Reading the Old Books: Great Literature & the Life of Faith: Joy: the Now and the Not-Yet (GH Day 23)

Sunday, December 23, 2012

Joy: the Now and the Not-Yet (GH Day 23)

It's Christmas time, and during this time the word "joy" pops up frequently. Maybe it's on Christmas decorations on sale in the stores ("JOY"), maybe it's in Christmas carols you hear or sing ("O tidings of comfort and joy," "Joy to the world"), maybe it's written on the Christmas cards you receive ("Wishing you joy in this holiday season"--or something like that). In southern Louisiana it's on the signs wishing everyone a merry Christmas, or "Joyeaux Noel."

What is this joy we wish people during the holidays? Commercials seem to suggest that if we're simply given the right gift at Christmas, then we'll experience this joy. But when has a physical gift you've been given (and think of your favorite gift ever here) truly brought you lasting joy?

George Herbert (of course!) speaks to this problem in the opening stanza of his poem "Man's Medley":

     Hark how the birds do sing,
          And woods do ring:
All creatures have their joy, and man hath his.
     Yet if we rightly measure,
          Man's joy and pleasure
Rather hereafter than in present is.

Even his opening word "Hark" is reminiscent of Christmas time for us (e.g., "Hark, the herald angels sing"). (What other time of year do we use this word? Granted, it's because of Charles Wesley's lyrics 100 years after Herbert, but now "hark" has Christmas time associations for us readers.) Birds & woods (that is, trees, garland, pine sprigs, red berries): these are also associated with Christmas.

Yet in line 3 Herbert draws a contrast for us between the joy experienced by creatures and that experienced by humans. What is different? We humans can never know true joy in this lifetime. It is "[r]ather hereafter" (6), in Heaven, that we can know true joy. No earthly present, no matter how nice it is, no matter the thought that went into it, can give us lasting joy and pleasure.

Lest we give up on experiencing any joy, or "cheer," as Herbert also calls it, he reassures us in stanza 4:

     Not that he may not here
          Taste of the cheer;
But as birds drink, and straight lift up their head,
     So must he sip and think
          Of better drink
He may attain to after he is dead.

Using another word that we associate with Christmas time, "cheer" (line 20), Herbert draws his illustration from nature. Don't get lost in the pleasures of the here-and-now. They are but foretastes of what is to come, the "better drink" (23) of the joys of Heaven.

Of course, as you no doubt know, the Christmas carol, "Joy to the World, the Lord is come," is really pointing us toward this "hereafter": the 2nd advent of Christ, ushering in the joys to be experienced in His kingdom under His rule. So, as we experience the joys of this holiday season with family and friends, let us remember that this present is only a foretaste of the "cheer," "joy," and "pleasure" to come with our spiritual family in Christ.

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Why Old Books?

C. S. Lewis wrote that old books, so often shunned by readers even of his era, might be able to teach us much wisdom and truth that our contemporary age has forgotten (at best) or ridicules (at worst). See, for instance, Lewis's essay "On the Reading of Old Books" (from which I've taken my blog title), where he states, "It is a good rule, after reading a new book, never to allow yourself another new one till you have read an old one in between. . . . Every age has its own outlook. It is specially good at seeing certain truths and specially liable to make certain mistakes. We all, therefore, need the books that will correct the characteristic mistakes of our own period. And that means the old books."

How often does the average American (or insert English-speaking-person here) read something written by an old dead guy and consider that, as a result of what we've read, we should "possibly modify [our] thoughts or [our] behaviour" (Lewis, The Screwtape Letters)? I'm not striving for anything ambitious with this blog, but perhaps by sharing the tidbits from my reading of old books (typically works of early English literature) and highlighting a story element, a concept, a passage, a word, I can take part in the tradition of passing along to you the lessons of beauty, truth, and goodness conveyed by these works.

There's one more element to this exploration: the old books, at least those written in the English language, were written mostly by people of faith in a culture of faith--namely, the Christian faith. As a Christian myself, I find the old books present all kinds of lessons for a life of faith.

For those of you in the literary know, you'll find that my approach to literature has been influenced heavily by Sir Philip Sidney's Defense of Poesy, as well as by neo-formalist criticism and, as already demonstrated, the great Medieval & Renaissance scholar and man of faith, C. S. Lewis.