surface thoughts on profundity

on a common misconception

people tell me that my theology mumbling is profound. and even when they don’t tell me, the results speak for themselves. those are generally the texts that get the most reactions. maybe it’s my nature to be immediately suspicious of stuff like this. but maybe not, because i know i used to think so as well, and it is a recent thing that i don’t. and i know exactly when it changed: when i started reading and writing fiction again, and more specifically down to earth, character focused fiction.

and now i just cannot agree. my theology mumbling is the easiest thing to write and read, and the least profound thing i have ever written or can ever write. and it’s not just because i am inept at it. it’s a structural thing.

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even the worst character driven fiction is, by default, more profound than Aquinas’ Summa. this might seem like a bold statement, but it’s not only true, but provable. if you read bad fiction you know it’s bad. there are lots and lots of objective measures, and prose quality is just one of them. it’s really more about the content itself. because we know from real life as well as other stories how people behave, what makes sense for them to do or say or not do or say, and if they do or say something that doesn’t make sense, that too, reveals things about the story and the characters.

maybe it will be simpler to understand if we ask the question: what is good theology. what are the criteria for saying this is theology done well, and that is theology done badly. it doesn’t take long to reach the conclusion that it is entirely subjective. there is no such thing as objectively good theology. the most one can say, i suppose, is if an argument is logically argued (but, having read my fair share of theology, even this is optional; and more importantly, it can be optional because the topics dealt with are too abstract to be put to the test of reality and plausibility).

let’s get more specific, and use examples from a book we all love, the Gospel of John. ‘in the beginning was the Word’. it sounds so profound, doesn’t it. if you don’t think about it for two seconds. because it’s not profound at all, it’s the opposite. it is so high minded and abstract that one can write book upon book and still not know what the hell it means. in fact, it can mean anything and nothing, and often does.

on the other hand, Mary anointing the feet of Jesus is actually profound. it says specific things about specific people. there is a finite number of interpretations, and they can’t all be true. and the same is the case for any of the passages where we see Jesus doing, or saying, something. and if you read the gospels with an eye to this it will also help you identify where the narrator is inserting his own high minded, unfalsifiable notions into the text.

often Jesus does or says something, and then the narrator interprets. and since we’re talking about texts that are held to be inspired by the highest god himself (at the very least), then it’s almost impious to doubt anything. but if you investigate these instances, you start to have doubts. to give again an example, Jesus says to the pharisees that he will destroy the temple and raise it in three days. and then the narrator tells you Jesus meant the temple of his body. neat, now you don’t have to think about what it means. he just told you. and since it’s very abstract, even better, because it can mean anything.

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one external indication that what i’m saying is not only true, but obvious, is the fact that non fiction has a lot more readers than fiction. and it’s not just a matter of preference. it’s a matter of what it requires of the reader. there are two reasons. the first is to do with specificity, the second has to do with structure.

the more specific, the less abstract, the more it is easy to detect falsehood or incoherence. specificity is falsifiable, even if you don’t know the specific thing being talked about. whereas with generality and abstraction, anything goes, or almost.

the more abstract and general, the less juice there is in it. it may sound profound, but really it’s talking about the very surface of things, where they are not distinguished. talking about humanity is abstract. talking about a specific human being is not, and cannot be.

which is why writing or reading a story, especially a character driven story, is much harder than writing or reading speculations on theology, metaphysics, politics, history, or any other kind of abstraction. and it’s why what Jesus does or refuses doing is more profound than his parables, interesting though they are, and these in turn are more profound than all the theology built around them.

the only underpinning structure of highly abstract prose is logical coherence (well, hopefully). that’s the only rule, so to speak. but one can see often that even that can be brushed aside, is optional, because in the realm of the highly abstract, in the realm of ideas, things are less solid, much more porous, and thus almost anything goes. it is easier to mask total irrelevancy not only by using lofty words, but by talking about lofty things.

a story, on the other hand, has for one an inherent structure that cannot be ignored. it is falsifiable, unlike metaphysical or theological propositions. it immediately calls the reader unconsciously to examine its plausibility by thinking back to his own experiences of life. and those experiences are specific. and it draws from all the other stories the reader knows. and those aspects cannot be violated, or rather, if they are, we know it immediately. so even in the question of logical coherence, a story requires more of it than nonfiction.

obviously, however, and this is seen especially when reading the bible, one can read the very specific words and actions of Jesus and always have the abstract filter on. we can be reading about a scene where this woman is rubbing oil on Jesus’ feet and be thinking that he’s ‘The Word’ (whatever that means). to rob Jesus of humanity is the most common thing in all of theology. i think the reason is that it’s so easy to do. again the opposite of profound. it doesn’t go to the depths, but takes you away from them.

i suppose it could be the case that we take this ‘Word’ business seriously and read and write about it from the perspective of grammar, syntax, semantics, etc. that is a little less abstract than whatever is meant by ‘Logos’, and all of the philosophy written about it. which is why so much of it is really talking about nothing.

if we talk about a person doing things, on the other hand, we cannot but relate it to people we actually know, with everything we know of what people do, and are, and act like, and feel like. if we talk about personhood instead, it remains at the level of abstraction. talking about a person tells us more about personhood than talking about personhood as such. we have no experience of personhood except secondhand (actually it’s more like twenty second hand), through real people. and so when we talk about personhood, there is a lot more room for bullshit, and fewer tools to tell bullshit from truth.

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all writing is a spell you put on a reader, but the spell of characters and actions is much harder to achieve, both for writers and readers, because it deals with analogues of experience, of real things that actually happened or could happen, rather than second or third level abstractions from experience. and this is why it is much deeper, and harder.

lastly, theology and metaphysics are really the most abstract topics of all. and so they are, by necessity, the least profound as well. they do not, and cannot, go deep into anything. they must remain at the level of the unfalsifiable, with little if any relation to real life and experience.

i guess i should be happy people find value in my mumbling about abstractions, and if you made it this far, thank you. but the fact is even the simplest, shortest story i have ever written (i think it’s this one), is incomparably deeper than the longest, most labored reasoning on metaphysics. it is of course harder to get to the heart of the latter. but there is a heart to it. this type of stuff is mind only, at best.

person contemplating metaphysical questions