…….
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze as pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel Shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born? (From “The Second Coming” by W.B. Yeats)
It is hard to believe now that I once did not understand this poem, which speaks to the poem itself. At one time not long ago, any literate man would know what this is about with ease: the coming of the Antichrist as told in John’s Revelation, the last section of the New Testament. But as other parts of the poem (not shone) state, a change has happened; “the centre (as he says) cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.” The new thing to come is a “rough beast,” one who does not know his own past and holds only scorn for it and his culture, rejecting “twenty centuries of stony sleep.” This is me, and much more so some years ago, who did not know enough of his own past to grasp the meaning of the poem; this is us, our culture, the flip-side of the last, one of rejection, of “newness,” of rough, uncultured stimulation slouching towards Bethlehem – that is, moving like a dangerous beast towards a birth in the same village as Jesus. It is to take his place. It will not be a kind and just ruler, to say the least.
I am about to slouch towards Bethlehem myself, and in fact should be there in just a few days. Yeats wrote his poem nearly a century ago; we are now only a decade or some from a full 2,000 years since the death of Christ, and more than that since his birth. It is time that I slouch, as millions more do every year, towards the center of modern civilization, where the uniting of the world under one global umbrella – almost a reality now with technology - began. And oddly – no, spookily and prophetically – the fruition of that initial impetus is happening just as that center crumbles, not only in the chaos of war but in the massive collective shrug of the once-Christian nations who carried it through nearly to its completion.
I have shrugged, too, and my rebirth into The Faith is only a pale reflection of what it once meant to believe. Once, it was a sign of being fully human, as reverence for The Law was to the Jews, and those who knew the New Book – who knew the words of Jesus – stood out like beacons to the faithful even among the roughest men. Now, I have grasped onto what seems to be a weak reed, or rather, I am the weak reed who can barely grasp, an anachronism of faith to most and even, sometimes, to myself. I should go to Bethlehem in awe and reverence and even tears, but expect tourists and the flash of IPhone lights and cargo shorts and tee shirts. I will not be much different. From the modern view, we once had “twenty centuries of stony sleep,” but it was not sleep at all, but rather the fruits of the first grace from which we have now fallen. We now think we are too smart for it, even as the darkness of addiction and suicide and fatherless children – or no children at all – rises over us like a cloud. Or like the shadow of a beast standing before the sun, on its way to Bethlehem.
Yes, I am certainly in that number, just too smart for the miracle which should seem at least likely if not inevitable. All things began in a mystery we call God, so beyond our ‘smartness’ that anything – anything at all – should seem possible. Certainly, we could or even should expect a flame to appear full face to us from that mystery, and it is more likely than not that the ‘father’ of his creation should seek to improve things through this flame. This one flame from Bethlehem once seemed likely to a good portion of the world, too, less than 200 years ago, when all others from other cultures also had their flames, however dim or bright. But now I, along with so many others, wrestle with the doubt that has been put into the world like a disease; like a cancer; or like a Beast.
That is the Beast, of course. This doubt is the beast that leads us to the darkness of the spiritually blind. That is our Antichrist. It has gone beyond smartness, because we are no longer all that smart, our greater troubles being solved by an elite of some sort or another, from techno-geeks to government planners. It has brought us to this spiritual blindness so that it is impossible to see the truth, let alone refine it. We are like the blind men touching the elephant, but much worse – we have decided, or been made, to not believe in the elephant at all. Just like that. We have become our new master, rough, unrefined beasts calling the stunning efforts of the last 2,000 years a slumber, when it is us who have our eyes closed as if in sleep. The beast has already arrived in Bethlehem, and I fear it is he who I will see once there rather than the first, the flame from God. I fear I will only see its shadow, because that is the shade under which I have long been accustomed to stand.
Or not. Long-faced Yeats may have forgotten that something else is in Revelation as well: The Beast is not the second coming, but rather its sign. But he did know that already it existed, as the beast slouching towards Bethlehem, the birds reeling above him winged scavengers picking from the carcasses left in his wake. He is not the second coming of Revelation, then, but Satan coming forth as the Antichrist. Thus it has been said: Satan shall briefly reign and then be struck down, opening one thousand years of peace before the true Second Coming and Judgement Day. Here our doubt, our disbelief, will reach its climax, and then vanish before another sign yet to come, of which we do not know. But this we do know: times will become worse, as Yeats says; but then infinitely better. Hope is in those who have faith. The Beast is not the end, but the crumbling bridge to the new.
So it is that I crawl, not slouch, towards Bethlehem, rocked by a crumbling world that has lost its center. It is how it should be, as the pains of human childbirth lead to new life. Thus she is left, our mother and ourselves, tired and retched but breathing with hope.
So with hope, then, I go to Bethlehem. In a few weeks I will report back what this one fading pair of eyes has seen. I will not be able to tell you of the whole elephant, but I hope to speak of something great that I cannot know, but do know exists, something far greater than anything we can make or imagine, ever, even as the Beast whispers false promises atop this fallen world, this last tower over Israel.
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze as pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel Shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born? (From “The Second Coming” by W.B. Yeats)
It is hard to believe now that I once did not understand this poem, which speaks to the poem itself. At one time not long ago, any literate man would know what this is about with ease: the coming of the Antichrist as told in John’s Revelation, the last section of the New Testament. But as other parts of the poem (not shone) state, a change has happened; “the centre (as he says) cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.” The new thing to come is a “rough beast,” one who does not know his own past and holds only scorn for it and his culture, rejecting “twenty centuries of stony sleep.” This is me, and much more so some years ago, who did not know enough of his own past to grasp the meaning of the poem; this is us, our culture, the flip-side of the last, one of rejection, of “newness,” of rough, uncultured stimulation slouching towards Bethlehem – that is, moving like a dangerous beast towards a birth in the same village as Jesus. It is to take his place. It will not be a kind and just ruler, to say the least.
I am about to slouch towards Bethlehem myself, and in fact should be there in just a few days. Yeats wrote his poem nearly a century ago; we are now only a decade or some from a full 2,000 years since the death of Christ, and more than that since his birth. It is time that I slouch, as millions more do every year, towards the center of modern civilization, where the uniting of the world under one global umbrella – almost a reality now with technology - began. And oddly – no, spookily and prophetically – the fruition of that initial impetus is happening just as that center crumbles, not only in the chaos of war but in the massive collective shrug of the once-Christian nations who carried it through nearly to its completion.
I have shrugged, too, and my rebirth into The Faith is only a pale reflection of what it once meant to believe. Once, it was a sign of being fully human, as reverence for The Law was to the Jews, and those who knew the New Book – who knew the words of Jesus – stood out like beacons to the faithful even among the roughest men. Now, I have grasped onto what seems to be a weak reed, or rather, I am the weak reed who can barely grasp, an anachronism of faith to most and even, sometimes, to myself. I should go to Bethlehem in awe and reverence and even tears, but expect tourists and the flash of IPhone lights and cargo shorts and tee shirts. I will not be much different. From the modern view, we once had “twenty centuries of stony sleep,” but it was not sleep at all, but rather the fruits of the first grace from which we have now fallen. We now think we are too smart for it, even as the darkness of addiction and suicide and fatherless children – or no children at all – rises over us like a cloud. Or like the shadow of a beast standing before the sun, on its way to Bethlehem.
Yes, I am certainly in that number, just too smart for the miracle which should seem at least likely if not inevitable. All things began in a mystery we call God, so beyond our ‘smartness’ that anything – anything at all – should seem possible. Certainly, we could or even should expect a flame to appear full face to us from that mystery, and it is more likely than not that the ‘father’ of his creation should seek to improve things through this flame. This one flame from Bethlehem once seemed likely to a good portion of the world, too, less than 200 years ago, when all others from other cultures also had their flames, however dim or bright. But now I, along with so many others, wrestle with the doubt that has been put into the world like a disease; like a cancer; or like a Beast.
That is the Beast, of course. This doubt is the beast that leads us to the darkness of the spiritually blind. That is our Antichrist. It has gone beyond smartness, because we are no longer all that smart, our greater troubles being solved by an elite of some sort or another, from techno-geeks to government planners. It has brought us to this spiritual blindness so that it is impossible to see the truth, let alone refine it. We are like the blind men touching the elephant, but much worse – we have decided, or been made, to not believe in the elephant at all. Just like that. We have become our new master, rough, unrefined beasts calling the stunning efforts of the last 2,000 years a slumber, when it is us who have our eyes closed as if in sleep. The beast has already arrived in Bethlehem, and I fear it is he who I will see once there rather than the first, the flame from God. I fear I will only see its shadow, because that is the shade under which I have long been accustomed to stand.
Or not. Long-faced Yeats may have forgotten that something else is in Revelation as well: The Beast is not the second coming, but rather its sign. But he did know that already it existed, as the beast slouching towards Bethlehem, the birds reeling above him winged scavengers picking from the carcasses left in his wake. He is not the second coming of Revelation, then, but Satan coming forth as the Antichrist. Thus it has been said: Satan shall briefly reign and then be struck down, opening one thousand years of peace before the true Second Coming and Judgement Day. Here our doubt, our disbelief, will reach its climax, and then vanish before another sign yet to come, of which we do not know. But this we do know: times will become worse, as Yeats says; but then infinitely better. Hope is in those who have faith. The Beast is not the end, but the crumbling bridge to the new.
So it is that I crawl, not slouch, towards Bethlehem, rocked by a crumbling world that has lost its center. It is how it should be, as the pains of human childbirth lead to new life. Thus she is left, our mother and ourselves, tired and retched but breathing with hope.
So with hope, then, I go to Bethlehem. In a few weeks I will report back what this one fading pair of eyes has seen. I will not be able to tell you of the whole elephant, but I hope to speak of something great that I cannot know, but do know exists, something far greater than anything we can make or imagine, ever, even as the Beast whispers false promises atop this fallen world, this last tower over Israel.
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