The Human Conspiracy Blog-space: BEATING UP ON BEOWULF

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BEATING UP ON BEOWULF

An article in National Review Online (assailing the film Beowulf as anti-Christian propaganda) has unearthed one of my pet peeves about the currently ascendant (ladies, forgive me) over-feminized Christianity.
The piece ran today -- November 30 -- by Raymond Ibrahim. Here’s the link -- --- (http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=NDU5MGIwYWJlOTQ3OWE2MjNjN2E2MzcyMjFkYWIxMmM=#more )
The context is important here: There is a deep tension between the modern and post-modern effete versions of Christianity and its earlier, more robust versions. Males do not enjoy a monopoly on martial courage (think of Joan of Arc and the young Queen Elisabeth), but let’s face it, the nurturing, pacifist, carry-a-feather-not-a-sword archetype is unmistakably feminine.
As to the movie, Beowulf, I prefer John J. Miller’s take (also in Nat Rev. on line- November 16th) in which he simply repeats what we all know – Hollywood is crude and almost always distorts the great classics.
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZmM5ODg2MDlhNmU5ZjExMDRmNTNkMmYxNjFmNGY5ZGE= .
In the Ibrahim piece, the author is right, of course, when he locates anti-Christian jibes throughout Hollywood’s efforts. This is a development that took hold in the late fifties and is just now beginning to draw a concerted pushback.
Mr. Ibrahim makes his most telling and interesting point with this question:
“If Christianity was, and is, some sort of un-masculine religion, meant to sap the “aristocratic” class of their manhood and arête — that is, manly virtue and excellence — why then did the ruling warrior class of Europe ever come to accept it in the first place?”
Why indeed?
Yes, Hollywood is prone to attack religion – and sometimes it represents an easy target.
I object most strongly to the unreal caricatures of priests, pastors and believers, either as naïve fools or malevolent monsters. Even when the writers and directors are trying hard to “do the right thing” they tend to screw it up.
But I’d not waste a second on Beowulf – whether in written translation from the Old English, or in its various cinematic incarnations.
As I recall, Beowulf is a (roughly 11th century) pagan epic about a pre-Christian culture in Scandinavia . In different settings, so were Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, Homer’s Odyssey and – for that matter - What about Star Wars?
J. R. R. Tolkien (a Roman Catholic) wrote an important essay Beowulf: the Monsters and the Critics in which he reportedly (sorry, I haven’t read the essay) lauded the manuscript as an important mythopoetic work – as opposed to an historical narrative.
Tolkien might have talked about an effete, anti-heroic Jesus; he might have complained that Beowulf exulted pagan heroism instead of an ethos of peace, but he did not.
I am personally persuaded that this is because he and C. S. Lewis, among others of that era, were Christians of a different and more heroic stripe, a model sadly diminished and derided in too many modern and post modern circles.
I grieve for the demise of the hero in our culture and of the self confident, robust, not-puritanical Christianity that animated most of “the good guys” who fought real evil in WW II, and those stalwart iconic lawmen who were depicted in the old westerns.
There is still a subset of the followers of Moses and Christ – and I number myself among them - who would gladly sacrifice the puritanical mindset (of which political correctness is just the latest manifestation) for a more pagan one, so long as the spirit of good humor, compassion, heroism, the core moral law and the deep meaning of resurrection are all conserved.
JBG

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BEATING UP ON BEOWULF

BEATING UP ON BEOWULF

An article in National Review Online (assailing the film Beowulf as anti-Christian propaganda) has unearthed one of my pet peeves about the currently ascendant (ladies, forgive me) over-feminized Christianity.

The piece ran today -- November 30 -- by Raymond Ibrahim. Here’s the link -- --- (http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=NDU5MGIwYWJlOTQ3OWE2MjNjN2E2MzcyMjFkYWIxMmM=#more )

As to the movie, Beowulf, I prefer John J. Miller’s take (also in Nat Rev. on line- November 16th) in which he simply repeats what we all know – Hollywood is crude and almost always distorts the great classics.

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZmM5ODg2MDlhNmU5ZjExMDRmNTNkMmYxNjFmNGY5ZGE= .

In the Ibrahim piece, the author is right, of course, when he locates anti-Christian jibes throughout Hollywood’s efforts. This is a development that took hold in the late fifties and is just now beginning to draw a concerted pushback.

Mr. Ibrahim makes his most telling and interesting point with this question:

“If Christianity was, and is, some sort of un-masculine religion, meant to sap the “aristocratic” class of their manhood and arête — that is, manly virtue and excellence — why then did the ruling warrior class of Europe ever come to accept it in the first place?”

Why indeed?

Yes, Hollywood is prone to attack religion – and sometimes it represents an easy target.

I object most strongly to the unreal caricatures of priests, pastors and believers, either as naïve fools or malevolent monsters. Even when the writers and directors are trying hard to “do the right thing” they tend to screw it up.

But I’d not waste a second on Beowulf – whether in written translation from the Old English, or in its various cinematic incarnations.

As I recall, Beowulf is a (roughly 11th century) pagan epic about a pre-Christian culture in Scandinavia . In different settings, so were Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, Homer’s Odyssey and – for that matter - What about Star Wars?

J. R. R. Tolkien (a Roman Catholic) wrote an important essay Beowulf: the Monsters and the Critics in which he reportedly (sorry, I haven’t read the essay) lauded the manuscript as an important mythopoetic work – as opposed to an historical narrative.

Tolkien might have talked about an effete, anti-heroic Jesus; he might have complained that Beowulf exulted pagan heroism instead of an ethos of peace, but he did not.

I am personally persuaded that this is because he and C. S. Lewis, among others of that era, were Christians of a different and more heroic stripe, a model sadly diminished and derided in too many modern and post modern circles.

I grieve for the demise of the hero in our culture and of the self confident, robust, not-puritanical Christianity that animated most of “the good guys” who fought real evil in WW II, and those stalwart iconic lawmen who were depicted in the old westerns.

JBG

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