The Age of Nothing

A few months ago I finished reading "The Age of Nothing" by Peter Watson, sub-titled "How we have sought to live since the death of God". I read much of this when surrounded by grandchildren. They often sought to play "horsey" on Grandad's knee, always insisting upon a "high fence" so that poor old grandad had to lift them high at full gallop as they whooped for joy. 

The book proved a good escape at times. Anyway, the death referred to in the sub-title was announced by Nietzsche, via Zarathustra, in the nineteenth century and though the death seems to have passed unnoticed by the various Fundamentalists of our Theistic Faiths, it has been taken on board by many since.

American version of the same book

I have read bits and pieces on and by Nietzsche and think he has come in for some unwarranted criticism. Here, in this book, it seems to be implied/assumed that he was an ardent nationalist and even anti-semitic, this simply because he is often seen as some sort of precursor to the advent of the Third Reich - the Nazis and Hitler. The whole thing is muddied by the sister of Nietzsche, who apparently was both those things and who played around with her brother's writings after his death for her own purposes and according to her own limited intelligence and understanding. Whatever the truth, my own reading has told me that Nietzsche would have been dismayed and shocked by Hitler and all he stood for. But I drift from my theme, the "death" of God.

Nietzsche, who announced that God is dead (but not the moustache - as is evident here)

G K Chesterton has said that if we do not believe in God we will believe in anything, which seems to imply that "non-believers" will always be flippant and perhaps lacking in any genuine commitment to anything. This book, the "Age of Nothing", gives the lie to any such implication. A better title for the book would be "Life After God", which would have none of the unnecessary overtones of its actual title, which seems to suggest at least a whiff of nihilism. Nothing could be further from the truth. The life that has been found, I have to say, seems to me to be often profound, deep and life affirming in ways that that "old time religion", with God in His heaven, more often than not fell short of. This is all in keeping with Meister Eckhart, who prayed to God to free him from God, and of the spirituality suggested by certain passages of the NT, that he has died that we might live; from God conceived as a being to the divine as the ground of being.

G K Chesterton, who also observed that "greater things are seen from the valleys than from the mountain tops"

The life found by so many referenced in Peter Watson's book, poets, authors, philosophers and more, makes for interesting, even inspiring reading. The potential of poetry to be a means of true communion between people is finely addressed. In fact the capacity for those who would seek true life amid the small things of existence runs throughout. More "down to earth" and not looking up to the heavens for inspiration. Rather looking across at those we share the earth with. Christians might well say "incarnational", those on the zen side "chop wood, carry water".

Chop wood, carry water

Getting back to the book and it's title, whether as "The Age of Nothing" or the "Age of Athiests" (USA version) for me the book is mis-titled. Whether "atheists" or "nothing", such titles point to - or at least imply - some sort of negativity, perhaps desperation, as people whose ability (or even wish) to believe in God has gone, reach out for virtually anything to fill the gap. The simple idea, articulated here in diverse people, is that the gap is felt more as a welcome release from a transcendent purpose imposed upon us from above, this now leaving us free to find our own meaning in the world around us. And I would emphasise "find" , with all its implications. "Find", not "imagine", "find", not "enter each to their own subjective world" where hope of communion with others is a hopeless fantasy. Peter Watson's book gave many examples of those who had found and articulated such meanings and in doing so have bridged the gap between self and other. I found that inspiring. For me, in Christian terms, it is incarnational. Our relationships can be between others and ourselves, between ourselves and this world, here and now, not between our private selves and "God". The latter is what can be alienating, often pointing us towards a future world and "reward" and inevitably creating conflict between all the various idols of the mind projected onto heaven.

 

Just to finish, here we have the Old Man in the Sky image of God....

(Regarding the above image, William Blake once addressed God in a little epigram in his notebook:- 

If you have formed a circle to go into,

Go into it yourself and see how you would do.)

And here, as the Ground of Being......

And getting back to zen and all things eastern, western or all points in between......