Thursday 18 January 2024

Mutual Incomprehension

"The Problem of Pain."

Arrach, the young female Ythrian, has been lost at sea. Miscommunications multiply. First, Arrach's father, Enherrian, assures her mother, Whell, that Arrach would have fought well and given God honour. Peter Berg wonders whether this means that Arrach prayed and confessed while drowning. It does not. Berg does murmur that Arrach is in heaven but must say this in Anglic, not in Planha. Christians cannot know where anyone has gone in the hereafter, especially not members of another species. In any case, Enherrian thinks that Arrach cannot be anywhere since she is dead. When Berg starts to ask about Arrach's spirit, Enherrian interrupts that that spirit:

"'Will be remembered in pride.'" (p. 122)

- and returns to his work. When Olga Berg completes her husband's question as to belief in spirits outliving bodies, Enherrian expresses incomprehension and closes the conversation not with words but with posture and plumage. They really are at cross-purposes here.

Berg reflects:

"How sorry I feel for these my friends, who don't know they will meet their beloved afresh!" (p. 122)

Sorry, Pete. You do not know that. You only believe it. But, even if there is a hereafter, it has got to be a big place. How do you know that you and Olga will survive in the same "mansion"?

And what is Berg's argument for survival? He continues:

"They will, regardless. It makes no sense that God, Who created what is because in His goodness he wished to share existence, would shape a soul only to break it and throw it away." (ibid.)

Assuming God's existence, it makes sense that He will do whatever He sees as best. If a human life is finite in time, with a beginning, a middle and an end, does this mean that it is broken and thrown away? This is wish fulfilment disguised as reasoning.

8 comments:

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

And I do believe, from faith and revelation, that I know the soul survives bodily death. Again, another error by the Ythrians.

In some ways "The Problem of Pain" is analogous to the much later "A Tragedy of Errors," with characters in both stories repeatedly misunderstanding each other.

Ad astra! Sean

paulshackley2017@gmail.com said...

Sean,

You believe that you know?

Paul.

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

Yes, because I believe revealed truths are true even if they have to be accepted by or thru assenting to faith.

Ad astra! Sean

paulshackley2017@gmail.com said...

Sean,

But that is not knowledge.

Paul.

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

And I disagree.

Ad astra! Sean

paulshackley2017@gmail.com said...

Sean,

Faith is knowledge?

Paul.

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

More exactly, what I had in mind was how I accept as true sources you disbelieve in--such as the Scriptures, the authoritative Tradition of the Church on matters of faith and doctrine. As found in the Fathers, Doctors of the Church, binding definitions when a valid Ecumenical Council or one of the Popes speaks ex cathedra.

Ad astra! Sean

paulshackley2017@gmail.com said...

Sean,

So really the word, "knowledge," is inappropriate. This is opinion or belief based on sources accepted by some but not by others.

Paul.