Comments on: The Primacy of the Imagination

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 04 Feb 2008 05:00:19 +0000

Thanks for these good thoughts…wonder if and how imagination differs in the sensory-deprived.

By: David

David — Fri, 04 Jan 2008 15:21:19 +0000

Alastair,

If you haven’t read them I would recommend reading Jacques Ellul’s Humiliation of the Word and Ioan Couliano’s Eros & Magic in the Renaissance.

Between the two of them they deal with both sides of this debate. Couliano’s work gives a historical analysis of the change in the Church between the premacy of the imagination to the premacy of the word. Ellul’s work is an interesting analysis of the eschatological implications of the image.

By: Kathy

Kathy — Mon, 31 Dec 2007 20:37:52 +0000

This was really thought-provoking. You referred to “a trained imagination” in a couple of places. What are your thoughts on “training the imagination”?

By: The Marriage of Word & Image | Cerulean Sanctum

The Marriage of Word & Image | Cerulean Sanctum — Thu, 27 Dec 2007 06:02:35 +0000

[...] Recently, I pointed out one of the best blog postings I’ve ever read on the Web. “The Primacy of the Imagination” over at adversaria. Please read the whole thing. I guarantee you’ll have your preconceptions about the practice of the Faith challenged. [...]

By: Aaron

Aaron — Sun, 22 Jul 2007 16:02:50 +0000

This is the type of post that you save to your hard drive in case the Internet crashes.

Thanks Alastair. Excellent stuff.

By: bedell

bedell — Fri, 20 Jul 2007 03:36:42 +0000

The Scylding don’t forget Idelette.

By: Adam

Adam — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 23:06:30 +0000

Alastair, thank you so much for this piece. You hit the nail fairly and squarely on the head, and express half baked thoughts in my own mind better than I ever could. May God help our churches to engage our intellects and our imaginations!

By: Al

Al — Tue, 17 Jul 2007 18:13:11 +0000

Thanks for your comment, Donita. Teaching children Bible stories can be a lot of fun. It can also do us a lot of good; we are never too old for Bible stories.

One of the best sermons I ever heard was a simple retelling of the story of Esther. I have heard dozens of sermons on the book of Esther, identifying the various theological truths that the book teaches us and the moral lessons that we can learn from the characters. However, this sermon avoided all of that and just told the story. In so doing it had a far more powerful effect on me than any theologically-driven sermon would.

I suspect that this is an area where gifted public readers of Scripture are needed. There are some people who can read in a manner that makes their text come alive. If the story of Scripture has gotten beneath the skin of a person, you can often tell when they read the Scriptures aloud. Whatever way we go about it, we need to excite people with the story of Scripture and recapture their imaginations.

By: Donita K Paul

Donita K Paul — Tue, 17 Jul 2007 16:40:02 +0000

One of my readers gave me the link to this discussion. I write Christian fantasy. I think that my years of teaching Sunday School saved me from being too “intellectual,” and lacking in imagination. My favorite students are the young ones whose mouths drop open and eyes get wide when you describe a fleece that is wet one morning and dry the next. Or dry one morning and wet then next. (I’d have to review the story before telling it, obviously.) Thank you for this bit of dialogue that has forced me think through how I perceive things and make some leaps of my own.

By: David A Booth

David A Booth — Tue, 17 Jul 2007 14:41:29 +0000

Al,

The imagination abhors a vacuum even more than nature does. Because we have failed to tell the great drama, many Christians have had their imaginations captured by truly pathetic dramas (e.g. the “Left Behind” series).

We erroneously think that we can correct such poor theology simply by pointing out where it is wrong - without offering the true drama, authored by God, in its place.

David