Sigh

[tree_and_leaf]

I was in Borders this afternoon, looking for a chocolate croissant, and noticed that Sarah Paretsky was coming to speak about her new novel tonight. Too late for me, alas.

On the other hand, I did get a very good book about the history of doctrine. But Border's 'Religion' section drives me up the wall. They jumble together Bibles and liturgy, academic theology, popular theology, devotional books (mostly American), utter rubbish of the Holy Blood and the Holy Grail type, some books on magic that I suspect were misfiled, and ghastly novels like the Left Behind series, which certainly shouldn't be in the non-fiction section. You can't find anything. Blackwells is much better: a far bigger selection and categorised by someone who knows something about the subject (and no Baigent and Leigh or LeHay, or whatever the guy is called, which is a good thing). On the other hand, they do sometimes have good books, particularly from American publishers, which Blackwells sometimes don't - such as Pelikan's history of Christian Doctrine.

/rant...

Comments

[gramarye1971]

I've noticed the disorganised nature of the Religion section at my own local chain bookstores as well. One of the bookstores does make some effort at sorting out the differences by having a separate section for 'Bibles' and for 'Christian Inspiration', but that still means that you get C.S. Lewis's Mere Christianity put next to the Left Behind books, which offends me to the point where I have to walk away quickly, lest I go and turn the Left Behind books (which are nearly always displayed face-forward, so as to give them more prominent shelf-space) so that the back cover is facing out.

Admittedly, it also erks me that recent spate of 'Popular Philosophy' books are mixed up with works like Plato's Republic, Marcus Aurelius's Meditations and Nietzsche's Beyond Good and Evil. But Lewis and LeHaye should practically be on opposite sides of the store...or preferably not even IN the same store.

[tree_and_leaf]

Yes - I've never read much of Left Behind (which I keep wanting to call 'Spirited Away', which is a bit of an insult to a fine animated film), but it appears to be, in my view, a very dangerous heresy (and eye-bleedingly badly written into the bargin). In any case, though, it's fiction - one usually doesn't find Lewis' science fiction in the religion section. On the other hand, there are reasons why non-Christians might want to read Lewis' SF that don't apply to LeHay's (such as literary quality, and interesting ideas).

I wonder where the Rapture idea got started? There's no trace of it in mediaeval theology or popular piety (or popular heresy) that I've found.

[gramarye1971]

I've heard varying information about the origin of the Rapture and its use by the LeHayes et al., but I think it comes from some text or other (possibly in Revelation) that mentions how the faithful will be 'lifted up' -- I'm not sure exactly what the context is, but I think it alludes back to some of the Old Testament patriarchs (Elijah?) who were taken up bodily and never actually died per se. There might also be some hints of the old Roman Catholic and Orthodox interpretation of Mary's Assumption, but from what I know most evangelical Protestant sects that believe in the Rapture have nothing but contempt for the Marian tradition.

Whatever it is, it's a strange belief that's spawned no end of interpretation. I remember hearing about an old film about the Rapture, showing scenes that included a man mowing his lawn being taken up and the lawn-mower continuing to move. Apparently, a parody of that film was made, where the lawn-mover was Raptured and the man was left behind. *snerk*

[tree_and_leaf]

Now I think about it, there's a bit in one of the Gospels which talks about people being snatched away; but from the context (it's a prophecy of the fall of Jerusalem, I always took it as a metaphor for death, possibly epidemic disease. But that's what you get for trying to read whole chapters or even whole books, not isolated verses).

It's very depressing, but this sort of stuff is almost enough to make one feel that the mediaeval theologians who thought that the Bible was too dangerous to let loose on uneducated laymen had a point - it's truly vile theologically!

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

it's truly vile theologically!

I rather like the Good Omens take -

“well, what I'm trying to say is who has time to go round picking people out and popping them up in the air to sneer at the people dying of radiation sickness on the parched and burning earth below them? If that's your idea of a morally acceptable time, I might add.”

[tree_and_leaf]

Absolutely! I had forgotten that - it's ages since I read 'Good Omens', I obviously should again.

The 'sneering at the people dying of radiation sickness' actually pinpoints what seems to be the most disturbing thing about the LB books - they are so smug and self-congratulatory. If they seemed to be honest preachers of the 'Repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand' school, inviting people to actually change, and to show some are for their neighbours, (rather than sign up to a rather esoteric list of doctrines) because of the imminent return of Christ, I might think them mistaken, but they wouldn't make me feel quite so ill.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

Yes - I got a definite impression from the LB books that the reader was to assume s/he would be one of the lucky ones, but some fellows of their own church (ie. the ones the reader doesn't like) would be less fortunate. Serves them right for quarreling over the flower rota.

[mrs-wolf.livejournal.com]

I always thought the Rapture was started in the early to mid 1800's in America, when everyone was slain by the Spirit and so on. But I might be wrong.

I trudged through all of Left Behind simply because it was on the bestseller list and it was affecting America so much. (I didn't know many Christians who hadn't read it, and I know alot of Christians.)

It's LaHaye, though I find your misspelling very endearing. Jenkins, is the true (ly awful) writer. LaHaye did the "research." LaHaye writes some equally bad books on ethics and his wife writes books on how to be a good wife. They were never very popular until the Left Behind came out, and now they do reasonably well.

Some info here: http://www.jerryjenkins.com/faqs.html#LB7

Waaah!

[tree_and_leaf]

I'm now very, very scared.

I know loads of Christians who haven't read it, if that's any consolation. And I have to say... it doesn't really sound that Christian, particularly in its take on morality, if the blog aervir linked to is any indication. There seems to me to be more Christian teaching in Harry Potter!

Re: Waaah!

[mrs-wolf.livejournal.com]

See, you're in England, so by default, your countrymen (and women) at least believe in good literature. (Not that there isn't excellent American literature, but it doesn't seem to be as well respected here, special affects rule.)

Christian literature is one of the more fascinating bits to American Christianity. Certainly quite lucrative. But it's very frightening. Maybe you picked up on the threads of misogyny in Left Behind? Well, that's normal. And the trussed up romance. Urgh. They read like dime novels, except worse.

Sadly, all my relatives believe Harry Potter to be witchcrafty. Obviously they haven't actually propped open the books, so...anyway. They all think I'm going to hell for reading The Bhagavad-Gita. Might as well be hung for a dragon as an egg, eh?

[aervir.livejournal.com]

I wonder where the Rapture idea got started?

Actually, it's all an Englishman's fault, i.e. that of the Anglo-Irish guy John Nelson Darby. He was one of the most influential teachers among the Plymouth Brethren and is probably the person who came up with the idea of the Rapture, founding the theology of Dispensationalism (which has some connections with the ideas in the Left Behind series).

You can find more about dispensationalism on Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dispensationalism). I haven't got any idea, though, how accurate this article is, as my own knowledge of the subject matter is very, very limited as well.

[harriet-wimsey.livejournal.com]

Blackwell's! I'd sort of heard of before, but then a Blackwell's vendor came to speak to my Technical Services class a few weeks ago and I got to hear about the history of the store and their library services, etc. Now I really want to go visit the place where it all started, tell them I'm a librarian, and get the grand tour.

[tree_and_leaf]

Blackwells is wonderful - certainly the Oxford main branch is. They could do with a better coffee shop, but other than that, it's perfect: big, rambling, serendipitious yet well organised, and they have very knowledgable and helpful staff. I could happily live there (the drawback of the coffee shop is compensated for by the excellent little pub, the White Horse, which looks like the stern cabin of a ship of the line inside, below Blackwells.) The classics room, in particular, is wonderful; the theology section is excellent also.

Borders is the exact opposite: characterless (it's like a big warehouse) and apparently run by the clueless. Unfortunately their coffee is better (not good, since it's Starbucks, but better)

[harriet-wimsey.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the rep mentioned the White Horse, too. As I don't like coffee, I could happily live without Borders. I go there for the selection, and because I know where it is and my town is too large and confusing for me to easily find smaller bookstores, but if I had someplace like Blackwells nearby I'd spend entirely too much time there.

[tree_and_leaf]

Spending entirely too much time in Blackwells is a grand Oxford tradition (so, alas, is spending too much money...)

Borders does sometimes have interesting stuff not available elsewhere, or rather except via Amazon, so I drop in every now and then, but it's not the same at all.

[straussmonster.livejournal.com]

That sounds like the section in Half Price Books labeled 'Metaphysics', which makes me cringe every time I see it.

[tree_and_leaf]

I don't know Half Price Books, but I can imagine...

[sophysduckling.livejournal.com]

But Border's 'Religion' section drives me up the wall.

I know. I had the misfortune to be looking for a book in the Religion section of Border's (I don't remember what) and there were "non-fiction" DaVinci Code spinoffs wedged between The Dummy's Guide to the Catholic Church and Left Behind: THE TRIBULAYSHUN. They had C.S. Lewis to an extent, but it was "NEW EDITIONS!" (i.e., books with pictures of Tilda Swinton and her polar bears on the cover) of the Chronicles of Narnia.

[tree_and_leaf]

Well, at least Catholicism for Dummies bears some resemblance to something recognisable as Christian doctrine ;-)

[sophysduckling.livejournal.com]

Probably true, although the book's not helpful if you're trying to find something a bit deeper. >.<

[mrs-wolf.livejournal.com]

As a bookseller (I've worked in the big stores and the little hole in the wall stores. I hated the big stores for their corporateness and I loved the hole in the wall stores but never seemed to actually get paid.) I can safely say that Waterstones is my favorite UK "new" bookstore. The thing I never understood about the UK, though, was the new bookstores. I'm an old book girl. I was in absolute heaven rifling through the old bookstores in London, I spent many a paycheck in a little hole-in-the-wall bookstore just beside the big London library. Their WWII selection was absolutely amazing.

Shelving is a bitch. I'm a perfectionist, and especially at the smaller stores where I was the one who knew the most about book prices, I'd always be checking to make sure they were correctly priced, and pulling rare books to sell for a higher price on the internet. It took so long, just to get through one row.

[aervir.livejournal.com]

O ye Gods. What a strange way of ordering (or rather: not ordering) their religion section.

I mean I can even see why the books on magic might be there, as the neo-Paganists will probably regard them as expressive of their religious beliefs, but Holy Blood and the Holy Grail belongs in the section for, um, non-fiction of questionable value and Left Behind onto the fiction shelves.

Speaking of LB, there's a weblog shredding the books sentence for sentence, paragraph to paragraph, chapter for chapter here (http://slacktivist.typepad.com/slacktivist/left_behind/index.html).I can't quite understand, however, how its author manages to plod through them so patiently without going mad...

And Blackwells is very lovely, and Borders has nice pastries. :)

[tree_and_leaf]

Thanks for the blog link - am somewhat speechless (I would say 'Get off my religion', but I expect they'd think I was a frightful pagan; why I even had a beer with dinner, and for my part, I would have to say: that's not actually Christianity, it's a hideous parasitical... thing. I'm almost tempted to say "Where's the Inquisition when you need it?', but that's going a bit far.)

[tree_and_leaf]

Oh, and the magic books were in the 'Christianity' subsection ;-). ALong with 'the Gospel according to Harry Potter' - although I have to say, I think JKR has written a more Christian story than the LB crew....

[aervir.livejournal.com]

Oh, and the magic books were in the 'Christianity' subsection.

Then I can certainly understand your confusion and exasperation. And -- "the Gospel according to Harry Potter"?

Is this some sort of trick to make all the Christian fundamentalists who are afraid of JKR's propagating witchcraft feel better? (Those guys include a former member of Parliament from one of the constituencies in my home town, by the way.)

[tree_and_leaf]

Well, it's actuallly more 'Witchcraft in HP is not Satanism (or even stanism, as I just typed!) and look, it teaches good moral lessons like loyalty to friends and choosing what is right over what is easy,' so it's not quite as silly as the title makes it sound.

[aervir.livejournal.com]

That sounds indeed rather sensible, but I'm still surprised that some people need a whole book to tell them this instead of figuring it out for themselves. :)

But I'm in a slightly bitchy mood right now, so I might be a bit hard on them...

[tree_and_leaf]

Oh, of course it ought to be blindingly obvious, but there you go... I knew a girl at St Andrews whose father (leader, whatever that means, of a small house church which, amusingly, met in a pub depsite being TT) made her swear never to read HP.

On the other hand, her brother was at a private Bible college where girls weren't allowed in boy's rooms, under any circumstances, even if they were brother and sister. Really makes you wonder about their view of their students.

[aervir.livejournal.com]

makes you wonder about their view of their students.

Um, they think these kids must be really kinky at heart...?

[tree_and_leaf]

Sounds like it, doesn't it! And these are the people who they hope will bring moral revival to a corrupt world.

I mean, even the most suspicious mediaeval clerics didn't suspect that all brothers and sisters secretly want to screw each other...

[aervir.livejournal.com]

And as the youngest of three siblings, with two elder brothers, I can only agree with them (the clerics I mean, not the loony Bible college staff). 'Cause ewww, just ewwwwww.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

Actually, that was the case when my mother spent a year at Pershore college (agricultural) in the 1960s. Brothers and fathers weren’t allowed beyond the front door even into the common room. I suppose the ‘risk’ is that a girl could pretend to be in her room with her brother, but really she’s downstairs and the brother’s with someone else.

[aervir.livejournal.com]

Okay, that's the less kinky explanation then. ;)

[aervir.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the Inquisition might be a bit too much, but picturing the authors of LB being smothered by the comfy cushions of Monty Python's Spanish Inquisition is an oddly soothing thought...

Nobody expects...

[tree_and_leaf]

Lovely image: "Noooo! Not the comfy chair!"

[mrs-wolf.livejournal.com]

Tracking these End Times prophecies is a form of escapism -- something to keep the idle faithful from getting bored until they finally escape for good.

***sigh***

Why can't there be good pop lit?

[aervir.livejournal.com]

But aren't there just dozens of books which one could consider good pop lit (e.g. lots of genre fiction)? It just happens that none of them was written by Jerry Jenkins and Tim LaHaye. :D

[mrs-wolf.livejournal.com]

I guess you're right! I keep thinking Christian pop, but I could even name some good Christian pop. (Though there are some that are quite bad. I hate the DaVinci Code, for instance.)

[tree_and_leaf]

I think calling the Da Vinci Code Christian is, er, a tad controversial...

[mrs-wolf.livejournal.com]

True that.

And I'm not sure I do. I was going by Borders placement, and the fact that it is quite religious. Christianity is a broad term, all you've really got to do is worship Christ, so technically, I am one, which would put half of Christendom in arms, and I don't call myself that.

It entirely depends on definition, I guess.

[tree_and_leaf]

It entirely depends on definition, I guess.

True. I mean, you can even debate about how you define 'worship' (as I believe there are Hindus who regard Christ as a god, as opposed to God.

I'm afraid my instinct is to go with the mediaeval Catholics and say those who are baptised are Christians, and if they no longer believe they are lapsed, but still Christian. That, however, would probably make me very unpopular :)

On the other hand, it does have the advantage of having a degree of objectivity and thus being a definition one can work with (especially as any other may well turn into 'Christian = someone whose ideas I approve of', or 'person at church whose ideas/ life I disapprove of = Not-Christian'...)

[tree_and_leaf]

Or, alternatively, that anyone who percieves themselves as being part of the Church or following Christ, is a Christian. That's my fuzzy liberal Anglican side coming out... But it's not much use as a practical definition, should you want one.

of course, the 'Baptism' definition doesn't work with books...