Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to Mythic Mind, where we pursue wisdom
Speaker 1: on the past between primary and secondary worlds. I'm your host,
Speaker 1: Andrew Snyder, and I am always grateful for your company.
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Speaker 1: Just saying all right, so now, without further ado, I
Speaker 1: give you j R. R. Tolkien and a long defeat. Actually,
Speaker 1: I am a Christian, and indeed a Roman Catholic, so
Speaker 1: I do not expect history to be anything but a
Speaker 1: long defeat, though it contains, and in a legend may
Speaker 1: contain more clearly and movingly, some samples or glimpses of
Speaker 1: final victory. J. R. R. Tolkien in a letter to
Speaker 1: Amy Ronald fifteenth of December nineteen fifty six, Tolkien was
Speaker 1: enamored with the Northern Spirit, which did not fight for
Speaker 1: ultimate victory, but for the victory of the day. In
Speaker 1: the Norse Mythos, there is no hope for the final
Speaker 1: triumph of the life of man, or even most of
Speaker 1: the gods for that matter, As the great Apocalypse of Ragnarok,
Speaker 1: claims the lives of both. This awareness of impending doom
Speaker 1: gives the Northern tales a unique flavor against their Southern counterparts.
Speaker 1: Tolkien rights, in the Monsters and the Critics his monumental
Speaker 1: essay on Beowulf, that the Southern gods are not the
Speaker 1: allies of men in their war against these or other monsters.
Speaker 1: The interests of the gods is in this or that
Speaker 1: man as part of their individual schemes, not as part
Speaker 1: of a great strategy that includes all good men as
Speaker 1: the infantry a battle. In Norse. At any rate, the
Speaker 1: gods are within time doomed with their allies to death
Speaker 1: their battles with the monsters in the outer darkness, they
Speaker 1: gather heroes for the last defense. In the Norse understanding,
Speaker 1: gods and noble men fight together against the monsters against
Speaker 1: the chaos, not to win in the ultimate sense, but
Speaker 1: because it is the valiant thing to do. Tolkien continues,
Speaker 1: the Northern gods, Kur said, have an exultant extravagance in
Speaker 1: their warfare, which makes them more like Titans than Olympians.
Speaker 1: Only they are on the right side, though it is
Speaker 1: not the side that wins. The winning side is chaos
Speaker 1: in unreason mythologically, the monsters, but the gods, who are defeated,
Speaker 1: think that defeat no refutation, and in their war men
Speaker 1: are their chosen allies, able whin heroic to share in
Speaker 1: this absolute resistance. Perfect because without hope, at least in
Speaker 1: this vision of the final defeat of the humane and
Speaker 1: of the divine made in its image, and into the
Speaker 1: essential hostility of the gods and heroes on the one
Speaker 1: hand and the monsters on the other. We may suppose
Speaker 1: that Pagan English in Norse imagination agreed. Now if there
Speaker 1: is no hope of ultimate victory, the what reason does
Speaker 1: the Northern hero have to fight on the side of
Speaker 1: the gods? Why fight an impossible fight? The answer is valiants.
Speaker 1: The answer is justice, which is good for its own sake.
Speaker 1: The answer is that there is good in this world,
Speaker 1: and it is worth fighting for, even if it is
Speaker 1: only the good of to day. Again, in the Monsters
Speaker 1: and the Critics, Tolkien says, it is the strength that
Speaker 1: the Northern mythological imagination, that it faced this problem, put
Speaker 1: the monsters in the center, gave them victory but no honor,
Speaker 1: and found a potent but terrible solution in naked will
Speaker 1: and courage. So potent is it that, while the older
Speaker 1: Southern imagination has faded forever into literary ornament, the Northern
Speaker 1: has power, as it were, to revive the spirit even
Speaker 1: in our own times. It can work, even as it
Speaker 1: did for the godless Viking, without God's martial heroism as
Speaker 1: its own end. But we may remember that the poet
Speaker 1: of Beowulf saw clearly the wages of heroism is death.
Speaker 1: The story of Beowulf is to some degree one of futility.
Speaker 1: In the end, Beowulf dies, and the Gayats whom he
Speaker 1: led and protected, would soon be conquered by its neighbors.
Speaker 1: It might be argued that Beowulf failed, but that surely
Speaker 1: is not what we are meant to get from the story.
Speaker 1: What we principally see is that Beowulf did what the
Speaker 1: Northern hero is expected and lauded for doing. He secured
Speaker 1: the life, the festivity, and the human good of the
Speaker 1: mead Halls against the encroaching winter for as long as
Speaker 1: he possibly could, as in a little circle of light
Speaker 1: about their halls. Men with courage as their stay went
Speaker 1: forward to that battle with the hostile world in the
Speaker 1: offspring of the dark, which ends for all, even the
Speaker 1: kings and champions in defeat. Now our Beoa poet, himself
Speaker 1: a Christian, is surely telling us something about the futility
Speaker 1: of mortal life. Tolkien explains, Beowulf is not then the
Speaker 1: hero of an heroic lay. Precisely he has known mesh loyalties,
Speaker 1: nor halfless love. He is a man, and that, for
Speaker 1: him and many is sufficient tragedy. The story of Beowulf
Speaker 1: is the story of all mortal heroes. They do heroic things,
Speaker 1: and then they die. Their death does not erase their heroism,
Speaker 1: but the heroism does make their death significant as they
Speaker 1: enter into the eternal realm of legend. Yet there is
Speaker 1: surely still a futility in this pagan hope, and our
Speaker 1: Christian poet of Beowulf was surely intentional about making this known,
Speaker 1: about making this experienced. Even if he did not explicitly
Speaker 1: provide a solution in the poem. Tolkien, however, does identify
Speaker 1: that solution with his idea of the yucatastrophe. He explains
Speaker 1: idea of Youu catastrophe as follows in his essay on
Speaker 1: Fairy Stories The Consolation of Fairy Stories. The joy of
Speaker 1: the happy ending, or more correctly, of the good catastrophe,
Speaker 1: the sudden joyous turn, For there is no true end
Speaker 1: to any fairy tale. This joy, which is one of
Speaker 1: the things which fairy stories can produce supremely well, is
Speaker 1: not essentially escapist nor fugitive in its fairy tale or
Speaker 1: other world setting. It is a sudden and miraculous grace,
Speaker 1: never to be counted on to recur. It does not
Speaker 1: deny the dis catastrophe of sorrow and failure, the possibility
Speaker 1: of these is necessary to the joy of deliverance. It denies,
Speaker 1: in the face of much evidence, if you will, universal
Speaker 1: final defeat, and in so far as Euangelium giving a
Speaker 1: fleeting glimpse of joy, joy beyond the walls of the
Speaker 1: world poignant as grief. Tolkien does not expect history to
Speaker 1: be anything but a long defeat, despite the many victories
Speaker 1: that we may experience along the way. Even as the
Speaker 1: Gospel tells of Christ who suffered and died before entering
Speaker 1: his glory, so too we must meet with the terms
Speaker 1: of our mortality before the yu catastrophe of resurrection, And
Speaker 1: so too does Tolkien believe will be the affairs of
Speaker 1: world history. Things will become worse than the long run,
Speaker 1: until finally they become infinitely better with the unexpected that
Speaker 1: is unexpected except by faith and happy turn of redemption.
Speaker 1: Although Tolkien knows this Christian hope, he recognizes that pagan
Speaker 1: futility is by no means erased with this revelation. He
Speaker 1: says again in The Monsters and the Critics, Beywuff's author
Speaker 1: is still concerned primarily with man on Earth, re handling
Speaker 1: in a new perspective an ancient theme that man, each man,
Speaker 1: and all men, in all their works shall die, a
Speaker 1: theme no Christian need despise. This temporal defeat is real,
Speaker 1: but its reality is taken up by the yucatastrophe, and
Speaker 1: thus we may face death with finite futility because we
Speaker 1: have a glimpse of eternal goodness. Tolkien says that the
Speaker 1: tragedy of this great temporal defeat remains for a while poignant,
Speaker 1: but ceases to be finally important. It is no defeat,
Speaker 1: for the end of the world is part of the
Speaker 1: design of Metod, the arbiter, who is above the mortal world.
Speaker 1: Beyond there appears to be a possibility of eternal victory
Speaker 1: or eternal defeat and the real battle is between the
Speaker 1: soul and its adversaries. So the old monsters became images
Speaker 1: of the evil spirit or spirits, or rather the evil
Speaker 1: spirits entered into the monsters and took visible shape in
Speaker 1: the hideous bodies of heathen imagination. Bailiff's poet, himself, being
Speaker 1: a Christian, does not despair of death. He does not
Speaker 1: object to demonstrating the role that death plays an ending
Speaker 1: and even in wiping out finite pursuits. As a Christian,
Speaker 1: he finds this element of the Northern mythos entirely palatable
Speaker 1: and even correct. However, what the Christian poet brings to
Speaker 1: the table is the ultimate hope that even in the
Speaker 1: catastrophe of death, we can expect to find or at
Speaker 1: the very least, hope to find you catastrophe the happy term.
Speaker 1: So our bao of poet is not, as talking points out,
Speaker 1: muddling up his Christian and pagan mythos, but he is
Speaker 1: rather bringing them together into something true, something that's truly
Speaker 1: Christian and profoundly powerful. A good way of thinking about
Speaker 1: this is to consider the Battle of Helm's Deep in
Speaker 1: the Two Towers. The men of Rohan, who are largely
Speaker 1: a stand in for the Anglo Saxons, stand against the
Speaker 1: monsters of chaos and darkness until the last free man
Speaker 1: would inevitably fall. If this played out, then this would
Speaker 1: be a Northern story. However, Gandolf arriving with the morning
Speaker 1: light alongside the forces of nature rightly oriented, make it
Speaker 1: into a Christian story. We do not know where the
Speaker 1: road will take us in this life, but we can,
Speaker 1: as Tolkien says, despair of an event while maintaining belief
Speaker 1: in the value of doomed resistance. There are many examples
Speaker 1: of the long defeat and the role of you catastrophe
Speaker 1: throughout Tolkien's writing, but we'll look at just a couple
Speaker 1: now from The Lord of the Rings. First, consider this
Speaker 1: statement of Gladiol concerning Caliborne. For the Lord of the
Speaker 1: Gallatin is accounted the wisest of the elves of Middle Earth,
Speaker 1: and a giver of gifts beyond the power of kings.
Speaker 1: He has dwelt in the West since the days of Dawn,
Speaker 1: and I had dwelt with him years uncounted for ere
Speaker 1: the fall of nargothrind of Gondolin. I've passed over the mountains,
Speaker 1: and together through ages of the world we have fought
Speaker 1: the long defeat. So there you have it, talking directly
Speaker 1: working this idea of the long defeat into his narrative.
Speaker 1: And who better to recognize the reality the long defeat
Speaker 1: than his long lived elves. And if you have read
Speaker 1: through the Cimmarillian, then you likely are already very aware
Speaker 1: of how this theme plays out throughout the course of
Speaker 1: his legendary. The glories of the elder days are ruins
Speaker 1: and stories in the Third Age, and they far outshine
Speaker 1: what the latter has to offer. Things fade, things get
Speaker 1: worse over time, but that is all the more reason
Speaker 1: for heroes to maintain valiance. As Rigorn says in the
Speaker 1: Two Towers, the Council of Gandolf was not founded on
Speaker 1: foregnoledge of safety for himself or for others. There are
Speaker 1: some things that is better to begin than to refuse,
Speaker 1: even though the end may be dark. And now we
Speaker 1: end with a word from Gandolf in the Council of Elrond,
Speaker 1: it is not to spare, for despair is only for
Speaker 1: those who see the end beyond all doubt. We do not.
Speaker 1: It is wisdom to recognize necessity when all other courses
Speaker 1: have been weighed, Though as folly it may appear to
Speaker 1: those who cling to falsehope. When you go to the
Speaker 1: roots of the word philosophy, you find the love of wisdom,
Speaker 1: which unfortunately is not what you find at the roots
Speaker 1: of all who call themselves philosophers. Now, how do we
Speaker 1: get here? What are the ideas that shape our world?
Speaker 1: And what can the old world tell us in response
Speaker 1: to the perennial questions of what it means to be human,
Speaker 1: what is our purpose? And what, if anything, ought we
Speaker 1: aspire to? In a brief history of ideas, we will
Speaker 1: navigate major epics of thought and survey some of the
Speaker 1: most important figures in the Western canon, including Plato, Aristotle, Boethius, Augustine, Anselm, Aquinas, Descartes, Nietzsche,
Speaker 1: Sart and carecguard and of course we will consider even
Speaker 1: more names. But these are the thinkers that will supply
Speaker 1: our primary readings. Each week will include primary sources that
Speaker 1: will be provided as PDFs. Although these are all texts
Speaker 1: that do belong in your personal library. You will be
Speaker 1: recommended some secondary text You'll be provided with some recorded
Speaker 1: presentations for you to watch at your leisure, ongoing discord chats,
Speaker 1: and weekly live meetings to discuss the readings. I've been
Speaker 1: teaching philosophy for many years, and I can say with
Speaker 1: confidence that you will leave this six week course with
Speaker 1: a better understanding of the foundation to Western thought than
Speaker 1: most contemporary philosophy majors enrolled today. By going to patreon
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