Posted by
Zentrist on Thursday, May 28, 2009 11:49:58 PM
Way back in 1974 we proctors went on a weekend retreat at the dean of students' lake house. There the school's chaplain suggested that we change our name from "proctor" to "resident assistant." At this time, I was reading Heidegger already. But I didn't make the connection: words do indeed, as our President reminds us frequently, "matter." Words matter an awful lot. From that weekend on, for quite some time, we/they were no longer "proctors" with the "baggage" (of too much authority) that that old-fashioned word carried. At the time, it made no difference to me. I got a good deal on the dorm room as a result of being chosen "resident advisor" or whatever. This was just part of working one's way through a private school.
LANGUAGE IS THE HOUSE OF BEING. This then popular philosophical slogan has become "reality." Or maybe I should say, in our current context, something surreal--what with the excesses of political correctness and all.
Ideas indeed have consequences. This intensive study of language began in ancient Greece among other places. "What is 'justice'?" asked Socrates and his various and sundry interlocutors. So, words like Justice and Freedom and Responsibility--certain words matter more than others.
Proctor, doctor, crocker. They all matter. But some matter more than others--especially at a time like this.
In a very recent homily, Pope Benedict put it this way: "...there is an even deeper meaning that is not immediately perceptible. In the passage from the Acts of the Apostles it is said that Jesus was 'lifted up' (v. 9) and then it says 'taken up' (v. 11). The event is not described as a journey on high but rather as an action of the power of God who introduces Jesus into the space of closeness to the Divine." (Google Vatican, Holy See, Pope Benedict, Homilies, May 24, 2009.)
Needless to say, Pope Benedict is steeped in all aspects of theology; also worth noting: this man has clearly read Bultmann among many others influenced by Nietzsche, Husserl and Heidegger, to mention only a few giants in the field.
The homily (on the Ascension) continues this way: "The presence of the cloud that 'took him out of their sight' (v. 9), recalls a very ancient image of Old Testament theology and integrates the account of the ascension into the history of God with Israel, from the cloud of Sinai and above the tent of the Covenant in the desert, to the luminous cloud on the mountain of the Transfiguration".
This is not exactly a "strict constructionist" or "Straussian" reading of the text. But it strikes me as an original reading. More, the sense of tradition in this interpretation really opens up the text, for me at least, in an inspiring new way.
This really remarkable homily continues as follows: "To present the Lord wrapped in clouds calls to mind once and for all the same mystery expressed in the symbolism of the phrase, 'seated at the right hand of God'. In Christ ascended into Heaven, the human being has entered into intimacy with God in a new and unheard-of way; man henceforth finds room in God forever. 'Heaven': this word Heaven does not indicate a place above the stars but something far more daring and sublime: it indicates Christ himself, the divine Person who welcomes humanity fully and for ever, the One in whom God and man are inseparably united for ever."
And now our Holy Father seems to speak directly to the trademark phrase of Martin Heidegger, "being-in-the-world." His Holiness says:
MAN'S BEING IN GOD, THIS IS HEAVEN.
"And we draw close to Heaven, indeed, we enter Heaven to the extent that we draw close to Jesus and enter into communion with him. For this reason today's Solemnity of the Ascension invites us to be in profound communion with the dead and Risen Jesus, invisibly present in the life of each one of us."
I haven't finished reading the homily yet, but the Pope goes on to speak of this Mystery in terms of Serenity and Joy and Enthusiasm--not so much because we are still gazing up into the sky, but because we've been given a mission to witness, each in his or her own way...I repeat, we've been given a mission to witness to the things that mattered--that we have seen and heard. Most importantly, we've been given the means to get closer to God--through Christ. And all of this is mediated, in our case, in the amazing English language.