I Am A Manichee
Thursday, March 27, 2014
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| Peter Breck |
In 1973 when I was living in Mexico I saw Jesus Christ Superstar, Norman Jewison’s film adaptation of Andrew Lloyd Weber’s musical. Two things stood out for me.
One had to do with the
song, Everything’s All Right. It might just be one of the first musical numbers
in popular music to use the somewhat difficult, almost remote 5/4 time
signature. Think of Paul Desmond’s composition, Take Five which appeared in the
Dave Brubeck Quartet album Time Out in 1959.
Two was even more
complex even though to my mind it a made lots of sense. It was that without
Judas there would have been no betrayal, no crucifixion. This would meant that
the concept of God sacrificing his Son, would cleanse mankind of original sin
would not have happened.
I must admit here that
once I read Heraclitus in 1963 I developed a belief that in Latin sounds really
neat – coincidentia oppositorum. Heraclitus believed that all things were characterized by pairs of contrary properties. Hot included cold. Fast included
slow and so on. Think of putting your toes into boiling hot water in the tub
and thinking at first that the water is ice cold! As these contrary properties
strive with each other they move towards unity and harmony. In a way Heraclitus
was paving the way for my German friend whom I read in an Argentine Navy brig
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel’s dialectics - the idea, its opposite, their
synthesis.
Luckily for me I live
in the 21st century and no church, no Torquemada will burn me at the
stake for having Manichaeistic beliefs. Manichaeism
taught a dualistic cosmology that was a struggle between a good, spiritual
world of light, and an evil, material world of darkness - God versus the devil
- the good angels versus the bad ones – Apple versus Microsoft and so on.
Call me a Manichee.
My girlfriend,
Californian Judy Brown, back in my youth around 1964 (when I discovered
Heraclitus) did not believe in selflessness. In fact she (I never asked her if
she had read anything by Ayn Rand) insisted that Christ had gone to the cross
for the pleasure of giving his life away. Forget the pain. He (He) was not
selfless but selfish. Brown would not budge from her philosophy and I could not
find any argument in my limited brain to counter her.
Besides my limited
brain I have been always plagued by an incipient nerdishness (somehow my
Rosemary never noticed it, God bless her!). The first few times that a young girl
looked at me (for more than a few seconds) I would look to see behind me to
figure out what had awoken her interest. In the few times that I have been
propositioned (the fingers of one hand will suffice) a somewhat tipsy woman who
went by the handle of Emma Peel (very English, but not that English one) looked at
me and said, “Let’s penetrate.” As you can imagine I didn’t. I was shocked. For too many years I wasn't aware that two of my ills had a name. I did not find out until 1976 that I was dyslexic and now I hear a lot of people talking about low self esteem. Who knew?
My friend Judy Brown
would have said, “It wasn’t guilt that you were a married man that made you
decline (in shock) but because you knew that Vancouver was much too small a town and in
your circles you would have been caught. Brown, in her firm belief in selfishness,
discounted the existence of guilt.
For me (remember I am
a Manichee) jealousy is the other side of the coin of love, right on the other
side of wrong. At all times I must make some sort of clear choice or apply situation
ethics with a dash of Hegelian synthesis.
I hold to these
truths:
1. You don’t mention
the word abortion or allude to it if you want to be a politician.
2. You don’t argue with
anybody for or against the existence of God.
3. You say nothing of
gun control when you visit Texas
or sip Pearl Beer with an inhabitant of that state. Natch, it also applies to
the idea of socialized medicine, Canadian style.
4. Like dozing dogs
you avoid all confrontation with ex-Georgia Straight dance critics.
5. This one is the
most important as it applies to several close members of my family. Avoid
bringing the idea of guilt even if you believe in it, as I do.
I believe that guilt
is very much like our perception that heat burns. Because we have extreme
abilities to sense heat in our fingers we can remove them quickly from a fire,
the stove or the oven. One of the most remarkable novels I have ever read,
Ingenious Pain, by Andrew Miller, tells the story of a boy who grows to be a
young man who is unable to feel physical pain. Pain helps us avoid more of the
same. It is part of our body’s self-preservation kit.
Guilt does to my head
what pain does to my body. When I feel guilt, I know I have done something
wrong, or not done something to make things right. A couple of my near and
loved ones often tell me, “Don’t throw a guilt trip at me.”
I wish I could be more
ingenious in helping them to see the consequences of not being a Manichee!
Happy to be sad
Happy to be sad
