In these two quotes from The Broken
Estate, Wood is defining Judaeo-Christian Scripture as being novel-like in
its best influence. Based on the quotation, Wood seems a proponent of an interpretation
of the Book of Job that is in some manner "an argument against
Himself [God]," an interpretation that highly arguable. He then asserts God "has no
negative capability," which is at best an unusual and broad general statement.
Magill’s Literary Annual 1991-2005 asserts that Wood has a tendency
toward "flat and categorical statements that may not always be valid." God is usually
defined by his positive attributes of love, merciful lovingkindness, etc, but he is also
defined by his actions as recorded in the "novel-like" record of Scripture, actions like
the throwing Jonah into the maw of a whale, which may justly be understood as showing
"negative capability" and therefore contradicting the claim that God "has no negative
capability."
If it is argued that the Book of
Job is "such an argument against" God because Job is made to suffer, his
friends torment him and accuse him falsely, and God reveals himself in the wrath of a
whirlwind (an argument which disregards the prologue of the Book), then the meaning of
"God could not have written a novel-like story that was such an argument against
Himself...He does not have negative capability" can be understood in reference to the
tendency to define God by his attributes alone, as mentioned above. If God is that which
his positive attributes attest, then as a God of positive attributes, God could not have
written / caused to be written / inspired to be written a "novel-like" story that
reveals negative qualities. The relevance of such an argument would be the assertion
that therefore Judaeo-Christian Scripture is confirmed as having a "novel-like effect
[of] these writings have on our hearts" without divine inspiration and without any
validity to an opposing assertion that "they [Scriptures] are supernatural and
infallible."
No comments:
Post a Comment