Re: EJ and religion - more

[Bertil Haggman <bertil.haggman@helsingborg.se>]

abdulbar@execpc.com wrote:

> Could you possibly post the article for the list, at the moment I have
> little or no access to german language periodicals.

It is not an article but an essay in a book published by Klett-Cotta
in connection with the celebration of EJs 100th birthday. Sorry,
but I don't have a scanner so I cannot post the essay. You should
be able to find the book without greater problem in the nearest
university library or through interlibrary loan.

 
> I myself agree with such a premis as this. Somehow EJ does believe in a
> source, my only point is that he has certainly made a break with the
> traditional approach to religion and the God head. One of my favorite
> quotes from the Paris Diaries is as follows (my translation):
> 
> Unknown in the old languages, the great mythos,
> Roman law, the Bible and Christian ethic,
> the French Moralists, the German Metaphysic,
> the poetry of all the World. Technical Goliaths,
> dwarves on true life-therefore massive in critique, in destruction,
> it is in that, hidden from them, that their true contract lies.
> Deformed, atrophied, blurred in all that which has to do with beauty and love.
> Single eyed titans, spirits of darkness, deniers and enemies of all
> creative powers,
> who can sum up a million years of their efforts,
> without leaving one work behind that weighs up to one blade of grass, one
> grain of wheat, one mosquito wing.
> Far from poetry , wine, dreams,  games and hoplessly caught in the heresy
> of presumptuous school masters.
> They have their task. (Ernst Jünger, Paris Diaries.)
> 
> Here I believe Jünger is pointing at a ordered universe in which a form of
> revelation is at work even now. This has a quality of understanding of the
> nature of evil that is worthy of Goethe. Mephisto says  the famous words
> "ein Teil von jener Kraft, die stets das Böse will, und stets das Gute
> schafft." and further "Ich bin der Geist, der stets verneint! Und das mit
> Recht; denn alles, was entsteht, Ist wert, daß es zugrunde geht; Drum
> besser wärs, daß nichts entstünde. So ist denn alles, was ihr Sunde,
> Zerstorullg, Kurz das Böse nennt, mein eigentliches Element." Goethe "Faust
> pt.1" These lines are often quoted and a god example of a unified
> understanding of the cosmos, in Islam the term is Tawhid, which roughly
> translates as unity. Though Goethes entire weltanschauung is formed by this
> very method, which of course has its roots in Taoism and all the other
> great world revelations as EJ points to.

Yes, and for a picture of security uses the picture of the cathedral:

"Von allen Domen bleibt nur noch jener, der durch die Kuppeln der
gefalteten Hände gebildet wird. In ihm allein ist Sicherheit." (Die
Schere).

EJ is critical of the central prayer of christianity, Our Father. He
means
it is just demands, no thankfulness. And gratefulness is the substance
of
prayer. Once during a heavy storm EJ was very taken by a wave of 
gratefulness for parents, for theachers, for friends, neighbours,
unknown friends, without those who he could never have reached
his high age "- es war immer einer da. Es kann kein Zufall sein."

The author is like the prophets. He can see decay full square in the
eye,
in its tragic meaning, just like the prophets.

There is truly a religious thread in EJs mainly later writing.

Greetings

Bertil Haggman
bertil.haggman@helsingborg.se