An Unusual Journeying (Part 2)
In this second part, I'm going to talk about what is perhaps an abnormal psychology. Mine.
The fear of death is an interesting phenomenon. The Romans used to say timor mortis conturbat me, and it remains a popular motif to the present day. A student of mind once did a research project on anthropomorphic personifications of Death, he with the hood and the scythe. Perhaps the only modern author to move significantly away from that macabre image is Neil Gaiman, whose Death is a wide-eyed young lady Goth with an ankh and a pleasant bedside manner.
Truth be told, I had no such conceptions of death. To me, it was a boundary, the line between life and afterlife. I still believe it's a line that everyone will cross it at least once; nobody has ever been exempt, although some have returned and some have passed on without a clear demarcation that we can contemplate.
In that sense, I echo the implicit philosophy of Gene Wolfe's eponymous hero, Severian, from The Shadow of the Torturer. His executioner's blade is the carnifex named Terminus Est. This name has often been mistranslated as '(This) Is The End', but a more subtle translation relies on the actual meaning of terminus: 'boundary'. A terminus is therefore a bound. It is a point or line or plane between one place and another. And to me, death has always been that. It has no concrete existence except as a consequence of what is on either side of it, much as a point, line, plane or other boundary marker of zero thickness.
What are the consequences of this? Well, it makes me more patient, more forgiving, slower to anger than I normally am. I am prone especially to wrath and impatience, but as the Good Book says, it is because we love each other that we know we have passed from death to life. Death and life are asymmetrical opposites, much as yes and no - negation is much more powerful than the other, but affirmation has more possibilities.
It also seems to have instilled in me a rather ironic sense of humour. I live in a culture surrounded by trophy-hunters, all looking for trophies such as wealth, examination performance, property, and professional certification. It amuses me, sometimes to the point of arousing ire in others. Ah well. You can't win them all.
In my next post I suppose I'll be speaking more of the material consequences as opposed to the psychological consequences. And I continue to thank God for the highly unusual gift of equanimity in the face of death.
The fear of death is an interesting phenomenon. The Romans used to say timor mortis conturbat me, and it remains a popular motif to the present day. A student of mind once did a research project on anthropomorphic personifications of Death, he with the hood and the scythe. Perhaps the only modern author to move significantly away from that macabre image is Neil Gaiman, whose Death is a wide-eyed young lady Goth with an ankh and a pleasant bedside manner.
Truth be told, I had no such conceptions of death. To me, it was a boundary, the line between life and afterlife. I still believe it's a line that everyone will cross it at least once; nobody has ever been exempt, although some have returned and some have passed on without a clear demarcation that we can contemplate.
In that sense, I echo the implicit philosophy of Gene Wolfe's eponymous hero, Severian, from The Shadow of the Torturer. His executioner's blade is the carnifex named Terminus Est. This name has often been mistranslated as '(This) Is The End', but a more subtle translation relies on the actual meaning of terminus: 'boundary'. A terminus is therefore a bound. It is a point or line or plane between one place and another. And to me, death has always been that. It has no concrete existence except as a consequence of what is on either side of it, much as a point, line, plane or other boundary marker of zero thickness.
What are the consequences of this? Well, it makes me more patient, more forgiving, slower to anger than I normally am. I am prone especially to wrath and impatience, but as the Good Book says, it is because we love each other that we know we have passed from death to life. Death and life are asymmetrical opposites, much as yes and no - negation is much more powerful than the other, but affirmation has more possibilities.
It also seems to have instilled in me a rather ironic sense of humour. I live in a culture surrounded by trophy-hunters, all looking for trophies such as wealth, examination performance, property, and professional certification. It amuses me, sometimes to the point of arousing ire in others. Ah well. You can't win them all.
In my next post I suppose I'll be speaking more of the material consequences as opposed to the psychological consequences. And I continue to thank God for the highly unusual gift of equanimity in the face of death.
Labels: Consequences, Death, Gene Wolfe, Life, Psychology
etched with acid at 8:59:00 pm
1 Comments:
Your observation about death reminds me of our conversation about time. Like the present, which is a mere line between the past and the future, death is the line between life on earth and life in heaven/hell.
Thus people aren't afraid as death, but some are unsure of the consequences.
Post a Comment
<< Home