Avalon Mentors

Maturity in the ancient world was depicted through the metamorphic cycle of the butterfly; pupa to chrysalis to adult butterfly. Each of us goes through such a series of changes. Hopefully we emerge as a sublime creature.

In his essay "BEOWULF: THE MONSTERS AND THE CRITICS" (1936), J.R.R. TOLKIEN wrote that 

"In the epoch of Beowulf (produced between 975 and 1025) a Heroic Age more wild and primitive than that of Greece is brought into touch with Christendom, with the Sermon on the Mount, with Catholic theology and ideas of Heaven and Hell."

This "fusion-point of imagination", as Tolkien calls it, which united the Norse heroic ideal with the Christian idea of sainthood found its inception in the baptism of Clovis I in 506.

And yet the ideals of the Norse hero and the Christian saint are NOT the same.  While Christianity acknowledges the violence of the world it suggests that one must return violence with love, greed with poverty, power with humility.  Christians were, from early on, encouraged to "turn the other cheek," "sell all they have and give it to the poor," "take up their cross" and follow Christ who, himself, "suffered death, even death on the cross" as Paul wrote.  

The Norse idea is framed by the knowledge of Ragnarok, or the "inevitable overthrow in Time."  Yet in the face of known defeat the warrior professes "the exaltation of undefeated will", an "indomitability" of spirit, "man at war with the hostile world."  Those forces opposed to the gods, therefore, "are identified with the foes of God. Grendel and the dragon are constantly referred to in language which is meant to recall the powers of darkness with which Christian men felt themselves to be encompassed. They are the 'inmates of Hell', 'adversaries of God', 'offspring of Cain', 'enemies of mankind'," as R.W. Chambers wrote.

When these two ideals of heroism were united, says Tolkien, "The monsters remained the enemies of mankind, the infantry of the old war, and became inevitably the enemies of the one God, ece Dryhten, the eternal Captain of the new. Even so the vision of the war changes."

Clovis was baptized on Christmas Day in 508. The adoption by Clovis of Catholicism led to widespread conversion among the Frankish peoples; to religious unification across what is now modern-day France, the Low Countries and Germany; three centuries later, to Charlemagne's alliance with the Bishop of Rome; and in the middle of the 10th century under Otto I the Great, to the consequent birth of the early Holy Roman Empire.  

Consequently the fusion of the Norse heroic ideal with Christian Sainthood became the image of European heroism culminating in the sine qua non of Saint Louis, the struggle with Islam, and the framing of much of European culture leading up even into our own era.

In this episode of Let’s Do Lunch I have a discussion with Mr. Todd Mikkelson.

I had the pleasure of meeting Todd when we taught together at a local classical school here in Minnesota. He is a teacher of 25+ years experience steeped in culture, politics, history, religion & art.

We discuss the current situation in America from an outside perspective; The current situation in Australia; The UKUSAUS alliance and the threat posed by the CCP; the vaccine mania sweeping our nations; and how we all might attempt to craft a hopeful way forward in our troubled world.

All this and more can be found in this episode of Let’s Do Lunch with Avalon Mentors podcast.

A commentary on the human artistic endeavor.  Helga Thoene proposes in her essay that Johann Sebastian Bach embedded into the ciaccona (Partita in D minor for solo violin (BWV 1004) numerous mathematical and musical references making the work a memorial, or trombeau, to his deceased wife, Maria Barbara Bach, who died in 1720.

Check out a recording of the Partita here

The album Morimur by the Hilliard Ensemble can be found here

More about the research by Thoene can be found here, here, and here.

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In this episode of Let’s Do Lunch I have a discussion with Mr Raymond Riethmeier.

I had the pleasure of meeting Ray when I worked with his incomparably talented wife at a local parochial school in Minnesota. Ray is a man of many talents; he is on the board of the Sherlock Holmes Society “The Norwegian Explorers”, is vice president of the “Friends of Sherlock Holmes” and was recently inducted into “The Baker Street Irregulars” out of New York. He contributes to various fiction collections and worked on a publication about the character, The Shadow. Ray and I share a common love of movies, comic books, collectibles, and prog rock.  In this episode we discuss the history of comic books, the turn that comics took in the 1980s, and the future of comics as contributing to a vision of heroism and nobility in our culture.

All this and more can be found in this episode of Let’s Do Lunch with Avalon Mentors podcast.

The Norwegian Explorers

The Dark Knight Returns

Watchmen

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In this episode of Let’s Do Lunch I have a discussion w/Dr. Cameron Thompson.

I had the pleasure of meeting Dr. Cameron when we taught together at a local classical school here in Minnesota. He is an anthropologist & teacher steeped in literature, philosophy, history & theology. We discuss

· the current situation in America from an outside perspective;

· The Benedict Option and how it prompted his family to move to Italy to create an authentic life for the future

· And how we all might attempt to craft a hopeful way forward in our troubled world.

All this and more can be found in this episode of Let’s Do Lunch on Avalon Mentors podcast.

Dr. Thompson's podcast is

The Marchese di Carabas

You can also find his observations and ideas at the website

A Human Way of Life

or at his professional website

Dr. Cameron M. Thompson

Saint Benedict of Nursia (c. 2 March 480 – c. 21 March 547 AD) wrote "The Rule of Saint Benedict" in 516 which became the standard rule for monasticism in Europe.  It is the basis for Alisdair MacIntyre's proposal in "After Virtue" that came to be referred to as "The Benedict Option".

Brit's Pub can be found here.

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This episode is a discussion of Tolkien's third book in the Lord of the Rings series, “The Return of the King.”

The episode introduces Tolkien’s concept of The EUCATASTROPHE as an embracing of suffering. We also discuss the nature of kingship especially as it involves this embracing of suffering & the confrontation with nothingness.

How is The One Ring an escape from suffering?

How might mythology offer us a response to the temptation of the Ring of Power?

And why was Tolkien so adamantly opposed to C.S.Lewis’ statement that myths are “lies breathed through silver”?

Myths, Lewis once told Tolkien, were "lies and therefore worthless, even though breathed through silver."

"No," Tolkien replied. "They are not lies."

THE EUCATASTROPHE

Tolkien invented the word EUCATASTROPHE to describe the workings of grace in life (and in mythology). It is taken from Greek ευ- "good" and καταστροφή "destruction".

Tolkien writes in Letter 89,

"I coined the word 'eucatastrophe': the sudden happy turn in a story which pierces you with a joy that brings tears (which I argued it is the highest function of fairy-stories to produce). And I was there led to the view that it produces its peculiar effect because it is a sudden glimpse of Truth, your whole nature chained in material cause and effect, the chain of death, feels a sudden relief as if a major limb out of joint had suddenly snapped back. It perceives – if the story has literary 'truth' on the second plane (....) – that this is indeed how things really do work in the Great World for which our nature is made. And I concluded by saying that the Resurrection was the greatest 'eucatastrophe' possible in the greatest Fairy Story – and produces that essential emotion: Christian joy which produces tears because it is qualitatively so like sorrow, because it comes from those places where Joy and Sorrow are at one, reconciled, as selfishness and altruism are lost in Love."

Most commonly the Eucatastrophe is equated with felix culpa; or a happy fault (paradoxically) – a bringing good out of evil. But it is more than that. The word “Catastrophe” signifies a “sudden and widespread disaster”; from Grk kata (over) and strophe (turning). Most everyone would see catastrophe, esp. the catastrophes of failure and death, as insurmountable.

Tolkien held it as a great truth that our self-mastery, our Kingship comes from facing the Eucatastrophe, going through it, and eventually experiencing the joy of the Resurrection.

This echoes the ancient Greek phrase:

“Drasanta pathos; pathei mathos”

The experience brings suffering; the suffering brings wisdom.”

Only by embracing the suffering can we eventually come to the wisdom of knowing ourselves, and thus to the self-mastery of kingship.

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This is a recording of the fourth lecture in a five-part series on Tolkien.

In this episode we discuss Tolkien's knowledge of Sacred Geometry, the crisis posed by Scholasticism, the treachery of images (with a nod to Magritte), and how our tendency to think in duality has the propensity to lead us into deception - even deceiving ourselves.

There exists (even in Tolkien's mind) a bit of confusion about which towers the title of the work is referencing.

In a letter to Rayner Unwin (the publisher) from Aug 17, 1953 (Letters #140), Tolkien wrote:
"The Two Towers" gets as near as possible to finding a title to cover the widely divergent Books 3 and 4; and can be left ambiguous - it might refer to Isengard and Barad-dûr, or to Minas Tirith and Barad-dur; or Isengard and Cirith Ungol."

I opt for the relationship between Minas Tirith and Minas Morgul (Barad-dur).

Nota Bene: The poet and aesthetic philosopher Samuel Taylor Coleridge introduced the term "suspension of disbelief" in 1817 and suggested that if a writer could infuse a "human interest and a semblance of truth" into a fantastic tale, the reader would suspend judgement concerning the implausibility of the narrative.

Also, Plato uses the term "Thaumatapoioi" (wondrous creations, "shadow puppets") in his great dialogue, "The Republic".  Tolkien's image of the Ring has much in common with Plato's Thaumatapoioi and with the Ring of Gyges which makes one invisible.  For Plato, as for Tolkien, the images must lead us to see the really real, the Good, Illuvatar - but taken in themselves they are like Lothlorien in their beauty but must be allowed to fade away.

Lastly, wrt names in the novel - this from Behind the Name:

Frodo: Derived from Old English froda meaning "wise".

Samwise Gamgee: Means "simple, half wise" from Old English sam "half" and wis "wise".

Meriadoc (Merry): From an old Breton name composed of the elements mer "sea" and iatoc "forehead". Conan Meriadeg was the legendary founder of Brittany.

Peregrine (Pippin): From the Late Latin name Peregrinus, which meant "traveller". (Frankish name of unknown meaning. It possibly means "awe-inspiring" from Frankish bib- "to tremble". This was the name of three majordomos of Austrasia including Pépin III the Short, who became the first Carolingian king of the Franks. He was the father of Charlemagne.)

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This episode is a discussion of Tolkien's first book in the Lord of the Rings series.

The episode gives a history of the text and introduces the literary concepts of The FOUR-FOLD METHOD OF EXEGESIS by Dante Alighieri & NATURAL & CONVENTIONAL SYMBOLISM. We also discuss further the nature of dragons & of the confrontation with nothingness. A brief reading period results in observations from participants leading finally into a discussion of The One Ring.

FOUR-FOLD METHOD OF EXEGESIS

Outlined by Dante Alighieri in his Letter to Cangrande the 4 levels trace their roots back to Jewish interpretation and perhaps further. Though they are normally done by a reader intuitively and automatically, it is helpful to interpret consciously using the method.

For me be able to present what I am going to say, you must know that the sense of this work is not simple, rather it may be called polysemantic, that is, of many senses; the first sense is that which comes from the letter, the second is that of that which is signified by the letter. And the first is called the literal, the second allegorical or moral or anagogical.

The levels consist of

1. Literal level

a. What do the words (litera) mean in the work?

2. Allegorical level 1 (Allegorical)

a. How do the images connect to other images in the text?

b. How do the images connect or make reference to images in other works?

3. Allegorical level 2 (Tropological / Moral)

a. What do the images mean for the human race?

b. What is the moral of the story? (i.e. “it is not good for men to be alone”)

4. Allegorical level 3 (Anagogical)

a. What do the images mean to me personally? (i.e. “this means X for the human race; I am a member of the human race; what does this mean in my life?”)

NATURAL & CONVENTIONAL SYMBOLISM

Natural Symbolism – greater of the two; symbol by its nature embodies that which it seeks to convey; symbol and meaning are inseparable and universal for all mankind.

i.e. water; darkness; the color red; the forest (primeval)

Conventional Symbolism – lesser of the two; symbol is agreed upon by a culture to represent something else; symbol and meaning are not intuitively connected; knowledge of culture is necessary to understand the symbol

i.e. A STOP sign; the letters that make up the word “STOP”; the edict against eating pork; a phrase such as “Talitha cumi” (Mark 5:41)

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A recording of the Eagles song.  Unlike the Dude, I do not hate the Eagles.

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