Speaker 1: This episode is brought to you by Middleborn Arms. Hello
Speaker 1: and welcome to Mythic Mind, where you pursue wisdom in
Speaker 1: the past between primary and secondary of worlds. I'm your host,
Speaker 1: Angel Snyder, and I am always grateful for your company.
Speaker 1: I had originally intended to provide you with an interview
Speaker 1: show today, but my plans were a little bit derailed
Speaker 1: when my family was hit by COVID recently. I was
Speaker 1: the first is to come and I was still able
Speaker 1: to get some work done from home at that point,
Speaker 1: but then my wife caught it and she's pregnant and
Speaker 1: so she definitely had it worse than I did. And
Speaker 1: then my two year old daughter had it worst of all,
Speaker 1: and so it was definitely an all hands on deck situation,
Speaker 1: which put me behind on some things, but I mean,
Speaker 1: of course I'm going to choose my family when things
Speaker 1: like this happen. Then, as a plan B, I had
Speaker 1: a topic that I hope to discuss as a standalone episode,
Speaker 1: but I wasn't able to get around to that either
Speaker 1: as I was playing catch up, and so today I
Speaker 1: bring you my plan. See, as you likely know if
Speaker 1: you've been listening along, I'm currently teaching my second independently
Speaker 1: led course, which is called Life, Death and Meaning with
Speaker 1: Beowulf and Boethius. We just started on the Boethia section,
Speaker 1: and so I'm going to provide you today with the
Speaker 1: audio from my introduction to the Constellation of Philosophy. This
Speaker 1: is an incredible text, and whether you're in the course
Speaker 1: or not, I strongly recommend that you pick up this
Speaker 1: book if you've not done so already. This is a brilliant,
Speaker 1: ever timely medieval wisdom that you can readily jump right into,
Speaker 1: even if you've never read any medieval or even any
Speaker 1: philosophical text up to this point. Now, of course, familiarity
Speaker 1: with such texts will likely enrich your reading of Boethius.
Speaker 1: But Boethius can definitely stand on his own. He's very accessible,
Speaker 1: and I hope that this brief introduction proves helpful to you.
Speaker 1: If you'd like to join the course, it's not too late,
Speaker 1: as you will have indefinite access to all the materials
Speaker 1: for Beowulf and Boethius, and so you're always welcome to
Speaker 1: go through it whenever you can and at whatever pace
Speaker 1: works for you. And if you enrolled during the month
Speaker 1: of September, you can use the code Fortune to get
Speaker 1: half off the cost. To enroll, just go to Andrew
Speaker 1: Snyder dot Patia dot com or click the link in
Speaker 1: the show notes and now here we go. Hello, welcome back,
Speaker 1: as we get started on Boethius's The Constellation of Philosophy. Now,
Speaker 1: this is an incredible text. I've read it roughly once
Speaker 1: a year for the last probably ten years or so.
Speaker 1: At this point, it's probably the book that I've read
Speaker 1: the most. Definitely one of my top five books of
Speaker 1: all time. And that says a lot because I've read
Speaker 1: a lot of books, but I think that there's just
Speaker 1: so much medieval wisdom packed into the pages. Now, I'm
Speaker 1: not going to spend a lot of time getting into
Speaker 1: the historical background, because I mean, honestly, that's just something
Speaker 1: that you can find elsewhere. You don't need me to
Speaker 1: lay that out for you. But I did provide a
Speaker 1: video in the course in this week's module that goes
Speaker 1: over the historical context really well, and so if you're
Speaker 1: not already very familiar with the period of time that
Speaker 1: surrounds the fall of Western Rome, then definitely take a
Speaker 1: look at that video does a great job of setting
Speaker 1: it up and leading us into Bowethius's historical context. But
Speaker 1: most directly to the point, Boethius is living in the
Speaker 1: city of Rome. It's being governed by the Ostrogothic king Theodoric. Well,
Speaker 1: even though the barbarians are in charge, they're still keeping
Speaker 1: the basic infrastructure of Rome in place. And so the
Speaker 1: Roman Boethias, the philosopher, the senator, the console, in fact
Speaker 1: even a personal advisor for a time to King Theodoric.
Speaker 1: This is a guy who has lived his life according
Speaker 1: to virtue, according to Christian faith, holding true to Nicene
Speaker 1: Trinitarian orthodoxy, despite the fact that his Ostrogothic king is
Speaker 1: an Aryan, because the Germanic peoples in large part were
Speaker 1: converted when the Roman Empire was Aryan itself. And so
Speaker 1: the Aryan Romans send out these missionaries to the Germanic
Speaker 1: peoples convert them to Aryan Christianity, while eventually Rome comes
Speaker 1: to adopt Nicene orthodoxy. They affirm the trinitarian nature of God.
Speaker 1: They say that Christ is indeed of the same substance
Speaker 1: as the Father. But then the Aryan Germanic peoples come
Speaker 1: in and conquer, and so now we've got these Aryan
Speaker 1: kings ruling over Trinitarian Catholics. But nonetheless, Boethia seemed to
Speaker 1: be doing okay for a time, but eventually, after routing
Speaker 1: out some corruption and making some enemies, lady fortune seemed
Speaker 1: to have turned on him as he was falsely accused
Speaker 1: of conspiring with the Roman Emperor in the East, which
Speaker 1: we would now usually call Byzantium. He supposedly was conspiring
Speaker 1: with the Roman Emperor in the East in order to
Speaker 1: get them to come and invade Italy and essentially reincorporate
Speaker 1: Italy into the Empire. And then also, just to add
Speaker 1: to the charges, he was also accused of witchcraft and
Speaker 1: some occultish things like that. All these accusations seem to
Speaker 1: be entirely baseless, and so it definitely seems like we
Speaker 1: have an innocent man who was just kind of set
Speaker 1: up and became a victim of fortune. And so now
Speaker 1: despite living his life as a good man by any
Speaker 1: reasonable standard, well now he finds himself imprisoned. I mean
Speaker 1: more like something like house arrest. He's not sitting in
Speaker 1: a dungeon, but he is imprinsoned. He is confined. He
Speaker 1: has had all of his honors, his prestige, his fortunes,
Speaker 1: have been stripped away from him as he's awaiting his sentencing.
Speaker 1: And I don't know exactly what Boethius expected was going
Speaker 1: to happen, but as history will tell us that at
Speaker 1: the end of the sentencing he would indeed face execution.
Speaker 1: According to tradition, he was actually bludgeoned to death by
Speaker 1: a cudgel, and so that's how he meets his end.
Speaker 1: And so what we have here is the story of
Speaker 1: a good man who has had external goods stripped away
Speaker 1: from him, and now he's left wondering, well, what is goodness?
Speaker 1: What am I? Who am I? Where can I find freedom?
Speaker 1: Where can I find goodness? Even in my current state
Speaker 1: when all of these external goods have been stripped away.
Speaker 1: And we're going to get some really profound reflections from this,
Speaker 1: things that we can readily apply to our own lives.
Speaker 1: So can immediately apply to our own lives, because we
Speaker 1: all live in a world that's given over to change.
Speaker 1: We've all experienced that to some degree or another, when
Speaker 1: wealth has been ripped away from us, when relationships have
Speaker 1: just fallen apart or maybe just turned sour on us
Speaker 1: through no obvious fault of our own. You know, maybe
Speaker 1: you've fallen into some kind of health crisis, or somebody
Speaker 1: close to you has done so, and the natural response
Speaker 1: is to be wondering, where is the goodness of God
Speaker 1: in this? What even am I when? And this value
Speaker 1: structure that I built my life around has now been
Speaker 1: ripped away. I've lost some fundamental existential pillars to my life.
Speaker 1: What still stands? And so these are perennially human questions,
Speaker 1: These are perennially Christian questions. Right. We even see these
Speaker 1: kinds of questions in Scripture. If God is good and
Speaker 1: God is in control, then why does it seem that
Speaker 1: the wicked so often prosper while the righteous suffer? Right?
Speaker 1: These are very real questions, and I think Boethius does
Speaker 1: a great job of handling them. And we're also going
Speaker 1: to see some continuity in themes between our Bay of
Speaker 1: Study and Boethius. Remember in Beowulf, what made him a
Speaker 1: stable character from beginning to end is the fact that
Speaker 1: he wasn't moved by external fortunes. This is somebody who
Speaker 1: is always presently minded. He rebukes Rowthgar for being overly
Speaker 1: concerned with the past and tells him to bear his
Speaker 1: present concerns, the idea being that all you ever have
Speaker 1: is the present. The only thing you ever have to
Speaker 1: decide is your response to present fortune. You decide how
Speaker 1: you relate to fortune, whether it be good or whether
Speaker 1: it be bad. But fortune can never make you into
Speaker 1: a victim. Only you can do that. And so we
Speaker 1: see this implicitly throughout Boef's story. We're gonna see it
Speaker 1: explicitly in Boethius's story, and so there's some strong continuity
Speaker 1: in themes. Here. Is just going to take these themes
Speaker 1: and be more precise with them, be more explicit with them,
Speaker 1: seeing as this is more of an explicitly philosophical text,
Speaker 1: whereas beoel if it's more of an implicitly philosophical text. Now,
Speaker 1: I want to spend the rest of this introduction talking
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Speaker 1: first starting with just talk about translations of the Consolation
Speaker 1: of Philosophy. First, we have my favorite edition, which is
Speaker 1: the Penguin edition. Here this is the first one that
Speaker 1: I read about a decade ago, and this is the
Speaker 1: one that is all marked up for me. Pages. Bent
Speaker 1: has got some signs aware on it, but I think
Speaker 1: that's what a good book should look like after a
Speaker 1: few years. Well, I really like this edition. I feel
Speaker 1: like the language really is aesthetically fitting of the material.
Speaker 1: I feel like even the prose sections have the right
Speaker 1: poetic heart to them. You feel like this is coming
Speaker 1: from an impassioned man who desperately is in search for
Speaker 1: the truth. He's in search for the beautiful, he's in
Speaker 1: search for the good, And I feel like that just
Speaker 1: flows from the language really well here, both in the
Speaker 1: pros as well as in the poetry, and so just
Speaker 1: on a purely esthetic level, this is the favorite edition
Speaker 1: that I have looked at, favorite translation I've looked at. Now,
Speaker 1: another way you can go with this is the Oxford
Speaker 1: World claud six edition. But frankly, I mean I've looked
Speaker 1: through this a good bit and I just don't like
Speaker 1: it as much. I feel like they try to make
Speaker 1: the language a little bit too modern if it feels
Speaker 1: like a more dynamic translation where they're trying to connect
Speaker 1: with the modern audience more and I feel like in
Speaker 1: so doing, they lose some of the substance. The pros
Speaker 1: loses its poetic value. In fact, even the poetry, I
Speaker 1: think loses something as well. For one thing, they make
Speaker 1: the versus rhyme, which to me tells me that they're
Speaker 1: probably being a little bit fast and loose with the
Speaker 1: translation by looking for rhyming words making that a priority.
Speaker 1: But I actually think that despite the fact that they
Speaker 1: try to add some rhyme, they try to make it
Speaker 1: more palatable to what we might expect from poetry in
Speaker 1: the modern era. I actually think that they lose it
Speaker 1: some of this poetic value. It loses some of its substance,
Speaker 1: some of its power. And so I'm just not very
Speaker 1: impressed with this edition. But it's another way that you
Speaker 1: can go if you want to. Now, for something a
Speaker 1: little bit more unconventional, perhaps there is a translation from
Speaker 1: the Old English edition of Boethius that's put out by
Speaker 1: the Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library. Now this is really interesting,
Speaker 1: and so this is the translation that came into Old English,
Speaker 1: supposedly by Alfred the Great, the ninth century Anglo Saxon king.
Speaker 1: But whether it was translated by his hand or at
Speaker 1: least closely associated with him. It's really interesting because Alfred
Speaker 1: or whoever translated this into Old English, did take some
Speaker 1: creative license in the translation, and so there are some
Speaker 1: substantial changes made here. For example, lady philosophy becomes recast
Speaker 1: as the masculine Wisdom, which may be an attempt to
Speaker 1: further link this guide with Christ, that is my assumption.
Speaker 1: There and again and again we see that this edition
Speaker 1: tamps down some of the classical pagan references that the
Speaker 1: Latin version gives us and makes it a little bit
Speaker 1: more explicitly Christian. And so it's just really interesting to
Speaker 1: see how they wanted to translate not just the words,
Speaker 1: but translate some of the ideas into Anglo Saxon sympathies,
Speaker 1: and so it's just it's really interesting to look at.
Speaker 1: I don't recommend making this your soul translation to read,
Speaker 1: but it's really interesting to read alongside a more conventional
Speaker 1: translation from the Latin. It's really nice that comes with
Speaker 1: this edition, comes with a nice ribbon bookmark. You've got
Speaker 1: the Old English on one side, you've got Modern English
Speaker 1: on the other, and so it's definitely something worth adding
Speaker 1: to your library and reading alongside or reading after you
Speaker 1: read one of the more conventional translations from the Latin,
Speaker 1: and so definitely interesting to take a look at that. Now,
Speaker 1: another text that I do recommend to you is Joshua
Speaker 1: gives how to Be Unlucky Reflections on the pursuit of virtue.
Speaker 1: Joshua Gibbs is a classical instructor of literature, and he
Speaker 1: has just a lot of great reflections on here as
Speaker 1: he reflects on a number of things, but he really
Speaker 1: uses the constellation of philosophy as his framework. He keeps
Speaker 1: going back to it again and again and discussing how
Speaker 1: to be unlucky right, how to untether yourself from the
Speaker 1: idea of luck, and how to maintain stable virtue despite
Speaker 1: changing fortunes, and so very much a Boithian theme there. Now,
Speaker 1: if you are an educator in some form of another,
Speaker 1: whether you teach at a classical Christian school, you're a
Speaker 1: college instructor, you have some kind of teaching role, maybe
Speaker 1: in a church setting, then this gets a double recommendations
Speaker 1: from me because he often will apply these lessons to pedagogy,
Speaker 1: in particular to how we construct lessons, how we teach
Speaker 1: the relationship that we should have with the classroom with students,
Speaker 1: and so this is a good recommendation for everybody, but
Speaker 1: if you are a teacher in some capacity gets double recommendation,
Speaker 1: definitely pick this up. Next, we have The Discarded Image
Speaker 1: by C. S. Lewis. Now, this is an exploration of
Speaker 1: Medieval and Renaissance literature in order to pull out something
Speaker 1: like the world view, the way that they Medievals, especially
Speaker 1: as was the early Renaissance figures, the way that they
Speaker 1: viewed the world, viewed the cosmos in their place therein
Speaker 1: their approach to learning, their approach to virtue, their approach
Speaker 1: to what it means to be human. Now, if you're
Speaker 1: not already very familiar with medieval and Renaissance literature, then
Speaker 1: a lot of this can be very overwhelming, and it's
Speaker 1: definitely not one of the easier Lewis text to read.
Speaker 1: But it is good and it is worth reading through,
Speaker 1: even if at first you have to jump around a
Speaker 1: little bit. You know, read the chapter on the Medieval
Speaker 1: view of the cosmos on the heavens. Look at the
Speaker 1: index to find the many times that he talks about Boethius.
Speaker 1: He refers to the constellation number of times. In fact,
Speaker 1: the constellation played such an important role for Lewis that
Speaker 1: Lewis said that to develop an appreciation for the constellation
Speaker 1: of philosophy is almost to become naturalized in the Middle Ages,
Speaker 1: And of course for Lewis to say that, I mean,
Speaker 1: that's a pretty big deal. And so as far as
Speaker 1: getting some more direct insights into the constellation of philosophy,
Speaker 1: as well as some broader insights into the world in
Speaker 1: which Boethius was writing from the background themes and ideas,
Speaker 1: then definitely pick up the discarded image by C. S. Lewis.
Speaker 1: And also because I think it would be helpful, I am
Speaker 1: going to include a portion of the video that I
Speaker 1: did for Out of the Side on the Planet in
Speaker 1: the CS. Lewis course that deals with the medieval view
Speaker 1: of the cosmos, and because Boethius is going to make
Speaker 1: some references to these cosmological ideas, and so it would
Speaker 1: be helpful if you weren't in that course. I know
Speaker 1: a number of you were in that course, but if
Speaker 1: you weren't, I think would be helpful to get that
Speaker 1: framework to catch some of what Boethius is doing. And
Speaker 1: obviously we'll talk about that more as we go through
Speaker 1: the text. Now, perhaps for some unexpected recommendations. My dissertation.
Speaker 1: My doctoral dissertation was on Carekereguard, and I've come to
Speaker 1: find that his psychological text, namely the concept of anxiety
Speaker 1: and the sickness unto death, pair very well with Boethius.
Speaker 1: They deal with some very similar themes. Now, these are
Speaker 1: notoriously difficult texts to just jump right into. The entry
Speaker 1: point to Carikeguard is far more steep than it is
Speaker 1: to Boethius. But if you can get a handle on
Speaker 1: what Carecard is doing, that I think you'll find this
Speaker 1: to be a very profound set of companions for Boethius.
Speaker 1: And I'll reference Kirkgard at least a few times as
Speaker 1: we go through our Boethius study now as aids to
Speaker 1: reading alongside Carikereguard. My first podcast series on the Mythic
Speaker 1: Mind Legacy podcast goes through the concept of anxiety and
Speaker 1: the sickness unto death. And so those might be helpful
Speaker 1: companions for you to make sense out of what Kckergard
Speaker 1: is doing, give you a guide for some of his
Speaker 1: major ideas. Now, at some point I would love to
Speaker 1: have to put together a whole course on Cairkeguard, because
Speaker 1: I would love to go more deeply into the text
Speaker 1: on a chapter by chapter basis than we get in
Speaker 1: the podcast series that I did. And also, frankly, I
Speaker 1: mean the podcast series at this point is a few
Speaker 1: years old. I feel like I just have a better
Speaker 1: handle on it and could present the information a little
Speaker 1: bit better now, but the podcast could at least be
Speaker 1: a holdover until I get something like that together at
Speaker 1: some point in the future. But that gives you, I think,
Speaker 1: a good bit to get started with. I really hope
Speaker 1: that you enjoy this text, that you appreciate it even
Speaker 1: a fraction as much as I do. I hope that
Speaker 1: it gives you a pathway to gaining a richer experience
Speaker 1: with reality, a more healthy experience with fortune. And I
Speaker 1: hope that you come to better understand who you are
Speaker 1: in the glorious cosmic cathedral in which we live. For
Speaker 1: now until next time, godspeed. Thank you for listening, and
Speaker 1: as a reminder, you can own all the materials from
Speaker 1: the Beowulf and Boethia's course by going to Andrew Sneyder
Speaker 1: dot Patia dot com or by clicking the link in
Speaker 1: the show notes and use the code Fortune for half
Speaker 1: off the cost. During the month of September and now
Speaker 1: before we go, I want to take a moment to
Speaker 1: thank by name all of my current patrons who are
Speaker 1: the second tier of support and hire, and so many
Speaker 1: thanks to Mark Cliff, Aaron, Paul William, Aaron, Andrew Brandon, Christopher, Ian, Emmy, Jeremiah, Joscelyn,
Speaker 1: Joshua Landon, Matthew and Steel and of course thank you
Speaker 1: to all of my Tier one patrons as well. Also
Speaker 1: as a reminder, I have a fairly new benefit set
Speaker 1: up for Tier three patrons as I'm currently releasing on
Speaker 1: a weekly basis content from my fiction and philosophy of
Speaker 1: CS Lewis course, including the videos as well as the
Speaker 1: the audio to go into the patroon podcast feed and
Speaker 1: so we have both ways of accessing it now. So
Speaker 1: far this includes content regarding all three of the Ransom books,
Speaker 1: so out of the Side on Planet Parilandra and that
Speaker 1: Hideous Strength, and that strength actually has three weeks to it,
Speaker 1: and so there's a lot of content there as well
Speaker 1: as the Screwtape letters and the abolition of Man. Coming
Speaker 1: up next will be a couple weeks up till we
Speaker 1: have faces. And so go ahead and sign up at
Speaker 1: the Tier three level to get access to all of that,
Speaker 1: and for patrons at that level, at the Tier three level,
Speaker 1: there's really never been as much Mythic Mind content as
Speaker 1: there is right now, also for patrons of any tier,
Speaker 1: even just the five dollars a tier. We are just
Speaker 1: about to start our first book club on the Poetic
Speaker 1: ed Up, which is one of our main sources of
Speaker 1: information on Norse myths and legends. And so just go
Speaker 1: to patreon dot com slash Mythic Mind or click the
Speaker 1: link in the show notes and that's it for now
Speaker 1: until next time. Godspeed. You may have noticed that there
Speaker 1: we're no annoying auto populated ads at the beginning or
Speaker 1: throwing to the middle of the show, and that's thanks
Speaker 1: to our current sponsor, middle Born Arms. I previously relied
Speaker 1: on those autopopulated ads, but to be honest, I know
Speaker 1: that they're basically soulless. I much prefer supporting real people
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Speaker 1: have something to advertise, whether a product, a service, or
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