Literature and Religion

LITERATURE AND RELIGION A. WiLBER Stevens At a Conference on Literature and Theology held at Emory University in November of last year, Professor Nathan Scott, Jr. made some interesting points in a paper entitled "The Conscience of the New Literature, or, Between Antioch and Alexandria." Dr. Scott mentioned that Joyce, Eliot, and other moderns in previous years had attempted to give form to formlessness. Their contribution was invaluable. He then went on to speak of a position which has situated the contemporary writer of today between Antioch (the culture which might be called Aristotelian, historical and realistic) and Alexandria (which might be represented by the philosophy of Philo and which could be termed Hellenic, Platonic, Mystical and Mythical). Scott sees the modern writer as embracing neither side—rather, the writer is in a kind of moral stalemate, in a mood of black humor and anti-teleological bias. He described the literature of today, then, as being in what he termed a "post-modern" phase. There is no serious attempt to compete with reality. (He used as examples the work of Robert Musil and Robbe-Grillet.) In these writers, there L· no metaphysical transcendence, no character as we used to understand it, and incidents do not have relationships with character. There is also a termination of a relation between literature and art, a kind of ruthless purism. Dr. Scott asked whether or not there is any solution to this dilemma, and introduced Kafka's admonishment: It is not necessary that you leave the house. Stay at your desk and listen. Don't even listen—only wait. Don't even wait, just be absolutely still and alone. The world will offer itself to you to be unmasked; it cannot do anything else— ecstatically will it whirl before you. Scott drew a connection between post-modernism and the "God is Dead" theologians who have attempted to convert perplexity to dogma. Indeed, he made it patently clear that literature and theology are both postmodern and are in the same situation. I hazard the opinion that Professor Scott spoke eloquently to that more and more enforced literary tactic and condition in which we find ourselves presently at rest. Possibly, to wait for the unfolding is our proper stewardship . If we do this, if we wait, we have nothing to lose but ourselves, and, at the same time, nothing to discover but ourselves. Surely, our current posture, while it has become increasingly fey and well informed, continues to be busy in its careful disregard for the humble access to random mysteries. The dimensions of this plenary session, in terms of time, aesthetic and scope are such that I find myself inevitably and immediately brought to my knees in fear of over-generalizing, and, if I may use the term, over-committing . In whatever realm of literary criticism one may be working, he is on the edge of a precipice when he comes to the subject of literature and Literature and Religion169 religion, and, in the words of our Executive Secretary, "the relevance of literature to other areas." I should point out, however, that in the last twenty years, particularly in the last eight or ten years, the relationship of literature to religion has been intensively explored and re-explored. I speak not only of vast amounts of published material and increasing numbers of meetings (represented by such organizations as the Conference on Christianity and Literature or by the conference held last year on Theology and Literature at Emory University ), but also in the areas of curricular innovation on many campuses. I would be amiss if I did not hasten to mention the splendid Bibliography of Literature and Religion compiled by Professor Emest G. Griffin of the University of Alberta, published in March 1967 and supplemented by a selected list of new tides dated August 1968. This bibliography lists books only. Dr. Griffin promises us a revised bibliography of literature and religion in the near future. At any rate, his present collection seems standard and basic to me. Incidentally, Professor Griffin's office would be glad to furnish anyone interested with the present Bibliography. The strategy (and I will be using this word again in a less...