Stories to live by

Hi all,

I wonder if any of you have ever considered what it means to have a guiding story by which one lives ones life. It isn’t even so uncommon if you consider the fact that our thoughts are continually telling us a story, unravelling the associations we make in situations, dreaming up romantic affiliations to total strangers, imagining ourselves in a role in a movie. We dress, talk, eat, drink, walk, stand, sit and do many other things because they are conformed to the story we have in our head at a particular time.

Why should it be so unusual for people to have their guiding mythology or a wisdom figure who talks them through the stages of their lives? Why shouldn’t an organized religion be a relic of such behaviour in earlier cultures, albeit with a positive intention and a substantial ethical code? I think that the religions of the world all have this kind of beginning, starting off with something that probably happened but which gained anecdotal popularity, was adopted by some group to transport an idea and grew out of proportion. The figures became legends, larger than life, and their words were composed by poets. The story takes on the classical form of a tragedy or drama, historical aspects are drawn into it and all the time, it is transporting an idea. The longer it holds, the truer the idea is to life – perhaps it is even considered to be wisdom.

Or take the Jesus story of a Jewish guru, spreading a dangerously new take on the Jewish Torah and the meaning of the Messiah prophecy of a new covenant. Purposely provoking the authorities and consequent to death, the ideas he proposed became popular (although mostly among people who were no longer die-hard Jews) and he was killed. When the disciples came together and started telling the stories about what he had said and done, when they sang the songs they had sung with him, they became curiously alive – enlightened even. The gatherings grew and spread into Greece and Italy and gradually throughout the whole world. Unfortunately after a few hundred years, the stories had a different nature and it all became very serious and academic. However, the academics also gave the whole tradition a new lease of life and after 2 thousand years, the movement has changed its form numerous times and split into various sects.

The most important thing is that these stories to live by are not meant to be believed, but lived. They are the guidelines for a different life-style and outlook, and have reformed many cultures. For some time now there has been more emphasis of believing than living by the stories, which is why the tradition is faltering and dropping into fundamentalist extremism. The same is of course true of Islam, that beautifully eloquent poetry about the struggle towards spiritual surrender of a society to the ineffable mystery of life. It too has suffered in the hands of people who have little faith and who are scared stiff of reality, so that they have to try and force it to stop progressing.

What do you think?

Take Care

Yea, unfortunately this touchy feely mythy stuff doesn’t square with the stories (if you can call them that) themselves. What you are doing is essentially what anyone does when they’re caught in a terrible lie----“Ohhh, you thought I was being literal?? Ohhh, you thought I was serious??”.

The mythy stuff is no doubt a myth, but not in your sense. Because it doesn’t square with the propositional language… about what to eat, how to fuck, and who to stone when they fuck the wrong way.

As a mythy type person, why don’t you try another book? And then another one after that? Amazon.com. Heck, go to the magazine section in a drug store and pick out a cheezy romance… almost every book on the shelf there will have more insight into the human condition than the best hand of the recently decended from the tree… Nevermind. And you can have the full breadth of thousands of years of human learning.

So you disagree?

Take Care

Those timeless stories of life which have survived for many centuries and even millennia have not only been enforced, of course there was that too, but they spoke to people in poverty as well as the privileged, they created the humble as well as the pious, they inspired artists, virtuosos and visionaries, they provided a storyline by which people understood life. They inspired people to do incredible things in devotion, some good and some curiously bad, some majestic and some so very abject that we can hardly bear hearing about them. People have gone without food for such stories, or donated their last penny as a token of their devotion.

The stories weren’t always a narrative, but were at times an analogy, an allegory, a fable, a myth, a parable or even a fantasy. They told the tales of archetypes, heroes and tragic figures, they took us on travels across oceans and deserts, took us in balloons to the sky or in submarines below the seas. But the simplest stories were the best, easily told with a touch of spectacle, dramatic voices and pregnant pauses, enough to catch the imagination of children and adults alike. We were disappointed when the stories were badly told, and not everybody dared try, which explains why there were those who told the stories and those who listened. Much of the time it was the mother or grandmother who told the stories and the men who enacted them in gruesome rituals, but there were also the priests and shamans and of course the ballad-mongers who sold their songs for bread and board.

Today, in this thoroughly modern and rational time, people flock to buy books and see films which carry the mystery in them – something true even in fantasy. They search for something to trust and even if it is the victory of Harry Potter over Lord Voldemort, or the Hobbit Frodo over Lord Sauron. Star Wars was based on the archetypes of Hindu mythology, the New Testament story has been filmed numerous times, the last showing the full pain of Jesus’ suffering. Who can think that stories to live by are out of date?

Take Care

What I am doing is writing about a way of understanding how religion may have come to be and pointing out that there is a sensitivity at the root of it, which has been thrown out with the bath-water – which, really has been something I have been doing for some time here on ILP. Since sensitivity seems to be one of the attributes which is driven out by your assumed masculine style of writing, it may be something that you are completely missing in what I have written.

It seems your world-view is exhausted with these two basic needs, but, believe me – there is more to life. I believe that the stories which people have lived by for centuries and millennia show that to be the case and originally attempted to take the blinkers off of people who only looked to fulfil the needs you have noted above and give them a panoramic view of this awesome thing we call life.

When your arguments run out the only thing left to do is attack the message-bearer. This is again probably a very masculine thing to do and may even arouse you for a second or so, but in fact it is just an attempt to cover up the fact that it disturbs you to know that under your façade, there is a soul (or heart) which needs the same kind of soul-food as anyone else does on this planet and that at some time, probably not so far away, that façade will fail and you will either pitifully hold on to an illusion or become a caricature of what you envisioned yourself to be.

This is of course one of the reasons that, at the root of religion, there is a striving to dismantle illusions, speak to the soul and allow the sensitivity to rise and find its place in our existence as a sentient being and perhaps overcome the aggression and bluntness of the underlying anxiety which agitates people like you when they read things like what I have written.

Take Care

I think you’re being unfair. Where has Bob indicated a cop out or distancing from literal interpretation? It seems his argument was not to deny the literal interpretation of scripture but to shift from an historical-scientific reading, where scripture reveals the truth of history or the natural world, toward a social-ethical reading, where scripture reveals “life truths” that we would be wise to listen to.

In both cases there needs to be a strong literal reading of the texts. The difference is in our interpretation of the texts’ point.

Here you are betraying your own “shirking” of the literal. A literal reading of scriptures would not see propositional language at its heart but rather narrative. (A point in Bob’s favour.)

Also, a close literal reading would reveal that the propositions made, mostly in the law sections or codifications, are not the point. The law is not the point. Rather the law was given to help Israel (in the case of Israel) back onto the track that Bob is describing: that of right living, which the stories were made to reveal.

(Indeed, the law is given in a story, and this broader context teaches us more, or is more properly the point, than the law given within it.)

Thanks for the support!

With reference to the texts being read “literally”, if the meaning of literal is: “in accordance with, involving, or being the primary or strict meaning of the word or words; not figurative or metaphorical”, then we will find that there is enough evidence for the stories to be understood as a work of art, composed and illustrated to provide guidance in the form of a narrative, rather than as a proposition, and to be regarded as narratives with a message rather than as a merely a historical report of occurrences.

The common use of the phrase, “to take something literally”, usually means the latter and would, in my view, be erroneous. There is no conflict with history or science because, as you say, that isn’t the point.

In my view, an enlightened humanity would have no reason for the competition between religions, just because they have different narratives. We might discuss certain social or ethical implications, and we might compare our stories, but they could stand alongside each other. Of course, the problem of blasphemy is a big issue for all three book religions, and it will not be easily reconciled. However, there is enough on all sides to be ethically questioned.

The case for such ethical discussions was made by Sam Harris when he made the point that Hustler and Playboy are hardly an encouragement for Islamic women to stop covering up, just as the macho behaviour of prominent Islamic men is hardly encouraging for western women to accept the role of islamic men in their society. The struggle for land is an issue between Palestine and Israel, just as the attempt of right-wing Christians to bring on Armageddon by pressing Islamists to destroy Jerusalem so that, a perverse vision of the second-coming of Christ can be invoked. As we see, there are numerous social-ethical questions and I find that a guide-line for that is given in scripture.

The basic need, however, is to understand our “books” as stories to live by and not as a God-given permission to end the world.

Take Care

To concur, I would want to allow as many layers of meaning as possible when performing a literal reading. When I say “literal” I mean that we have to take every word seriously, both in its strict meaning and in its metaphoric possibility. Taking it seriously means we cannot disregard it or underplay it. If the word is there then it is important, and it must be considered as such.

For example, I’ve been thinking about Jeremiah 13 lately, about the loin cloth. Why does God tell Jeremiah not to dip it in water? How are we take seriously this seemingly trivial insertion? A strong literal reading would be deeply troubled by its presence…

In another example, when Job sits in the ashes we have to take this literally. We have to see Job as actually sitting in the ashes (not historically mind, but in the story), but we also have to consider the metaphoric possibilities of this action. Perhaps Job is doing this as a sign of his lament, or that he is lamenting. This is true. But an even deeper literal reading might see Job as giving us a sign of what he believes his present and future worth to be.

A literal reading would take seriously every word/statement and try to imbue each word/statement with as much meaning as possible given the strict, but also metaphoric, possibilities of the text.

I’m with you in your spirit of comparison and giving attention to “competing” stories. I don’t believe all stories are created equal though, even those that achieve a mythic/religious status, so I do still see a competition. Quite simply, some stories are better than others. Some stories reveal greater truths. Our social-ethical discussions (guided by these stories, or entered into with the resources drawn from these stories) are meant to discern precisely this.

Yes. While it is difficult to determine what the guide-line revealed by any particular text is (given the difficulty of what I’ve tried to describe as literal interpretation!) I think you are right.

To be consistent however I would have to assert again that some guides are better than others. I believe that the scriptures of different religious traditions reveal different ways of being human, and that we not only need a way of determining these (e.g., literal interpretation) but also of evaluating them.

The evaluation, again, is when we take the “guidance” we have received from our guiding stories and enter into the social-ethical conversations rampant in this world. It is in this cauldron that our wisdom is tested. The failure of our wisdom, however, is not necessarily a failure of the story. It is just as likely a failure of our interpretation. (This fact is too often forgotten. Those such as Harris sit smugly upon their poor interpretations and assume the failure of the story versus their own failure as interpreters.)

Given what I have said I would alter this a bit. We need to be doubly mindful that 1) our “books” may not be the source of wisdom that we took them for and that 2) our interpretation of the book may not do the wisdom of the book justice.

This puts us in the awkward but healthy place where we aren’t allowed be get too comfortable in our wisdom, or too full of ourselves, which I take to be your meaning here.

Thanks Bob,

I have looked at the text and the word translated as “water” (according to Strong’s) is mayim (or mah’-yim) which does mean water but it can also figuratively mean juice, and by euphemism even urine, semen.

The word rendered as “put” is bow’ (or bo), can be variously translated: to go or come (in a wide variety of applications):–abide, apply, attain, X be, befall, + besiege, bring (forth, in, into, to pass), call, carry, X certainly, (cause, let, thing for) to come (against, in, out, upon, to pass), depart, X doubtless again, + eat, + employ, (cause to) enter (in, into, -tering, -trance, -try), be fallen, fetch, + follow, get, give, go (down, in, to war), grant, + have, X indeed, (in-)vade, lead, lift (up), mention, pull in, put, resort, run (down), send, set, X (well) stricken (in age), X surely, take (in), way.

So the “dipping in water” may even be a command not to have it stained, which would fit into the allegory of the text. The girdle was “ruined” or “marred” and God says, “After this manner will I mar the pride of Judah, and the great pride of Jerusalem.”

I agree that the ashes are meant literally in the context of the story ([RNKJV] Job 30:19: “He hath cast me into the mire, and I am become like dust and ashes” and later in the story [RNKJV] Job 42:6: “Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes”). Keil and Delitzsch have clearly stated that Job is the result of poetic genius and numerous scholars have detected three layers of Job which have added to the story as time went on, so the multi-layered meaning of Job’s words are quite possible.

I agree but at the same time the comparison still is subjective with regard to what is “better” and, of course, it is a question of where we are born and what heritage we have. I believe that a discussion about difficult points would show that many “difficult” expressions are to be understood within a cultural context and would lose their graveness when we understand where the story is leading us. Our problem with this is that we tend to have a very light-hearted approach to problems which cultures, which do not embrace the technical and medicinal advances willingly, may have difficulty accepting as something which can be taken light-heartedly – and there is always the question: Is a light-hearted approach really appropriate?

I agree here too! As we have seen above, the expertise of biblical translators haven’t been able to provide us with the broad possibilities contained within the Hebrew language, which has a great deal to do with our language. You have to compare several translations and Strong’s to get a feel for what is going on in a text. When you also take into account that some stories show that we have become quite prude in what we expect the Bible to speak of and what not, there are numerous factors which we have to take into account.

I agree, the self-criticism or inherent suspicion that we may have missed something should always accompany us.

Many thanks to you too!

Take Care

Ah, but the loin-cloth is ruined because it was buried, not because it was stained! The loin-cloth, which was to be the pride of Jeremiah (just as Israel was to be the pride of God) did not cling to Jeremiah but was hidden instead (just as Israel did not cling to God but turned away instead).

Both as such are good for nothing or “ruined.” (That is, it is not Jeremiah/God who ruined the loin-cloth/Israel but rather the loin-cloth/Israel was ruined because of its separation from Jeremiah/God.)

But here I could see your reading working really well. If instead of reading God’s statement as “do not dip it in water” we read it as “do not stain it,” it becomes obvious that God is telling Jeremiah to take pride in his loin-cloth and to care for it. (Just as God would never stain Israel, who was to be God’s pride.)

Interesting! I must say this reading gives me some rest. But I’m also called back to the standard interpretation, “do not dip it in water.”

As in many other instances in scripture we are given a line here that can be read in two opposite ways, in this case 1) “do not dip it in water” i.e., do not care for it! and 2) " do not stain it" i.e., care for it!

That’s where I always struggled before: Why would God tell Jeremiah not to care for or clean his loin-cloth (by dipping it in water)? I think there’s a deeper meaning here still. Something that, despite how well your proposal works, we are meant to be troubled by. Something to the effect that it is not due to the care from Jeremiah/God that that the loin-cloth/Israel is to fulfill its glory, but rather through its own virtues.

In other words, that small, seemingly trivial but also troubling phrase is in fact a statement about our natural dignity as humankind. That is, while it is true that we will be nothing if we don’t cling to God, it is not due to the care or cleaning of God that we attain to our glory. We can attain that on our own, as attested by God’s statement “do not dip it in water.”

(Sorry for derailing your post! This passage has been troubling me though and it’s good to get some thoughts out. It was also good to hear your thoughts as I never considered the interpretation you provided before.)

No problems, it makes more sense to me the way I read it whereby the command not to stain it would hold the girdle in honour, whereas the “hiding” and “digging” up of the girdle seems to fulfil the requirement to later say that the girdle was now “ruined” or “marred” and God says, “After this manner will I mar the pride of Judah, and the great pride of Jerusalem.” But it is a difficult text to understand.

In the end I suppose the story becomes clear, but a literal reading tends to cause the storyteller a few problems with the possible explanations, which as you say, stand seemingly opposite each other. The storyteller must then serve the story and choose a reading which serves the pristine intention (as best he or she knows) and put his or her curiosity to one side. Very often this may mean choosing the traditional reading over a more controversial one.

One thing which I forgot to mention is that Thomas Moore’s book “Care of the Soul” used Greek mythology amongst other sources to describe certain psychological behaviour and made it very clear that many of those myths are geared up to assist the care of the soul in everyday life. Chapters with this in mind include, “The Myth of Family and Childhood”, “Self-love and Its Myth: Narcissus and Narcissism”, Love’s Initiations”, “Jealousy and Envy: Healing Poisons”, “The Soul and Power”, “Gifts of Depression”, “The Body’s Poetics of Illness” and “The Economics of the Soul: Work, Money, Failure and Creativity”. The books of Thomas Moore are altogether a good read with the subject of this thread in mind.

Take Care

I’m starting to realize a literary device prevalently used in Biblical scripture.

I first found it in the book of Job, where it is deployed on the scale of a book. I’m now finding it here in the story of Jeremiah’s loin-cloth.

To define this device I would say it is when a text, through linguistic ambiguity, makes for two, at surface, opposite readings. In the case of Jeremiah 13, either God is saying “do not clean it”, or God is saying “do not stain it.” But which one is it? God can only be saying one, right?

To further define this literary device, it is not just a matter of a text lending itself to two opposed readings, but to two readings that each reveal truth, and where the truths revealed are not opposed to each other. The resultant stories are indeed different, since we can only read the text in one way, but the truths are not contrary.

In the case of Jeremiah then, God’s point to Jeremiah is that he is not to stain the loin-cloth, since it is to be an object of pride. But this is only one half of the story, albeit a whole story on its own. It is also God’s point to Jeremiah that he is not to clean the loin-cloth, so that it can attain to glory on its own and take pride in itself.

It is not a matter, as you put it above, of “choosing the reading which serves the pristine intention.” Indeed, both readings are true when this literary device is at work and need to be read and/or recognized.

(Since I mentioned the book of Job, where I believe this device is also deployed, (as I’ve no doubt said before) I believe the book can be read in two edifying ways: 1) either Job loses his fear of God and needs to have the fear of God put back into him, hence he “repents in dust and ashes” in 42:6, or 2) Job loses his fear of himself and needs to be re-convinced of his status as God’s image, hence he is “consoled about dust and ashes” in 42:6.

In the book of Job even God’s speeches are an example of this literary device, being truly readable as both putting the fear of God back into Job and/or as encouraging Job to fulfill his royal function as humankind. Not simultaneously mind, since the story needs to be read in both ways separately. But both truths are revealed by God’s words nonetheless, that we are to fear God and take pride in ourselves.)

(Clearly I see great parallels between Jeremiah’s loin-cloth and Job. Not just in their deployment of this device, but in the truths revealed as well. (Perhaps we are called to recognize this in God call for Job to gird his loins!))

Excuse my butting in, but regardless the sources of our stories, those that “stick” are those which takes our own personal experience to complete the story. Naturally, every perspective is very close to being the same because there is no escaping the human condition and it is this that provides the commonality of what we are to take away from our stories. The table of contents varies little because our “issues” remin the same generation upon generation. What we need is to take in our stories in heart and mind and not get lost expecting a regurgitation of the owners manual…

Definately, the storyteller may choose a traditional approach, but he or she will always flavour or colour the story in telling it. I see storytelling incorporating personal experience to bring the story up to date and make it personal, but important for me is that it should not just become exegesis about the story. The stories have to be told in a way that retains the dramaturgy and the excitement. That is what I like about setting ancient dramas in modern settings. The storyline is, as you say, the same generation for generation - and yet each century has its special perspective.

The problem with religious stories is that they often become so overloaded by exegesis that it is really just a regurgitation of the same words in the same order. These stories live when a real bard tells them. I experienced this with a non-religious epic when I was at evening school years back and one of the teachers who stood in for our german language teacher and told us the short version of the eddic poem “the Nibelung”. I became fascinated with the story, as did all listening, although previously we had all seen it as a story primarily picked up by the 19th century German composer Richard Wagner who himself conceived of and promoted the idea of a special festival to showcase his own works, in particular his monumental cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and Parsifal. It was all heavy stuff, but the short rendering was entertaining and opened it up for us and Richard Wagner had put it all to music, so we went on from there.

Take Care

Are the stories that “stick” those that take our own personal experience to complete, or are they those that really speak to our personal experience, and that perhaps bring some sort of completion, or rest, to us, as we try to understand what we have experienced? Maybe it’s two sides of the same coin.

I guess I’m just hesitant to see this “normalization”, if I can call it that, that you speak of. I don’t think there is a constant underlying human condition that serves as our common grounding when reading a story and that orients us and brings our interpretations of a story toward merger.

In fact, I see a great disparity from one person to the next. That is, no human condition but rather human conditions. And it is this disparity from one human to the next that can result in extremely diverse or diversifying interpretations.

So, maybe the stories that stick are those that are capable of speaking across human conditions. That is, those that are relatable or relevant to human beings of any stripe, or with any number of issues on the mind. If a story can speak to a person no matter what their condition or problem then it will attain to universality. (A story is not universal because it taps into some underlying constant, i.e., some human condition or basic set of issues that remain constant over time and that “complete” it.)

I would have to agree with you Bob. In order to tell them right, though, there must be exegesis. There must be interpretation and understanding before there can be right telling. And with a religious text, those do not come easily.

It seems to me the mark of a truly religious text is one that challenges our discernment. They challenge us to discern. That means exegesis.

Once the truth revealed by the text is discerned, then the story can be brought to life through the telling.

(I’m obviously a fairly “busy” interpreter of scripture. I love playing that game as my posts will often show. And my point in doing so is to bring the text to the very life you speak of, to a point where it is alive and can speak to us in our own lives. I have also found in my own experience that exegesis often falls short. We don’t interpret enough or give the text the credit, in the form of time and attention to detail, that it deserves. But anyways. This criticism is typically to be launched at the despisers of religion out there with their straw man interpretations, or to the fundamentalists with their unthinking doctrines. Neither give the credit that is due, or put in the hard exegetical work that is required.)

I think that what is referred to as the human condition, that which encompasses the experiences of being human in a personal, social and cultural context, is common to all human beings. Of course this experience has different facets, but being human has enough common ground for analogy, allegory and metaphor from other cultures to still reach us, and the soul language of myth, symbolism and images speak to us without eloquent language. The differences we have do not cover the commonalities – and the universality of soul language is becoming widely known, whether in traditions or dreams.

The problem is that there are few bards telling Christian or biblical stories, instead theologians preach by telling you for half of the time what they see as the historical context, a quarter of the time how that compares with today and an eighth of the time what it has to do with you and the rest reassuring you that all will be OK if you believe in Jesus. The conflict of living life and how to live through it and finally transcend it is what religion is about. The experiences of the hero or heroine are given to us in preparation for our own, not to save us the trouble. It should help us mature together with the initiation rituals, so that we take on roles that we have previously expected others to play (a father or mother, a protector or redeemer) and become wise.

Of course this entails the exegesis of the storyteller, but it remains my place of work and isn’t the story itself which I tell others. I have often experienced such meetings where someone goes on and on about where they found this or that, their head continually immersed in their jottings and the eyes rarely on the listeners. But the story has been exciting in itself for me and others, which you can feel. People sit and wait for the story to go on or, sometimes, even to emerge out of the explanations of the person who is leading a meeting. I feel that the story has to have people dancing out the storyline in their mind, it is told as much with the eyes and gesticulations as with the tongue, and time passes like a flash.

The preparation of a meeting is always deep and long, but when the story is told it must be exciting and now, entertaining and yet a confrontation, and listeners will see and feel themselves and others engrossed in the storyline and understand their own lives as a stage and their identities as roles or personae which they play. Life, as we often take it to be, is an illusion, just as theatre is an illusion. If we could but understand that.

Take Care

Bob,
If story telling is important, and I agree that it is, then you’ve opened a line of inquiry that perhaps explains a lot of things not just religious understanding. I don’t want to derail this thread, so I’ll start one and toss out a few ideas.

Maybe it’s a matter of semantics and what is meant by “the human condition.” I certainly do see great relatability between persons across time and place. No doubt. I think we have a lot to learn from our ancestors and that, differences aside, there is a deep continuity in life. I also think there are huge chasms. Not just between persons now and 5000 years ago but between neighbours in time and space.

Would I say there is a soul language? My point was that some texts “stick” because they can speak to us no matter our condition. No matter the chasms between us. I don’t think that idea is too far off from what you’re trying to express here.

The bard doesn’t really exist anymore though, right? There are sermonizers with their flocks. Social media might create a space for a modern bard. I would say a big problem is that the space is rather filled, and there is little room for such bards to emerge. For example, there are fundamentalists, who are rather unthinking and incapable of bringing the stories to life. There are academics, who are too focused on historical criticism or theology versus the stories themselves. There are critics of religion, who continue their fight against religion. There is also government, which respects religion but makes it a private affair (perhaps in its “separation from state”). We are not really encouraged to publicize our faith. There is also the simple fact that religion is, and has long been, our of fashion. Little room for such bards to emerge…

I would have to disagree with that quite wholeheartedly. Or at least, I have trouble with the phrase “and finally transcend it.” (Why would we want to transcend life?! Sounds like Buddhist talk to me!)

Exegesis and story telling are separate, and can indeed be related to an audience separately (the story itself can be told and the exegesis can be laid out). But my point is more that exegesis is required in order to understand the story, so that in understanding the story it can be told right, which is to say in such a way that it speaks to the audience in the way that it was meant to.

My suggestion, taken to an extreme, is that a bard can’t just be handed the text of a story and that the story, upon being told, would come to life. No, the bard must get into it, and that requires exegesis and understanding. If the understanding is wrong or short the story will be told wrong or in an unfulfilled way and won’t speak to the audience as much as it could. The more a bard understands a story (and with religious texts there are always layers or levels or understanding) the more they can bring it to life.

This “relatability” is what I mean, we won’t, of course, understand exactly what it meant to live under the conditions which dominated humanity for thousands of years, but that isn’t what people are telling stories about. That seems to be what happens when people try to relate stories via books. The oral traditions are about substantial aspects of life which have remained across the ages and are full of images which we also find in dreams and visions, which does ask the question, which has been speculated upon many times, whether the mind has a collective source.

This is what Tentative picked up on in his thread. There are bards, but they have developed. Clarissa Pinkola Estés (Women Who Run With the Wolves: Myths and Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype; The Gift of Story: A Wise Tale About What is Enough … and many others), for example, is a poet who uses her poems throughout her psychoanalytic books, spokenword audios, and stage performances as expressive therapy for others, who says, “I was raised in the now nearly vanished oral and ethnic traditions of my families”, so she has perpetuated the storytelling in a way that I feel is natural.

There are, of course far too few people doing this work, and, as you say, we have a lot going against it. But this isn’t mass-media stuff, it is normally something for smaller groups where the communication is immediate and interactive. Many bards are lyricists and musicians with a restricted audience but who manage to electrify when they perform. There have been some Christian singers who have done this, but often the evangelical or new-age attitude overbears their talent or they have died early. Keith Green was Christian an example of that. However, the bard is today often pushed away in favour of multi-media or is only found underground. There are numerous talents caught up in protest and discontentment and fail to develop beyond that.

If you like, it is the stage where we rise above the struggles to the wisdom which understands that the conflicts have been necessary for a development and that in the end it is the human condition. Learning to live through the struggles often takes a lifetime and when we can finally go past that stage, that is transcendence. It is about waking up to the facts of life but not remaining stuck in them. Buddhism or Taoism seems to transport this best, but it is found in biblical wisdom as well.

I think that, although there are wrong ways of telling stories, we must be wary of making correctness too important. Some things don’t work in a modern setting the way they did pre-technology, and we have to develop in order to bring across the bottom line.

I agree, we just must avoid getting stuck in exegesis and presenting that, instead of the actual story, to an audience.

Take Care