I’m not super busy or anything. Just rendered speechless by much of what’s going on in the world and the reactions to all these things. It’s hard – as it always is – to know how to step in. In that case, perhaps it’s best to hush up. Good advice all round, probably.
Anyway. I say this once a week in this space, and more to myself, muttering about the house. I need to shake whatever it is loose and get things out – beyond the pages of journals and idea books and endless pads of paper.
Things will get more involved around here this week, as classes and activities start back up. The piano teacher’s back in town and there’s a big recital in two weeks. AP Statistics tutoring begins in earnest. Economics and Physics begin this week, with Apologetics added on soon. Fraternus begins. This weekend, the Latin tutor will be met again for the first time since June. There’s boxing boot camp, YMCA workouts and a football game (to attend) this weekend.
Around here, he’s planned his own history self-tutoring, and we’re talking about Gawain and the Green Knight early this week and then starting Chaucer.
Let’s talk about Beowulf and Gawain.
Not in detail. You don’t need that from me. But I just thought I’d share some moments in these works that struck me, even moved me.
And yes, maybe consider revisiting them – or visiting them for the first time – yourself. They’re not long, editions abound online, and you might find something meaningful yourself.
As per usual, encounter millenium-old works reminds me that while everything changes, nothing really does, especially human nature.
Confounding, terrifying, destructive forces still threaten us. Courage is still required. Temptation to live for oneself still invites.
Everything’s so different. Everything is still so much the same.
Anyway.
Beowulf first, and just some notes, in order of reading.
(These are from the Seamus Heaney edition.)
These were hard times, heart-breaking
For the prince of the Shieldings; powerful counselors,
The highest in the land, would lend advice,
Plotting how best the bold defenders
Might resist and beat off sudden attacks.
Sometimes at pagan shrines they vowed
Offering to idols, swore oaths
That the killer of souls might come to their aid
And save the people. That was their way,
Their heathenish hope; deep in their hearts
They remembered Hell. The Almighty Judge
Of good deeds and bad, the Lord God,
Head of the Heavens and High King of the World,
Was unknown to them. Oh, cursed is he
Who in time of trouble had to thrust his soul
In the fire’s embrace, forfeiting help;
He has nowhere to turn. But blessed is he
Who after death can approach the Lord
And find friendship in the Father’s embrace.
(Lines 171-188)
The futility of relying on idols – on anything but God for our ultimate help. Yes?
How pathetic it is when we look back at our own lives and see how we flailed, when we remember the idols we trusted – other people, goals, achievements, ourselves – for peace and happiness.
What were we doing? What was that about, anyway?
One of the points we brought out in our discussion was the tension throughout (and this is a part of Gawain as well) between God’s Providence and human will and effort. It’s never teased apart, of course, since these are stories, not theological treatises, but it’s unavoidable and a constant undercurrent, as these men take up arms and brace themselves to fight, knowing that what they do and choose indeed matters – but yes, indeed, God’s will be done.
But the Lord was weaving
A victory on his war-loom for the Weather-Geats.
Through the strength of one they all prevailed;
They would crush their enemy and come through
In triumph and gladness. The truth is clear:
Almighty God rules over mankind
And always has.
(696-702)
To separate oneself from the great literature from the past is to cut oneself off from community with the human beings who, in every time and place have grappled with the same mysteries you are wondering about tonight: I am choosing this…but am I really free? And if God is God , what place do my actions have?
It’s a deep disservice to young people to make the essence of education the exploration of their own feelings and identities, with no reference to the greater world, present or past.
No wonder they feel so alone.
Two more points out of many that could be made
First – and this is good fruit for discussion – in the end, for Beowulf’s final battle, the dragon is awakened, not by anything important or magnificent, but by one foolish man’s greed.
(One lesson being learned in this study is how much of LOTR is derived, in one way or another from all of this ancient literature, A well known and documented reality, but also a useful hook for the Tolkien-immersed student.)
Finally:
The veteran king sat down on the cliff-top.
He wished good luck to the Geats who had shared
His hearth and his gold. He was sad at heart,
Unsettled yet ready, sensing his own death.
His fate hovered near, unknowable but certain….
(2417-2420)
Again, no simplistic binaries here. Borne of deep culture and wisdom, the insight given to the old king Beowulf: What is coming is unknown in some ways, but certain in others, and when a human being accepts the reality of both life on earth and God in heaven, it is the natural way to face it all…unsettled but ready.
