1 00:00:00,680 --> 00:00:05,040 And you and I sat surrounded by broken glass, smoking these cigars and drinking 2 00:00:05,080 --> 00:00:10,320 Guinness, remember at the top of Grafton Street, and the thing you said, 3 00:00:10,320 --> 00:00:14,279 and I agreed with you said, you know, myth and story is 4 00:00:14,359 --> 00:00:19,920 just the best way to talk about almost everything. It's the indigenous way to 5 00:00:19,960 --> 00:00:23,719 talk about everything. It's the classical way to talk about everything. It's the 6 00:00:23,879 --> 00:00:27,760 Artherian way. It's the Irish way, it's the Russian way, it's the 7 00:00:27,800 --> 00:00:32,439 Aboriginal way. It's what we've always done. There's a very old notion I'm 8 00:00:32,479 --> 00:00:37,359 interested in, which is human beings get made. It's actually a process. 9 00:00:38,119 --> 00:00:43,920 And if you don't have connection to stories, rather like a cloak, then 10 00:00:44,039 --> 00:00:49,600 you are prone to enormous floods of anxieties. You get older as you experience 11 00:00:49,719 --> 00:00:54,799 the dress of life. Despite all the gadgetry, if we don't have this 12 00:00:55,039 --> 00:00:59,840 very ancient technology called the story close to hand, we were unequipped in some 13 00:01:11,120 --> 00:01:26,640 This is Jonathan phel Welcome to the symbolic world. So hello everyone. I 14 00:01:26,680 --> 00:01:32,000 am overjoyed to be with Martin Shaw again. Martin John's been on my channel 15 00:01:32,040 --> 00:01:34,920 before. We've done some events in Ireland and in England. He is a 16 00:01:34,920 --> 00:01:42,480 mythographer, professor at Stanford, wonderful writer, amazing storyteller, and he is 17 00:01:42,519 --> 00:01:46,560 going to be one of the headline speakers for the Symbolic World Summit. So 18 00:01:46,640 --> 00:01:52,120 I'm really excited to be able to continue our exchanges. And so Martin, 19 00:01:52,120 --> 00:01:55,959 thanks, thanks for coming on. Oh, Jonathan, delighted to be here 20 00:01:56,079 --> 00:02:00,599 and very much looking forward to Florida in February. And so, Martin, 21 00:02:00,799 --> 00:02:06,480 you are a storyteller in ways that is difficult for reminding people to understand. 22 00:02:06,519 --> 00:02:09,840 So this is something that I also at first didn't totally grasp and in meeting 23 00:02:09,879 --> 00:02:14,759 you, I started to understand it, which is that you are one of 24 00:02:14,800 --> 00:02:17,439 the few people I don't know left in the world, not many people that 25 00:02:17,759 --> 00:02:23,560 tell stories over sometimes days, you know, like hours, and then sometimes 26 00:02:23,680 --> 00:02:27,960 days. And you are getting ready now to give a version of the Artissey. 27 00:02:28,639 --> 00:02:31,000 Yeah, that's true, Jonathan. I'm going to be telling the truncated 28 00:02:31,120 --> 00:02:38,520 version from Friday night through to Sunday afternoon, really without a breath. That's 29 00:02:38,560 --> 00:02:43,759 the synopsis. That's synopsis. So I'll report back to you how that went. 30 00:02:44,240 --> 00:02:51,120 I haven't told it since before Lockdown. So stories from a Bardic perspective, 31 00:02:51,800 --> 00:02:55,800 they are illrascible animate beings, and they require a kind of courtship if 32 00:02:55,840 --> 00:02:59,520 you're going to tell them. They're not just repertoire. They're not just going 33 00:02:59,599 --> 00:03:02,800 to show up up. And so I found that for the first couple of 34 00:03:02,840 --> 00:03:07,840 weeks, the Odyssey simply didn't want to be remembered by me. It had 35 00:03:07,840 --> 00:03:10,879 gone into a huff, It had gone to the back of Polypemous's cave and 36 00:03:10,919 --> 00:03:15,719 wouldn't come out. So you just have to sit there with a story and 37 00:03:15,759 --> 00:03:20,120 show fidelity to it until finally it says, okay, let's try this out. 38 00:03:20,680 --> 00:03:24,159 But as you will know through our time together, I don't tell stories 39 00:03:24,159 --> 00:03:30,520 in this kind of recital manner. It's very much imagining out loud. So 40 00:03:31,599 --> 00:03:39,800 that interest in spontaneity, that interest in trafficking in wild thoughts, that was 41 00:03:39,919 --> 00:03:44,719 kind of what got me into this in the first place. Yeah, But 42 00:03:44,840 --> 00:03:47,960 so there's a kind of a I guess there's a mix between getting the basic 43 00:03:49,599 --> 00:03:51,919 let's think the basic structure of the story right, you know, you know 44 00:03:51,960 --> 00:03:55,039 you have the element that you can't transgress that, and then weaving through that 45 00:03:55,639 --> 00:04:00,879 with the kind of improvisation. Think of it like a recipe that's been passed 46 00:04:00,879 --> 00:04:05,000 down through a family, and no one is meant to mess with the recipe. 47 00:04:05,000 --> 00:04:09,680 And for the first hundred times you cook it, you cook it exactly 48 00:04:09,680 --> 00:04:15,120 as your aunt told you to do. But on cook up one hundred and 49 00:04:15,120 --> 00:04:18,439 one you discover smoke paprika. And you don't know if your aunt you were 50 00:04:18,439 --> 00:04:24,160 about smoke paprika or not, but you can add that little thing. It's 51 00:04:24,199 --> 00:04:29,279 to do with what they call the sense and the matter of stories. The 52 00:04:29,319 --> 00:04:31,600 matter of the story is what you just described. It's the A to B 53 00:04:31,800 --> 00:04:36,480 to see. But the sense of the story is the genius in it. 54 00:04:36,560 --> 00:04:42,639 And it's why three people could turn up and tell the Handless Maiden, but 55 00:04:42,720 --> 00:04:46,920 there'd be one telling that you would energetically, you'd lean, you'd lean to 56 00:04:47,040 --> 00:04:51,920 them rather than all three. It's not a sort of generic handout. Storytellers 57 00:04:53,000 --> 00:04:58,240 are odd figures who have usually been hurt by the world early on, and 58 00:04:59,000 --> 00:05:04,879 to make sense of a cosmos when most mythology is lying in pieces around our 59 00:05:04,879 --> 00:05:10,600 ankles. Stories of sense making devices, you know, their codes of a 60 00:05:10,680 --> 00:05:15,279 fashion. Well, the Odyssey, I know when I told the ancient stories 61 00:05:15,279 --> 00:05:17,959 to my kids, the Odyssey was the one that just stuck to them. 62 00:05:18,240 --> 00:05:23,279 My daughter, when she was eleven years old or maybe even I think around 63 00:05:23,319 --> 00:05:28,120 maybe even younger, like ten to eleven, she memorized that ABC of the 64 00:05:28,120 --> 00:05:30,160 Odyssey. She knew all the sections. She didn't know, I mean, 65 00:05:30,160 --> 00:05:33,759 she didn't memorize the story, but she could tell you what all the narrative 66 00:05:33,800 --> 00:05:36,879 elements were. And she did it one time at a campfire where she just 67 00:05:36,959 --> 00:05:44,000 kind of enumerated the narrative elements at least of the story. And so I 68 00:05:44,079 --> 00:05:46,720 was really surprised at just how much it's stuck. And so now and you're 69 00:05:46,759 --> 00:05:51,040 rereading it and sitting with it, what insights have you come out have come 70 00:05:51,079 --> 00:05:57,319 out of that time? Well, there's a strong one. If you were 71 00:05:57,360 --> 00:06:01,279 a Mediterranean warrior for three thousand years ago, you lived in what I would 72 00:06:01,279 --> 00:06:09,360 call a claos culture, not chaos. Claos now, claos means imperishable glory. 73 00:06:09,959 --> 00:06:15,160 It means your reputation that lives on once you're gone. And you remember, 74 00:06:15,160 --> 00:06:17,879 to a Mediterranean warrior, that's not heaven you're going to. It's this 75 00:06:18,079 --> 00:06:26,480 far more ambivalent underworld. So you want your reputation to exist longer than you. 76 00:06:26,920 --> 00:06:33,759 But here's the rub about claos claos is entirely dependent on external validation. 77 00:06:34,560 --> 00:06:41,639 You can't give yourself claos your sense of inner oblige. It doesn't matter, 78 00:06:42,160 --> 00:06:46,120 It doesn't really matter. There is no U in the way that modern people 79 00:06:46,160 --> 00:06:48,600 think about it. It is all about how other people look at you. 80 00:06:48,759 --> 00:06:53,800 So as I come to telling it again, I realize we're living in another 81 00:06:53,879 --> 00:06:58,600 age of laos. And our screens, which are the temples that we now 82 00:06:58,680 --> 00:07:03,240 generally serve in, and our mirrors which we are entranced in. Like Narcissus, 83 00:07:04,000 --> 00:07:14,040 We've replaced we've replaced what we've replaced shelter with comfort, religious shelter to 84 00:07:14,120 --> 00:07:20,000 spiritual comfort. We have a kind of a la carte attitude towards you know, 85 00:07:20,240 --> 00:07:25,199 cosmological, spiritual, religious issues, and we just pick and choose what 86 00:07:25,240 --> 00:07:30,079 we want. So that's been the strange thing, and it often happens with 87 00:07:30,160 --> 00:07:35,720 a story. There's a reason why the Odyssey has now been remembered an active 88 00:07:35,759 --> 00:07:43,680 act of remembering for what twenty eight hundred years something like that. It's because 89 00:07:44,160 --> 00:07:47,120 the Odyssey is happening every day. The issues that are going on in it 90 00:07:47,160 --> 00:07:51,120 are hardy perennials. They don't go away. So the claos thing has been 91 00:07:51,160 --> 00:07:57,720 big for me. And so when you say that that we live in this 92 00:07:57,800 --> 00:08:01,279 new aide of clay art, you mean in terms of the the the likes 93 00:08:01,319 --> 00:08:07,480 and the kind of this this kind of outer approbation of our of our of 94 00:08:07,519 --> 00:08:09,480 our existence. Let's say, like we need to we need to be seen 95 00:08:09,600 --> 00:08:13,399 by the world, We need to show ourselves on Instagram and to have that 96 00:08:13,480 --> 00:08:16,279 kind of Is that is that what you mean? Yeah, it's a kind 97 00:08:16,279 --> 00:08:20,800 of anti John of the Cross. It's an anti still small voice. These 98 00:08:20,879 --> 00:08:24,120 days, if we even get in touch with our still small voice, we 99 00:08:24,160 --> 00:08:30,519 may be getting fake news from our own psyche because because we don't tell stories 100 00:08:30,560 --> 00:08:33,960 anymore, we don't actually do it in the jaw what they call the mead 101 00:08:33,000 --> 00:08:37,759 hall of the jaw. Then stories remain. As there's a poet called Friedrich 102 00:08:37,799 --> 00:08:41,840 Holderland and he says, God's be careful. You have become decorations in their 103 00:08:41,879 --> 00:08:48,440 poems. And the reason it's good to tell stories orally is the stories stop 104 00:08:48,519 --> 00:08:56,720 becoming decorative or witty. They bring their troubles right to your door and they 105 00:08:56,759 --> 00:09:01,360 start to do the work that can only be told when you actually involve it. 106 00:09:01,480 --> 00:09:05,159 So kudos to your daughter qudos to my daughter, who, when she 107 00:09:05,240 --> 00:09:11,720 was about eight knew all of Wolf from Varnishingbach's possible, And I implore everybody, 108 00:09:11,840 --> 00:09:16,679 I'm so thrilled with what's going on with Symbolic World and this whole network 109 00:09:16,720 --> 00:09:26,600 that's happening. YouTube has become a really interesting place. My one petition would 110 00:09:26,679 --> 00:09:31,039 be that when people study your story with you, they go away in small 111 00:09:31,080 --> 00:09:33,320 groups and tell it to each other. Just try it. Take a risk. 112 00:09:33,799 --> 00:09:37,399 Maybe they're a myth tell us amongst you. That's an interesting idea. 113 00:09:37,480 --> 00:09:43,519 We're doing now a kind of intense reading of Bewolf with Richard Rowlin, and 114 00:09:43,559 --> 00:09:46,879 it's it's really insightful because it's something like a Christian reading of bea Well, 115 00:09:46,919 --> 00:09:52,279 trying to help people see the Christian cosmology that a lot of the scholars actually 116 00:09:52,360 --> 00:09:54,600 can't see because they don't know the Book of Enoch and all these weird traditions 117 00:09:54,600 --> 00:09:58,600 in Christianity. But it's a good idea to then maybe take that and be 118 00:09:58,679 --> 00:10:03,080 able to and then retell Baywell. I used to do it too. I 119 00:10:03,480 --> 00:10:07,320 actually memorize the elements of Bewolf and would tell it like at the campfire we 120 00:10:07,080 --> 00:10:11,360 we we'd have this storytelling at the campfire, try to kind of get into 121 00:10:11,679 --> 00:10:16,000 the story. Yeah, I I I'm by the way. I'm very interested 122 00:10:16,080 --> 00:10:20,720 that you and Richard, and thank you for introducing me to Richard's work. 123 00:10:20,759 --> 00:10:24,720 The man has a mind as big as a prairie. He's fantastic and the 124 00:10:24,799 --> 00:10:30,080 two of you together Wow. From next week on Substack all the way to 125 00:10:30,200 --> 00:10:35,200 Christmas, I am telling the Icelandic Saga of King Croft Krackey, which is 126 00:10:35,240 --> 00:10:41,480 the dark twin of Berewolf's. It's darker than Berewolf. Okay, uh, 127 00:10:41,840 --> 00:10:46,120 just as a just as a just in case people were wondering what paganism really 128 00:10:46,120 --> 00:10:52,240 look like. AVO. There you go. And so that's that's an insight 129 00:10:52,320 --> 00:10:56,960 that you Just before we started recording, you mentioned something about that. You 130 00:10:56,000 --> 00:11:00,679 said that you feel like the world is becoming pagan again, but with some 131 00:11:00,720 --> 00:11:03,759 differences. I think the world is turning. The world has to turn pagan 132 00:11:03,840 --> 00:11:11,480 because atheism. Atheism is simply too depressing. And I think the argument of 133 00:11:11,639 --> 00:11:18,600 rationality and in rationality, in irrationality, that's been a big religious argument over 134 00:11:18,600 --> 00:11:20,960 the last hundred years. I think to some degree we're past that now. 135 00:11:22,000 --> 00:11:26,200 I think people are aware, we all serve some kind of temple, and 136 00:11:26,279 --> 00:11:31,279 wherever we put our attention for any length of time, if we look at 137 00:11:31,320 --> 00:11:35,679 it in a certain way, we afford it enough significance, it becomes holy 138 00:11:35,799 --> 00:11:39,279 to us. That's what happens. But I think we are becoming pagan, 139 00:11:41,279 --> 00:11:48,679 but without without the influence of the Olympians, without the wisdom of those you 140 00:11:48,720 --> 00:11:56,200 know, those beings that direct and inform those stories. So I'm not advocating 141 00:11:56,279 --> 00:12:01,720 for it, but claos is a pagan response to the world. Clos is 142 00:12:01,759 --> 00:12:05,600 a pagan response to the world. Imperishable glory is what was going on in 143 00:12:05,720 --> 00:12:11,120 Greek and Roman myth. Therefore, I see through you know, being a 144 00:12:11,200 --> 00:12:18,240 father and having a teenage daughter, what is coming at her endlessly through social 145 00:12:18,279 --> 00:12:22,399 media is an attempt to create just that kind of thing. Yeah. One 146 00:12:22,399 --> 00:12:26,480 of the things that I've been thinking about in terms of the ardissey. You 147 00:12:26,519 --> 00:12:31,000 know, I've been thinking that it is very appropriate to this time now, 148 00:12:31,159 --> 00:12:35,080 because the ardisty is this desire to return home, you know, the sense 149 00:12:35,120 --> 00:12:39,600 of being adrift, being kind of you know, moving around without without having 150 00:12:39,679 --> 00:12:46,200 an anchor, and and you know, encountering all these strange principalities and't the 151 00:12:46,200 --> 00:12:48,879 strange woman and all of this, all of this stuff, but then with 152 00:12:48,919 --> 00:12:52,879 this desire to kind of return home to the hearth, and so it feels 153 00:12:52,960 --> 00:12:58,879 like it's an appropriate it's an appropriate story to tell today because we all seem 154 00:12:58,919 --> 00:13:01,720 to feel that we have we feel alienated, we feel like we don't have 155 00:13:01,840 --> 00:13:05,519 a place to stand, and then we don't even know where to look, 156 00:13:05,679 --> 00:13:09,480 at least for now, where to look to find that home again. Yeah. 157 00:13:09,600 --> 00:13:13,519 Now, you and I, coming from an Orthodox background, would have 158 00:13:13,600 --> 00:13:16,519 the same take on that, probably that C. S. Lewis did, 159 00:13:16,000 --> 00:13:22,840 which is you're really that nostos. That's the word the yearning that Odysseus has 160 00:13:22,840 --> 00:13:26,919 for Ithaca is nostos. In Welsh, it's called hiraus. It's this, 161 00:13:26,440 --> 00:13:33,080 it's homecoming, but it's more than homecoming. Lewis sensed it when he used 162 00:13:33,120 --> 00:13:37,840 to experience what he in Tolkien called northernness. It's a feeling, it's it's 163 00:13:37,840 --> 00:13:41,720 a it's a feeling. The Jungians would call animal possession. But that's a 164 00:13:41,799 --> 00:13:46,480 grotesque phrase, so forget I ever said it anima possession. But the point 165 00:13:46,519 --> 00:13:52,919 of it is from an Orthodox perspective, from a Christian perspective, that is 166 00:13:52,960 --> 00:13:58,000 the divine world starting to radiate through this one and call to you. But 167 00:14:00,080 --> 00:14:03,519 it's interesting because you will know before you know. The other great text from 168 00:14:03,639 --> 00:14:09,960 Homer is the Iliad. Now, the Iliad is not a story of nostos. 169 00:14:09,039 --> 00:14:13,039 It is a story of war. It's a story of a great conflict 170 00:14:13,240 --> 00:14:18,559 in the great hero of that era Achilles. And Achilles has the choice of 171 00:14:20,559 --> 00:14:24,200 because his mother is a goddess, he knows things about his life he should 172 00:14:24,240 --> 00:14:28,320 not know. And one of the things he knows is he has a choice. 173 00:14:28,799 --> 00:14:33,399 Do I want a small life filled with laos or do I want a 174 00:14:33,519 --> 00:14:39,519 long life but absolutely obscure. And he goes down the James Dean Jimi Hendrix 175 00:14:39,759 --> 00:14:46,519 dead at twenty eight route. You know, but I'm fascinated by this because 176 00:14:46,080 --> 00:14:50,759 now, the first time we met, we ended up talking about the Odyssey, 177 00:14:50,879 --> 00:14:54,240 and mid conversation with you, I had a thought that I will now 178 00:14:54,279 --> 00:15:01,840 repeat because it's significance to me. I think in the oddest we hear an 179 00:15:01,879 --> 00:15:07,480 echo of the arrival of Christ, a foreshadowing. And the reason why is 180 00:15:07,519 --> 00:15:11,799 it's when Odysseus goes to the underworld and he bumps into Achilles, who does 181 00:15:11,799 --> 00:15:15,919 not have good words for him, but he asks Achilles, how's this Clayos 182 00:15:16,080 --> 00:15:20,799 working out for you down here in the dark, and an Achilles says, 183 00:15:22,279 --> 00:15:26,480 sooner be a slave to a poor man than king of the underworld. Now 184 00:15:26,559 --> 00:15:31,000 that is an anti claos move. And as far as I can tell, 185 00:15:31,399 --> 00:15:37,480 the beattitudes, the Sermon on the Mount, the sheer, weird achido, 186 00:15:37,360 --> 00:15:45,240 countercultural moves of Christ turn all of that on its head. You're hearing what 187 00:15:45,480 --> 00:15:48,320 eighteen hundred years or something, No, eight hundred really, I suppose with 188 00:15:48,360 --> 00:15:54,360 the Homer before Christ, you're hearing the end of one age and the beginning 189 00:15:54,399 --> 00:15:58,039 of another. What's so mind blowing for me is, you know, Copernicum 190 00:15:58,120 --> 00:16:03,159 was on a trade route, so it's possible that, you know, can 191 00:16:03,200 --> 00:16:07,320 you imagine the Jewish boy is hearing some of these stories, not just the 192 00:16:07,320 --> 00:16:11,440 oldisty, but he might have heard fragments of them. I'm not saying they 193 00:16:11,480 --> 00:16:15,240 influenced him. It's just a mind boggling thought. Yeah, to think that 194 00:16:15,240 --> 00:16:19,200 that would be part of the same kind of storytelling world I've also seen in 195 00:16:19,200 --> 00:16:25,639 in Odysseus, when Odysseus returns home and he he dresses as a as a 196 00:16:25,639 --> 00:16:29,720 beggar, basically as a as a beggar, and then he what he wants. 197 00:16:29,919 --> 00:16:34,200 It seems like he wants his son to recognize him through he wants the 198 00:16:34,240 --> 00:16:40,320 people that he loves to recognize him, possibly through the disguise or or or 199 00:16:40,360 --> 00:16:45,080 he's using the disguise to get back into to the house. There's something about 200 00:16:45,120 --> 00:16:49,279 that also about Christ who who comes as? Who is this king who's hiding 201 00:16:49,360 --> 00:16:52,519 in the in the lowest, the lowest image, you could say, I 202 00:16:52,519 --> 00:16:56,759 don't know if you've ever thought about that. Yeah, more so recently than 203 00:16:56,799 --> 00:17:00,039 before. You know, the last time I told the story, I was 204 00:17:00,039 --> 00:17:04,599 a screaming pagan romantic, so a few things have changed in the last five 205 00:17:04,680 --> 00:17:10,960 years. One thing I'd say, though, is all of the trouble that 206 00:17:10,960 --> 00:17:15,920 Odysseus gets into is because of when he blinds the Cyclops. The Cyclops says 207 00:17:15,920 --> 00:17:22,559 to him, who did this? And Odysseus can't bear leaving without announcing his 208 00:17:22,680 --> 00:17:27,720 achievement. And when he says that, the Cyclops's father, Poseidon says, 209 00:17:27,880 --> 00:17:34,119 right, I've got a ZIP code from Odysseus. Now he's done, and 210 00:17:34,160 --> 00:17:40,519 again, in a reversal of Chlaos. The only way Odysseus can return to 211 00:17:40,559 --> 00:17:47,960 Ithaca. He leaves as somebody and he returns as nobody. And it's only 212 00:17:48,160 --> 00:17:53,880 through that shift does he finally display that wonderful word metis his particular wit, 213 00:17:55,039 --> 00:18:00,319 his particular cunning to get through being contact with his son Telemachus speak to Penelope 214 00:18:00,359 --> 00:18:04,920 and then all the mayhem that then goes on. But that Christ connection is 215 00:18:04,920 --> 00:18:08,599 is really interesting. Yeah, well, I mean it's interesting in the sense 216 00:18:08,880 --> 00:18:14,240 with obviously Christ didn't have that other part and you can see that in you 217 00:18:14,279 --> 00:18:18,119 can see that in Christ. You see the opposite, which is it's interesting 218 00:18:18,119 --> 00:18:22,119 because Christ hides his divinity during the story. He actually he always says people 219 00:18:22,119 --> 00:18:25,559 and he heals people and says, don't tell anyone, you know, you 220 00:18:25,599 --> 00:18:29,079 know, don't tell anyone what I did. This weird. And it's only 221 00:18:29,079 --> 00:18:32,680 as he gets closer to his crucifixion, and it's in the moment when he's 222 00:18:32,720 --> 00:18:36,720 basically been beaten, you know, he's been tortured, he's bloody, and 223 00:18:36,759 --> 00:18:41,279 he's standing there in front of the judges, in front of the Sondrin and 224 00:18:41,319 --> 00:18:44,720 then he says, you know, like I'm that I'm the son of Man. 225 00:18:44,759 --> 00:18:48,000 Basically it's like and the you know, the the high priest rips his 226 00:18:48,079 --> 00:18:51,599 vestment. But it's like in that it's it's almost like a very different than 227 00:18:51,640 --> 00:18:53,519 the story of Odysseus, which is that at first he hides it and when 228 00:18:53,559 --> 00:18:56,920 he reveals it, it's in the worst possible moment. It's like it's in 229 00:18:56,920 --> 00:19:02,200 the moment where you're a prisoner and you've been completely humiliated, and now you 230 00:19:02,240 --> 00:19:04,279 say, I am the son of a son of man. It's a wow. 231 00:19:04,480 --> 00:19:10,920 It's a wow reversal. Yes, And it's why as a mythologist, 232 00:19:11,240 --> 00:19:17,920 I just avoided my root system. I avoided Christ for fifty years because he 233 00:19:18,039 --> 00:19:23,160 was nonsensical to me. It's not difficult for me to fall into a kind 234 00:19:23,160 --> 00:19:30,839 of biological resonance with the great heroes of the earlier stories. But Christ is 235 00:19:30,880 --> 00:19:36,319 a much more thin skinned, pressurized kind of individual. Do you know. 236 00:19:36,799 --> 00:19:40,559 It's funny, because I'm a storyteller. Whenever Christ says, don't tell anybody 237 00:19:41,400 --> 00:19:44,960 in my mind in a fairy tale, whenever you say don't do that, 238 00:19:45,400 --> 00:19:49,119 it means who there? Now, I don't think that's what he meant. 239 00:19:49,160 --> 00:19:55,160 But I always smile at those moments because there's nothing more that will be quickly 240 00:19:55,279 --> 00:20:00,799 disclosed, you know, that's a fad that it just it point to think 241 00:20:00,839 --> 00:20:03,000 about, like it could be part of the some of the deep ironies that 242 00:20:03,119 --> 00:20:07,599 Christ manifest, you know, like they're they they appear, especially in the 243 00:20:07,599 --> 00:20:11,160 Crucifixion, but there are the deep ironies in his story where you know, 244 00:20:11,200 --> 00:20:15,039 he's humiliated, but it's treated like a king at the same time. So 245 00:20:15,160 --> 00:20:21,000 it's possible that when he says that he's it's almost like he's saying, you 246 00:20:21,000 --> 00:20:23,799 know, here's a seed, you know, keep it, keep it safe, 247 00:20:23,960 --> 00:20:26,240 and then it grows, and it starts to grow, and it starts 248 00:20:29,039 --> 00:20:32,480 you know, I mean, this is this is very much your bread and 249 00:20:32,519 --> 00:20:34,519 butter, you know, your your bread and beer in terms of what you 250 00:20:34,640 --> 00:20:41,880 love. But the the shock of coming to the Bible profoundly in Middle Age 251 00:20:41,359 --> 00:20:48,519 and recognizing it's this kind of echo chamber where everything is talking to everything else 252 00:20:48,799 --> 00:20:53,319 all the time, and nothing is wasted. There's not a line in the 253 00:20:53,359 --> 00:20:57,200 book I can find that is wasted. Now, there are things I struggle 254 00:20:57,240 --> 00:21:03,200 with constant I think you're supposed to. I think that there's something about scripture 255 00:21:03,640 --> 00:21:08,279 which makes it that there are some stories it's like you can see exactly what 256 00:21:08,319 --> 00:21:11,160 you said, you can see all of these things connecting, and you can 257 00:21:11,200 --> 00:21:15,440 notice that there's this giant web of references that are that are going backwards and 258 00:21:15,480 --> 00:21:19,160 forwards, and so you trust it. But then you come to some bit 259 00:21:19,240 --> 00:21:22,640 where, you know, in the Book of Judges, the man who cuts 260 00:21:22,680 --> 00:21:29,279 his his his mistress into pieces and sends it off to the tribe. It's 261 00:21:29,279 --> 00:21:33,000 like, there are some bits that are so crazy, and you know that 262 00:21:33,359 --> 00:21:36,920 this probably is hiding a very deep meaning because everything else is, but you 263 00:21:36,960 --> 00:21:41,039 can't you can't catch it. You know, it's painful. No, And 264 00:21:41,119 --> 00:21:45,680 I think as modern people, we're wired to like or dislike characters. We 265 00:21:45,839 --> 00:21:51,160 like strong signals, who's good, who's bad, what's going on? And 266 00:21:51,200 --> 00:21:57,279 then the Bible has these stories where supposedly good people suddenly do very strange things. 267 00:21:57,359 --> 00:22:02,240 You know, David is one of them. I'm telling this story, 268 00:22:02,920 --> 00:22:07,640 the Saga of Pinkoff, cracky right through the autumn, this deep Icelandic town. 269 00:22:07,000 --> 00:22:14,920 There's no comedy value, none in fact in the sagas. If there's 270 00:22:14,960 --> 00:22:18,400 too much comedy in you can be sure that that is a continental influence. 271 00:22:18,720 --> 00:22:23,279 That's not that's not how the schools would have told it. But there's this 272 00:22:23,319 --> 00:22:27,640 one character called a Halty the Magnanimous who lives in a bone pile. He's 273 00:22:27,680 --> 00:22:33,240 the only guy remotely approachable. The rest of them are just berserkers. And 274 00:22:33,279 --> 00:22:38,039 then just as you're starting to like him, he bites his girlfriend's nose off 275 00:22:38,039 --> 00:22:45,119 in an argument and continues talking to her, crunching up her nose and saying, 276 00:22:45,160 --> 00:22:48,960 well, you know, I think this is I think this is it 277 00:22:49,000 --> 00:22:53,279 for me and you. I'm just not feeling it anymore. And my heart 278 00:22:53,440 --> 00:22:57,480 sunk at that moment because I thought Halty the Magnanimous was all I had, 279 00:22:57,759 --> 00:23:02,799 you know, he was in my own only moment of warmth in this this 280 00:23:03,079 --> 00:23:07,000 thing. And so the Bible can be like that for me and the way, 281 00:23:10,000 --> 00:23:14,440 you know, I find it an act of will sometimes to remember the 282 00:23:14,440 --> 00:23:17,960 Bible. It's just as if the stories they sort of test you. They 283 00:23:17,960 --> 00:23:22,119 almost want you to forget them. They want you to remember them. I'm 284 00:23:22,200 --> 00:23:27,440 just improvising this, as I said. To learn a story from the Bible 285 00:23:27,640 --> 00:23:33,799 is like when I'm in Divine liturgy and Father Preforous serves me that bit of 286 00:23:33,839 --> 00:23:38,400 bread soaked in wine that looks all to the world like a piece of meat, 287 00:23:40,200 --> 00:23:41,680 you know, all to the world like a piece of meat, and 288 00:23:41,759 --> 00:23:48,000 I'm suddenly in this kind of living iconography. You know, I'm changed. 289 00:23:48,519 --> 00:23:52,000 It's amazing. I don't do you experience this at liturgy? I eat the 290 00:23:52,039 --> 00:23:56,720 bread, this tiny bit of bread, and I am no longer hungry. 291 00:23:56,920 --> 00:24:00,519 I noticed this again and again. I'm always hungry obviously in fastings, in 292 00:24:00,720 --> 00:24:04,960 vestpers and I get in there and I eat and this tiny thing. But 293 00:24:06,039 --> 00:24:10,200 because of what is what it is, it is subsumed in it has this 294 00:24:10,400 --> 00:24:14,400 miraculous effect. Yeah. And in the story of the saints, you have 295 00:24:14,519 --> 00:24:17,759 that, you have story, crazy stories of saints that live only from the 296 00:24:17,799 --> 00:24:21,359 Eucharist. Wow, that's all they eat. Yeah, there there's some wild 297 00:24:21,359 --> 00:24:25,640 stories. Sometimes it's like once a year or something like some really crazy story 298 00:24:25,640 --> 00:24:30,039 about eating the Eucharist once a year and surviving all through. But there's what 299 00:24:30,119 --> 00:24:33,960 you said about the Scripture. There's something. There's something about the Scripture stories, 300 00:24:34,119 --> 00:24:41,039 which it's also because they've been so glossed that sometimes we kind of see 301 00:24:41,079 --> 00:24:45,680 them through the gloss, which is not bad because the raw stories are sometimes 302 00:24:45,680 --> 00:24:48,839 a little too much to deal with. But uh, you can actually read 303 00:24:48,880 --> 00:24:52,440 all the Bible stories from multiple points of view, very much like you could 304 00:24:52,440 --> 00:24:56,319 read the Iliad and you know, sympathize with the Trojans, and so you 305 00:24:56,359 --> 00:25:00,759 could try to read the story, so you know, read the story of 306 00:25:00,839 --> 00:25:03,839 Abraham and realize and read it as if Abraham is not not a hero at 307 00:25:03,839 --> 00:25:07,680 all, and you'll see that the story will tell itself and it will make 308 00:25:07,759 --> 00:25:11,519 sense, and you can do the opposite. So there's this weird thing about 309 00:25:11,519 --> 00:25:15,079 the story, and it's very algebraic. That's why it's difficult to remember. 310 00:25:15,160 --> 00:25:19,400 Because a lot of the more ancient types of epics, they have descriptions and 311 00:25:19,559 --> 00:25:23,880 they'll be like these poetic types of description of emotion. There's none of that 312 00:25:23,920 --> 00:25:26,200 in the Bible. The Bible is just like this happened, this happened, 313 00:25:26,240 --> 00:25:30,279 this happened, this happened, you know, And so it's more difficult to 314 00:25:30,519 --> 00:25:33,319 But once you see the pattern, you realize how powerful it is. It 315 00:25:33,400 --> 00:25:37,119 just takes more, at least for our minds to pierce them. Yes, 316 00:25:37,400 --> 00:25:42,000 and you have to be careful because once if you are a chapter in verse 317 00:25:42,079 --> 00:25:48,920 Christian and you have so sort of calcified your imagination to the point where that 318 00:25:48,119 --> 00:25:53,680 is the only legitimate way those stories can be told or even chanted in our 319 00:25:53,720 --> 00:25:59,920 tradition not even told God forbid the intonation of your own voice and expression could 320 00:26:00,079 --> 00:26:04,480 come into it. You know, this is Martin Luther territory. So so 321 00:26:06,200 --> 00:26:08,839 that has been a struggle for me. Is how far in I mean the 322 00:26:08,920 --> 00:26:14,799 great the great way in recently has been I've been telling and will be continuing 323 00:26:14,839 --> 00:26:18,599 to tell the story of Joseph in Egypt as an underworld to sense story Joseph 324 00:26:18,680 --> 00:26:23,880 in the Underworld, I've been telling the story of Job as the opening of 325 00:26:23,920 --> 00:26:29,960 what I call the Wonder Eye, where actually I think although we think we're 326 00:26:30,000 --> 00:26:33,119 loaded up with questions for God. Of course, in that story, in 327 00:26:33,160 --> 00:26:37,839 the end God doesn't answer any of Job's questions, but he does say, 328 00:26:37,960 --> 00:26:41,839 come have a look behind the veil for five minutes, and then let's see. 329 00:26:41,240 --> 00:26:48,119 Then let's see how chatter you are. So I'm finding my way into 330 00:26:48,119 --> 00:26:49,680 it. I'm thinking a lot about the story of Sampson at the moment, 331 00:26:49,680 --> 00:26:53,440 and others. Oh man, there's a good story of Sampson, is it 332 00:26:53,519 --> 00:26:57,720 is? I think one of the drid Falders said that the story of Sampson 333 00:26:57,839 --> 00:27:02,799 is the closest story to in the Old Testament. Ah, And that's a 334 00:27:03,039 --> 00:27:06,799 that's it. But you have to just see it through the right lens, 335 00:27:06,880 --> 00:27:11,400 which is Samson is trying to join with the stranger. That's what Samson is 336 00:27:11,440 --> 00:27:17,519 trying to do, and so he's this weird character that is moving towards He's 337 00:27:17,519 --> 00:27:19,640 trying to join the margin and the center. Right, he takes the door 338 00:27:19,680 --> 00:27:22,480 and brings it up to the top of the hill. That's basically what Samson 339 00:27:22,559 --> 00:27:26,279 is trying to do, but he keeps messing it up. Right, he 340 00:27:26,359 --> 00:27:29,720 finds he finds honey in the dead lion. That's what Sampson is, right, 341 00:27:30,079 --> 00:27:33,400 but it's like but at the same time, he can't hold it together 342 00:27:34,119 --> 00:27:38,240 and then he has to he has to kill himself. That's in that the 343 00:27:38,480 --> 00:27:47,000 the the honey in the lion, just as the sheer unintellectual power of that 344 00:27:47,119 --> 00:27:52,160 image. That's got to be a Christian group called Lion's Honey or something. 345 00:27:52,160 --> 00:27:56,240 It just it just begs, it just begs for it. But it's it's 346 00:27:56,519 --> 00:28:00,599 I mean, I I came into stories, and I came into when I 347 00:28:00,599 --> 00:28:03,839 would have been in my early twenties. I'd loved them when I was younger, 348 00:28:06,039 --> 00:28:07,440 but I ended up living in a tent for four years. I don't 349 00:28:07,480 --> 00:28:11,880 know if we've ever talked about this. I ended up it became important to 350 00:28:12,000 --> 00:28:17,400 me in the late nineties, when I would have been in my mid twenties, 351 00:28:17,920 --> 00:28:22,640 to see if there were any real pockets of British wilderness left. So 352 00:28:22,720 --> 00:28:26,640 I took off in a black tent without a phone or a computer, and 353 00:28:26,680 --> 00:28:32,599 effectively to the outside world to some degree, disappeared for four years. And 354 00:28:33,039 --> 00:28:40,799 I just wanted to be absolutely undomesticated. I wanted to find what there's an 355 00:28:40,799 --> 00:28:45,839 Irish philosopher, John Moriarty calls it your bush soul. And so when I 356 00:28:45,920 --> 00:28:51,880 went through that experience, I found the best way to talk about it without 357 00:28:51,880 --> 00:28:56,599 the use of ie statements was these old stories. You and I. We 358 00:28:56,599 --> 00:29:02,599 were once in You and I once went walking in Dublin late at night, 359 00:29:03,160 --> 00:29:07,319 and every single person we passed was hurling bottles around, and that you remember, 360 00:29:07,400 --> 00:29:11,880 they're just bottles smashing the whole the whole town was in what you call 361 00:29:12,279 --> 00:29:17,119 seaeous, and he says, we are approaching jubilation. They hadn't got to 362 00:29:17,240 --> 00:29:19,799 jubilation, but they were approaching it. And you and I sat surrounded by 363 00:29:19,839 --> 00:29:26,640 broken glass, smoking these cigars and drinking Guinness remember at the top of Grafton 364 00:29:26,759 --> 00:29:30,160 Street and the thing you said, and I agreed with you said, you 365 00:29:30,200 --> 00:29:36,480 know, myth and story is just the best way to talk about almost everything. 366 00:29:37,319 --> 00:29:41,000 It's the indigenous way to talk about everything. It's the classical way to 367 00:29:41,039 --> 00:29:45,319 talk about everything. It's the Artherian way. It's the Irish way, it's 368 00:29:45,359 --> 00:29:48,440 the Russian way, it's the Aboriginal way. It's what we've always done in 369 00:29:48,480 --> 00:29:55,039 the There's a very old notion I'm interested in, which is we don't human 370 00:29:55,079 --> 00:30:00,240 beings get made. It's actually a process. And if you don't have connection 371 00:30:00,559 --> 00:30:07,200 to stories, rather like a cloak, then you are prone to enormous floods 372 00:30:07,240 --> 00:30:11,559 of anxieties. You get older as you experience the dress of life. Despite 373 00:30:11,640 --> 00:30:17,839 all the gadget tree, if we don't have this very ancient technology called a 374 00:30:17,960 --> 00:30:22,599 story close to hand, we run equipped in some way. Yeah, I 375 00:30:22,640 --> 00:30:26,599 think that there's something. So if you think of something like an ethical code, 376 00:30:26,640 --> 00:30:29,400 for example, right, a series of that, that's fine, we 377 00:30:29,480 --> 00:30:33,160 need those, you know, they're they're important. But a story is like 378 00:30:33,200 --> 00:30:37,359 a tuning for you know what. It find of vibrates and you start to 379 00:30:37,480 --> 00:30:42,160 vibrate with it, and you can actually be transformed without understanding anything, without 380 00:30:42,240 --> 00:30:48,000 knowing why it's happening, without without having any rational explanation for why it is. 381 00:30:48,039 --> 00:30:53,440 You're being transformed because because you're actually you're identifying with the characters, you're 382 00:30:53,599 --> 00:30:57,279 you're or you're or you're not identifying with the characters, and that's putting you 383 00:30:57,319 --> 00:31:00,680 in a space where you're basically it's more like music. You know, you're 384 00:31:00,720 --> 00:31:06,200 more vibrating with the pattern. And then at some point, without knowing it, 385 00:31:06,279 --> 00:31:11,359 you find that your perspective has been transformed. Yeah, and now what's 386 00:31:11,400 --> 00:31:15,680 going to happen on that thought, what's going to happen in a few hours 387 00:31:15,720 --> 00:31:22,559 in my life is I'm going to get seventy people responding getting tuned at different 388 00:31:22,680 --> 00:31:27,759 polyphonic parts of the story of this is not just one part but many. 389 00:31:29,119 --> 00:31:33,039 It's a little bit like watching someone having acupuncture and they go, I'm not 390 00:31:33,039 --> 00:31:37,039 feeling much here, don't feel anything there. Oh my god, that's where 391 00:31:37,039 --> 00:31:41,400 it is. That's where the trouble is. Now. The thing that turns 392 00:31:41,680 --> 00:31:49,599 a myth from a reenactment fair or a seance into something that's actually happening in 393 00:31:49,640 --> 00:31:56,799 the room now, a living myth is exactly that proximity to wonder, that 394 00:31:56,880 --> 00:32:04,480 proximity to the story do its cathonic work on you before you've had someone allegorize 395 00:32:04,559 --> 00:32:07,759 it to death or tell you what it means. One of the things that 396 00:32:07,839 --> 00:32:14,680 I liked about the Exodus series that you did with Jordan and our mutual friend 397 00:32:14,799 --> 00:32:22,519 James or and others is that I was impressed at how much pandemonium, intellectual 398 00:32:22,559 --> 00:32:27,279 pandemonium was going on. I was so pleased that that hadn't all been cut 399 00:32:27,319 --> 00:32:30,240 out and we just had the bits where you were all concurring and agreeing and 400 00:32:30,279 --> 00:32:36,519 nodding sagely. It was kind of messy, and that really is it's saving 401 00:32:36,559 --> 00:32:39,759 gresce we you and I and maybe Jordan, And if we should do one 402 00:32:40,000 --> 00:32:44,680 on the Obyssey, Oh yeah, just putting it out there, you know, 403 00:32:45,160 --> 00:32:49,759 of in normal If you want to understand how we in the West tick, 404 00:32:50,359 --> 00:32:53,359 you cannot get there without stories like the Obyssey. Yeah, that's a 405 00:32:53,400 --> 00:32:57,720 great idea to do a reading of the artisty and to kind of go through 406 00:32:57,759 --> 00:33:00,079 the images. I would love to do that. We should definitely organize it. 407 00:33:00,319 --> 00:33:07,440 Tell me about the conference. So okay, so I'm speaking told me 408 00:33:07,519 --> 00:33:14,279 what you know, and so I've been doing this now for what seven years, 409 00:33:14,319 --> 00:33:20,680 I guess since twenty sixteen, slowly building up let's say, helping hopefully 410 00:33:20,839 --> 00:33:23,279 helping people see the world differently. I would say that's the thing that I've 411 00:33:23,319 --> 00:33:25,480 been doing, you know, also in line with some of the things my 412 00:33:25,519 --> 00:33:30,079 brother has been doing as well. And now what I'm what I've noticed is 413 00:33:30,119 --> 00:33:34,119 that there are people that have been able to transform the thinking. And it's 414 00:33:34,119 --> 00:33:37,759 impressive to what extent they have been And I'm always surprised because for a large 415 00:33:37,799 --> 00:33:42,480 part of my life I felt like I was a freak, that it was 416 00:33:42,519 --> 00:33:45,039 a freak that thought in a very strange way and that nobody could understand. 417 00:33:45,119 --> 00:33:47,680 And now all of a sudden, there are these people that are that are 418 00:33:47,680 --> 00:33:52,880 thinking this way. It's transforming their their their thinking. So the idea is 419 00:33:52,000 --> 00:33:57,240 to meet in person. Really, it's to to instead of just doing this 420 00:33:57,359 --> 00:34:00,160 online thing, to actually come into the same space, you know, to 421 00:34:00,160 --> 00:34:06,920 to to meet each other and also to participate in There'll be different streams they'll 422 00:34:06,960 --> 00:34:09,119 be There'll be a artistic stream, so artists will have a chance to meet 423 00:34:09,119 --> 00:34:13,679 each other, exchange about their work, look at how they can you know, 424 00:34:13,960 --> 00:34:16,880 use this kind of mythical thinking in their work. There'll be one which 425 00:34:16,920 --> 00:34:21,920 is more like the home how to include these this way of living in your 426 00:34:21,920 --> 00:34:25,119 home, symbolic living, symbolic thinking in your home life. And then there'll 427 00:34:25,119 --> 00:34:29,960 be obviously the universal history path, which is, you know, people moving 428 00:34:30,000 --> 00:34:35,360 closer to how to reinterpret history in a way that that connects it with myth. 429 00:34:35,679 --> 00:34:38,280 Uh and then you know, realizing that myth is the driving power of 430 00:34:38,360 --> 00:34:43,400 history. To be honest, that without the myth behind the history, you 431 00:34:43,440 --> 00:34:47,119 know, we don't care about these stories like the Bay. The boring historical 432 00:34:47,559 --> 00:34:54,119 things have no no spark if they're not anchored in something that is transcendent or 433 00:34:54,159 --> 00:34:58,320 something that you that you can care about. That's why all the ancient people 434 00:34:58,320 --> 00:35:01,159 would connect their story to Troy and two and to the Bible. It's like 435 00:35:01,280 --> 00:35:05,960 they had to connect to the ancient mythic past. So basically we're going to 436 00:35:06,039 --> 00:35:08,199 be there. There'll be some music, you know, and then obviously they'll 437 00:35:08,239 --> 00:35:12,440 be They'll be you speaking, will we have discussions, will be Father Stephen 438 00:35:12,440 --> 00:35:15,800 de Young, who I don't know if you've heard some of his So I 439 00:35:16,159 --> 00:35:21,679 just feel like even just having the three of us together is going to be 440 00:35:21,719 --> 00:35:25,000 pretty explosive, but then other people there, it's gonna be great what it 441 00:35:25,079 --> 00:35:29,480 is. And I've also seen you know, you've got vesper Stampa, You've 442 00:35:29,519 --> 00:35:32,719 got you got you know, coaches are with your rolling Neil the grade like 443 00:35:32,760 --> 00:35:36,760 that. Oh, I mean this is this is I go. You know, 444 00:35:36,840 --> 00:35:38,599 I buy a ticket for this being in the audience if I wasn't on 445 00:35:38,639 --> 00:35:42,760 the stage for short Man. Yeah, so you know, I'm really looking 446 00:35:42,760 --> 00:35:45,400 forward to it. And uh and in some ways, you know, I 447 00:35:45,400 --> 00:35:52,039 think that this, you know, rediscovering the ancient way of thinking and and 448 00:35:52,039 --> 00:35:57,000 and living, that's the key to the future. It's it's not easy to 449 00:35:57,039 --> 00:36:00,519 connect it to the modern world. Sometimes it's it's difficult to know how to 450 00:36:00,559 --> 00:36:04,760 deal with the technological world and kind of want to go back into this mythical 451 00:36:04,840 --> 00:36:08,400 world. But we have to work through it, right, we have to 452 00:36:08,440 --> 00:36:12,920 find a way to connect them together or else, or else we're going to 453 00:36:13,000 --> 00:36:17,079 lose ourselves. So we are and I think I think, you know, 454 00:36:17,239 --> 00:36:22,000 of course, from a distance, everything looks different from a distance. You 455 00:36:22,039 --> 00:36:25,360 know, when I try and explain to my friends that I'm an Eastern Orthodox 456 00:36:25,440 --> 00:36:30,719 Christian, a Russian Orthodox Christian. Right now, that's not a popular look 457 00:36:30,760 --> 00:36:35,360 in Europe, I can assure you, ah. But from the it looks 458 00:36:35,400 --> 00:36:37,840 like one thing. From the outside, it just looks like these odd shaped 459 00:36:38,199 --> 00:36:43,320 bubal onions and strange looking things, and everybody's standing up and what's going on. 460 00:36:43,559 --> 00:36:46,800 But you get in there, you get inside, and it's nothing to 461 00:36:46,880 --> 00:36:51,400 do with a long time ago. That's one of the great secrets of myth. 462 00:36:51,880 --> 00:36:54,679 Myth, when it is functioning efficiently, is not really to do with 463 00:36:54,760 --> 00:37:00,000 a long time ago. Those stories do not get remembered. The stories that 464 00:37:00,039 --> 00:37:06,039 get remembered are the ones the day that was not like the day before, 465 00:37:06,599 --> 00:37:13,760 and when you didn't have endless iPads or even literacy, you had to decide 466 00:37:14,480 --> 00:37:17,000 what am I going to choose to remember. It was a conscious act of 467 00:37:17,079 --> 00:37:22,679 will. And as you were saying a few minutes ago, stories like the 468 00:37:22,719 --> 00:37:30,320 tuning fork they do something to you. I'm very interested in the notion of 469 00:37:30,440 --> 00:37:35,840 no bless oblige, which really translates as if you are noble, you have 470 00:37:35,960 --> 00:37:40,920 to act noble, and to act noble you really need to be around stories 471 00:37:40,960 --> 00:37:50,079 that externally show you through symbolic images, what that looks like and without consuming 472 00:37:50,159 --> 00:37:54,960 that. It's very hard to stay focused on it. And so you've been 473 00:37:55,000 --> 00:38:00,480 on a path like a maas of massive transformation, you know, in your 474 00:38:00,480 --> 00:38:04,800 own personal life then obviously also even I imagine even your readers, there's been 475 00:38:05,039 --> 00:38:08,000 change in that world, like who's coming to the workshops all of that, 476 00:38:08,119 --> 00:38:14,000 And so I'm curious to see you know, you're the change of your perspective 477 00:38:14,360 --> 00:38:16,719 and how it has changed your vision of storytelling. You feel like the way 478 00:38:16,760 --> 00:38:20,480 that you see stories or that you engage with stories, the change in the 479 00:38:20,480 --> 00:38:25,199 past few years. Yeah, and I think I can stum it up pretty 480 00:38:25,440 --> 00:38:30,679 quickly, actually, I would say, and I'm moving between a sort of 481 00:38:30,679 --> 00:38:35,679 a mythic and a religious perspective, and there's almost no difference in the world 482 00:38:35,679 --> 00:38:40,880 that I live in. Myths showed me everything I needed to know about the 483 00:38:40,960 --> 00:38:46,400 conditions of living. Different gods and goddesses. Show you the betrayals, the 484 00:38:46,480 --> 00:38:52,559 healings, the strange nuances to it all. It shows you the planning field. 485 00:38:52,639 --> 00:38:58,000 It's phenomenal how to live. It was the missing element for me. 486 00:38:58,960 --> 00:39:02,960 And that I have to say is the Christian narrative. It's the Christian story 487 00:39:04,000 --> 00:39:08,719 because it's so it actually turns a lot of the myths before it kind of 488 00:39:08,760 --> 00:39:16,000 on its head because of this last you'll be first antichlaos kind of thing going 489 00:39:16,159 --> 00:39:24,000 on, this huge enormous consciousness where we're not just venerating trees and bends in 490 00:39:24,000 --> 00:39:30,960 the river and all the thousands and millions of little ellaheens and messengers that are 491 00:39:30,960 --> 00:39:36,440 moving around us. We're making a claim that we're in contact with the being 492 00:39:36,880 --> 00:39:42,360 that is infused in that, but also completely outside of it as well. 493 00:39:43,079 --> 00:39:47,440 That was just kind of too big for me. But in the absence of 494 00:39:47,480 --> 00:39:52,679 that, my life, I suppose, up until, you know, up 495 00:39:52,760 --> 00:39:59,400 until a few years ago, had the familiar kind of chaotic fault lines of 496 00:39:59,480 --> 00:40:06,559 not how that essential kind of binding agent that is Yesua sot a lot has 497 00:40:06,679 --> 00:40:12,119 changed. It's not as if my life hasn't been nourished and informed and blessed 498 00:40:12,119 --> 00:40:16,559 beyond measure by these stories. But the reality is, and this is hard. 499 00:40:17,480 --> 00:40:21,960 Lot of Christians don't like me saying what I'm about to say. The 500 00:40:22,000 --> 00:40:25,840 reality is, you know, I'm with Augustine. All truth is God's truth, 501 00:40:27,800 --> 00:40:30,480 and I think that a lot of these stories, there could be some 502 00:40:30,519 --> 00:40:34,519 story way up from the Inuit and they and I respect this. They may 503 00:40:34,519 --> 00:40:37,920 not want to see it in this way. But from my point of view, 504 00:40:37,440 --> 00:40:44,639 many myths and stories are filled with pinpricks and hints of this great story. 505 00:40:45,880 --> 00:40:49,960 And so I feel that I was on a kind of drip feed for 506 00:40:50,000 --> 00:40:53,800 a really long time, and the thing that my heart was swooning for over 507 00:40:53,880 --> 00:40:59,920 and over in these stories was something that I could never depend in defend him 508 00:41:00,119 --> 00:41:08,320 public, but was actually this sort of terrifying revelation that actually it was the 509 00:41:08,400 --> 00:41:13,679 you know, the Aslam of my youth wishing to announce itself. I went 510 00:41:13,719 --> 00:41:15,400 on a vigil for one hundred and one days. I went out into a 511 00:41:15,480 --> 00:41:23,519 Dartmoor forest, and at the end of it, I had a profoundly eviscerating, 512 00:41:24,159 --> 00:41:30,400 beautiful, unimaginable, almost encounter with Christ, but in the one place 513 00:41:30,440 --> 00:41:35,559 I never expected to meet him. I went out there thinking, well, 514 00:41:35,639 --> 00:41:37,800 by the time I finished this, I'll probably be married to the wild in 515 00:41:37,880 --> 00:41:43,480 some way. And I came back married to Christ. And I realized that 516 00:41:43,559 --> 00:41:47,639 both of these weddings are facing each other. It's a strange thing to say 517 00:41:49,400 --> 00:41:52,480 as someone I'm not a classicist. We're talking about the Odyssey. I'm not 518 00:41:52,519 --> 00:41:59,159 a classicist in England. If you're a classicist that's kind of connected to a 519 00:41:59,199 --> 00:42:04,280 class system, really connected to a certain level of school that you would have 520 00:42:04,320 --> 00:42:08,239 gone to. I didn't go to schools like that, But I have a 521 00:42:08,480 --> 00:42:20,039 real experience understanding and many decades long involvement with indigenous and shamanic stories. Oddly, 522 00:42:20,519 --> 00:42:24,079 they're much much closer to Christ figures than ones that you get in the 523 00:42:24,079 --> 00:42:29,840 West. They understand very well, the idea of the suffering healer, they 524 00:42:30,000 --> 00:42:34,039 understand very well. The one that you're not looking at is the one that 525 00:42:34,159 --> 00:42:38,119 is actually kind of binding and through an act of love and sacrifice, bringing 526 00:42:38,159 --> 00:42:45,400 you life to the tribe. So I was aware of these things, but 527 00:42:45,599 --> 00:42:52,199 now, of course I see the For example, I see, you know, 528 00:42:52,239 --> 00:43:00,320 the crucifixion as the supreme poetic event of human experience. But I I 529 00:43:00,920 --> 00:43:05,679 it was as if I was just not allowed to see it until I was 530 00:43:05,679 --> 00:43:08,480 almost fifty. It was like this, and then God said, and now 531 00:43:10,119 --> 00:43:15,760 now, and for the last two years, my Jovian wonder eye has been 532 00:43:15,840 --> 00:43:21,519 opened. But for some reason he wanted me to get all this other stuff 533 00:43:21,559 --> 00:43:27,760 in me too, And so I'm in this thrilling and unexpected You know what 534 00:43:27,880 --> 00:43:30,599 midlife is like? You can feel like you've seen all the movies worth possibly 535 00:43:30,639 --> 00:43:36,960 seeing. So to be in this new world where I'm meeting. I like 536 00:43:37,039 --> 00:43:39,440 what Paul vander Clay is doing. You know, he's a very interesting man 537 00:43:39,480 --> 00:43:44,320 with all his sort of cross associations. You see. I come from my 538 00:43:44,440 --> 00:43:47,280 dad as a preacher. My brother is a pastor. I'm very familiar with 539 00:43:47,320 --> 00:43:52,360 all of this. But at the same time, because of Orthodoxy, I've 540 00:43:52,360 --> 00:43:58,079 been opened up to I grew up in church. All the action was in 541 00:43:58,119 --> 00:44:02,360 the pulpit. Now the action in the liturgy. You know, the pulpit 542 00:44:02,480 --> 00:44:06,320 is the only moment. It's the sermon. It's the only moment where you 543 00:44:06,360 --> 00:44:08,800 can sit down. He's like, yeah, okay, sit down. This 544 00:44:08,960 --> 00:44:15,000 is just me for five minutes, and everybody you know stand awry wisdom and 545 00:44:15,039 --> 00:44:17,559 we're off. You know. So I kind of know where I am, 546 00:44:17,639 --> 00:44:21,320 but I also don't know where I am, which is a wonderful place to 547 00:44:21,320 --> 00:44:24,519 be. And I think that what you said, you know, the idea 548 00:44:24,519 --> 00:44:29,559 that in some ways you had to pack all this other, all this other 549 00:44:29,599 --> 00:44:32,360 stuff in you. I think in some ways, you know, this might 550 00:44:32,400 --> 00:44:37,480 will seem a little maybe I'm pushing it and whatever, whatever, people think, 551 00:44:37,519 --> 00:44:39,719 but that it seems like to me that's the role that I perceive that 552 00:44:39,760 --> 00:44:44,559 you can have right now in this moment, which is you know, you 553 00:44:44,679 --> 00:44:49,480 use the word the word rewilding Christianity. There are different ways to say it. 554 00:44:49,719 --> 00:44:52,960 But there is something in the other myth, within these shamanic stories, 555 00:44:53,039 --> 00:44:58,559 in these ancient myths, which can can help us see the story of the 556 00:44:58,559 --> 00:45:02,760 Bible afresh and again, because in some ways it's giving you tax and it's 557 00:45:02,760 --> 00:45:07,639 giving you ways into it that a lot of people have glossed over through their 558 00:45:07,719 --> 00:45:10,000 kind of systematic theology, you know, like this is this leads to this, 559 00:45:10,360 --> 00:45:13,679 to this, and Jesus died for your sins and if you believe in 560 00:45:13,719 --> 00:45:15,760 him, you go to heaven. You know, that kind of stuff where 561 00:45:15,920 --> 00:45:21,679 it's like you've actually stopped looking at the at the crazy things that Jesus does 562 00:45:21,719 --> 00:45:25,320 and the crazy things that are in those stories. You you will be aware. 563 00:45:25,480 --> 00:45:30,000 And I think we have to kind of certainly in this kind in England, 564 00:45:30,320 --> 00:45:32,480 we have to off our caps to Tom Holland, the writer in his 565 00:45:32,519 --> 00:45:37,679 book Dominion. Tom was the first guy that was saying, actually, despite 566 00:45:37,719 --> 00:45:44,960 the propaganda, England in the West in general, is profoundly Christianized. Now 567 00:45:45,000 --> 00:45:47,760 I go along with that for a while. But the problem is we have 568 00:45:47,920 --> 00:45:54,159 Christianized civically and culturally. We're not spiritually anymore. We're not This is not 569 00:45:54,360 --> 00:46:00,199 Christian culture, and so the cross isn't quite We've got that bit, but 570 00:46:00,239 --> 00:46:06,599 we haven't got that bit. So I love the fact that he yourself, 571 00:46:06,800 --> 00:46:09,960 Paul Kingsnorth, lots of others are talking about the fact that we have. 572 00:46:10,679 --> 00:46:15,719 We can't be taking our cues from a culture that doesn't give a shit about 573 00:46:15,840 --> 00:46:19,920 us anymore, because we just get more and more thinned out, diluted, 574 00:46:20,280 --> 00:46:24,719 apologetic. We're sort of you know, look at me, look you know, 575 00:46:25,679 --> 00:46:30,760 whereas actually people. I meet people all over the world looking for a 576 00:46:30,840 --> 00:46:38,639 deeper life. And the more we take our cues nervously from a culture that 577 00:46:38,719 --> 00:46:44,239 at best has amnesia, if not active hostility to these stories, the better. 578 00:46:44,599 --> 00:46:52,559 But we need to retell them, not not anethetize them or put in 579 00:46:52,639 --> 00:46:59,239 little cues to make them politically correct. Forget that. We just need them 580 00:46:59,679 --> 00:47:04,400 in their pure genius, raw form to be, to do their work, 581 00:47:04,480 --> 00:47:07,800 to let God do his work. You know, I think something's happening. 582 00:47:08,400 --> 00:47:13,599 I have to say it I think something's happening. I've never born in the 583 00:47:13,639 --> 00:47:17,039 early seventies. I've never seen a moment quite as pregnant as this one. 584 00:47:17,280 --> 00:47:22,760 I've never known so many people talking about things like this. I think you're 585 00:47:22,840 --> 00:47:25,519 right, you know, I think that the way that I see it is 586 00:47:27,159 --> 00:47:30,639 something like a like an arc you know. It's like we're actually there's a 587 00:47:30,679 --> 00:47:36,239 contraction of Christianity. But in that contraction, the people that care about it 588 00:47:36,320 --> 00:47:40,039 have to do it so deliberately that it cannot be accidental anymore. It can't 589 00:47:40,079 --> 00:47:45,079 just be something we're surfing. You just can't be So we have to look 590 00:47:45,119 --> 00:47:46,880 into it deeply. We have to. We don't have a choice. And 591 00:47:46,880 --> 00:47:53,400 so because of it, it creates this weird little this this this smaller but 592 00:47:53,519 --> 00:47:58,920 brighter group of people that can see each other. And are you know, 593 00:47:59,039 --> 00:48:00,840 I'm amazed, like you said, Like you know, if you would ask 594 00:48:00,920 --> 00:48:06,800 me to predict Paul Kington North and Martin Shaw, you know, five six 595 00:48:06,880 --> 00:48:08,840 years ago, I could not have predicted it. But then when I see 596 00:48:09,079 --> 00:48:13,920 when I see that coming over the horizon, I'm like, yes, that 597 00:48:13,920 --> 00:48:15,440 that that's that's it, like, and I can see that, like you 598 00:48:15,480 --> 00:48:19,960 said, I can see things coming together. Uh, and so it's exciting. 599 00:48:20,039 --> 00:48:22,679 I mean, what what other life would you want to lead? It's 600 00:48:22,679 --> 00:48:27,480 exciting to be to be in a world that is semi hostile to you, 601 00:48:27,679 --> 00:48:31,079 but then being surrounded by a round table of amazing nights' is like what else 602 00:48:31,079 --> 00:48:35,440 would I want? Yeah? Yeah, I think I think we're all in 603 00:48:35,519 --> 00:48:38,000 agreement. The church needs to become a lot again, you know, I 604 00:48:38,039 --> 00:48:44,719 think really and if people don't think we're in a moment of tremendous peril, 605 00:48:44,880 --> 00:48:49,920 they are simply not paying attention. They're not paying attention. All the ingredients 606 00:48:50,000 --> 00:48:57,199 you want for a phenomenal myth are occurring in real time right now. You 607 00:48:57,239 --> 00:49:00,239 don't need to be nostalgic. You didn't miss out. There was There's no 608 00:49:00,280 --> 00:49:04,559 other golden age of myth that was more more engaging than this. This is 609 00:49:04,639 --> 00:49:07,800 the moment. And so find your place at the table. And I say 610 00:49:07,880 --> 00:49:14,440 that to everybody. There'll be some kid right now watching us on a phone 611 00:49:15,079 --> 00:49:19,119 doing some shift, you know, his third shift at McDonald's. We're talking 612 00:49:19,159 --> 00:49:23,559 to you, you know, we're talking to you. Locate locate that and 613 00:49:23,559 --> 00:49:27,760 a blessed o please in you and see what kind of trouble you can get 614 00:49:27,800 --> 00:49:30,800 into. You know. That's amazing, Mart and I think that that is 615 00:49:30,840 --> 00:49:35,920 the best place to finish our conversation and thank you for everything you do all 616 00:49:36,000 --> 00:49:37,639 a pleasure. I can't wait to be with you again. It's going to 617 00:49:37,679 --> 00:49:39,800 be amazing. I can't wait. I can't wait for all of us to 618 00:49:39,880 --> 00:49:43,840 be at the Symbolic World and people take your queue, you know, get 619 00:49:43,840 --> 00:49:46,400 your tickets. I'm going to do my plug and come meet us at the 620 00:49:46,400 --> 00:49:51,559 Symbolic World at the end of February. We are all excited to see you 621 00:49:51,599 --> 00:49:55,280 there, so thanks. If you enjoy these videos and podcasts, please go 622 00:49:55,320 --> 00:49:59,880 to the Symbolic World dot com website and see how you can support what we're 623 00:50:00,639 --> 00:50:04,800 There are multiple subscriber tiers with perks. There are apparel and books to purchase, 624 00:50:05,119 --> 00:50:07,519 So go to the Symbolic World dot com and thank you for your support.