catapult magazine

I’m really glad I took the time to plod through this classic by Tolstoy. The author really starts kicking it into high gear around page 837 or so.

I know it’s a long shot that anyone else is reading this right now too, but I’d love to talk about it here. I’ll just put the hook out there for anyone to bite. It’s an excellent book to read at this or any other time in our history.

dan, what is wrong with being scientific? what is so different from accuracy, academic responsibility and being scientific? you say scientific like it is a swear word or a dirty idea, same thing with pre-postmodern, it is almost like code for don’t listen to her; she is soooooo scientific and pre-postmodern. good grief what are you ten? ;) that is just silly. furthermore, i am almost positive that you unconsciously utilize the ‘scientific method’ everyday; you know what you learned in fifth grade about having a problem, developing a hypothesis, gathering evidence, and then developing a theory?

one shouldn’t equate being scientific with determinism or mechanism, which are modern ideas- as in the 19th c. post-modern historians utilize and advocate thinking logically and providing evidentiary support all the time, because it makes one’s work credible. i quoted this from hayden white’s, a rather famous post-modern historian, ‘tropics of discourse essays in cultural criticism’ earlier but here it is again

Nothing wrong with being scientific except that the way science has been traditionally done is boring. And I’m very against boring history no matter how correct it might be. Why? Because to make history boring is a lie. History doesn’t always make sense because people don’t always make sense. Historians have to admit sometimes that there are things they won’t ever know but that won’t stop them from speculating.

I recently read “Koba the Dread”, a non-fiction book by the novelist Martin Amis. The subject is Stalin. How should a history book about Stalin be organized? Chronologically? Thematically? Should one start with a hypothesis and then use the scientific method to prove it? Luckily for the reader, Amis does none of those. It’s written from the heart, history mixed with personal history, mixed with anger, mixed with the author’s personal notes to his friends. Some in my class objected to this book being considered good history, but when pressed, all they could come up with was various takes on “because it’s not boring.” For me the book had a huge impact precisely because the author’s “feelings” were front and center, which is a scientific no-no.

What about the fact also that the professor of the same class had lost his father to Stalin’s purges? How could he be teaching a class on Stalin? He’s BIASED! (all modernists gasp now). This course also happened to be one of the best classes of my life. My personal bias is that I prefer to have profs who are interested rather than disinterested, historians who have something at stake. When it comes down to it, most historians were drawn to their particular field of study for a reason anyway, and if they won’t admit it, it’s everyone’s loss.

I haven’t read brinkley, but your description seems to suggest that he still depends on an objective kind of method in which events are understood in terms of cause and effect, conditions and results. Tolstoy might still criticize brinkley for trying to tell a cause and effect story of conditions leading up to certain events. It seems to me that Tolstoy’s story mocks this kind of thinking. It was the spirit, the will of the men, that led the French army to loot Moscow, therefore putting their own lives in danger. What conditions were involved? Is the will or spirit of a whole people merely one condition among others? Take the East Coast black-out as an example. Even though the conditions were right for New York citizens to loot the city at night, they did not. What were the “conditions” for that?

In another matter, the temptation to engage in an art vs. science debate is strong, but I must resist. I do not wish to set the two against eachother. I would love for science to be less excluding when it comes to feelings, moods, the sense of the sun shining through the cannon smoke at Smolensk etc. I’m kind of like Freud that way. And maybe like many of the women who have made important contributions to the male dominated field of history, as well.

And I also take issue with the quote about history mediating between what is and what ought to be. Maybe if it’s a Christian history, driven by the Holy Spirit, but not history in and of its own power. This quote seems to suggest that history is God rather than that history is ruled by God.

i couldn’t disagree more, grant. tolstoy is not the end all and be all of historiographical thought; there are generations of historians, professional and lay, that have poured their lives into their work and you seem to glibbly ignore them. you seem to sweep up their ideas and work into a giant pile of crap because they attempt to exercise objectivity. there is nothing niave about attempting to be objective; the only niavete is believing that the position you present is the final word or that humans are capable of total objectivity.

furthermore, interpreting history in terms of will or spirit is imposing on one’s subjects; how on earth is the historian suppose to know the inner sanctums of men’s hearts? come on, count yourself blessed if you know the depths of your own heart but don’t be so presumptious to assert that you can know the workings of another. correct me if i am wrong grant, but isn’t that a role (knowing the hearts of men) something that only God can do?

i also think you misunderstand the quote from hayden white. white is not claiming that history is God, rather he is asserting that men think that they know the world, i.e. what men think ought to be. but in contrast to what men think ought to be, there is what is. you know, ontology and epistemology; how often the two don’t line up in men’s minds. white is simply claiming that history attempts to bring the two together so that men may understand the world better.

what do you mean by xn history?

Where do I begin? I’ve been trying to repeat my intention again and again so you don’t think I’m trying to get rid of historians and their work. I’m just saying that they and you ought to leave room for novels, poetry, visual art etc. to be of equal value as academic history when it comes to telling the truth about events. I want to bring science and art closer together, as they were when the Greeks called such things “techne”, according to Heidegger’s “The Question Concerning Technology” essay.

And about knowing “the inner sanctums of men’s hearts”: I don’t think I’d agree that human beings have such a sanctum, but I do believe, with the Holy Spirit’s direction, we can discern the spirits that move human beings to do what they do. Before the gift of the Spirit, I would agree with you that no man can know their own heart or any other, but things have changed! What point would there be in examining ourselves before taking communion if we couldn’t see our own sinfulness? The whole communion routine would be a mere charade. I do it all because I believe the act of confessing the sins of my heart is a very real and performable act, thanks to the power of the Holy Spirit.

And if you want to talk about being presumptuous, you can certainly apply that criticism to a science that tries to explain away all of man’s actions objectively. There’s a built in deceit in the claim that science merely objectively describes what occurred in a non-judgmental manner. Again, I’m not saying to get rid of science, I’m actually passionately standing up for science by saying that it needs to keep itself relevant to actual human experience if it wants to sustain the trust of the people (historical revisionism has already done much to harm the science of history).

And I won’t lay out a theory about Christian history right here, but such a project is definitely what I’m trying to work out here and as I was reading Tolstoy’s novel. I’m trying to figure out the relation between the history of technology (which is the history I’ve been criticizing) and the history of God working out His kingdom on earth (a history that has the ring of truth because it’s based in a knowledge of the end—the meaning— of history, in the victory of Christ as seen in The Book of Revelation).

grant, i guess my basic question about tolstoy’s assertions that the will of napoleon drove him to destruction and that they will of the french soldiers drove them to loot moscow, how does he(tolstoy) know that? my first thought on the soldiers actions is that it probably resulted from a lack of food (extended supply lines) and amenities; essentially a physical need. how is it possible for tolstoy a hundred years later and not knowing napoleon personally; know what went on in napoleon’s heart; how does tolstoy know? is it secret knowledge that only the truly special, blessed minds have access? :D

perhaps it is best if i define what i mean by history; history as i understand it is human activity in whatever form it takes. so to talk about feelings or spirit unless there is evident action resulting from the feelings is pointless. moreover, those feelings or ideas need some evidence from the subject (person) they are appointed to, to also have merit.

i knew you were going to say that xn know that humans are sinful so that means we should know our own hearts and understand the hearts of others. that seems a rather simplistic answer; it is like the intro philosophy students answering to every question about the problems in life that Jesus is the answer. Jesus saves! Jesus saves! they chorus out from all the years of sunday school, and while they are right in the ultimate sense they are also missing the complexity and diversity of life, humanity, and how much that sounds like an easy answer to difficult, heart wrenching questions. therefor, i may very well know that i am sinful and so is everybody else and that knowledge helps in preparing for communion, but the actual depths of my sin and need for salvation are realities that i am only beginning to grasp. so i would never presume to judge the hearts of others; just because i know they are sinful doesn’t mean that i have a right to deal out judgement. ‘let those who are with out sin cast the first stone’

let me know how you got ahold of a pipeline from the Holy Spirit that tells you what moves other human beings. ;) that seems like a rather hamhanded approach to history, or xn history if you will. if you are attempting to develop a philo of xn history you should check out butterfield, m.c. smit, dooyeweerd, and goudzwaard. have you read the anything in the calvin school? (noll, hatch, marsden)

as a side question, i thought that plato and aristotle (?) condemned poets and artists as unnecessary or something like that? or to what greeks are you referring ?

I really appreciate your tenacity when it comes to this argument. I am familiar with the Christian history thinkers you mentioned. And I could add several more. One being Hendrik Hart, whose book, “The Challenge of Our Age”, reminds us that the spirits which motivate people always break out in the form of action and events. So, it is of utmost importance to history that we study the spirits which are evident in events and actions. I should add that artists tend to be more receptive to these spirits that make themselves felt almost before they appear in the form of events or actions. This mystery of the spirit before the act occurs when the artist is pinched by some unseen force that tells her she’s arrived at the finished painting, song, film etc. which has been keeping her up nights.

And it IS possible, even necessary, to develop the ability to discern between those spirits that are antithetical to Christianity and the Spirit of Christ itself. So, if I may present one more Intro to Philosophy lesson to you, claiming to be able to discern spirits is perfectly fine for a sinner, if they give credit to the Holy Spirit because, if you have the Holy Spirit, you should be able to recognize spirits which contradict it.

Does this seem too simple? If so, blame the apostle John. He’s the one responsible for articulating the idea of anithesis. He thought it was a helpful way of teaching Christians how to tell false prophets from true ones.

right, i am not so sure that discerning spirits is so much a philosophical exercise as a theological one. i am also not certain that i agree with you on the issue of spirits. while i do believe that the Holy Spirit does enable one to see more clearly i am thinking of calvin’s spectacles analogy paul makes it very clear that one even the xn sees very darkly in the mirror. so while the Holy Spirit’s presense makes the mirror a little clearer one’s mind, heart, and soul is still mired in the sinfulness. God never promises us clear vision hear on earth; just a less fuzzy picture.

anyway speaking of intro to philosophy; grant wasn’t it socrates that proclaimed one should embrace one’s ignorance? socrates was a pagan but i still believe he was onto something

Grant, are you saying that as Christians we can know the spirits or hearts or the “inner person” of others, because after all we know our own heart (e.g. during the Lord’s Supper)?

Or are you saying that as Christians we can judge actions and events, because “spirits which motivate people always break out in the form of action and events.”

I’ve was reading this strand and was curious.