I love how you use the parable of the ten bridesmaids to carve out a space (or a time, if you will) between endless time and the end of time. Jesus seems to carve out that same space by telling us that the bridegroom is late. I had never thought about that before.
We want to measure the time until the end. We resonate with clocks and the eventual strike of the midnight hour when all clocks, and the time they measure, will be no more. But the bridegroom comes at a very different midnight, one that can’t be found on a clock’s face. Our anticipation of the bridegroom creates this time that remains.
Giorgio Agamben seems to carve out a similar space in his book The Time That Remains, though he focuses mostly on Paul’s very similar understanding of time: “What interests the apostle is not the last day, it is not the instant in which time ends, but the time that contracts itself and begins to end (ho kairos synestalmenos estin; 1 Cor. 7:29), or if you prefer, the time that remains between time and its end” (62).
These distinctions of time are somehow heartening. Agamben, of course, isn’t the first to understand our time in terms of a messianic overlap of ages.
The idea that the bridegroom is late no longer threatens to overturn my faith, a threat that I think drove Schweitzer’s Paul to institute some changes in church practice. Instead, the time “while the groom was delaying” (NAS) represents an active hope. Get the oil now: we’ll need the lamps then!
This reckoning of time in terms of a delay—even this search for the right language for that reckoning—is playful, almost Churchillian. I’ve always found his remarks after the Battle of Egypt as oddly inspiring: “Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.”
This is beautifully put. What you make newly visible—though it’s been there all along—is how the delay carries the meaning. Midnight matters—but not as a deadline we can master. It arrives as a summons to a readiness formed over time. That’s why the delay doesn’t hollow out hope; it disciplines it. Oil is practiced attention. And yes, that search for language is part of the work. Not the end, not the end of the end—but a time charged with responsibility.
Midnight "arrives as a summons to a readiness formed over time." Oh, my goodness, yes. Your succinct expression here makes the idea even more explosive -- a moment before a Big Bang of sorts, commensurate with the annealing of time. Even so, come, Lord Jesus!
Jonathan, I think that's a fruitful approach to understanding Western civilization. Have you read James K. Rowe's book Radical Mindfulness: Why Transforming Fear of Death is Politically Vital? Rowe spends time in sources outside of "civilization" to construct and critique the political ramifications of that fear.
I love how you use the parable of the ten bridesmaids to carve out a space (or a time, if you will) between endless time and the end of time. Jesus seems to carve out that same space by telling us that the bridegroom is late. I had never thought about that before.
We want to measure the time until the end. We resonate with clocks and the eventual strike of the midnight hour when all clocks, and the time they measure, will be no more. But the bridegroom comes at a very different midnight, one that can’t be found on a clock’s face. Our anticipation of the bridegroom creates this time that remains.
Giorgio Agamben seems to carve out a similar space in his book The Time That Remains, though he focuses mostly on Paul’s very similar understanding of time: “What interests the apostle is not the last day, it is not the instant in which time ends, but the time that contracts itself and begins to end (ho kairos synestalmenos estin; 1 Cor. 7:29), or if you prefer, the time that remains between time and its end” (62).
These distinctions of time are somehow heartening. Agamben, of course, isn’t the first to understand our time in terms of a messianic overlap of ages.
The idea that the bridegroom is late no longer threatens to overturn my faith, a threat that I think drove Schweitzer’s Paul to institute some changes in church practice. Instead, the time “while the groom was delaying” (NAS) represents an active hope. Get the oil now: we’ll need the lamps then!
This reckoning of time in terms of a delay—even this search for the right language for that reckoning—is playful, almost Churchillian. I’ve always found his remarks after the Battle of Egypt as oddly inspiring: “Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.”
This is beautifully put. What you make newly visible—though it’s been there all along—is how the delay carries the meaning. Midnight matters—but not as a deadline we can master. It arrives as a summons to a readiness formed over time. That’s why the delay doesn’t hollow out hope; it disciplines it. Oil is practiced attention. And yes, that search for language is part of the work. Not the end, not the end of the end—but a time charged with responsibility.
Thanks for this careful response.
Midnight "arrives as a summons to a readiness formed over time." Oh, my goodness, yes. Your succinct expression here makes the idea even more explosive -- a moment before a Big Bang of sorts, commensurate with the annealing of time. Even so, come, Lord Jesus!
Oh, your goodness, yes!
It is interesting to note that you refer to the book The Denial of Death. Such denial is at the root of Western culture altogether.
These references describe the situation.
http://www.easydeathbook.com/purpose.asp
http://beezone.com/adida/easydeath/deathisnotyourconcern.html
http://beezone.com/latest/death_message.html Death as the Constant Message of Life http://beezone.com/whats-new
http://www.adidaupclose.org/death_and_dying/index.html
Jonathan, I think that's a fruitful approach to understanding Western civilization. Have you read James K. Rowe's book Radical Mindfulness: Why Transforming Fear of Death is Politically Vital? Rowe spends time in sources outside of "civilization" to construct and critique the political ramifications of that fear.
The 1989 version of the still unpublished book The Basket of Tolerance features at least 50 items re death, dying, karma and rebirth
http://beezone.com/current/botc.html
At the time of his Maha -Samadhi in 2008 it most probably featured many more (dozens) of items re this very important topic