On Church History
  • Adam WoodAdam Wood
    Posts: 6,451
    Whene'er we look, with shaded eyes
    at long-since follies, dead men's lies,
    How simple yet the judgments be
    what ease put them to dispatch we.

    "Filoque? Ha!" the modern shrieks
    "Is this of what the Gospel speaks?
    And Tewahado (monophys.)
    Such subtle science all this is."

    And all the fights from now to then
    Seem one unbroken chain of men
    who 'gainst the Gospel constant toil
    and seek the Church but to despoil.

    Or 'side despoilers, only those
    who labor God, and do suppose
    to ferret out the secrets hid
    by One who bid'st, from those here bid.

    Thus do we, in our lately pride,
    think somehow we escape the tide
    that drags us, though we fight for air,
    to drown in God and shipwreck there.

    There is no diff'rence, only style,
    'tween yester's heap, and 'morrow's pile.
    So gird up, as did those before
    who 'gainst the wind did sweep the shore.

    Think not to win the fight, 'tis won.
    Think not completion: all is done.
    'Tis ours then only loud to sing,
    and serve, and work, and 'wait our King.


    ---------------------------------------

    I usually don't post all my random non-music related thoughts, poems, etc. here,
    but I thought some of my friends here might appreciate this one in particular.

    For semi-regular doses of this sort of thing
    (along with general updates about what I'm reading or eating),
    be my friend on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/wood.adam.michael

    Thank you for your indulgence.

    (Oh, also- as is the case with the hymn texts I post here,
    criticism both literary and theological is always appreciated,
    as are corrections, suggestions, insults, and acclaims.)
  • Kathy
    Posts: 5,500
    I couldn't disagree with you more, Adam. Faith is the door, and it must be the right door, in order for charity to really take root. Faith is the door, the key, the beginning of all good things. We must believe rightly.

    Kathy "Filioque" Pluth
  • Adam WoodAdam Wood
    Posts: 6,451
    I don't disagree with what you just said, so I maybe don't know what you disagree with in my above poem. I'm not taking issue with past disputes, but rather with the modern notion that those disputes are silly and meaningless, and that we're all somehow past such nonsense today. "The modern" in st2 is who I have a problem with; not because he is more or less guilty than the ancient, but because it seems both tactless and useless to argue with people long since deceased and therefore (I assume) fully aware of their earthly failings.
  • Kathy
    Posts: 5,500
    Oh! Sorry. Then, I couldn't AGREE with you more--perhaps. Do you mean to say that the modern is wrong for thinking the past doctrinal disagreements trivial? (This is my position.) Or are you saying that the modern is wrong because because s/he is judgmental?
  • Adam WoodAdam Wood
    Posts: 6,451
    Both.
  • Kathy
    Posts: 5,500
    Interesting. From your text, I take the suggestion, in several places, that the poem's speaker holds that the disputes were trivial: follies, lies, a heap, a fight that should not have been fought. It's not entirely clear, textually, that the speaker does not concede that aspect of the criticism. Rather, it seems that the poem argues against present-day arguments, because they are just as foolish. I could just be reading foolishly?
  • Kathy
    Posts: 5,500
    OTOH, your text is quite nimbly Gilbert-and-Sullivanish in a number of places, much to my delight.
  • Adam WoodAdam Wood
    Posts: 6,451
    >>OTOH, your text is quite nimbly Gilbert-and-Sullivanish in a number of places, much to my delight.

    THANKS!!

    As to the rest:
    Perhaps the poem isn't clear because the poet remains conflicted.
    I do think the controversies of the past were important issues, and I also believe they were solved rightly by the Western Church and her succession of Patriarchs.
    On the other hand, the idea that violence, coercion, and politicking were appropriate or necessary means of resolving them is abhorrent.

    Largely, though, the speaker of the poem (me?) is not voicing his own opinion through the first four stanzas, but rather is recounting the view of the modern, who sees only "with shaded eyes." The only indictment of the poem is not leveled against past problems, but rather "our lately pride."

    We all, those of us alive today and those who preceded us in faith, are (or were) moved, broken, and shipwrecked by our encounter with the living God, and it is not for any of us to judge what that encounter has driven others to do: whether they war on the infidel or retreat to the monasteries is not my business- my business is to recognize that God indeed has drowned me and has broken me, and to respond in the way that God calls me in particular- to sing, to work, to serve, and to wait.
Add a Comment