[Gilthalion]

While I have neither time nor inclination (believe it or not) to split hairs, count angels on pinheads, strive after the wind, etc., perhaps a final response is in order.


Marileangorifurnimaluim:
If you read what my posts actually said, you would understand that I am guilty of none of the accusations you have made. I'm frankly a little surprised at your obvious hostility. You seem to be aguing with Christianity itself, or some wicked phantom Fundamentalist, rather than with the simple points I raised. You anticipate answers I would never give and argue points I never made. But I must rise to answer a question or two that you have raised...

Gilthalion, you have a circular and unprovable argument.

I think you are confusing issues. My argument about resonant worldviews producing enhanced emotional enjoyment have nothing whatsoever to do with Christianity. You take my analogy too far. As I will show, the argument would be true for Buddhists if Tolkien had been one and infused his work with such a perspective.

Perhaps I shouldn't have used the blind man analogy, because it has been used to demonstrate certain points about Faith vs. Unbelief. It is not an argument to be proven or disproven. It is an assertion of fact. While not provable in a controlled laboratory environment where phenomenon can be repeated and measured, it can certainly be proven to the person who has accepted Jesus as Savior. In that this is a personal matter between you and God, there is nothing I can do to convince you of it. The fact that I have not ventured an argument, does not negate the report.

...people are converted to Christianity every day.

When does this non-blindness occur?

While it was sincerely not my intention to abuse this forum for purposes of preaching, this questions (and the answers thoughtfully but errantly provided) reveal a critical misunderstanding of what Christianity really is. This is a side issue to the main point of this thread, and not central to my argument. Other Christians may disagree.

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Christianity is not meant to be a religion, in the traditional and immemorial sense. Certainly, it has become that to many people. (To too many people. But I told you not to get me started on the ongoing depredations of the institutional Church. Greedy, sexually immoral televangelists, miracle-faking charletans, protectors of pedophiles, and morality nazis are not what Jesus intended.)

A religion is the quest for the values of the ideal life, involving three phases: the ideal, the practices for attaining the values of the ideal, and the theology or world view relating the quest to the environing universe. (American College Dictionary)

In its finest sense, Christianity is a personal sacrifice of one's self in submission to Jesus of Nazareth, believing him to be the Son of God, the Christ, the Messiah prophesied by the Jews. Theology is vain without direct communication from God. The practice of discipleship is useless without a living Master of those disciples, and the quest for the ideal is mere human effort without the intervention of the Ideal Himself.

You have perhaps heard the expression, "you must be born again." This describes a spiritual birth that occurs supernaturally (how else) when a person believes and surrenders to the Lordship of Jesus and thus enter into his Kingdom. This is an act of heartfelt faith. That faith, in and of itself, is a gift given by the grace of God to the open, seeking heart. Blind faith indeed, though that is a redundancy, or it is not faith at all. I'm sorry if you have not experienced this, but whining about it does not make it go away, nor does it (nor CAN it) logically refute what (as you say) is unprovable. Refusing to seek it is a personal perogative, and I cannot speculate on such motivations. There are none so blind as those who WILL not see.

The other points you cite as points when "blindess" ends have little to do with the defining eternal experience of salvation and what it means to actually be a Christian.

Baptism is an act of obedience in faith, rather than of faith alone. Being dunked or sprinkled with water does not make one a Christian, though it usually results in church membership noted on paper or in a computer.

Being raised a Catholic, like Wormtongue, obviously is no guarantee of Christianity (he seems to have rejected the religion, but I would advise him to learn of Christianity from Jesus himself rather than Monty Python), or of the joys of harmony that the believer will share with Tolkien's perspective. It does not matter that the man began his work by toying with language. It ended with a great tale that is infused with his morality and informed by his perspective. If I tell you that I derive a satisfaction that you tell me you DON'T, then you waste your breath to deny what I know I have felt.

Learning the Scriptures is a good thing, but will not necessarily give you a Christian perspective, as you astutely observe.

It is perhaps here that my point is made even more strongly. The true believer, who reverently studies Scripture with an open heart will have meanings divinely revealed, and will indeed appreciate them far more than the person who merely seeks to support an antithetical view. This is something beyond the joys of harmony that I described in previous posts and should not be confused with it.

To a lesser extent, ALL ELSE BEING EQUAL (I must obviously spell out and emphasize what I have so poorly communicated), this will be true of Tolkien's work (or C.S. Lewis' to a greater extent than Tolkien's) as well.

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I believe that the meaning of my posts was obvious and is supported by the undisputed facts I cited and the application of common sense.

The originator of the post sought an understanding of qualitative differences in emotional enjoyment of the work as affected by individual worldview. I addressed that. If Tolkien had been a Buddhist, and had written about an adventure in a legendary Himalayan mountain range, borrowing from Asian mythology, my argument would still hold. While the Westerner might enjoy the tale immensely, ALL ELSE BEING EQUAL, the Bhuddist or the Hindu might enjoy it in ways that the Westerner will not, for he will see nuances of the writing that others will not recognize, or do not themselves hold to be as true as their own understanding.

How is this so difficult to understand?

For the record, I did not deny the universality of Tolkien's work. I did not deny the common Humanity of us all. Nor cn this be logically extrapolated from my posts except by willful intent. But the position that is maintained antithetical to mine falls apart when examined plainly.

A blind physicist may well have a great understanding (and appreciation) of the mechanics of a sunset. He may be able to describe in great detail the calculus of orbit and rotation, the physics of light, and the phenomenon of its refraction through the atmosphere and differences that might be measured due to various weather and presence of particulate matter. Having done so, and finding that the poor sap who had to listen while watching that sunset understood very little of what he had to say, the blind man might conclude that his own appreciation was equal or better than his hapless victim's.

And he would be right, in a fashion.

But there is a qualitative difference in the appreciation that the sighted man has for the phenomenon that the blind man will not understand, however well he otherwise understands a sunset. He does not see its beauty in the same way.

And yes, he is missing something. It is not arrogant to maintain this. I'm sorry if it offends the blind man, but I do him no favor to humour his sour grapes attitude.

It can be argued that the fellow with an undamaged optic nerve is also missing out. He does not see the elegance of the mathematics, and therefore does not fully appreciate the sunset for what it is.

If the sighted man says, "The blind man does not know what he is talking about. There is no elegance in the raised bumps on that sheet of paper," he is wrong.

If the blind man says, "This sighted fellow is simply imagining that there is beauty in what he sees," he is also wrong.

But the man who both understands the math and can see the sunset with his own eyes will have a greater appreciation of it than either of his friends.

I hope that makes my position a little more clear. Christianity is a side issue to my argument. I do not dispute Tolkien's genius, our common Humanity, or whatever truths anyone's worldview may hold.

Kalessin:
Perhaps I have sufficiently answered most of your points in the above verbosity. I thought it was understood that ALL ELSE BEING EQUAL my assertions would hold true. I went to some trouble to point out that there are naturally exceptions.

Who are we to judge the quality or depth of an individual's response to art based solely on their faith or lack of it? That is arrogance and elitism of the most sinister kind.

(Sigh. I hope that no one thinks me sinister or arrogant.) When did anyone judge another individual? I do find that there are some who deny the existence of the transcendent appreciation that some Christians report. There is at times a spiritual thrill that I cannot describe, infused as it seems to be with the presence of God Himself. It is beyond emotion and intellect. It is present at times when reading works that seem especially blessed. The act of committing Art (if I may put it that way), something Tolkien and Lewis referred to as "sub-creation" CANNOT be considered in whole apart from a living appreciation for the Creator. If a reader lacks this belief, and especially if he is indeed hostile to it, he may well have a profound intellectual and emotional understanding, but he simply CANNOT get the same thrill. To deny it is real is willfull disbelief, an act of faith in a worldview that collapses in the face of such a fact. Can I reproduce it for you in a laboratory? No, but the promise of Christianity is that it CAN be reproduced in your heart.

But again, Christianity is a side issue, for the assertion would be true in an entirely different sense if another worldview was at issue. Mein Kampf is better "enjoyed" by Neo-nazis and anti-semites than by Orthodox Jews. How plain do I need to make this?

You see, I do not feel able to judge that I am better at appreciating Tolkien than someone else because I am of a particular faith, nor do I feel the need to.

Nor do I. I have been forced into a digrssion on the nature of Christian experience, a side bar to my assertion of the appreciation of resonance. I do not address any individual cases, and to take it that way is reading too much into my viewpoint. There are always exceptional exceptions and classes of exceptions, but these invariably prove the rule when more completely understood. (For example, if God in his sovereignty grants Saul, the persecuter of the infant Church a visitation, then we are talking about an exceptional occurence, not a proof against a general observation that God normally leaves such folk to their fates.)

But there are some who, like the blind physicist, would deny that others experience something that they themselves cannot measure. Or like the mathematically challenged person who cannot grasp how a blind man can enjoy a sunset. Neither of them are logical, or scientific, or right.

I'm not sure that anything will be gained from more of this sort of tedious hair-splitting. I doubt it is much more fun to read than it is to write. I don't know if it is in my power to express myself any more plainly. Folk are free to continue to disagree, of course, but my assertion is simple and ALL ELSE BEING EQUAL it stands whether applied to a Christian who writes a work with great morality, or a Buddhist who does likewise, or a Nazi who does the opposite.

I do not feel slighted or take offense that I do not thrill to Hitler's prose, even though David Duke might tell me how wonderful hate makes him feel. I understand the English translation, yet I don't feel the same thing the Ku Klux Klansman feels. Even so, I don't at all disbelieve his reports of pleasure.