Pointing
Karen Armstrong is irritating in a great many ways, but one of the major ways is her passion for stringing together resounding words that sound vaguely impressive but don’t actually mean anything that one can figure out – that are carefully chosen not to mean anything. That is a habit that always makes me want to hit things, and she has a really severe case of it.
In the past, many of the most influential Jewish, Christian and Muslim thinkers understood that what we call “God” is merely a symbol that points beyond itself to an indescribable transcendence, whose existence cannot be proved but is only intuited by means of spiritual exercises and a compassionate lifestyle that enable us to cultivate new capacities of mind and heart.
What on earth is a symbol that points beyond itself to an indescribable transcendence? What does she mean by an indescribable transcendence? What exactly is that?
Whatever you want it to mean, right? After all, she did say it’s indescribable. But if it’s indescribable – why is she talking about it? Why does she do both? Why does she lay down the law about this stuff but choose her language in such a way that she avoids saying anything exact that one can get to grips with?
Well that’s a stupid question; we know why; because she can, because it works, because it sells lots of books, because it wins her an undeserved and indeed ridiculous reputation as an expert on religion among hordes of people who don’t know any better. Because it’s a good wheeze. There’s very little reason (apart from intellectual honesty) for her not to do it, because it does work such a treat.
And yet it surprises me all the same; I suppose it surprises me that she doesn’t make herself sick. It always surprises me that people who peddle meaningless jargon don’t make themselves sick in the process.
The best theology is a spiritual exercise, akin to poetry. Religion is not an exact science but a kind of art form that, like music or painting, introduces us to a mode of knowledge that is different from the purely rational and which cannot easily be put into words.
Says Armstrong. But the trouble with that is, it isn’t true. It’s apparently what Armstrong thinks should be true, it’s apparently what she wishes were true, but she expressed it in the indicative, not the conditional or the subjunctive. It would be nice if she were right about what religion is – it would be great if it were a kind of art form. But she isn’t right – she’s just confusing her wishes with reality.
I’ve never studied linguistics, but isn’t a signifier usually supposed to point to something signified? After ‘god’ has been emptied of all the attributes of existence, what does the word point to? Armstrong would have me believe it simply points beyond itself. There presumably isn’t even a god shaped hole in the world, since then we might infer something about the chap from the outline of the hole that certainly wasn’t him to start with.
So ‘god’ means ‘that which is beyond god’? But, beyond in what sense? Certainly not greater than, since god is usually acknowledged as ‘ultimate’ in some sense.
And it hopefully it isn’t some Orwellian doublespeak. Though the tools of the inquisition would, no doubt, be very effective at ‘re-educating’ us to accept whatever definition of god serves the purpose of those doing the redefining.
It seems that in Armstrong’s world, whoever makes the least intelligible remarks about god is clearly the wisest. Except perhaps for those who remain silent on the matter altogether.
Since my dog has never uttered a word on the subject, intelligible or otherwise, clearly she must be a true prophet. Just to be safe I think I’ll take her for a nice long walk and give her a good brushing. Maybe that’ll get me into heaven…
The word points to an indescribable transcendence, of course – any fule kno that. Now, we can’t prove the existence of this indescribable transcendence, but we can damn well intuit it by doing our spiritual exercises (80 repetitions, keep the knees bent) and a compassionate lifestyle, which means granite counter tops and stainless steel appliances and a sympathetic expression on the face. It’s so simple! If only you would pay attention and try harder and stop kicking Jones Minor.
I too thought of Orwell when reading Armstrong’s tripe. She needs somebody to make her read “Politics and the English Language,” although the horse-to-water bromide applies.
And then Orwell’s great quote from “Notes on Nationalism” came to mind: “One has to belong to the intelligentsia to believe things like that: no ordinary man could be such a fool.”
It’s all very puzzling. But I actually love the first para of her article. I couldn’t have put it better myself, although I’ve often made much the same point (as have many others before me, of course).
It seems like she is being intellectually dishonest, but the sad thing is she has probably deluded herself into thinking she is doing “deep thinking.”
I started the piece w/o knowing who the author was, and had high hopes in the first paragraph. But then I got a whiff of “is a merely a symbol” “indescribable transcendence” and quickly checked the end and lost hope. . . At least my mother had the sense to stop at explaining what symbolism was. Then she said “oh, honey, that stuff (the bible) is just a bunch of stories people made up to explain stuff.”
Armstrong’s writing is badly put together, can’t mean anything, boldly in conflict with the sense of words. Yes, if I may say, it is akin to. . . hot gas.
Armstrong is a special being because she is akin to a volcano. She disrupts the climate with each emission. She creates huge clouds of toxic gas. This hot gas melts rocks, throttles many readers and intoxicates them, and they fall for that gassy but rapidly dissipating vocabulary stringing. Ahh. . . “akin to poetry.”
Can’t you just smell the gas?
“a kind of art form that, like music or painting, introduces us to a mode of knowledge”
Wha? What “mode of knowledge” does music introduce us to? Don’t get me wrong, I’m a huge afficionado of music but “mode of knowledge”? Huh?
When she says that she’s talking about something indescribable as a way of supporting her view that her subject matter is meaningless, she’s being perfectly consistent. If things break in her favor, then she has validity on her side as far as that goes; to say something is meaningless is just to say that it defies description, let alone definition. But then we’d be speaking nonsense, and so it is a mystery as to why we would much care about logical validity, which only trucks in sense. That appears to be her point, and among those of us who like sense on our plates and our nonsense in the garbage, (and our plates out of the garbage), this makes for an awkward conversation.
But of course if it breaks in the other direction, she’s both begging the question and confessing confusion. For if we have a wider notion of meaning than the logical positivists did (and everyone confesses we certainly do), then depending on the details it might be possible to suppose that we have something meaningful to talk about, and are just being ham-fisted in our efforts. In other words, she might think she intends something meaningless, but she might be wrong. Now that would be embarressing.
What is an indescribable transcendence? That seems like a gremlin of a phrase. Well, maybe it’s too much of a zen nut to crack. So how about we start out by asking an easier one, like “What is a describable transcendence?”
That would be, I guess, like a case of trying to ask what it would be like to be an apple. I don’t much know what it would be like to be an apple. But I can describe what an apple is pretty well, because I know a heck of a lot about apples, have relevant apple-experiences, and that sort of thing. I never doubt that apples exist, even though I’m not one myself (I hope). So there’s a sense in which I’m transcending my experience, even as I’m describing the object of my affections, though my descriptions help me to fix onto what I uniquely want to talk about.
No such luck with indescribable transcendence. That evidently means fixing onto something or other that exists without really telling yourself how to go about doing that. Well, except that she tells us that it can be summoned by a compassionate lifestyle and spiritual exercises. If William of Occam knew of the placebo effect, then Occam’s Razor might then advise us that she intends trick us into having a compassionate lifestyle and perform spiritual exercises. From a sober third person point of view, the postulated existence of the indescribable is pointless busywork that clears the person’s mind for the sake of achieving the relevant objectives of compassion and sensitivity. Acknowledgment of the real goal would defeat the point of the exercise; delusion is necessary for a placebo God.
But then we’re in a bind, aren’t we? For if we aim to achieve this indescribable transcendence, then there’s no commitment required for compassion and sensitivity, short of Armstrong et al’s say so. Replace compassion with feelings of rancor and reckoning when you happen to be in a funk and you’re still adopting the same goal by different means. Unless of course you have a well-disciplined system of doctrines to keep you in line, and/or a pantheon that is an anthropomorphisation of all the bad feelings in life.
Karen Armstrong is an anarchist of the soul, and the Pope is the king. If she meant what she says, then I wouldn’t doubt that we might say that they have their backs to each other (even if at the end of the day they have a suspicious rhetorical effect akin to good cop/bad cop).
On a merely academic level, I suppose a lot comes down to how she defines “religion” in contrast to “superstition”. If she is prepared to call the doctrines of the Catholic Church “superstition”, and to advertise the fact, then that would settle it as far as I care.
I think “hot gas” is right on the mark.
I can just imagine her response to readers’ questions: “What do I mean by ‘spiritual exercises’? Well, you can start by pulling my finger. No, really, give it a try. Oh, that was a good one. How do you like it? Can you feel the ‘indescribable transcendence’?”
This is just god-of-the-gaps wrapped in shiny paper.
Surely “indescribable transcendence” simply means “transcendent quality that cannot be described”. Or did I miss something?
Armstrong: “Darwin showed that there
could be no proof for God’s existence”?
Darwin (and Wallace) showed that the appearance and disappearance of species has a natural explanation, not that God doesn’t exist.
She seems to be claiming that Darwin shared her view on God. But if that is so, doesn’t it undermine the rest of what she says?
If you read the piece again, mentally replacing every occurrence of “God” with “Wungle-wungle”, it makes almost as much sense.
Apologising for possibly being OT, but I suddenly had a flshback to good ol’ Tom Lehrer when trying to visualize the “spiritual exercise”.
……
First you get down on your knees,
Fiddle with your rosaries,
Bow your head with great respect,
And genuflect, genuflect, genuflect!
Do whatever steps you want, if
You have cleared them with the pontiff.
Everybody say his own
Kyrie eleison,
Doin the vatican rag.
Get in line in that processional,
Step into that small confessional,
There, the guy whos got religional
Tell you if your sins original.
If it is, try playin it safer,
Drink the wine and chew the wafer,
Two, four, six, eight,
Time to transubstantiate!
So get down upon your knees,
Fiddle with your rosaries,
Bow your head with great respect,
And genuflect, genuflect, genuflect!
Make a cross on your abdomen,
When in rome do like a roman,
Ave maria,
Gee its good to see ya,
Gettin ecstatic an
Sorta dramatic an
Doin the vatican rag!
…..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3f72CTDe4-0
Cassanders
In Cod we trust
Have mercy on poor Ms Armstrong O.B she is still recovering from the spanking you and Jerry gave her in your book?
I wish those “influential Muslim thinkers” had managed to influence the three latest jihadists to be convicted for attempting to murder loads of people. Going by their videos, the god they believe in is a very concrete personage indeed, who will hand out favours to them and their families after they martyr themselves. Doesn’t Armstrong listen to the news?
‘So how about we start out by asking an easier one, like “What is a describable transcendence?”‘
And that would be so much more interesting, too.
I mean, I can easily understand and relate to the thought that, for instance, human beings are very interesting and impressive but it’s almost impossible to ponder them without wishing they were much much better in many ways, so if “God” is a symbol that points to that thought, I can at least make sense of it, and we can go on to specify the ways humans could be better if only they were. But that’s a concrete sort of thought, while Armtrong’s version…isn’t.
Good post OB. This stuff is describable, and you have done so.
Its totally dishonest for the theology boffins to pretend god is NOT the big person that we imagine from the Bible, because all the ordinary types they are backing up teach exactly that – God is personal, effective, and answers your prayers. Stephen’s “God of the gaps wrapped in shiny paper” is spot on.
It’s a bit Lovecraftian, all this indescribableness. Possibly Armstrong’s god is Cthulhu?
Despite references to past theologians she seems to be saving god by jetisoning anything that makes christianity distinctive as a creed. Something of an own goal one would have thought. Mr Nelson’s points about god as placebo remind me of an old standup line – if you are addicted to placebos what do you take to wean yourself off them?
If religion is all about unknowable, indescribable transcendent non-beings inspiring profoundly important non-thoughts, why shouldn’t a religious person conclude that killing the rest of us is the right things to do? Why should this transcendent pseudo-maybe-god be about peace, love and understanding? Why shouldn’t Armstrong’s god lead his/her/its believers to rejoice in slaughter? As she’s rejected rational discourse, she can’t give a reply to that except, presumably, some variant on the theme of ‘God is love because I say so.’
I just read the piece on Karen Armstrong by the President of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary that you linked to. How much more you can respect that kind of robust clarity from an actual believer to her foggy witterings.