowed self and other other and self
shelved in the open All
surprised by some beautiful true Beyond
layer on layer on layer on blessed layer
in some eternal vineyard some anything of everything
propelled and completely present past
and completely to come
upon the restoration of all things!
upon the source – the literal Lamb!
onwards! and withwards – everything “good”!

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If I were an Aristotelian, girl,

If I were an Aristotelian, girl,
you would be my telos.
And if I were a Neo-Platonist,
you would be the One.

If I were a rationalist,
you would be my ergo and I
would be your subject.
If I were an idealist, well,
you’re already phenomenal.

If I were a Marxist,
you would be my utopia.
Life’s dialectic; let’s
work it out.

If I were an existentialist, girl,
you would be my nausea, my sickness
unto death. My negation would be willed
by you and I would despair you, affirm you, and die
authentically.

And if I were a feminist, well,
clearly that’s necessary.

Yet I am but a poor Gentile idolater and we
are dust.

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Ecclesiastes and waitin’ around to die

TRIGGER WARNING: Suicide themes

Ecclesiastes is my second favourite book of the Old Testament, after Job. I read it something like this: (a) Existence is cyclical and meaningless; (b and throughout) but we can kind of ignore it if we live in moderation and appreciate the simple things; (c) we can handle cyclicity and meaninglessness to an extent but a lot of life exceeds this cyclicity and positively sucks; (d) after all this, there is a lot we do not know so let’s do our best to live in accordance with the one who gave it to us.

You can find nice in Ecclesiastes, especially if you read it in one sitting, as I did before writing this. But there’s also a lot of unnice. So it would be a bit irresponsible to airbrush over these unnicities for the the sake of harmonising with brighter parts of the biblical picture. The doubts Ecclesiastes so willingly endorses are not to be overcome but allowed, like Jesus, to join and suffer with us.

Existence is cyclical and meaningless

Ecclesiastes scores low on eschatology. If there is a sense of judgement (12:14), this is not the Last Judgement where God sets the world to right,¹ but an immanent judgement where God deals justice in the here and now, though this is also problematised throughout (e.g. 7:15; 8:14; 9:1-2, 11)! Contrariwise, time is not heading to a roaring end but it calmly repeats itself:

A generation goes, and a generation comes,
but the earth remains forever.
The sun rises and the sun goes down,
and hurries to the place where it rises.
The wind blows to the south,
and goes around to the north;
round and round goes the wind,
and on its circuits the wind returns.
All streams run to the sea,
but the sea is not full;
to the place where the streams flow,
there they continue to flow…

What has been is what will be,
and what has been done is what will be done;
there is nothing new under the sun.

(1:4-7, 9).

This theme dominates the first three and a half chapters. As in nature there is nothing new, so also human pursuits suffer from a lack of newness. Thus the Teacher, whom the writer implies is King Solomon (1:1), is presented as one who enjoys all the pleasures and achievements of the world yet is still dissatisfied (2:1-11). The famous poem in 3:1-8, “For everything there is a season…,” suggests that all worldly possibilities, for good or for bad (cf. 7:14), have their season and contribute to the totality which is existence. A later reflection situates the same principle of cyclicity in the individual: In the same way someone enters the world naked (i.e. with nothing), so they leave it (5:15).

Comprehending and transcending the totality

Not everyone experiences existence as meaningless, and I doubt that anyone who does experience it as meaningless would do so consistently. I understand the Teacher’s experience of meaninglessness to be related to cyclicity and totality as mentioned above. Firstly, existence is meaningless because instead of heading towards a telos, a goal, it reproduces itself in a cycle. Secondly, this reproduction is a result of its having limited possibilities. The Teacher experiences existence as a bounded totality outside of which there is nothing. Inside the totality there only has been, is, and will be what is already there. There is nothing new. Those who experience existence as meaningful are those who remain within in it. Conversely, through reflection the Teacher transcends the totality, no longer viewing it as something of which he is a part but stepping out of it and viewing it from the outside. And outside of being their is nothingness. In fact, through reflection he is straddled between the something of which he remains a part and the nothing beyond the totality which he comprehends. This reflection is an inevitable consequence of wisdom:

I said to myself, “I have acquired great wisdom, surpassing all who were over Jerusalem before me; and my mind has had great experience of wisdom and knowledge.” And I applied my mind to know wisdom and to know madness and folly. I perceived that this also is but a chasing after wind.

For in much wisdom is much vexation,
and those who increase knowledge increase sorrow.

(1:16-18).

This I understand to be the logic behind the continual appeals to everyday distraction:  “There is nothing better for mortals than to eat and drink, and find enjoyment in their toil. This also, I saw, is from the hand of God; for apart from him who can eat or who can have enjoyment?” (2:24-25; and many similar conclusions throughout!). Outside existence is nothingness; let us then be distracted with an excess of somethingness! This is also the logic of the song posted above, Waitin’ Around to Die. We know death and nothingness are at the door, but for fear of boredom or despair let us grasp at and be distracted by this present moment.

The beyond within the totality

Whereas both the Teacher and the singer see the nothingness and run from it to distraction because at least something is preferable to nothing, others see the nothing and prefer it to their unbearable something. This is definitely the case with Job. Rather than being threatened by the same, the cyclicity, the totality, he is threatened by the different, the new, the particular. The new of perverse suffering ruptures his otherwise contented life. He desires that he was never born. He seeks to retroactively annul the day of his birth because its somethingness disrupts the peace of nothingness:

Let the day perish in which I was born,
and the night that said,
‘A man-child is conceived.’
Let that day be darkness!
May God above not seek it,
or light shine on it.
Let gloom and deep darkness claim it.
Let clouds settle upon it;
let the blackness of the day terrify it.
That night—let thick darkness seize it!
let it not rejoice among the days of the year;
let it not come into the number of the months.
Yes, let that night be barren;
let no joyful cry be heard in it.
Let those curse it who curse the Sea,
those who are skilled to rouse up Leviathan.
Let the stars of its dawn be dark;
let it hope for light, but have none;
may it not see the eyelids of the morning—
because it did not shut the doors of my mother’s womb,
and hide trouble from my eyes.

(Job 3:3-10, though see whole chapter).²

On seeing the oppressed living, the Teacher echoes Job’s desires (4:1-3). Yet elsewhere he claims that life is to be preferred to death (6:3-5; 9:4-6). Those who desire to remain living either have not experienced great suffering or prefer the something over the nothing, perhaps just a result of blissful ignorance: “They will scarcely brood over the days of their lives, because God keeps them occupied with the joys of their hearts” (5:20).

The new of suffering arises within the totality yet the individual experiences it outside of the totality. This is because the suffering is so excessive that the individual cannot arrive at it by way of all the possibilities within the totality. Great suffering is something new, that which subverts the totality from the inside and in so doing transcends it. Though I have little to say about it, love may also arise within existence as a newness, but with the opposite effect. Instead of directing the individual to nothingness, their whole existence is overwhelmed with colour, so much so that all mundanities, hitherto the exhausted possibilities of the totality, also take on a new existence, open toward the future for whatever good will come. The individual can now faithfully say that something is better than nothing.³

The beyond within and beyond the totality

Though the transcendent may arise within the totality, there is yet an even greater transcendence both within and beyond the totality. The Teacher notes God’s relation to the totality: “I know that whatever God does endures forever; nothing can be added to it, nor anything taken from it; God has done this, so that all should stand in awe before him” (3:15). Existence is complete and subject to God. Beyond it there is not nothingness but the God who birthed it, leading to worship. He later revisits the same distinction of creation and Creator: “Never be rash with your mouth, nor let your heart be quick to utter a word before God, for God is in heaven, and you upon earth; therefore let your words be few” (5:2). If we attempt to include God in our system, our comprehension of the totality, he disappears. It is not God we include. God is not subject to anything outside of God. Finally, with reference to God, the whole idea of a totality breaks down because there is no totality which can include God; rather, God includes the totality. Beyond the totality is not something comprehensible but mystery:

When I applied my mind to know wisdom, and to see the business that is done on earth, how one’s eyes see sleep neither day nor night, then I saw all the work of God, that no one can find out what is happening under the sun. However much they may toil in seeking, they will not find it out; even though those who are wise claim to know, they cannot find it out.

(8:16-17).

Perhaps, too, the Teacher would have understood life differently if he studied eschatology. Though now it appears that existence reproduces itself, through the coming of Jesus and the Spirit the infinite has entered into the finite. No longer is the finite many-things possible but only the immeasurable all-things. And these are good things. “[T]he blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them” (Matt 11:5). Ahead of the resurrection of all people, Jesus has been raised and the Kingdom is here. God is at work through the Spirit to reconcile the world to him. The cyclicity of history has been punctured thus with something itself could not produce and now it heads to its fulfillment when all things will be made new.

These are no doubt beautiful events which I am routinely reinspired by. To what extent does the beyond and mystery of God add meaning where there is none? If we are exposed to this excess of meaning can we still experience meaninglessness? Will there be occasion for experiencing meaninglessness in the new heavens and new earth? So the Teacher persists in his questions. This book is in our canon. Take and read!

* * *

¹This is evident in the lack of eschatological reflection on death (e.g. 3:19-21; 9:1-2). However, if the voice in 12:14 is different from the Teacher introduced in 1:1 (see 12:8-9) then it may refer to the Last Judgement. Regardless, a sense of eschatological judgement would still be missing from the words of the Teacher (1:1-12:8).

²Obviously because Job was a righteous man his prayers were answered. He was born February 30.

³This is not to say that love is an easily attainable answer to life’s lack of meaning. Nor would love not be difficult when the individuals arrived at it. Rather, it is capable of providing bursts of meaning to the otherwise mundane.

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Guilty as guilty as charged

Guilt may be good or bad or both or neither. I’m often of the opinion that it’s good, at least my own personal guilt. Maybe its a punitive fascination. I know I’ve done something bad so feeling bad about that something serves as punishment. But this is not ideal. The something disappears into the consequent feeling of guilt. Alternatively, guilt may be more practical. The bad feeling that follows some unsavoury action moves the offender to focus on their offence and attend to any damage they have done.

But I’m here especially interested in the feeling divorced from any restorative action. Part of the problem is to call feeling guilty about something and not doing anything about it a problem. If I’m guilty and become fearful of attempting amends then I develop a second order guilt: Guilt for feeling guilty. The offender indulges in the feeling of guilt to punish their self for their actions, but, then, realising the selfish orientation of their guilt, plunges into more guilt and inaction.

Of course, action which has been lost in the process of guilt can be recovered at the point of realising this, but it requires a decisive break with the current cycle of accumulative guilt. The problem with this is that an offender familiar with their selfishness cannot source their subsequent action from the hurt of the offended; it inevitably rises out of a response to inner self-oriented guilt.

Well! I haven’t written anything so dark and existential for a while. Enjoy! Perspective matters. I’m probably completely wrong so let me know!

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A non-existential reading of Philippians 2:13

Philippians has for a long time been one of my favourite books in the Bible. I’m not sure if I can justify that. Maybe it’s just because of the overall encouraging message set against the backdrop of persecution and eschatological anticipation. I jumped at the chance then to do my assignment on it for biblical interpretation — that and the fact that it was the shortest out of the books we had to choose from. Reading Philippians this morning was a good time to reflect on one of the book’s most influential verses for my own faith and what that looks like in terms of the whole:

Therefore, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed me, not only in my presence, but much more now in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

(2:12-13)¹

Coming to this as a serious new Christian in a Pentecostal context there was only one way to interpret the passage: After Paul has given the model for faith and overseen young Christians as they come to terms with how to live that faith, they must then be weaned off their dependence on him and depend solely on God’s Spirit at work within them, existentially working out the faithful life in their individual relationship with God. This interpretation was no doubt consolidated by my enthusiasm for Kierkegaard and his use of “fear and trembling” for the title of his most famous work, one dealing with how the individual through relationship to God is an exception to the ethical context they find themselves in.

But there are some problems with this approach, especially considering the weight of importance Paul puts on the Christian community in writing to the Philippians. In reading the letter as a whole this sense of the individual working out their salvation in distinction to those who forsake the inner call of the Spirit is not as forthcoming as this reading of 2:12-13 would suggest. Au contraire, the sense is of the faith community at Philippi as a whole working in relationship with God.

2:12-13, starting with the “Therefore”, actually conclude the previous section where Paul sets out life in community demonstrated in the example of Jesus’ incarnation:

If then there is any encouragement in Christ, any consolation from love, any sharing in the Spirit, any compassion and sympathy, make my joy complete: be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others. Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus.

(2:1-5)

As in v.13, God working within is the point from where the community works out their salvation, so at the beginning of this passage “encouragement in Christ” and “sharing in the Spirit” are the points from where the community learns to love each other in godly love. When Paul lays out the model of Jesus’ incarnation (vv.5-11) he only demonstrates in greater detail the point with which he has already begun. Therefore, a few verses later when Paul compares Timothy with selfish people, “All of them are seeking their own interests, not those of Jesus Christ” (v.21), the interests of Jesus here referred to are actually those concering the welfare of the community at Philippi: “I have no one like him who will be genuinely concerned for your welfare” (v.20). The point is that a primary concern of the Spirit working among the Philippians is not to justify them each as individuals in their relationships with God but to live and love together as community.²

Ok, so Paul in Philippians definitely shows the importance of right living in community but isn’t the community just a collection of individuals whose communal love stems from each of their individual relationships with God? The love does not exist in the community itself but in the collective of individuals who existentially come to terms with the importance of expressing that love. But I don’t see much of a problem in saying that the community itself is something more than a collection of individuals. There is something that cannot be accounted for in community by simply tallying the individual spiritual values of all contained within it. What if the category of the individual for Paul is something completely different to the category we employ today?

Only, live your life in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ, so that, whether I come and see you or am absent and hear about you, I will know that you are standing firm in one spirit, striving side by side with one mind for the faith of the gospel.

(1:27)³

Here it is interesting that Paul uses the same context to make his point: Whether he is present or absent should not affect the faithful state of the Philippian community. But in comparison with 2:12-13 there is no possibility of misreading it as the individual’s relationship to God when external support is withdrawn. In this case the external support (Paul) may be with the Philippians or not but the Spirit will lead them as a community into unity with “one mind”: “Let those of us then who are mature be of the same mind; and if you think differently about anything, this too God will reveal to you” (3:15). There will be differences among individuals within the community but these are not so much differences between some individuals and other individuals. They are differences between these individuals within the community and the mind of the community as essentially beyond a collection of individuals. The mature within the community mediate the one mind in spirit and together as a community, and the exceptions who are earnest in their commitment to the community will receive help from the Spirit to become fully a part of that community’s revelation.

The community as defined by the Spirit precedes the individuals within it, having a being both distinct from yet dependent on the individuals within it. This has been an attempt to explore that relationship, with more emphasis on the collective which individualistic Christianity, though sincere and a productive ground for people who would otherwise be caught up in the institutions of the status quo, largely ignores. I welcome any alternative readings of the passages and further discussion on the issue.

* * *

¹All scripture quotations taken from NRSV

²Cf. Jesus’ focus on being reconciled to others before reconciliation with God: “When you are offering your gift at the altar, if you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift” (Mt 5:23-24). Perhaps more difficult are his words on not being forgiven unless we forgive others (Mt 6:15).

³Little “spirit” here can also be read as “Spirit”. The Greek does not distinguish between the two. Also, it is unhealthy to say that Paul meant one or the other because saying this dismisses the possibility that Paul could be talking about both with a particular emphasis on one. Also notable is the use of the plural “you” in the Greek here and throughout Philippians.

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Why I read Nietzsche but have no tattoos

“I now go away alone, my disciples! You too now go away and be alone! So I will have it.
Truly, I advisee you: go away from me and guard yourselves against Zarathustra! And better still: be ashamed of him! Perhaps he has deceived you.
The man of knowledge must be able not only to love his enemies but also to hate his friends.
One repays a teacher badly if one remains only a pupil. And why, then, should you not pluck at my laurels?
You respect me; but how if one day your respect should tumble? Take care that a falling statue does not strike you dead!
You say you believe in Zarathustra? But of what importance is Zarathustra? You are my believers: but of what importance are all believers?
You had not yet sought yourselves when you found me. Thus do all believers; therefore all belief is of so little account.
Now I bid you lose me and find yourselves; and only when you have all denied me will I return to you.”

Zarathustra to his disciples in Nietzsche’s Thus spoke Zarathustra (‘Of the bestowing virtue’, part one).

* * *

Favourite picture of Nietzsche. Who needs philosophy when you’ve got a mo’ like that?

A couple of years ago, Nietzsche’s name for me was a symbol of intellectual insecurity. He was the kind of guy for the spiritual giants who fasted twice a week, prayed four hours a day and always ended up with the right amount of money (down to the cent!) from God at the last minute for whatever obscure purpose¹. They would love God too much to be swindled by some philosophical naysayer. Or Nietzsche was for those thinkers who had spent forty years doing so (ie. thinking), that when it came to the time to think about Nietzsche’s thoughts the words passed by devoid of all their original passion and challenge. But the attraction to Nietzsche came when I expanded my still-intellectually-secure reading list and began reading Christians who took Nietzsche’s criticism on board and agreed with him, mostly in the sense of saying that Christian theology (maybe not practice, but definitely a lot of theology) historically focusses on the beyond, the eternal, the unseen, the ideal, etc, to the detriment of the here and now, the temporal, the seen and the real². On reading these friendly faces, Nietzsche has become for me no longer a symbol of fear but one of creativity, and hope for a new voice in any stiff and outdated theologies, rather than a challenge that needs to be countered.

But, to be honest, I was quite disappointed. After potentially finding some ideas to contribute to more thoughtful theological practice, I just didn’t gel with the guy. The opening excerpt is one exception (there are a few more). As this post mentions the relative undangerousness of Nietzsche, I might also do a post in the future about why he’s not as cool as I thought he’d be.

* * *

What’s Zarathustra actually saying? First of all, here’s the background. Zarathustra/Zoroaster was a Persian prophet/philosopher and the founder of Zoroastrianism, an ancient and today dying religion from the same primordial ooze as Judaism, Christianity, Islaam, etc — the Near East. Nietzsche wrested him from his historical context and characterised him in said book. Thus spoke Zarathustra was viewed by Nietzsche as his most important work and a lot of his vital organs are contained in it. The text throughout mocks the bible, portraying Zarathustra at once as the new Messiah and Anti-Christ. One of my favourites was, “If we do not alter and become as cows, we shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven” (‘The voluntary beggar’, part four). The existentialist heart of the opening excerpt is important to the other key ideas in the work, albeit not Nietzsche’s most important idea, in comparison to the emphasis with which he puts on others.

And after all that, here’s in short what the puppetted prophet Zarathustra is actually  saying: “My philosophy does not ask you to believe in me and follow my ways, but to abandon me and find your own way. Those who abandon me and follow their own reality faithfully are most loyal to me and the ones I thus return to”. Zarathustra, in contrast to Jesus, asks not that we follow him and conform to his image, but that we abandon him and become like ourselves³. At this point you may want to re-read the quote at the start and realise its genius.

* * *

A good (dead) friend of mine

But to what extent is Nietzsche’s critique of Jesus based on a caricature of him? Does Jesus actually want us to all be like sheep⁴? Or is Jesus more like Nietzsche’s Zarathustra than we think? Perhaps Nietzsche was not so much attacking Jesus as he really is but what the church had constructed of him. I’ll use an example from another name you may find difficult to pronounce. Kierkegaard, probably the best ever philosopher (who was not really a philosopher but more of a man of faith in my elevated, saint-canonising conception of him), also criticised Jesus for the same reason Nietzsche did, but with a different focus⁵: Kierkegaard recognised that it was the church and contemporary philosophy (rather than the saviour himself) that advocated conformity to a universal code of ethics, something that Kierkegaard criticised throughout his life as deeply non-Christian.

A biblical example of Zarathustra’s ‘abandon me and find yourself’ existentialism was used by Kierkegaard as the title to his landmark work on the subject, Fear and trembling:

“Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose” (Philippians 2:12-13 NIV).

Paul, one of the most defining figures in early Christianity with lasting significance, is writing to the Philippian church while in jail. “Hey guys, I’m not always going to be there to hold your hand and look both ways for you before you cross the road. You’re big kids now and it’s not me you should be looking to for direction. And it’s not conformity with the ethical law that makes you a good person. Now that you’ve received the Spirit, God will work in each of you according to his purposes”. Kierkegaard takes the sentiment and writes a lifetime’s supply of philosophy on it: We discover that the will of God is different for every person.

But before I move on, I’ve got to call Nietzsche back over here for some input. While Kierkegaard would say that good determined by society or the Church should not deter the individual from doing the good to which God has called them, Nietzsche would say he has not gone far enough: good determined by society, the Church and God should not deter the individual from being faithful to their individual reality. Nietzsche would say that Kierkegaard’s theological weaknesses are trapping him from fully facing and embracing his reality. But I’m just the guy that drives the van.

* * *

This is seriously the coolest picture of Moltres I’ve ever seen and a Moltres tattoo might be the place to start. Check out the rest of this guy’s work here: http://cockrocket.deviantart.com/ You can buy his prints.

Working in hospitality with a lot of travellers and passing-through-ers, and knowing a lot of people my own age, has generally brought me into contact with a lot of tattoos. And every now and then a stray thought (stray in the sense of a stray dog) tells me how cool it would be to get a tattoo. And then I’m totally pouring different glasses of wine for customers, and that beautiful aroma! But I don’t drink alcohol. I don’t see anything wrong with getting tattoos or having a drink; I just don’t do it. Herein lies the tension between the universal and the particular⁶.

The particular is what I’ve hitherto spent this whole essay explaining to you, whether Kierkegaardian, the call to follow the Holy Spirit⁷, or Nietzshean, the challenge to live faithful to your individual reality. But the particular can only be understood against the background of the universal. Universalism in this sense asserts things such as universal truth, and therefore universal ethics, the idea that the most virtuous person in society is he or she who conforms most closely to this code of ethics. For me, this idea stinks of mathematical simplicity and is in keeping with reducing people to numbers, statistics, and stick figures. But, necessarily, a dual embrace of the universal and the particular is required for living as a Christian. Most clearly, I think, and this example would be a common one, if in the universal I know that God is love and that the ideal person is loving, then in the particular I cannot say that God is asking me to kill someone. Note also, that in the same chapter to the Philippians, Paul first describes aspects of a unified community, the universal which he encourages his readers to conform to before he reminds them that God will work in them according to his purposes:

“Make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others” (Philippians 2:2-4 NIV).

Further, a mature understanding of the universal and particular requires the rejection of the two as a dichotomy. The rejection is based on who has claims to the universal. In some states in the USA, capital punishment is an accepted punishment for certain crimes. In other states, it’s no longer an option. Understand that there are particular claims to the universal. According to some, it is universally acceptable that those who commit certain crimes should be punishable by death; according to others it’s universally unacceptable. The individual therefore has the duty of constructing their own universal but living according to their particular. In my understanding of the universal, it is alright to drink and get tattoos, but it’s not alright to get drunk. In my particular, I have not been called to either drink or get tattoos at this point in my life. Not that I’m so righteous because I’m doing what the Lord asked me to do. I could tell you that he’s asked me to do a lot of things that by my actions I’ve laughed at. Tattoos and drinking are just two things I’ve yet been almost successful in.

* * *

I leave you with this poem from the very existential and forever readable Emily Dickinson:

How happy is the little Stone
That rambles in the Road alone,
And doesn’t care about Careers
And Exigencies never fears—
Whose Coat of elemental Brown
A passing Universe put on,
And independent as the Sun
Associates or glows alone,
Fulfilling absolute Decree
In casual simplicity.

* * *

¹It’s amazing how manifold these stories of divine providence are and they never cease to shock me and capture my imagination. I had a quick lazy look for some but I couldn’t find any so if you’d like to know what I mean then just ask.

²N T Wright, for example would be one of the writers that helps me identify with Nietzsche’s critique; however it’d be my guess that Wright’s not in direct dialogue with the man himself but rather listening to what the world around him and onto-it theologians are saying about the Christian heads-in-clouds-syndrome, which no doubt this critique has been inherited by secular academia and onto-it theologians from reading Nietzsche. Peter Rollins, another guy whose writings influenced me, on the other hand, seems to be in more direct dialogue with him.

³Paradoxically, Zarathustra’s disciples can either heed his words and abandon him (thus following him by taking his counsel) or, in weakness, continue to follow him (thus abandoning him by not understanding or being strong enough to take his counsel).

⁴A pun.

⁵It’s possible that Nietzsche, coming onto the scene a few years later, south of a couple of borders, read the holy philosopher as he seems to be denouncing him in some parts of Thus spoke Zarathustra. If so, Nietzsche took on board Kierkegaard’s existential ideas but pushed them beyond the realm of faith. However, I haven’t yet heard of any direct and verifiable evidence of Nietzsche’s speculated reading habits.

⁶I first came into contact with these terms through Kierkegaard, but they may be Hegelian. I really don’t know.

⁷A deliberately charismatic reading of Kierkegaard. Note that Kierkegaard acknowledges two possibilities in the particular, (a) the aesthetic, which means living according to your own desires and (b) faith, living according to your best understanding of God. Pentecostalism goes horribly wrong when faith is confused with the aesthetic, resulting in an heavily individualist approach to Christianity, a practice that fulfills all your spiritual and fleshly desires under the guise of faith.

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Robbie Williams and the weak man

“You think that I’m strong. You’re wrong. You’re wrong” — Robbie Williams in Strong.

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Before I left my hometown of Christchurch I experienced something of a Robbie Williams renaissance in my own life. As I worked the checkouts at Fresh Choice, my ears always pricked up when one of Robbie’s classics was cycled through the delightfully plain playlist. After a little reflection I realised how much of an effect his music had had on me when I was younger. I was familiar with his song Back for Good from his earlier days in the boy band Take That. And his combined effort with Nicole Kidman on the older song Somethin’ Stupid was very cherishable. Perhaps most important was the Rock DJ, one of the highlights of my primary school music-listening days. I never stayed up late enough or always forgot — something like that — to see the video, allegedly, according to the accounts of schoolmates at the time, showing Robbie strip, taking off all his clothes, skin, muscles, etc, eventually becoming a skeleton. The primetime version always ended in his undies. I could never understand the transfixed facial expressions of the rollerblading ladies circling around Robbie… But perhaps the most important aspect of the song was the line, “If you can’t get a girl but your  best friend can it’s time to move your body”. I remember hearing the line, somehow thinking that if my nine year-old-or-so best friend at the time got a girlfriend then, according to Robbie’s rule, it would be time to move my body. Out of my three best friends at the moment, one has managed to “get a girl” so according to Robbie’s rule I’m yet under no obligation to move my body, or only under obligation to move a third of it. The careful reader will note that if two mutual best friends followed Robbie’s rule then they would remain perpetually girl-less.

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Being exposed once again to Robbie’s words as an adult, I noticed some thematic overarchings across his singles¹. The search for love, his self-confessed failings and cosmic bewilderment, among others, can be summarised in what I’d like to term ‘the weak man’, the self not as something central, boastworthy and knowledgeable, but admittedly dependent, confused and unreliable.

Millenium

At the same time as Robbie embraces the carpe diem, “We all enjoy the madness ’cause we know we’re gonna fade away”, there is an underlying sadness for the current humanity: “We’re praying it’s not too late  /’Cause we know we’re falling from grace”. Of course there is not a huge hurry to attend the first-world issues of the current humanity, but rather an acknowledgement that the issues are there and the ideal of sorting them out in the future. The value of Millenium is in its cynicism and self-deprecation: “Live for liposuction /And detox for your rent; /Overdose at Christmas /And give it up for lent”. The words are indicative of a generation searching for meaning and cataclysmically failing, periodically hopping from one extreme to the other.

Angels

I was surprised to learn that Robbie himself didn’t write this. The words are however in keeping with the purpose of this post. Although this song lends itself to the possibility of depicting an imbalanced relationship with a weak and a strong partner, it is also possible to read it as one side of a weak:weak relationship, where the Angel in the song is only an angel through her lover’s eyes; she equally depends on him for his love. In saying that, the Angel may very well have angelic qualities, therefore attracting the dependent speaker, who relies on her, looking for affirmation: “And as the feeling grows /She breathes flesh to my bones² /And when love is dead /I’m loving angels instead”.

The lyrics also allow for interpretation in a cosmic sense, where the non-physical angel is either a past/passed lover, representing the ideal, no longer attainable relationship, or an imagined/spiritually experienced angel whom the speaker looks to for hope when feeling downtrodden: “When I’m feeling weak /And my pain walks down a one way street /I look above /And I know I’ll always be blessed with love”.

Better Man

Perhaps signifying Robbie’s love for New Zealand, this song was only released in Australia, New Zealand and Latin America. The speaker tenderly acknowledges not only a need for love, shelter, security, etc, but also resolves to become a better person, possibly in relation to a past fault: “As my soul heals the shame /I will grow through this pain. /Lord I’m doing all I can /To be a better man”. The beauty of this is that speaker has clearly also been hurt by his own fault and is therefore quite defensive: “Go easy on my conscience /’Cause it’s not my fault”, which pairs nicely with his dependence and weakness expressed in the opening verses. Perhaps an appeal to Lord in the chorus represents a break from the accusations of others. The speaker has undoubtedly been hurt by his own actions, but this hurt has been made much worse by the condemnation by others arising from his own actions. Lord is therefore the last refuge, a hopeful desire for grace after being rejected by everyone else.

The speaker also expresses some naivety in resolving to become a better person, which can only be received lovingly by his listener. The bridge represents an alternative way of moving on, “Once you’ve found that lover /You’re homeward bound; /Love is all around” and “I know some have fallen /On stony ground /But love is all around”. The speaker moves away from his confession and appeal to the Cosmos, and instead hopes to find a new love, with the possibility of repeating again his past mistakes.

Feel

This is my favourite on the list. The edgy guitar, the tense video, and a more confidently weak man assaults his weakness head on with strength. The speaker explores existentialist questions in the opening verses: “Not sure I understand /This role I’ve been given” — What is my responsibility in life as a human? “I sit and talk to God /And he just laughs at my plans” — A variation of the adage, ‘If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans’, represents the speaker’s cosmic bewilderment, earnestly seeking a spiritual connection and yet finding no answers. “My head speaks a language /I don’t understand” — The last straw is the unintelligible self. The speaker cannot find refuge either in the world or out of the world; now he is rejected by his very self.

Surprisingly, the speaker makes the most beautiful conclusion. Instead of doing away with himself, he aggressively confronts his meaninglessness and demands answers. He lives in spite of a world of questions and unfulfilled dreams. And he wrestles with the reality that birthed him, until it will answer him, “‘Cause I got too much life /Running through my veins /Going to waste. /And I need to feel real love /And a life ever after; /I cannot give it up”.

Before I end, I would just like to say that Robbie Williams is the man.

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¹Unfortunately all I have heard of Robbie has been on the radio, having never acquired one of his albums.

²There is a subtle hilarity in reading this as a reference to the skeleton Robbie in Rock DJ.

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