Analyzing Literature and Comparing Discrimination: Comments in Response to Andrew Slack’s “A Letter To My Fellow Heterosexuals”

Andrew Slack, of The Harry Potter Alliance,[1] wrote a letter to his fellow heterosexuals, arguing in favor of equal rights for LGBTQIA, specifically on the topic of same-sex marriage.[2] In addition to being posted on the Tumblr blog of the Alliance, it was also posted on MuggleNet.[3] The letter received much attention on both websites. I commented on the letter in the comments section on MuggleNet. (After that comment, myself and another person Medea37 got into an argument with two other people called Opinionated and Larissa.) The following is what I wrote, directly in response to the letter.

Thanks very much for writing this, Andrew. The messages of equality and love in the Harry Potter books are extremely important to me and are part of the reason why the books have remained important to me; it’s not just a fun story (though it is fun, of course) but it has meaning and ideas that are relevant to my life. When the characters face bullying and discrimination and threats, that’s similar to what goes on in the real world. Of course, the analogies are not exact and there can be some instances where the comparison is odd, but overall, I think it’s really meaningful and is a story we can learn a lot from.

Given that these messages in the books are so important to me, I can’t believe it when people claim that posts supporting LGBTQIA people are “politicizing” Harry Potter. To me, reading HP and then complaining about people using the story to support equal rights suggests the person kind of missed the point of the books. I’ve gotten really, really tired of the fact that discussions about equality (including right here in the comments section of this post) get turned into discussions reassuring the people who are against homosexuality that we’re not being unfair to them. Look, this is a human rights issue. People criticizing those who disapprove of homosexuality are in the right. We’re upset that you disapprove of homosexuality for the same reason Sirius Black was angry at his parents; they didn’t join the Death Eaters and go do horrible things to Muggles themselves, but in general thought that the disapproval of Muggles and Muggle-borns was correct. Disagreeing with discrimination isn’t discrimination.

Meanwhile, on Tumblr, I had reblogged the letter after seeing it.[4] Later, I reblogged it again, in order to respond to comments by jonesinforjosie.[5] I also posted my comment as its own post.[6] Below is what I wrote.

I have to disagree a little with the comment by jonesinforjosie. I think it depends on how the person wrote it and the details of the comparison they made. I wouldn’t compare not allowing marriage equality to slavery, but I would compare allowing marriage regardless of gender to allowing inter-racial marriage. And I think it’s appropriate to point out other similarities between discrimination based on race and discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, such as these groups facing violent hate crime. A person should not say that racism is over (because it’s not) but I think it’s fair to point out that, in the specific area of a type of marriage being legal, inter-racial marriage became legal in the US earlier, and that’s an example of the idea that we shouldn’t allow prejudice to limit marriage. There are still people who are against inter-racial marriage, of course, but I think it’s fair to make a comparison to say we should legalize marriage regardless of gender as we legalized inter-racial marriage.

To me, learning about and believing in equal rights regardless of race and gender gave me a foundation that made it easier to accept that I’m gay. Personally, being female, gay, and a racial minority in the US … If someone discriminates against me for any of these three reasons, I’m still going to be upset about it. It’s not going to be better or less wrong if it’s based on me being gay vs. being a racial minority.

Plus, one of the reasons I think that the comparison can be not only correct but useful is that the people on the other side, when arguing against LGBTQIA people, imply (or outright state) that racism and sexism is “real” discrimination, while discrimination against LGBTQIA people is just “disagreeing with homosexuality” or “wanting things to say as they were created and intended”. (I encountered these phrases, among many other places, in the comments section of Andrew Slack’s post —- the same as this one —- on MuggleNet. The people I was arguing with mostly ignored the comparisons between racial discrimination and discrimination against LGBTQIA people, but they did take the stance that they were just “disagreeing”.)

To me, it’s important to say, “Look, even if you’re okay with me being a racial minority and being female, that doesn’t mean it’s okay for you to think homosexuality is wrong.” And likewise, to make similar statements when people discriminate based on either gender or race, but not for other reasons.


References

[1] The website of The Harry Potter Alliance can be found at http://thehpalliance.org.

[2] Slack Andrew. A Letter To My Fellow Heterosexuals”. Posted on 27 March 2013 at the Tumblr of The Harry Potter Alliance. Retrieved on 6 April 2013 from thehpalliance.tumblr.com/post/46479823091/andrew-slack-a-letter-to-my-fellow-heterosexuals.

[3] Slack, Andrew. “To My Fellow Heterosexuals”. Posted on 28 March 2013 at MuggleNet. Retrieveved on 6 April 2013 from http://www.mugglenet.com/app/news/show/6674.

[5] My second reblog of Andrew Slack’s letter, where the comments to which I was responding can also be read (in addition to my own comment), can be found at http://hermionesbookshelf.tumblr.com/post/46809140857/reblog-comparing-race-and-lgbt.

In Honor of Hufflepuff House [Part 2 of 5]: “Where They Are Just and Loyal”

[To read Part 1, click here.]

‘You might belong in Hufflepuff,

Where they are just and loyal,

Those patient Hufflepuffs are true

And unafraid of toil’

(The Sorting Hat’s Song, 1991)[1]

Justice and loyalty are virtues that are greatly valued by Hufflepuff House, and they are among the most important and recurring themes throughout the series. Justice is at the very heart of the story, as Harry and his friends observe and experience the various injustices of the world and attempt to fight against them. Loyalty is demonstrated by characters with various beliefs on different sides of the fight, and we see the power of loyalty to bring about both the worst and the best in people. Ultimately, those who have a loyalty to justice show how a combination of these virtues can improve the world.

Justice against Injustice

The fight against Lord Voldemort is a fight for justice, as he and his Death Eaters would create a world in which there is great injustice. They commit violence against innocent people, as Hagrid tells Harry about the first wizarding war: ‘Anyway, this – this wizard, about twenty years ago now, started lookin’ fer followers. Got ’em, too – some were afraid, some just wanted a bit o’ his power, ’cause he was gettin’ himself power, alright. Dark days, Harry. Didn’t know who ter trust, didn’t dare get friendly with strange wizards or witches … Terrible things happened. He was takin’ over. ’Course, some stood up to him – an’ he killed ’em. Horribly.’[2] Many of the Death Eaters believe in pure-blood supremacy and were motivated by that belief to join Voldemort and take discriminatory actions against those who are not of a pure-blood ancestry. This is demonstrated by various actions, from name-calling to discriminatory laws to violence, on the part of Death Eaters and their supporters.

During the second wizarding war, after Voldemort and his followers take over the Ministry of Magic, there are various discriminatory laws being put into place and discriminatory actions taken against anyone who is considered to be of inferior blood status. Attendance at Hogwarts is made mandatory for all young witches and wizards, so that the Death Eaters will have the chance to teach these students their ideology, and all students must show that they are of wizard descent in order to attend.[3] There is a Muggle-born Registration Commission (headed by Dolores Jane Umbridge) and the Ministry hauls those who they suspect of being Muggle-born in front of the Commission. They are accused of stealing magic from witches and wizards, as we see during the interrogation of Mary Elizabeth Cattermole.[4] Some who suspect they will be targeted go on the run to escape being captured, and people are threatened, imprisoned, and murdered for their blood status or their opposition to Voldemort.[5] Much of this is done with the claim that society is being made a better place.

One of the reasons why the Death Eaters, and all such villains, are so frightening is because they believe that what they are doing is correct. They are not comical villains, but rather villains whose ideology reminds readers rather disturbingly of the support for discrimination and persecution in our own world by people who claim they are doing the right thing. Though there are those who support Voldemort for various other reasons (such as fear, bewitchment, or a desire for power) many of the Death Eaters believe that their ideology of pure-blood supremacy is justice, that the world will actually be a better place for them and their families if those who are different from them are either killed or otherwise persecuted. They see themselves as protecting their families against a dangerous threat in their fight against those who are not pure-bloods.

This demonstrates that even those who are actually doing injustice may believe that they are doing what is right; we see how justice can be corrupted, and this corruption of justice — this mirror image of justice, which may insidiously integrate itself into society by resembling the real thing, by making claims of justice while promoting injustice — can convince a great many people to support it and even more to ignore its consequences.

As there are in the real world, however, there are people in this story who do not ignore those consequences. Those who are fighting against Voldemort and the ideology of blood purity are motivated by the injustice they see and a desire to make the world in which they live a better, more equal, place. As Sirius Black responds when Pettigrew ask what will be gained by fighting Voldemort, innocent lives can be saved by opposing evil.[6] As Remus says to Harry, when Harry expresses regret about the fact that Remus died so soon after his son Teddy was born, ‘I’m sorry too. Sorry I will never know him … but he will know why I died and I hope he will understand. I was trying to make a world in which he could live a happier life.’[7] We see in their willingness to fight for justice an understanding of what will happen to even more innocent people, in addition to those who have already been harmed, if Voldemort and his Death Eaters can rule unopposed. Professor Dumbledore helps Harry realize that it is his own knowledge of the harm caused by Voldemort that motivates him to fight, not the prophecy.

‘Imagine please, just for a moment, that you had never heard of the prophecy! How would you feel about Lord Voldemort now? Think!’

Harry watched Dumbledore striding up and down in front of him, and thought. He thought of his mother, his father and Sirius. He thought of Cedric Diggory. He thought of all the terrible deeds he knew Lord Voldemort had done. A flame seemed to leap inside his chest, searing his throat.

‘I’d want him finished,’ said Harry quietly. ‘And I’d want to do it.’[8]

Even though Harry is the boy who lived, even though there is a prophecy about him, it is not these things which motivate him to fight against Voldemort and the Death Eaters. Because of all he’s been through and learned before this conversation with Professor Dumbledore, he had already decided that he has to fight; he would fight Voldemort even if there was no prophecy. He does not feel that he is being forced to, but knows that he should, because of the injustice promoted by the Death Eaters.

We are motivated to cheer for the members of the Order of the Phoenix, Dumbledore’s Army, and their various allies because of their reasons for fighting against the Death Eaters. They are not merely taking up a fight against comical villains who are proud to be evil, against villains who we know are evil only by their being labeled as such. We see the harm that the Death Eaters are doing, and so we know that our heroes are fighting against injustice; therefore, their fight has behind it a certain moral and just cause that makes it essential for them to win. They must fight, not just because they have been told to do so, but because it is the right thing to do; they must win, not just because they are the main characters, but because their triumph will have an impact upon the lives of those around them. Their victory would mean much more, far more, than just a personal triumph, and their defeat would mean more, much more, than a personal failure. Upon their success or failure hinge the lives of many people, and it is because of the human desire for justice that we want them to win.

Justice is clearly an important theme throughout the books, both in its corruption and in its defense. This virtue, when corrupted, is a great force for evil in the world, and this same virtue, when defended, is a great force for good. The characters in the story each make decisions based upon their own ideas of justice. The characters’ motivations seem a reflection of our own world, because we so often take actions upon our own beliefs of what is just; we are familiar with the arguments between people who have different views and who all think that their beliefs and actions are the best possible way to achieve a better world. These actions affect the lives of others, sometimes intentionally and sometimes unintentionally, and should teach us to think before deciding on our own ideas of justice, given the power these ideas have to motivate the best and worst in human beings. The virtue of justice, so prized by Hufflepuff House, has a great impact upon this story and on the lives of its characters, showing us how people’s idea of what is just can define who they are, can motivate them to take great actions both good and evil, affect those around them, and change the world for both good and ill.

The Loyalties of Villains and Heroes

The loyalty of the fans of the Chudley Canons, who ‘live in hope of a renaissance’ despite the fact that many consider the team’s glory days to be over,[9] may be a source of good fun in the series — an attempt to show that we can become very devoted to our favorite sports team, band, or book series — but loyalty, and the actions taken by characters based upon their loyalties, are very important parts of the series. The importance of loyalty in the series is shown in Sirius Black’s memorable admonishment to Peter Pettigrew (the series’ infamous coward and traitor) after Peter tries to explain his betrayal by saying Voldemort would have killed him: ‘“THEN YOU SHOULD HAVE DIED,” roared Black. “DIED RATHER THAN BETRAY YOUR FRIENDS, AS WE WOULD HAVE DONE FOR YOU!”’[10] Sirius is willing to die rather than betray his friends, and he isn’t the only one. There are characters who stay true to their friends and to their cause, no matter what the danger, on both sides of the fight. We see throughout the story that a person’s loyalty, their devotion and dedication, can result in a myriad of outcomes and effects on others, based upon what exactly they are loyal to.

Bartemius ‘Barty’ Crouch Junior (son of the Minister of Magic of the same name) joined Voldemort and was sent (along with three other Death Eaters) to Azkaban for the torture of Frank and Alice Longbottom.[11] He was later able to leave the prison secretly when his mother disguised herself as him by drinking Polyjuice Potion and took his place. He lived under his father’s Imperius Curse before escaping and rejoining Voldemort, who gave him the assignment of impersonating Alastor Moody; since Moody was to be the Defence Against the Dark Arts professor during the 1994-5 school year at Hogwarts, this assignment would bring Crouch close to Harry and allow him to deliver Harry to Voldemort. After this plan is successfully carried out, and Voldemort has regained a body, Crouch (while still disguised as Alastor Moody) has a conversation with Harry in which he reveals his true loyalties (though Harry does not understand what is happening until Crouch later tells the whole story under the influence of Veritaserum).

‘If there’s one thing I hate more than any other, it’s a Death Eater who walked free. They turned their backs on my master, when he needed them most. I expected him to punish them. I expected him to torture them. Tell me he hurt them, Harry …’ Moody’s face was suddenly lit with an insane smile. ‘Tell me he told them that I, I alone remained faithful … prepared to risk everything to deliver to him the one thing he wanted above all … you.’[12]

Barty Crouch Junior valued loyalty and considered himself Voldemort’s most loyal Death Eater, because he served time in Azkaban while others went free and also because he helped Voldemort get back into power when others had abandoned him. Although he, unlike Bellatrix Lestrange, begs to not be sent to Azkaban, he believes that the fact of his imprisonment, later confinement by his father, and eventual taking on of the assignment to capture Harry demonstrated his loyalty to Voldemort. He is so fervent in his obsession about loyalty that he wishes to see those who were disloyal tortured. He is desperate to be praised for his loyalty by the person he considers his master, showing that loyalty to Voldemort has become his overriding obsession.

Bellatrix Lestrange is Voldemort’s most devoted follower, ‘his last, best lieutenant’[13] who stayed by his side and fought to her death, even after other Death Eaters had abandoned the fight. Even before her last stand, she was already known for both her loyalty to Voldemort and her cruelty. While there were Death Eaters and other supporters of Voldemort who claimed, when the first wizarding war ended, that they had been bewitched and forced to follow Voldemort, she didn’t. When she is on trial along with three other Death Eaters for the torture of Frank and Alice Longbottom, she says, ‘The Dark Lord will rise again, Crouch! Throw us into Azkaban, we will wait! He will rise again and will come for us, he will reward us beyond any of his other supporters! We alone were faithful! We alone tried to find him!’[14] After Draco Malfoy joins the Death Eaters, his mother Narcissa Malfoy (Bellatrix’s sister) is concerned about him, worried that he will not be able to complete the task Voldemort has given him and be killed as a punishment. When Narcissa expresses this concern, Bellatrix says to her, ‘If I had sons, I would be glad to give them up to the service of the Dark Lord!’[15] Her loyalty to Voldemort is so strong that she is willing to sacrifice anything for him. She is loyal even when others are not, and her loyalty to Voldemort becomes her greatest goal, an essential part of her character.

Voldemort has his followers, some more loyal than others. After he regains his body, he summons his Death Eaters to the graveyard in Little Hangleton, where Tom Riddle Senior (Voldemort’s Muggle father) is buried and accuses most of them of forsaking him. He says, ‘I ask myself … why did this band of wizards never come to the aid of their master, to whom they swore eternal loyalty?’ When a Death Eater named Avery begs forgiveness, Voldemort refuses, saying that he wants thirteen years’ repayment for the thirteen years he was without a body after his defeat at Godric’s Hollow. There are three people who Voldemort believes have been most loyal to him. He praises the Lestranges, saying ‘They went to Azkaban rather than renounce me … when Azkaban is broken open, the Lestranges will be honored beyond their dreams’. He refers to Barty Crouch Junior as the one ‘who remains my most faithful servant, and who has already re-entered my service’.[16] Voldemort demands loyalty of an extreme degree, commanding his followers to forsake everything for him, to go to prison for him, to die for him, to kill for him. His demand for service is a vivid illustration of loyalty taken to its extremes for the most horrible of causes.

Loyalty is demonstrated by characters on the other side of the fight as well, of course. Hermione and Ron are loyal to Harry, from their remaining friends with him even when other students were gossiping and spreading rumors about him to their willingness to risk their lives to help him defeat Voldemort. When Harry tells Ron and Hermione that he’s not planning to return to Hogwarts for his seventh year, and will instead be searching for Voldemort’s Horcruxes to destroy them and eventually kill Voldemort himself, they say they will come with him.

‘We’ll be there, Harry,’ said Ron

‘What?’

‘At your aunt and uncle’s house,’ said Ron. ‘And then we’ll go with you, wherever you’re going.’

‘No –’ said Harry quickly; he had not counted on this; he had meant them to understand that he was undertaking this most dangerous journey alone.

‘You said to us once before,’ said Hermione quietly, ‘that there was time to turn back if we wanted to. We’ve had time, haven’t we?’

‘We’re with you whatever happens,’ said Ron.[17]

Ron’s statement, ‘We’re with you whatever happens’ is an excellent summation of the essence of loyalty. Loyalty is demonstrated, not by staying by a person during the good times, but by staying by them no matter what happens. There are various characters who demonstrate great loyalty to certain people and causes.

Nymphadora Tonks, herself a Hufflepuff,[18] shows great loyalty in both her personal life and in her work for the Order. She demonstrates her love for and her loyalty to Remus Lupin when she says that she wants to be in a romantic relationship with him regardless of the fact that he’s a werewolf.[19] Even though she knows that she will be shunned by many in wizarding society because of her decision to become romantically involved with a werewolf, she does not allow that to stop here from expressing her feeling for Remus.

Perhaps the character whose loyalties most intrigued readers throughout the series and whose actions and motivations continue to be a topic of great discussions is Severus Snape. Snape’s loyalties confused and mislead those around him. He acted as a double agent during the second war, with both sides believing he was on their side until he killed Dumbledore,[20] which provided confirmation for the members of the Order that he was actually loyal to Voldemort.[21] We get hints of Snape’s personality, past, and motivations throughout the story,[22] but it is not until after his death, when Harry looks at Snape’s memories in the Pensieve,[23] that Snape’s love of Lily and some of his reasons for switching sides, secretly helping Dumbledore and the Order (including killing Dumbledore due to Dumbledore’s own request), are revealed. Snape’s loyalties have a great influence on Harry’s life and his task of defeating Voldemort. His character has been analyzed, with many varying interpretations offered; his reasons and motivations for his actions (for joining the Death Eaters in the first place and leaving them to help the Order in the second place) are extremely important and the various hints we receive are taken into account during the analysis. How a reader interprets his actions, words, and memories to determine his motivations and loyalties greatly influences that reader’s opinion of him; that his actions, thoughts, and loyalties were of utmost importance to the story is evident.

Loyalty, another virtue prized by Hufflepuff House, plays an essential role in the story. The various characters in the books show loyalties to their families, friends, and causes. They make difficult decisions when they are faced with conflicting loyalties, and the decisions they make have a big effect on those around them. These characters, and more besides, reflect the world in which we live, as we make our own decisions based upon our own loyalties. In our own lives, we demonstrate the depth of our loyalties to our loved ones and to the ideas which we believe in. One of the reasons that the loyalties of the characters resonate so much with us is because of this similarity between our own world and theirs, between our own personalities and theirs. The virtue of loyalty, so valued by Hufflepuff House, can be used for both good and ill; it has the power to motivate the best and the worst in humanity, depending on what the person is loyal to, and the loyalties of the characters in this story are an essential part of them, just as our loyalties are of us.

A Loyalty to Justice

Throughout the series, characters take actions based upon what they believe is right and demonstrate their loyalty to those who they love and to the causes they support. Based upon their ideas of justice and their loyalty, they take greatly varied actions. It is those, however, who demonstrate their great loyalty to justice by risking their own lives to make the world better and more equal who show us the best of what these virtues can inspire.

Part of this loyalty to justice is the realization that the lives of others are worth defending, that one’s own comfort in a society should not be one’s sole concern, but that we should also be concerned about how our society treats those who are different from us in some way. On an episode of the underground radio program Potterwatch, a conversation between Kingsley Shacklebolt (‘Royal’) and Lee Jordan (‘River’) contains this important sentiment.

‘Muggles remain ignorant of the source of their suffering as they continue to sustain heavy casualties,’ said Kingsley. ‘However, we continue to hear truly inspirational stories of wizards and witches risking their own safety to protect Muggle friends and neighbours, often without the Muggles’ knowledge. I’d like to appeal to all our listeners to emulate their example, perhaps by casting a protective charm over any Muggle dwelling in your street. Many lives could be saved if such simple measures are taken.’

‘And what would you say, Royal, to those listeners who reply that in these dangerous times, it should be “wizards first”?’ asked Lee.

‘I’d say that it’s one short step from “wizards first” to “pure-bloods first”, and then to “Death Eaters”,’ replied Kingsley. ‘We’re all human, aren’t we? Every human life is worth the same, and worth saving.’[24]

Harry, Ron, and Hermione are in a tent, during their extended journey to find and destroy Voldemort’s Horcruxes, when they hear this broadcast of Potterwatch. They have been having a very difficult time during their journey, as they must look for Horcruxes using the limited information that they have and avoid being caught or killed in the process, even though they are being specifically targeted and searched for. Ron’s return has cheered up the group significantly, and Potterwatch cheers them up even more, as they hear the voices of friends who they have not seen for quite a while and about whom they have been concerned. The reason these three friends are putting themselves in danger is for the reason that is stated by Kingsley on Potterwatch; they believe that every human life is worth saving, regardless of the person’s blood status or other differences. They demonstrate through their actions, and their taking on of this great responsibility, that they are truly dedicated to their cause, and they show that their cause is just by advocating a position which puts them in mortal danger.

During the Battle of Hogwarts, many of the students want to stay to fight the Death Eaters, even many who are not yet of age. When Pansy Parkinson wants to hand Harry over to Voldemort, students stand up to defend him, despite Voldemort’s threat.

Before Harry could speak, there was a massive movement. The Gryffindors in front of him had risen and stood facing, not Harry, but the Slytherins. Then the Hufflepuffs stood, and, almost at the same moment, the Ravenclaws, all of them with their backs to Harry, all of them looking towards Pansy instead, and Harry, awestruck and overwhelmed, saw wands emerging everywhere, pulled from beneath cloaks and from under sleeves.[25]

After this display of loyalty to Harry, students who are of age have to decide if they will stay to fight in the battle or leave. Included among those who stay behind are many of the members of Hufflepuff House. The reason for this is because they, being in a house that values justice and loyalty, are motivated by their belief that fighting Voldemort is the right thing to do. Though it is not only the Hufflepuffs who contribute to the fight against Voldemort (in fact, members of all four houses do), these essential values of justice and loyalty are a part of Hufflepuff House’s beliefs, showing that Hufflepuff is important, not just an extra house.

This action by the students near the end of the story is symbolic of an ongoing idea; this theme of characters having a great loyalty to justice is present from the very beginning of the story. In the saga’s first chapter, we learn of the deaths of Lily and James Potter, killed by Voldemort.[26] They fought against the Death Eaters and sacrificed their lives. As Hagrid tells Harry, who had not heard the truth about his parents’ previously,

‘Now, yer mum an’ dad were as good a witch an’ wizard as I ever knew. Head Boy an’ Girl at Hogwarts in their day! Suppose the myst’ry is why You-Know-Who never tried to get ’em on his side before … probably knew they were too close to Dumbledore ter want anythin’ ter do with the Dark Side.

‘Maybe he thought he could persuade ’em … maybe he just wanted ’em outta the way. All anyone knows is, he turned up in the village where you was all living, on Hallowe’en ten years ago. You was just a year old. He came to yer house an’ – an’ –’[27]

They weren’t the only ones who were maimed or killed at the hands or on the orders of the Dark Lord, though. Hagrid also tells Harry that Voldemort ‘killed some o’ the best witches an’ wizards of the age – the McKinnons, the Bones, the Prewetts’.[28] Four years later, Alastor Moody shows Harry a picture of the original Order of the Phoenix, including many people who were killed. Among the names are some familiar ones, including Marlene McKinnon, Edgar Bones, and Fabian and Gideon Prewett, in addition to several others.[29] Frank and Alice Longbottom, also members of the Order, reside at St Mungo’s Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries, because they were tortured into insanity by Bellatrix Lestrange.[30] These are people who put themselves at great risk and were terribly hurt or killed due to their participation in the Order; they joined the organization and went into the fight knowing the risks, and chose to take those risks, because they believed that it was just, and they were truly demonstrating their loyalty to justice by taking those risks.

Part of the loyalty to justice that is shown by various characters is seen when people who could have, if they wanted to, stayed out of the fighting and yet chose to put themselves in danger because they know that fighting against Voldemort and the Death Eaters is the right thing to do. Sirius Black, a pure-blood, could have joined Voldemort. He told Harry that his parents, though not Death Eaters themselves, approved of Voldemort’s beliefs and actions.[31] Unlike Muggle-borns, Sirius would not have been automatically targeted due to his blood status; he could have adopted beliefs of pure-blood supremacy and become a Death Eater. Nymphadora Tonks, being a Metamorphmagus,[32] could have chosen to go into hiding, taking on a disguise so that she would not be recognized. Considering that she was especially being targeted by Bellatrix Lesrange,[33] one of Voldemort’s most dedicated and deranged followers, such a decision on her part may have even been understandable. Remus Lupin is discriminated against in wizarding society because he is a werewolf;[34] he could have made a decision similar to that of Fenrir Greyback some other werewolves who sided with Voldemort. Even though Voldemort and the Death Eaters may have provided him with an outlet for his frustration and anger against wizarding society, he chose to join the Order. These are people who had danger all around them, and the opportunity available to choose a safer option; however, they chose to do the more dangerous, more moral thing, by being just and by showing that they were loyal to the cause by fighting, and ultimately dying, for it.

There is, then, the boy who lived. Harry walks into the Forbidden Forest, walks willingly to his death, in order to make sure that Voldemort can be defeated.[35] Though Harry’s sacrifice is the one that offers protection to those who are fighting against Voldemort in the final battle[36] and though it contains significant symbolism from readers’ perspective, his sacrifice is one of many throughout the story. He demonstrates his great dedication to defeating Voldemort by walking willingly to his death; others who fought did not know for certain that they would die, but they knew there was a good chance they would end up either dead or seriously injured.

All the characters who sacrifice their lives to defeat Voldemort echo the sentiments expressed by Regulus Arcturus Black, who wrote in a note to Voldemort (after realizing his mistake in joining the Death Eaters), ‘I face death in the hope that when you meet your match, you will be mortal once more.’[37] There is, in this statement, a mixture of acknowledging one’s own mortality and impending death while hoping that another person in the future will continue, and finish, the fight. After Harry’s sacrifice, Dumbledore tells Harry that he has the choice of whether or not to go back to fight Voldemort, adding, ‘By returning, you may ensure that fewer souls are maimed, fewer families are torn apart. If that seems to you a worthy goal, then we say goodbye for the present.’[38] This sentiment is also echoed by the characters who fought against Voldemort; they decided to join the fight for the lives of innocent people and continued to fight even when they had already given so much.

A person can demonstrate loyalty to an unjust cause, which is why loyalty alone is not sufficient; a person can believe in justice but not feel enough loyalty to the idea to take action based upon it, which is why the belief alone is not sufficient. Many people have beliefs about what they think is just and many people have ideas to which they are loyal, but this story teaches us that the truly good thing to do is to support true justice that helps others and to be loyal to this cause to such a degree that risks to oneself are considered acceptable. The characters who are extremely loyal, but to an unjust cause (which they believe to be just), become the most terrifying villains. The characters showing great loyalty to justice become to us, the readers, heroes, because they consider the lives of others important and are willing to put themselves at risk to create a better world. Both justice and loyalty are included in the story through the words and actions of characters who clearly place much importance in them and are motivated by them; these values, considered important to Hufflepuff House, are essential to the story to such a degree that the books would not convey the same ides if these values were not included.

[To read Part 3, click here.]


References

[1] Rowling, J. K. Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. London: Bloomsbury, 1997, Ch 7, p. 88. Print.

[2] Philosopher’s Stone, Ch 4, p. 45.

[3] Rowling, J. K. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. London: Bloomsbury, 2007, Ch 11, p. 173. Print.

[4] Deathly Hallows, Ch 11, pp. 172-3; Ch 13, pp. 206-15.

[5] Deathly Hallows, Ch 15, pp. 242-7; Ch 21, pp. 338-43; Ch 22, pp. 355-61.

[6] Rowling, J. K. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. London: Bloomsbury, 1999, Ch 19, pp. 274-5. Print.

[7] Deathly Hallows, Ch 34, p. 561.

[8] Rowling, J. K. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. London: Bloomsbury, 2005, Ch 23, p. 478. Print.

[9] Rowling, J. K. Kennilworthy Whisp’s Quidditch Through the Ages. London: Bloomsbury, 2001, Ch 7, p. 66. Print.

[10] Prisoner of Azbakan, Ch 19, p. 275.

[11] Rowling, J. K. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. London: Bloomsbury, 200, Ch 30, pp. 516-525. Print.

[12] Goblet of Fire, Ch 35, pp. 582-600 (quote from pp. 586-7).

[13] Deathly Hallows, Ch 36, p. 590.

[14] Goblet of Fire, Ch 30, pp. 516-25 (quote from p. 517); cf. Rowling, J. K. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. London: Bloomsbury, 2003, Ch 25, pp. 480-1. Print.

[15] Half-Blood Prince, Ch 2, pp. 37-9 (quote from p. 39).

[16] Goblet of Fire, Ch 33, p. 561-71 (quote from pp. 562, 564-5).

[17] Half-Blood Prince, Ch 30, p. 607.

[18] J. K. Rowling had originally stated that Tonks was in Hufflepuff House on her official website http://www.jkrowling.com. Since then, however, the site has been redesigned and the pages that once contained the extra information about characters are no longer there. Information about Tonks can be found at http://harrypotter.wikia.com/wiki/Nymphadora_Tonks.

[19] Half-Blood Prince, Ch 29, p. 582.

[20] Half-Blood Prince, Ch 27, p. 556.

[21] Half-Blood Prince, Ch 28, p. 573-9 and Chapter 30, p. 593-5.

[22] See, e.g., Philosopher’s Stone Ch 17, p. 217; Prisoner of Azkaban, Ch 18, pp. 261-2; Rowling, J. K. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. London: Bloomsbury, 2003, Ch 26, p. 521 and Ch 28, pp. 563-73. Print.; Half-Blood Prince Ch 25, pp. 508-14 and Ch 30, pp. 593-4. (There are many passages one could cite; I’ve included the ones that came to mind.)

[23] Deathly Hallows, Ch 33, pp. 529-53.

[24] Deathly Hallows, Ch 22, p. 357.

[25] Deathly Hallows, Ch 31, pp. 490-1.

[26] Philosopher’s Stone, Ch 1, pp. 14-5.

[27] Philosopher’s Stone, Ch 4, p. 45.

[28] Philosopher’s Stone, Ch 4, p. 45.

[29] Order of the Phoenix, Ch 9, pp. 157-9.

[30] Order of the Phoenix, Ch 23, pp. 454-5.

[31] Order of the Phoenix, Ch 6, pp. 103-4.

[32] Order of the Phoenix, Ch 3, pp. 51-2.

[33] Deathly Hallows, Ch 1, pp. 16-7 and Ch 5, p. 68.

[34] See, e.g, Prisoner of Azkaban, Ch 22, p. 309; Order of the Phoenix, Ch 14, p. 271; Deathly Hallows, Ch 11, p. 175-6. (There are many passages one could cite; I’ve included the ones that came to mind.)

[35] Deathly Hallows, Ch 34, pp. 554-64.

[36] Deathly Hallows, Ch 36, p. 591.

[37] Half-Blood Prince, Ch 28, p. 569. cf. Deathly Hallows, Ch 10, p. 154.

[38] Deathly Hallows, Ch 35, p. 578.

In Honor of Hufflepuff House [Part 1 of 5]: Introduction; or, The Misconception Summarized

Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry has four houses (named after the four founders of the school) into which new students are sorted: Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin. Gryffindor is focused on, because it is the house of Harry, Ron, and Hermione. Slytherin is also often discussed, as is the house of their school rival turned uncertain Death Eater Draco Malfoy, of the villain Lord Voldemort, and of the intriguing Severus Snape. Ravenclaw comes to the forefront when Luna Lovegood is one of the students who travel to the Ministry of Magic near the end of the 1995-6 school year and when Rowena Ravenclaw’s diadem is found to be one of Voldemort’s Horcruxes. Hufflepuff receives some attention when Cedric Diggory becomes one of the four champions in the Triwizard Tournament and is murdered and when Harry, Ron, and Hermione must come up with a plot to break into Gringotts to find Hufflepuff’s Cup in the Lestranges’ vault; despite this, however, less information is found out about Hufflepuff throughout the series, compared to the other three houses, and some characters have a negative opinion in of the House. When Harry meets Draco for the first time in Madam Malkin’s, Draco says about being sorted into houses, ‘Well, no one really knows until they get there, do they, but I know I’ll be in Slytherin, all our family have been – imagine being in Hufflepuff, I think I’d leave, wouldn’t you?’ After their conversation, Harry asks Rubeus Hagrid some questions about what Draco said (since Harry is not yet familiar with the wizarding world). About the school houses, Hagrid gives voice to a common perception of Hufflepuff when he says, ‘Everyone says Hufflepuff are a lot o’ duffers, but –’[1] Whether or not Hagird personally has a negative opinion of Hufflepuff is uncertain, as he is cut off before finishing his sentence, but Harry learns from him that Draco’s opinion of Hufflepuff House is not uncommon in the wizarding world.

Within the Harry Potter fandom, there is a certain amount of willingness among some fans to take seriously the insults that are targeted at Hufflepuff. The lesser amount of information we find out about the house may contribute to this feeling. Even among fans who may not necessarily dislike or hate Hufflepuff House (feelings that are sometimes expressed towards Slytherin) there are those who think of it as being boring or not good enough. It is sometimes seen as the extra house, where students are sent if they aren’t exceptional enough in the qualities that the other houses value.

My contention is that this is a misconception. Rather, the opposite is true: The characteristics valued by Hufflepuff House and its founder are exceptional and ever-present throughout the journeys of Harry Potter and his friends, as well as being essential in the fight against Voldemort. The negative opinions of some characters (which are included in the series, in my view, to create a realistic world with school rivalries and misconceptions about others) are shown to be false upon analyzing the books. The story contains a clear message that justice and loyalty, hard work, and equality are of the utmost importance.

[To read Part 2, click here.]


References

[1] Rowling, J. K. Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. London: Bloomsbury, 1997, Ch 5, pp. 59-62 (quotes from pp. 60 and 61). Print.

The Existence of Secular Comfort in Times of Grief: a response to Barry York, concerning Susan Jacoby’s “The Blessings of Atheism”

I just finished reading (and very much enjoyed) Susan Jacoby’s new book The Great Agnostic: Robert Ingersoll and American Freethought. A few days ago, while looking through blog posts tagged with her name, so see if anyone had written about her book, I came across Barry York’s open letter to Jacoby[1] concerning an article of hers called “The Blessings of Atheism”[2] that was published earlier this month. I started writing a comment in the comment section, but (as often happens) it became very lengthy. Not wanting to take up essay-length space in a comment section of someone else’s blog, and considering the fact that his letter addresses some topics I want to write about in any case, I decided to expand on what I was originally going to write and turn it into an essay.

It would, perhaps, be a good idea to start with Jacoby’s piece, since that is the piece under discussion here. Jacoby writes about a misapprehension that atheists don’t believe in anything positive and don’t have a source of comfort when their loved ones die, since they don’t believe in an afterlife. She also addresses theodicy, which is a vindication of the divine attributes, particularly holiness and justice, in establishing or allowing the existence of physical and moral evil.[3] She writes that an atheist does not have to try to reconcile the horrors that happen in the world—including illnesses and murders—with a belief in a just God. In the second half of her article, she writes about Robert Ingersoll and how atheists can show that empathy is a cause of atheism, to disprove the idea that atheism is devoid of feeling or concern.

This issue of empathy resulting in atheism is relevant to the first of York’s points that I want to address. In response to Jacoby’s story about a childhood friend was stricken by polio, and how this caused her to ask why God would do such a thing, York writes,

The concern I would raise is that by your own admission it appears you came to your worldview through subjective feelings, not objective observations. With all due respect, may I point out that this seems to be inconsistent with the atheistic worldview which rather prides itself on being scientific-based and research-oriented?  Perhaps you have established your position in this manner, but after reading your article several times it was appeals to emotion that you used to justify your atheism, not science.

This is a common accusation against atheists whenever we write about a story from our own lives as part of a piece about atheism. The problem here is with the definition of God being used by many in the monotheistic religions; if we start with the concept that God is omnibenevolent, omnipotent, and omniscient, even one example of something bad happening contradicts that description of God. Jacoby’s point may not be based upon a scientific study, but it is indeed based on an observation: the observation that her friend had polio and the fact that this does not fit with the description of God that she had learned about. Yes, of course, she had an emotional reaction to the situation, since her friend was ill, but her observation is still accurate.

Related to this point are the explanations which are offered by religious leaders and others for why God would allow bad things to happen. Jacoby received an unsatisfying answer from her mother when she asked why God would allow such a thing to happen to a little boy; her mother said that while the priest might say that God has His reasons, she did not know what those reasons were. York asks, “As an author and researcher, have you ever looked carefully at the theodicy issue as presented not by unbelieving ‘Cinos’ (Christian-in-name-only) such as the childhood priest you mentioned, but by sincere teachers of the Bible?” Apart from the fact that this is yet another example of a person of a particular religious faith declaring that others in the faith are not “true” followers of that faith (a topic which could fill volumes by itself), there is also the fact that people have been attempting to address the problem of theodicy for quite a long while, and many of them are sincere, believing that their particular interpretation or answer is in accordance with scripture. The problem is not that certain people are sincere teachers while others are not; the problem is that, regardless of their sincerity, the various interpretations offered are not sufficient. They may offer explanations with some scriptural support, but the initial problem—that contradiction between the description of God and the existence of suffering—still persists.

What, then, does the Bible have to say about the subject? It says many things on the topic, but the one Biblical book that is particularly famous for addressing the topic is the Book of Job. York writes, “One whole book of the Bible, the Book of Job, is taken up with theodicy as one man struggles with horrible personal tragedy.   So it is a subject any true Christian has to wrestle through to find answers.   Honest Christians all admit our struggle with it as well, for theodicy has always been a difficult one for us.” I’ve mentioned before that Job is my favorite book of the Bible;[4] there are many wonderful passages, but the following seems rather apt for the discussion at hand.

Look, my eye has seen all this,

my ear has heard and understood it.

What you know, I also know;

I am not inferior to you.

But I would speak to the Almighty,

and I desire to argue my case with God. (Job 13:1-3)[5]

I find it rather odd the way that the Book of Job is automatically invoked against atheism and against those who question God’s justice in times of tragedy, given that it portrays God behaving rather indifferently towards his subjects. It also contains the words of a man who seems more human than many of the other characters in the Bible, as he struggles with the tragedies that have befallen him without a divine explanation. Both Christians and non-Christians struggle with the existence of tragedies in our imperfect world, and we hear explanations given by others that we may not find convincing; we attempt to understand what’s going on and why. The desire to argue one’s case with God (though not all would phrase it in that manner) is an understandable reaction to the horrible things which happen.

Lastly, there is the topic of finding comforting in the face of death and other tragedies. This is the part where, I must admit, I often not only disagree with religious apologists, but also feel a certain amount of frustration, due to the frequency with which people dismiss the feelings and experiences of people not of their faith. York writes,

I also must say to you, as one whose occupation means that I am often called on to comfort people in tragedy, that I do not think you can bring any true consolation to those who mourn.   Oh, you can offer personal concern, hugs, tears, a meal, etc.  But please realize that though your atheism may allow you to ignore the question of ‘Why?’ when other people are traveling through dark valleys, their pain will not let them.

York makes a mistake that I have noticed in the comments of other religious leaders as well; he makes a generalized statement about humanity based upon members of his particular faith. He is a Christian pastor, so I understand that his faith is important to him in times of grief, just as the faiths of many religious people are important to them in such times. People who are not religious find comfort in sources other than religion, whether it is in the presence of loved ones or in words of comfort or in knowing that we live in an imperfect world where bad things do happen. It shouldn’t be surprising that people who do not follow a particular religion would probably not find comfort in it. It’s also worth pointing out that the idea of an afterlife of a different religion isn’t going to offer much comfort to people if they not only don’t follow that particular religion but are also condemned by that religion to an afterlife that is filled with punishment for them for not believing in the correct god. In fact, there are people who feel the exact opposite of what York writes; they feel that it was their religious belief, or that of their family, which failed to offer them any meaningful comfort during difficult times.

It’s also important to mention, I think, that nonreligious sources of comfort are not only for nonreligious people. Minimizing the importance of nonreligious comfort that people take solace in during times of grief is insulting to both Christians and non-Christians who have found comfort in sources other than faith. There are people who, in difficult times, have been comforted by friends or relatives who are not of the same faith; while those relatives’ and friends’ faiths may not have been a comfort, their presence definitely was. York seems to present religion as real or better form of comfort, while relegating other forms to a secondary category. The secular forms of comfort mentioned by York are ones that people can have regardless of faith; they are not just a poor substitute or a halfway measure that is adopted by those who do not believe in god or in an afterlife.

Anyone, religious or not, who encounters tragedy—and most people do, in varying degrees—tries to find sources of comfort, to still the storm within, to find a way to continue living despite the reality of horrors in our world. While nonreligious people may ignore the question “Why would a just God allow such things to happen?” when not responding to claims made by religious people, since we don’t believe gods exist, we don’t ignore all the difficult question that are posed by death and destruction, by pain and misfortune, by terror and loss, by the terrifying lack of understanding about life that is a part of human existence. We think about the questions we have about the universe and why certain things happen the way they do.

Many of us also give thoughtful consideration to the nonexistence of justice in this life and the potential for justice in the future, not through divine intervention but through human morality. York writes, “Remember that the ‘dicey’ part of the word theodicy means ‘justice.’ Just because you choose to remove God from the equation does not mean you have answered the question.” In reality, neither including nor removing god in the equation means one has answered the question; including god simply means having to deal with yet another unknown variable in an equation that no human being on Earth fully understands. My secular worldview doesn’t offer a reason why the tragedies were just, and that’s just the point; they were not just, because the universe isn’t a just place. Religious worldviews don’t come up with a reason why those same tragedies were just, either; some try to, but doesn’t succeed. Human beings can and should aspire to be just, and to make our societies more just; however, when we ascribe justice to the universe, we will be disappointed and may become convinced to rationalize away any observations inconsistent with the description of a just universe.[6] It is better to acknowledge that we live in an uncaring universe that does not know we exist and try to make our societies more just than to claim that there is ultimate justice despite lack of good reasons for believing so.

The lack of justice in this world is often observed by people both religious and nonreligious, and one of the things we seek is some sense that there are others who understand what we are going through. One common religious argument is that God understand the trials faced by humans. In this vein, York writes,

We see there that God made himself known by becoming flesh and entering into the sufferings of this world, then showing by his resurrection from the dead his ability to conquer the awfulness of sin and death.  At the cross not only is comfort offered for those who grieve, but the promise of justice that mourning hearts also yearn for.  You see, God the Father understands heartache.  He watched his own Son die.

It would perhaps be advisable to keep in mind that, when addressing someone who does not share your religious beliefs, simply stating your beliefs is not going to be very convincing. As for the point about God understanding heartache, although I hesitate to be so blunt, it is worth pointing out that if you believe the common interpretation that Jesus’s death was God’s salvation plan for humanity, then God planned the death of his son and Jesus was reunited with his father after his death. To compare God’s experience of Jesus’s death with the experience of parents who, even if they are devout believers, cannot be absolutely certain of what lies beyond and grave and who will be separated from their children either for many years (if there is an afterlife and if they are send to the same place as their children after they die) or for eternity (if there is no afterlife or if they are send to a different afterlife than the one their children were sent to) is appalling to me. I know that there are believers who take comfort in the belief that God understands what they are going through and is there for them (as I also did, when I believed in a god), but the specific story of Jesus’s death is not likely to be very convincing to someone who doesn’t share your interpretation of that specific part of your faith.

Related to this point about not considering the perspective of the person being addressed, York states towards the end of his essay, “Ms. Jacoby, you said very confidently that ‘the dead do not suffer.’  Have you observed this?  By this statement you are making a claim about something that only God himself could know.  Think about that.  When people are truly hurting, adding false and empty solace to the pain creates more despair and confusion, not less.” The immediate observation one can make is that people who believe in the afterlife have not observed it, either, just as atheists have not seen for certain that the dead do not suffer. The second observation one can make is that if someone does not believe in an afterlife, then it’s the afterlife that is the false and empty solace. It’s true that all the secular comfort in the world cannot create an afterlife for someone who fears death, but that does not mean that other sources of solace will cause more despair and confusion; the complete negation of death through belief in a supernatural afterlife is not the only way to lessen the pain.

I have always feared death, and there are a great many books (some nonfiction books about religion and atheism, but mostly works of fiction) that have helped me in thinking about it. They do not offer an afterlife, but they do offer what I think is the commonality between religious and nonreligious forms of comfort in times of grief: the knowledge that we are not alone, that there are others who have tread this path and lived, and that there is still some good in the world.

#

Recommended Reading

Back in December 2011, Susan Jacoby wrote her last regular “Spirited Atheist” column, titled “American atheists must define themselves, not be defined by the religious”.[7]

I’ve been reading Bart Ehrman’s God’s Problem: How the Bible Fails to Answer Our Most Important Question—Why We Suffer, in which he discusses the various answers that the different books of the Bible offer to the eternal problem of theodicy.[8]

Another relevant (and excellent) book is John Green’s novel The Fault in Our Stars.[9] (I reviewed the book in August of last year.)[10]

One of Greta Christina’s must-read essays “Comforting Thoughts About Death That Have Nothing To Do With God” is about the difficulty of thinking about and dealing with death and how to find meaning and comfort in the face of it.[11] Interestingly, Greta has written in another blog entry that the first part of the “Comforting Thoughts” essay—in which she acknowledges that death can be terrifying to think about—has been quoted out of context by some pastors, who have left out the comforting thoughts about death, which (as one can tell from the title) are the point of the essay.[12]

Chapter Nine of Adam Lee’s book Daylight Atheism is titled “Stardust” and is about death.[13] (I reviewed the book in July of last year.)[14]


Referenes

[1] York, Barry. “An Open Letter to Susan Jacoby”. Posted on 10 January 2013 at Gentle Reformation. Retrieved on 16 January 2013 from http://gentlereformation.org/2013/01/10/an-open-letter-to-susan-jacoby/.

[2] Jacoby, Susan. “The Blessings of Atheism”. Posted on 5 January 2013 at The New York Times. Retrieved on 16 January 2013 from http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/06/opinion/sunday/the-blessings-of-atheism.html.

[3] “theodicy”. Dictionary.com Unabridged. Random House, Inc. 16 Jan. 2013. <Dictionary.com http://dictonary.reference.com/browse/theodicy&gt;

[4] Sharmin, Ani J. “Traversing the Bible: On the Experience of Reading the Good Book”. Posted on 28 August 2012 at The Eternal Bookshelf. Retrieved on 16 January 2013 from http://eternalbookshelf.wordpress.com/2012/08/28/traversing-the-bible/.

[5] New Revised Standard Version Bible with Apocrypha. Ed. Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A. Peabody: Hendrickson Publishing, 1989. Print.

[6] Lee, Adam. The Delusion of a Just World. Posted on 3 October 2011 at Daylight Atheism. Retrieved on 21 January 2013 from http://www.patheos.com/blogs/daylightatheism/2011/10/the-delusion-of-a-just-world/.

[7] Jacoby, Susan. “American atheists must define themselves, not be defined by the religious”. Posted on 28 December 2011 at The Spirited Atheist. Retrieved on 16 January 2013 from http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/spirited-atheist/post/american-atheists-must-define-themselves-not-be-defined-by-the-religious/2011/12/27/gIQAovELMP_blog.html.

[8] Ehrman, Bart. God’s Problem: How the Bible Fails to Answer Our Most Important Question—Why We Suffer. New York: HarperCollins, 2008. Print.

[9] Green, John. The Fault in Our Stars. New York, Penguin, 2012. Print.

[10] Sharmin, Ani J. “Book Review: John Green’s ‘The Fault in Our Stars’”. Posted on 26 August 2012 at The Eternal Bookshelf. Retrieved on 16 January 2013 from http://eternalbookshelf.wordpress.com/2012/08/26/book-review-john-greens-the-fault-in-our-stars/.

[11] Christina, Greta. “Comforting Thoughts About Death That Have Nothing To Do With God”. Posted on 10 June 2007 at Greta Christina’s Blog. Retrieved on 16 January 2013 from http://freethoughtblogs.com/greta/2007/06/10/comforting_thou/.

[12] Christina, Greta. “Thou Shalt Not Bear False Witness Against Thy Neighbor”. Posted on 12 December 2007 at Greta Christina’s Blog. Retrieved on 16 January 2013 from http://freethoughtblogs.com/greta/2007/12/12/thou-shalt-not/.

[13] Lee, Adam. Chapter 9. “Stardust”. Daylight Atheism. Big Think, 2012, Ch 9. E-book.

[14] Sharmin, Ani J. “Book Review: Adam Lee’s ‘Daylight Atheism’”. Posted on 16 July 2012 at The Eternal Bookshelf. Retrieved on 16 January 2013 from http://eternalbookshelf.wordpress.com/1012/07/16/book-review-adam-lees-daylight-atheism/.

So Long (to the old year), and Thanks for All the Stories: Celebrating the New Year with the Fourth Book of a Trilogy

Many were increasingly of the opinion that they’d all made a big mistake in coming down from the trees in the first place. And some said that even the trees had been a bad move, and that no one should ever have left the oceans.

And then, one Thursday, nearly two thousand years after one man had been nailed to a tree for saying how great it would be to be nice to people for a change, a girl sitting on her own in a small café in Rickmansworth suddenly realized what it was that had been going wrong all this time, and she finally knew how the world could be made a good and happy place. This time it was right, it would work, and no one would have to get nailed to anything.

Sadly, however, before she could get to a phone to tell anyone about it, the Earth was unexpectedly demolished to make way for a new hyperspace bypass, and so the idea was lost, seemingly for ever.

This is her story.

(Douglas Adams, So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish)[1]

Our planet Earth is moving around our sun Sol, and it has been about one year since my last New Year’s Eve entry,[2] continuing[3] a tradition[4] started three years ago.[5] I wrote recently about humanity’s ability to bring about its own end,[6] and Homo sapiens will one day no longer exist, but until that time, we must live in this universe and try to figure out as much as we can. We are, after all, still here at the moment. We are on our little planet in our little corner of the universe, and we look up at the stars and we look within ourselves. We find, in this endeavor, a great multitude of stories.

The universe cannot sit us down by the fireplace, with a warm blanket to keep out the cold, and tell us its story in a comforting way; it tells us its story through math and science (with results sometimes wondrous and sometimes deathly cold) and we struggle to understand the greatness of existence, in all its confusion, appreciating each small step forward in comprehension, even (and especially) when these steps reach across generations. Our discoveries give us greater understanding, and whether what we find is comforting or frightening, we grow in our appreciation and use that knowledge to take actions that affect the lives of our fellow humans, our planet, and our universe. What we find and what we decide to do with our findings determine who we are and our future; we can do both good and bad acts, for that good and evil which is not found in the inanimate objects of the universe is found within those who live in it.

We humans tell our stories, too, like the universe in which live; we speak and write about what has happened to us and create tales that hold up a mirror to reality. We try, through these efforts, to understand our existence and this odd place in which we live. These stories show us at our best and at our worst, as we find within ourselves what we capable of and what we can be; we create stories about the destruction of the world through those traits which we fear in ourselves and of it saving through those traits we aspire to; we create societies that contain the humor and terror, the comfort and confusion, the hope and the fear, that we find in our own world around us; we create heroes and villains with characteristics that resemble, sometimes disturbingly, what we see in the depths of ourselves. Though these stories can be frightening and painful, they can also be hopeful: we recognize ourselves in what others communicate and feel understood by those around us, even if none of us can really understand everything; we find an expression of what has happened to us and what is possible for us; we find all of existence reflected in the words created by fellow human beings. We take what we have learned from the universe’s stories and our own stories, distilling from them what we find the most meaningful or moving, and we shape our lives and our world in ways that are influenced by these stories in ways that we ourselves don’t always fully understand. Our stories abound, filling countless hours of speech and volumes of writing, each having influence and effects that cannot be predicted by the original authors, weaving a web of connection between human beings down the ages.

And all of these stories put together, all of the stories that humanity has told throughout our history on this Earth (as it has been traveling around our sun, here in our little corner of the vast universe), comprise the story of humanity.

This is our story. Let’s make it a good one.


References

[1] Adams, Douglas. So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish. (first published 1984, last copyrighted 1985) In: The Ultimate Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. New York: Gramercy Books (Random House), 2010 (printed), Prologue, p. 475.

[2] Sharmin, Ani. Celbrating the New Year with Life, the Universe, and Everything. Posted 31 December 2011 at The Eternal Bookshelf. Retrieved on 31 December 2012 from http://eternalbookshelf.wordpress.com/2011/12/31/new-year-2012/.

[3] Sharmin, Ani. Celebrating the New Year at The Restaurant at the End of the Universe. Posted on 31 December 2010 at The Eternal Bookshelf. Retrieved on 31 December 2012 from http://eternalbookshelf.wordpress.com/2010/12/31/new-year-2011/.

[4] The link goes to the entries in the tag “New Year” which can be found at http://eternalbookshelf.wordpress.com/tag/new-year/.

[5] Sharmin, Ani. Celebrating the New Year with The Hitchhiker’s Guide. Posted 31 December 2009 at The Eternal Bookshelf. Retrieved 31 December 2012 from http://eternalbookshelf.wordpress.com/2009/12/31/new-year-2010/.

[6] Sharmin, Ani. “But If It Had To Perish Twice”. Posted on 21 December 2012 at The Eternal Bookshelf. Retrieved on 31 December 2012 from http://eternalbookshelf.wordpress.com/2012/12/21/but-if-it-had-to-perish-twice/.

“But If It Had To Perish Twice”

Some say the world will end in fire,

Some say in ice.

From what I’ve tasted of desire

I hold with those who favor fire.

But if it had to perish twice,

I think I know enough of hate

To say that for destruction ice

Is also great

And would suffice

(Robet Frost, “Fire and Ice”)[1]

One is tempted, when hearing about the most recent iteration of the frequent apocalyptic predictions, to insist that humanity is more resilient than the universe gives us credit for, but when upon considering the fact that it is humans who have repeatedly predicted the end times with excitement at the prospect, doubt of our fate begins to flourish. Today is the most recent in a list of the many days which have been predicted by members of the human race to be the day when the world will end—the day it will perish.

This topic brings to mind Robert Frost’s “Fire and Ice”, which is quoted in full at the beginning of this essay. When I included this poem in a high-school English project as one of my favorite poems, I did so because I found in it great insight into a topic that humans have written countless volumes on: the end of the world.  This poem addresses the end of the world by focusing, not on predictions of the date on which it will occur, but on the observation that it is human beings who will likely bring about the end of the world with the question of which of humanity’s characteristics will be the ultimate cause. Both human beings’ desire and hatred are capable of destroying the world, and the narrator thinks it is our desire that is more likely to be the cause, though our hatred would (no doubt) be sufficient for the task.

There are seven other planets in our solar system, and hundreds of extrasolar planets have been discovered so far—so many worlds— and, yet, when we talk about the end of the world, we obviously mean our world, the planet Earth. The destruction of a lifeless planet (or other astronomical object) is fascinating from a scientific and aesthetic viewpoint, but it would not affect life, would not be the end of a species or a society or a civilization. While we talk about the end of the world, the focus is often the end of humanity—the end of our world—and what will bring it about.

There is no dearth of hypotheses concerning the end of the world and the end of humanity. There are those who propose plausible scientific suggestions (such as plagues or the collision of an asteroid with Earth) for disasters that could occur and destroy the human race, based on events that have happened in the past. (Some of these would destroy the planet as well, but some would merely destroy us, with the potential for evolution to continue on the surviving species.) There are those who believe that contact with aliens from other planets will bring about, if not the destruction of humanity, then at least a great change in our world and societies. (There is the oft-stated observation that if the extraterrestrials have the technology to travel to Earth and arrive here at a time when we don’t have the technology to travel to their planet, they are probably more technologically advanced than we are, and would be able to conquer us easily.) There are those who believe that there will be a supernatural end that has been planned by a deity or deities that watch our actions. (These tend to come with inevitably-incorrect predictions containing specific dates.) There are many possible scenarios that could destroy us, and even when one subtracts out those which seem the most outlandish and unlikely, the planet still seems a dangerous place to live and the universe an unfeeling expanse that would not care if we ceased to exist.

There are a great many endings that can be imagined, as is evidenced by the great many stories that humans have already created. The end time narrative is forever being discussed, altered, imagined, and forecasted by a species which can imagine its own end and deals with that ability by telling stories about it. The same imagination that allows us to line our bookshelves with wonderful stories also allows us to bring about some of the great and terrible things we imagine in reality. We have added to our stories, ominously, the means to destroy ourselves. Our desires and our hatred, which define so much of who we are, combine with our abilities, skills, intelligence, and ignorance with results that show what we are capable of at our best and worst.

There will come a day when the world will end, when humanity no longer exists, whether because our descendants no longer exist or because our species has changed beyond anything we would recognize. The eternal question is, when that day comes, which one of the many possible causes will bring about our destruction. It may not be a great cataclysm, but a quiet end of for our species, though our ability to bring about our own end in such myriad ways is disturbing enough to make me wonder if there will indeed be some sadly ironic end reminiscent of a science fiction novel containing a (hopefully) thoughtful message about the dangerous of human folly. We are left with few certainties, but with an acknowledgement of a though that teaches us something about ourselves. The world will perish, and given our nature, it may be due to our devices.

And even if it had to perish twice, humans could no doubt still provide sufficient ammunition for the cause.


References

[1] Frost, Robert. “Fire and Ice” (1920). In: The Poetry of Robert Frost. Ed. Edward Connery Lathem. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1975, p. 220.

Book Review: J. K. Rowling’s “The Casual Vacancy”

But then, so local legend told, came the sudden darkness that attends the appearance of the wicked fairy. (J. K. Rowling, The Casual Vacancy)[1]

Barry Fairbrother dies (of an aneurysm) within the first few pages of J. K. Rowling’s new book The Casual Vacancy. His death will likely not surprise readers, as it is mentioned in the synopsis, but it does surprise the people in the town of Pagford. The book is about the aftermath of his death, and during that aftermath, we see into the minds of various Pagford citizens whose lives interact with one another’s and show some of the most disturbing aspects of life.

This book was released on 27 September 2012, and I finished reading it in early October. I decided that I should write a review, but the idea of doing so presents a certain personally fascinating topic for thought. It should perhaps be clear from my confessed devotion to[2] and frequent writing about[3] the Harry Potter series that my reviewing of any book by J. K. Rowling will present the dilemmas of how to make sure I am being as fair as possible and how to determine what effects my love of Harry Potter is having on my review. This feeling began even before the book was released. I was extremely excited about the release of Vacancy, but also felt a feeling of quiet dread; I felt afraid that I would hate it or that I would be so biased due to my love of Harry Potter that I would not be able to judge the book fairly, considering it better than it actually is (due to my bias in favor of the author) or considering it worse than it actually is (by comparing it to Harry Potter and thereby, inevitably, finding it lacking). I have mentioned before that I think Barry’s death is a metaphorical death for Harry Potter,[4] and I think Vacancy is a book that, because it is the first book by a famous author that is not part of her beloved series, presents fans with the excitement and nervousness of unexplored territory.

The territory, it turns out, is fascinating but uneven in places, sometimes delightfully and sometimes frustratingly. This is a book that takes a while to become enthralling. The book is divided into eight parts, seven of which are numbered One through Seven with a part called (Olden Days) in between Part One and Part Two. Each part begins with a (surprisingly relevant) quote from Charles Arnold-Baker’s Local Council Administration, Seventh Edition. Part One reads a bit like a prologue that’s meant to give small amounts of information that will be expanded upon later, but at fifty pages long, it’s a bit lengthy for that role and it takes at while for the reader to get settled into the world of this book. The reader is introduced to many characters in quick succession; the purpose of this is to introduce them by showing their reactions to the death of Barry Fairbrother. The beginning sections of the part called (Olden Days), from page 51 to page 62, read more like the actual beginning of the story, after the Part One prologue has ended. This section introduces the reader to the history of the Pagford and its relationship with nearby Yarvil and with the Fields (the council estate just north of Pagford). After this, the remainder of the part titled (Olden Days) and the rest of the book continue with the stories of the various characters, their interactions with each other, and their personal struggles within the larger narrative. The structure of the story is clearly very important, because experiencing the story from the points of view of certain characters during certain events helps to build the different levels of the narrative and gives us insight into various characters’ minds.

The characters in Vacancy range from the fascinating to the boring, from the sympathetically almost-lovable to the thoroughly despicable. It sometimes happens in a story with many points of view that I will find myself looking forward to certain sections moreso than others, and that was the case with this book as well; there were certain characters who were immediately interesting and whose sections I would look forward to reading, and other characters whose sections I found a struggle to get through. Certain characters were better written and more developed than others. It has been commented on by others that Rowling’s teenage character are more sympathetic and interesting than her adult characters — an assessment which I think is partially accurate for this book specifically. The teenagers in this book are all extremely fascinating. Krystal Weedon is, of course, the person whose life story shows the central theme of the story, and she is portrayed in a way which makes the reader cheer for her to overcome the struggles she is faced with and despair when horrors occur in her life. Sukhvinder Jawanda almost immediately became one of my favorite characters soon after she was introduced. Andrew “Arf” Price is extremely sympathetic due to his horrible home life and his struggle to be brave enough to stand up to his abusive father. Gaia Bawden is at first just the loud teenage daughter of one character and the crush of another, but she becomes more interesting as the story goes on, especially in her friendship with Sukhvinder. Some characters, despite being not very likeable, were still interesting to read about. One such character was Stuart “Fats” Wall. Though he is one of the characters I very much disliked, due to his treatment of Suchvinder and sympathetic feelings towards Simon Price, his sections are among the best writing in the book. Not all of the adult characters are beyond redemption, however, and some were among the best characters in the story. Parminder Jawanda, Kay Bawden, Tessa Wall were great to read about; in addition to each of their roles in the story, they were each full-developed as characters in their own rights, in addition to being sympathetic due to at least some of their actions. Parminder’s internal struggle about her motivations for wanting to help the people in the Fields and her reminders to herself, when she has acted in a way she feels ashamed of, that she ought to see the good in everyone make her story fascinating. Her actions which emotionally harm her daughter Sukhvinder make me angry at her, but the fact that she does this unknowingly makes me feel sad for her as well. Kay Bawden is a social worker whose concern for the Weedons makes her an almost-immediately likeable character and I ended up wishing that she would be able to inspire more characters to share her dedication. Tessa Wall is the guidance counselor who wants to help her students, but at the same time, has trouble with her own son at home, especially in dealing with the relationship between her son Stuart Wall and husband Colin Wall. By contrast, some other characters were not as well-developed. Samantha and Shirley Mollison were defined almost entirely by their rivalries and resentments. Colin Wall was a character who I would have liked to know more about, but it’s understandable why his story wasn’t central to the narrative. There were some characters, such as Howard Mollison and Gavin Hughs, who were effective in showing legitimate problem in society (with Howard Mollison’s reasons for being against the Fields sounding extremely similar to arguments put forward by politicians in our own world), but who were not as fascinating and didn’t motivate a desire to know more about them. Overall, Rowling has a talent for creating fascinating characters who take on a life of their own in readers’ imaginations, but that talent was on display here for only some of the characters and not others.

The writing in this book may seem shockingly different from the writing in Rowling’s previous books, due to the profanity and descriptions of sex, but after this briefly surprising impression, there is the recognition of the fact that these aspects are appropriate for this particular story. Reading Rowling without Harry, Ron, and Hermione is initially an odd experience, but once I got settled in, I began to recognize the familiar contours of Rowling’s writing. As uncomfortable a place as Pagford is, and despite the fact that readers likely want to run away from it as quickly as we wanted to run towards Hogwarts, Rowling’s writing is — at least in some places — a welcome place to return to. Though I did not finish reading this novel as quickly as I got through each of the Harry Potter books, it is still compulsively readable after a bit of a slow start.

Vacancy contains important social messages, the most prominent of which is the theme about how we treat others and how a person’s actions can affect others, sometimes even in ways the person is not aware of. This is not a story of a gigantic battle between good and evil, but it is about how little good and bad things done by individual people affect others, and the story of this village is powerful despite the small size of its setting, due to the fact that its story is relevant to so many societies and to humanity in general. There are certain parts of the book which are disturbing reminders of the horrors which occur in the world, bringing to mind the reader’s own personal experiences. While reading the book, there were several times when I felt that sick feeling of recognition, that feeling that an author has so well captured a situation I have been in or a feeling I have experienced that I feel both ill at the reminder and grateful for the understanding. This book illustrates the existence of bullies without the comfort of a story in which the bullied find allies and triumph over those who hurt them. It shows a world in which teenagers cause great harm to their peers without others in the class standing up for the student who is being bullied, in which those who are abused and assaulted find themselves without anyone to turn to for help, and in which adult bullies are in positions of power with the ability to make life much worse for those who are already in desperate circumstances. This is where Rowling’s writing is at its best, as she is able to write passages which make us feel the horror of being in the situations her characters are experiencing. There is great emphasis on both the mundane aspects and horrors of life, with some hints that hope exists but is easily defeated by humanity’s great faults — one of which is our ability to avoid paying attention to and thinking about things which make us uncomfortable. The last line of the book reads, “Her family half carried Terri Weedon back down the royal-blue carpet, and the congregation averted its eyes.”[5] This, I think, a wonderful summation of the social message of the book. Many of the people in the town of Pagford have been ignoring the plight of those who are in less fortunate circumstances than themselves, sometimes even despising people like the Weedons instead of feeling motivated to help them. At the end of the story, though they regret what happened to Robbie Weedon, there is not a great indication that they have realized their mistakes or changed their behavior. To put it another way, this is a book in which the funeral of Barry Fairbrother is one of the most humorous passages.

This book is one of that number which come with automatic audiences; there are a great many Harry Potter fans (myself included) who decided to read this book due to our love of Rowling’s previous books. This is, I suppose, to be expected whenever any book by J. K. Rowling is released. Readers who judge this book against their feelings towards Harry Potter will likely be disappointed. (It would perhaps be too much to ask for a repeat of the series’ success; there are books which take on such a central role in a person’s life that not many others, even those by the same author, will be considered equal.) Readers who are willing to accept that their opinion of J. K. Rowling’s most recent book do not have to be equivalent to their feelings of her previous ones may find a book worth reading. This isn’t a book which will be reread innumerable times by fans looking to return to a beloved story and a place where they feel hope. It is, however, worth reading and considering, given the writing and the subject matter it addresses.


References

[1] Rowling, J. K. The Casual Vacancy. London: Little, Brown, 2012, (Olden Days), III, p. 55. Print.

[2] Sharmin, Ani J. Harry Potter is Love. Retrieved on 24 October 2012 from http://eternalbookshelf.wordpress.com/harry-potter-is-love/.

[3] The link goes to the posts in the “Harry Potter (i.e. My Life)” category on my blog. These posts can be found at http://eternalbookshelf.wordpress.com/category/harry-potter-i-e-my-life/.

[4] Sharmin, Ani J. J. K. Rowling’s New Testament “The Casual Vacancy”: My Thoughts on the Announcement and Hopes for the Book. Posted on 13 April 2012 at The Eternal Bookshelf. Retrieved on 10 November 2012 from http://eternalbookshelf.wordpress.com/2012/04/13/rowlings-the-casual-vacancy-announcement/.

[5] Vacancy, Part Seven, p. 503.

Sally Ride, 26 May 1951 – 23 July 2012

Sally Ride, an astronaut who was a part of two space flights aboard Space Shuttle Challenger, died last month.[1] Among the many excellent articles about her life and contributions,[2] there’s one which ends with the moving paragraph, “Dr. Ride told interviewers that what drove her was not the desire to become famous or to make history as the first woman in space. All she wanted to do was fly, she said, to soar into space, float around weightless inside the shuttle, look at the heavens and gaze back at Earth. In photographs of her afloat in the spaceship, she was grinning, as if she had long last reached the place she was meant to be.”[3] That view, the sight of our little planet from the vastness of space, is one that very few human beings have seen, and one of the people who saw that wondrous sight is no longer with us.

Ride became the first American woman in space on 18 June 1983, and she is to this day, the youngest American astronaut launched into space. She was the third woman in space, after Valentina Tereshkova (1963) and Svetlana Savitskaya (1982). After Ride’s death, it was revealed that she had been in a 27-year relationship with her partner Tam O’Shaughnessy, making her the first known LGBT astronaut.[4] When someone has the courage and determination to challenge unjust social barriers, to show that they are just as capable as members of the majority group, that person is often remembered for taking a step forward and bringing society with them. It is for this reason that Sally Ride is remembered not just for her own wonderful accomplishments, but also for the impact she had had on others, by inspiring those who have heard of her and speaking out about science education, especially for girls.

The exploration of space fascinates humanity, regardless of the genders of the astronauts, due to the great amount of knowledge that waits for us out in the vastness of that frontier. The fact that there have been female astronauts and at least one LGBT astronaut who worked hard and fought to be included despite the discriminatory assumptions made about them makes me feel that my love of science and of space is shared and understood. It gives me inspiration to keep fighting when someone tries to stop me from accomplishing my dreams. It gives me hope for a better future for science, for our country, and for our world.

I just want to say: Thank you, Sally Ride. Thank you.

Because of Sally Ride and others like her, who worked hard and fought for their dreams, the lives of girls and women who want to go into science are better. We have more opportunities than we would have if they hadn’t done what they did. In their actions and successes, we have historical precedents and inspirational stories. Because they followed their dreams, we can follow ours, and the people who will be able to see that amazing view of the Earth from space in the future will hopefully be drawn from all of humanity.

Ride, Sally Ride.


References

[1] Sally Ride’s obituary can be found at https://www.sallyridescience.com/sallyride.

[2] There’s a page at Sally Ride Science called “Remembering Sally Ride” with links to many articles. The page can be found at https://www.sallyridescience.com/sallyride/remembering.

[3] Grady, Denise. American Woman Who Shattered Space Ceiling. Posted on 23 July 2012 at The New York Times. Retrieved on 28 August 2012 from http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/24/science/space/sally-ride-trailblazing-astronaut-dies-at-61.html.

[4] Garofoli, Joe. Sally Ride ‘never hid,’ just private. Posted on 25 July 2012 at San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved on 28 August 2012 from http://www.sfgate.com/politics/joegarofoli/article/Sally-Ride-never-hid-just-private-3732556.php.

Traversing the Bible: On the Experience of Reading the Good Book

It is full of interest. It has noble poetry in it; and some clever fables; and some blood-drenched history; and some good morals; and some execrable morals; and a wealth of obscenity; and upwards of a thousand lies. (Satan, Mark Twain’s Letters from the Earth)[1]

How would I describe the experience of reading the Bible? What difficulties are encountered? How would one describe the writing? Which parts are enjoyable and which are excruciating? Which parts are well-known and which are surprising? These are some of the questions I want to address. This is not meant to be a complete review, as I have many more thoughts on specific passages, but is meant as an expression of the experience of reading the Bible, of what it’s like to read this collection of texts that is so often discussed and so infrequently read in our society. Reading the Bible is like traversing a diverse landscape about which one has heard much from many others, most of whom have never actually visited the location.

The first observation about the Bible (and perhaps one of the most common) is its length. The Biblical canon contains many books, different in quantity and sequence in the canons of different religious denominations. Reading through the Bible took me about two years — and I wasn’t even reading from the King James (or “Authorized”) Version. I started reading the New King James Version (from a copy I had received as a Christmas gift from a friend several years prior) but switched over to the New International Version (NIV) sometime during the Torah and read most of the Bible from that translation. I read some of the apocryphal/deuterocanonical books from the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV), because the NIV does not include those books. This was actually my second attempt at reading the Bible; I had tried reading it once before, during a period of time during middle school when I was considering converting to Christianity (a story for another day, perhaps).

Reading the Torah (the first five books) is most definitely slow going, due to the lists and minute details about animal sacrifices and instructions on violent punishments. The worst was Leviticus, not just because of the aforementioned characteristics, but also because, in the middle of all this horribleness, there were a couple of lines that said to love your neighbor (Leviticus 19:18) and that is jarring in its contradiction. Similarly, there are passages in the Bible about God’s mercy that are surrounded by examples of God behaving in exactly the opposite manner. It becomes clear from reading these types of passages that the Biblical claims of justice are only meant to apply to certain groups of people and are really discriminatory in their application.

There are some sections that are particularly wonderful and worth reading as literature. The Book of Job is my personal favorite part of the Bible. It shows a character who, unlike many of the other main characters in the Bible (who receive prophecies and other messages from God on a regular basis), is in a situation similar to the average human being for most of the book, prior to the part when God speaks to him. There are horrible things happening to him, even though he is blameless and upright. He’s wondering why these horrible things are happening and wants to confront God. God’s response in the end does not really address Job’s complaints, and we are left thinking that Job was right in wanting to argue his case against God (Job 13:1-3). The Book of Job deals with the problem of bad things happening to good people, even when they follow what God wants them to do, and the book makes a case against the versions of God described in most of the books of the Bible. It questions God’s justice and the existence of a just world.

The Psalms are surprising, because the famous Psalm 23 (“The LORD is my shepherd”) is not really representative of the tone or subject matter of the rest. The psalms range in length from two verses (Psalm 117) to one hundred seventy-six verses (Psalm 119) and range from the comforting to the terrifying, from expressions of jubilation to misery. The Proverbs are also varied, from the obvious to the objectionable, and contain some poetry. I’m partial to Proverbs 8, personally. Ecclesiastes is another book that, like Job, questions the existence of justice, though in a different way, and states that all are subject to time and chance (Ecclesiastes 9:11).

Reading the Prophets is especially interesting, because I think these are among the books of the Bible of which I knew the least before reading them. Stories of Adam and Eve, Abraham, Moses, and Jesus are mentioned in our society very often (in everything from religious debates to children’s cartoon shows), and though the versions we hear are often stripped of some of the more objectionable passages, we do get the basics of the storyline. The Prophets, by comparison, are often well-known for certain short passages that are important to certain points of doctrine or are famous due historical reasons (e.g. Isaiah 7:14, 53:5, 40:4-8; Amos 5:24; Micah 4:3, 6:8) and certain miraculous stories such as Daniel’s survival despite being thrown into the den of lions and Jonah surviving despite being swallowed by a fish, with much of the context or general outline of the stories in which these events occur left unmentioned. While there are other books and sections of books that I was unfamiliar with prior to reading the Bible, this was a major section comprised of many books about which I knew very little, compared to its length. The Prophets, it turns out, are a questionable and confusing lot, sometimes wonderfully poetic, sometimes horrendously cruel, and often both simultaneously. These books are often quoted for their passages about justice (as support for social justice causes) and their prophecies about the future (linked by certain movements within Christianity to Jesus Christ and the upcoming End Times). When reading these books, one is struck (as with the Torah), with the juxtaposition of claims of justice alongside unjust actions taken by God. Again, we have the claims about God being just alongside descriptions of his wrath. There is focus on helping the poor and needy, but also focus on following the correct god. Reading these books while not being a member of the religions of which it is scripture, one notices the repeated associations made between following the wrong gods and immorality, which is one of the things which make the claims of justice ring hollow.

Oddly enough, the Gospels (despite apologetic arguments about the New Testament’s superiority to the Old Testament) are rather frustrating, because it feels like you’re reading different versions of the same story four times in a row. The Gospel of John provides some relief, as it is substantially different from the synoptic gospels. When I was reading the Bible, I received some advice online to read the Gospel of John first. I also saw this advice on other websites. Though I did not follow it at the time, I think I understand now why John is so beloved; it contains long passages of Jesus speaking directly to his apostles with emphasis on his nature, their salvation, and love. These passages read like a personal message to his followers, mentioning his love and dedication to them. In addition to making the reader (especially the believing reader) feel personally addressed, these passages also flow together well, in contrast to the various parables in the other three Gospels that sometimes seem to stop and start suddenly.

A great deal of the letters in the New Testament sound like what’s referred to as Christianese, filled as they are with the authors’ advice on Christian doctrine and practice. Unlike narrative texts, in which one can usually follow the story from one event to the next (with some suspension of disbelief for the fantastical elements), the letters contain direct statements and opinions of religious doctrines with less narrative to read around them. There were several times when I had to go back and read a passage again, because (being letters between believers) they contain phrases that one unaccustomed to the community may find odd. Some of the arguments only connect together if one accepts the underlying premises, whereas if one doesn’t, it can be difficult to understand why the authors have reached their conclusions. Despite this, the New Testament as a whole is easier to read than the Hebrew Bible, due both to its shorter length and writing style.

The Book of Revelation is the New Testament’s answer to the Prophets. This is a book that has been described as written by someone who must have been under the influence of a drug (by critics of the Bible) and has been interpreted in a variety of ways relating to the End Times, especially Armageddon (by certain Christian denominations). I think I was expecting a clearer message of what will happen at the end of the world (given the confidence with which people speak about certain details), but I actually think Revelation is less clear on those details than the other prophetic and apocalyptic passages in the Bible, filled as it is with symbols that have been interpreted as references to various historical figures, countries, and dates throughout history.

One of the many difficulties in assessing the collections of works that are the Bible, even to form one’s own opinion, is the inevitable influence that our perceptions of the Bible, based upon its place in our society, have upon our views. It is, of course, true of many books that their reputation precedes them, but few others are taught with instructions from authority figures that one must believe this book is wonderful or risk upsetting a divine being. Few others, in addition, are cited as ultimate justification and final authority for certain treatment of others. Given these preconceptions, often partially based upon the way one’s life has been affected by the use of Biblical texts, it is difficult (if not impossible) to come to the text bereft of a prejudgment or notion of how one should feel about it. I do not claim to be without preconceptions of the Bible, but my conclusion after having read it is that more people should read it. Comparing one’s sparse knowledge of the Bible from our society and various media with the actual contents of the book provides an opportunity to be surprised (both pleasantly and horribly) and to marvel at the fact that a book which so few people have read has such a big impact upon our world.

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Acknowledgements and Recommended Reading/Listening

Recently, Jerry Coyne over at Why Evolution is True wrote about his decision to read the Bible (specifically the King James Version) and what he things of it so far.[2] Professor Coyne has since posted updates: one at the end of July[3] and one a couple of weeks ago.[4]  Eric MacDonald wrote about the Bible as literature in response to Coyne’s efforts.[5] Much of what I’ve written here are things that I’ve been thinking about writing for a while, but these pieces entries motivated me to actually write it, so I offer my thanks.

Over the past few weeks, I listened to the online lectures in the course Introduction to the Old Testament (Hebrew Bible) by Professor Christine Hayes[6] at Open Yale Courses.[7] I found the course very educational, and I very much recommend it. There is also another course called Introduction to the New Testament History and Literature by Professor Dale B. Martin,[8] which I have not finished listening to yet, but which promises to be just as wonderful.


References

[1] Twain, Mark. Letters from the Earth. In: The Bible According to Mark Twain: irreverent writings on Eden, heaven, and the flood by America’s master satirist. Ed. Howard G. Baetzhold and Joseph B. McCullough. New York: Simon & Schuster Inc., 1996, p. 227. Print.

Mark Twain’s Letters from the Earth is available to read online (with some differences from the edition from which I’m quoting, probably due to the work’s incomplete nature and posthumous publication) at http://www.sacred-texts.com/aor/twain/letearth.htm.

[2] Coyne, Jerry. The Bible is boring and insipid. Posted at Why Evolution is True on 22 Jun 2012. Retrieved on 2 July 2012 from http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2012/06/22/the-bible-is-boring-and-insipid/.

[3] Coyne, Jerry. Interim Bible report: no poetry in sight. Posted on 30 July 2012 at Why Evolution is True. Retrieved on 5 August 2012 from http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2012/07/30/interim-bible-report-no-poetry-to-be-seen/.

[4] Coyne, Jerry. Again: Is there poetry in the Old Testament? Posted on 8 August 2012 at Why Evolution is True. Retrieved on 12 August 2012 from http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2012/08/08/again-is-there-poetry-in-the-old-testament/.

[5] MacDonald, Eric. The Bible as Literature. Posted on 8 August 2012 at Choice in Dying. Retrieved on 14 August 2012 from http://choiceindying.com/2012/08/08/the-bible-as-literature/.

[6] The Open Yale Course Introduction to the Old Testament (Hebrew Bible) by Professor Christine Hayes can be found at http://oyc.yale.edu/religious-studies/rlst-145.

[7] The Open Yale Courses website can be found at http://oyc.yale.edu/. There are courses in various subject areas.

[8] Introduction to the New Testament History and Literature by Professor Dale B. Martin can be found at http://oyc.yale.edu/religious-studies/rlst-152.

Book Review: John Green’s “The Fault in Our Stars”

“There will come a time,” I said, “when all of us are dead. All of us. There will come a time when there are no human beings remaining to remember that anyone ever existed or that our species ever did anything. There will be no one left to remember Aristotle or Cleopatra, let alone you. Everything that we did and built and wrote and thought and discovered will be forgotten and all of this”—I gestured emcompassingly—“will have been for naught. Maybe that time is coming soon and maybe it is millions of years away, but even if we survive the collapse of our sun, we will not survive forever. There was a time before organisms experienced consciousness, and there will be a time after. And if the inevitability of human oblivion worries you, I encourage you to ignore it. God knows that’s what everyone else does.” (Hazel Grace Lancaster in John Green’s The Fault in Our Stars)[1]

 Ignoring oblivion might seem a necessity for Hazel Grace Lancaster, a sixteen -year-old cancer patient who recognizes the likelihood of her premature death, but this book isn’t about oblivion. It’s about the life that precedes it. Hazel writes, “Sometimes, you read a book and it fills you with an evangelical zeal, and you become convinced that the shattered world will never be put back together unless and until all living humans read the book. And then there are books like An Imperial Affliction, which you can’t tell people about, books so special and rare and yours that advertising your affection feels like a betrayal.”[2] The books which fall into either of these two special categories are wonderful indeed, and The Fault in Our Stars is one of them.

One may expect a book in which a patient with a terminal illness gains wonderful insight about the meaning of life to be predictable (one of the “cancer books” with which Hazel contrasts her favorite book Peter Van Houten’s An Imperial Affliction), but Hazel story is both relatable and remarkable, both ordinary and profound. She’s a girl who spends every moment hooded up to oxygen, due to the cancer metastases in her lungs, and one of her most fervent desires is to find out what happens in the story after her favorite novel ends. The questions of life that we all think about are more urgent for her, given her illness, and she worries about the effect her death will have on the people closest to her, especially her parents. She has experienced the harsh realities of life and her observations about life are serious, hilarious, and witty. Her personality and her remarks about life, her decisions and her reactions to the situations she faces (everything from hospital visits to reading books to meeting a boy she likes), all make her a character that readers will cheer for and love.

John Green’s writing in this novel is wonderful to read, and one can really imagine a person speaking the way that Hazel narrates the story. Green writes in a way that makes the reader feel that Hazel is a real person and her comments, both in narration and dialogue, can evoke laughter while reading one paragraph and tears while reading the next, and sometimes both at the same time. While writing this review, I couldn’t decide on just one quote to include in this review, which is why there are several. This is one book which readers will come away from wanting to quote the entire volume. It’s both well-written and very quick to read, the ease of its prose not to be mistaken for simplicity. As Hazel feels about An Imperial Affliction, we come to the end of the book and want the story to continue.

This book contains great depth and meaning. There is discussion of serious topics such as death, the inevitable pain that is a part of life, the unexpected and surprising situations that humans face, and the experience of living life while knowing that you’ve drawn — really, been given by chance, and for no discernible reason — an extremely difficult lot. There are myriad symbols and references to be analyzed in this book. There are references to Shakespeare (including the title); a great deal of symbolism involving (among many others) water, stars, and breathing; and some mentions of little things in life that hold a lot of meaning in the story. This is a book that I want to read again, because I know that there are more things I will find that I missed the first time through.

There is a passage in the book in which Hazel says, “Some infinities are bigger than other infinities.”[3] There is infinity in this book, waiting to be explored by readers who are eager for the journey.

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Recommended Listening

Melissa Anelli and Rosianna Halse Rojas of LeakyNews discussed John Green’s The Fault in Our Stars in a podcast back in January.[4] It’s a really fun and nerdy conversation, and I really enjoyed it.


References

[1] Green, John. The Fault in Our Stars. New York: Penguin, 2012, Ch 1, p. 13. Print.

[2] The Fault in Our Stars, Ch 2, p. 33.

[3] The Fault in Our Stars, Ch 20, p. 260.

[4] Anelli, Melissa. BookTalk: The Fault in Our Stars. Posted on 13 January 2012 at LeakyNews. Retrieved on 12 August 2012 from http://www.leakynews.com/booktalk-the-fault-in-our-stars/.