RAID ON THE ARTICULATE: Comic Eschatology in Jesus and Borges

by John Dominic Crossan ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 22, 1976

Crossan, an adventurous New Testament interpreter, tellingly structures his book like a musical score, and the music of its meaning comes only as the reader tries its parts--stories, critical quotes, speculative analysis, historical detail. Sources range from Kafka to Peter Beagle, Chesterton to Emily Dickinson, literary critics to biblical scholars, though the writings of Borges and the sayings of Jesus hold center stage; insights come madcap, wave on wave. Perhaps a rehearsal of dominant motifs says best what a linear summary could only distort. Our world is the playful creation of imagination, and language is the basic game. Being--the whole story--is both shrouded and unveiled in the play of language, but words reveal most when they're knowingly at play, not speaking some solemn, final truth. What the myths create, parables destroy: the schemes of coherence that constitute religions and cultures and sustain ways of life are radically relativized by the mocking wisdom of paradoxes made into stories. In the interplay between best laid plans and reversed expectations (the first are last, the sinner a saint) some of the mystery is disclosed. For Crossan, Jesus and Borges are consummate ""parablers,"" geniuses at ""comic eschatology""--standing traditions (of religion, of literature) on their heads and pointing Zen-master style to a beyond only koans can say. Traditions domesticate and moralize, but parablers bring down the house with a joke that restores the fertility of chaos. God's story is finally comedy, tragedy exposed as an act. A rich, heady book; whether a symphony of revelations or just a cacophony of bright ideas depends largely on how you play it.

Pub Date: Sept. 22, 1976

ISBN: 1556358229

Page Count: -

Publisher: Harper & Row

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1976

Categories: NONFICTION