Gunnar Heim:
"Please...let me live that long. I don't ask for more. Please, Fox has got to be told." (p. 194)
See "There are no atheists in foxholes," here.
Heim offers a foxhole prayer. We can all do this. It is the old pagan/agnostic prayer to "whatever gods may be" and does not prove that we are all covert monotheists. The prayer of monotheist faith is not just said in foxholes and is a different matter entirely. My closest approach to it is zazen meditation because I do not believe that reality is or can be a person to be addressed in verbal prayer. But, whatever the reality is, we are all in it.
Do novels always raise ultimate philosophical questions? I think so, as long as their characters reflect and/or pray.
Kaor, Paul!
ReplyDeleteMost times, however, when I read about agnostics in dangerous places making foxhole prayers, they address them to God, not "gods." The instinctive default seems to be monotheistic, not polytheist.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
ReplyDeleteI think that that is cultural and linguistic, not instinctive.
Paul.