Naturalism And Northern Courage

[Dave_LF]

This has been sitting on my hard drive for some time. It's not quite as polished as I'd like, but I'm worried if I don't just post it now I'll never get around to it.

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The pre-Christian inhabitants of northern Europe had a fundamentally pessimistic worldview. History was to culminate in the great battle Ragnarok in which the giants and other forces of chaos would triumph over the gods and heroes and the universe itself would torn apart (1). The belief in a great battle at the end of the world is common to many religions; what makes the Northern version special is that the gods and heroes know full well what awaits them. This foreknowledge infused the Northern religions and people with a certain pessimistic fatalism. A lesser people might have quailed and slunk quietly out of history; the Northerners stared into the abyss and found courage there. Death in battle was not only accepted, but actively pursued, and to be counted worthy to fall alongside Odin in Ragnarok was the highest honor to which a warrior could aspire (2). "Glory in defeat" became the Northerner's rallying cry--"thought shall be the harder, heart the keener, courage the greater, as our might lessens" (3).

This attitude, summed up by one reviewer as "unflinching will against impossible odds", impressed J.R.R Tolkien at an early age. "Northern Courage" was one of the topics in Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics, and the attitude permeates both The Silmarillion and The Lord of the Rings from start to finish. In both these works, Tolkien advances a somewhat counterintuitive notion: the solution to despair is not optimism. It's not happiness, and it's not even love. It is courage. Courage is what drives you to pursue the enemy even though you know they're too many and you're too late. Courage is what makes you take up your sword and rally the people even when you're outnumbered and outgunned. Courage is what enables you to take one more step toward your goal even though you know you'll never make it.

Tolkien, of course, was no pagan, and his greatest heroes go beyond courage into faith. Their immediate pessimism is tempered by a higher optimism--a belief that "beyond all shadows rides the sun"--and it is this higher optimism that drives them to persevere. That's all very well in stories, but what about the real world? What about those of us who don't believe in destiny or a higher power that will make everything right in the end? Although your average Naturalist has little in common with a Viking, the conclusions of a Natural worldview are strikingly similar to the old Northern beliefs. Sooner or later, knowledge and order will be swallowed up into chaos. People die, civilizations collapse, species go extinct, ecosystems fail, and stars burn out. In the end, entropy will reign, and it will be just as if nothing had ever happened. Here is an abyss every bit as dark as the one the ancient Vikings stared into. What is the Naturalist to do when confronted with such bleak prospects? Will he quail and slink quietly out of history, or will he find the courage of despair, defy the abyss, and go down fighting? A modern Naturalist is not likely to believe in giants, but the forces of chaos are still there: ignorance, supersition, greed. Swords are no use against such enemies, but we have new weapons: education, reason, compassion. We are outnumbered and outgunned. We're too late and they are too many. There's little or no chance we will succeed. But we have to try anyway. Not because we have hope, but because we have courage.


(1) In some sources, the world is remade after being destroyed in Ragnarok. Debate rages over whether this is due to later Christian influence. In any case, the gods seem to behave as though Ragnarok is the end.

(2) There is a chicken-and-egg paradox here. Did the Northerners glorify death because the gods would die, or did the gods die because the Northerners glorified death?

(3) The Battle of Maldron

[Jnyusa]

Very interesting parallel, Dave. Thanks so much for pulling this off your hard drive at last!

I want to think about this as a prescription for Naturalism and will have some comments to offer a bit later. If I think about the people I know who've adopted the Naturalistic worldview, I don't think Courage is a virtue I would automatically ascribe to them ... most are better characterized by free-floating hostility. I'd like to think about the extent to which a philosophy of Courage might be an effective antidote to the ineffectuality of hostility.

Jn

[Dave_LF]

I don't think that Naturalists are automatically courageous; I do think they need to choose between courage, despair, and denial. I also don't think Northern Courage is only valuable for naturalists; it comes in handy for pessimists of all stripes!

[Faramond]

It would seem from these definitions that Courage is to free oneself from the tyranny of time. In this model, the Courageous do not let the future determine their present, as they so easily could allow.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Very interesting, Dave. Thank you for posting this. I will ponder some more, and hopefully have something useful to say at some point.

[Jnyusa]

Faramond:to free oneself from the tyranny of time

Good observation, Faramond!

Dave:I do think they need to choose between courage, despair, and denial

Yes, I think that hostility is kind of a poor man's despair. Either denial or open rage would feel better, from a purely emotional perspective.

Jn

[Dave_LF]

most are better characterized by free-floating hostility. ...Yes, I think that hostility is kind of a poor man's despair. Either denial or open rage would feel better, from a purely emotional perspective.

I think the type of hostility you're thinking of has more to do with the person's perception of his immediate circumstances (as opposed to his ultimate ones). The sense that the whole world is against you, or that you have answers but no one will listen, has a way of making one hostile! I don't think I've fallen victim to this (I like to imagine that any hostility I have is well-targeted), but I can certainly sympathize. Whether courage could act as an antidote, I don't know. If the attitude is born from a sense of powerlessness, it seems like it should.

[Jnyusa]

f the attitude is born from a sense of powerlessness, it seems like it should.

If I might engage in a bit of armchair psychoanalysis ...

I suspect that (in some cases) people who suffer from a general feeling of powerlessness are drawn to situations where that perception will be validated. Sometimes they even act in ways that cause the prophecy to be self-fulfilling.

This is not all a matter of personality, though. Our media culture, by shovelling vast amounts of 'bad news' at us from situations in which we truly can do nothing while supressing information about the avenues that are open for civic change, increases our sense of futility.

Jn

[ToshoftheWuffingas]

I'm not familiar with the Naturalist philosophy.
There is something deep in the British psyche that responds to this attitude. The hymn that means the most to us is Abide with me. Churchill's success with the people in 1940 and 1941 was because he recognised and articulated that attitude. Check out David Low's cartoon 'Very well. Alone' that followed the Fall of France for the twentieth century expression of that spirit.
I think the essence is that you have to do what you think is right, even if it is pointless or doomed to failure if you want to keep your self respect.

The Battle of Maldon took place just 50 or 60 miles down the road from me. Those two lines from the poem are the only bit of Anglo Saxon I know.

[Maria]

Courage is what drives you to pursue the enemy even though you know they're too many and you're too late. Courage is what makes you take up your sword and rally the people even when you're outnumbered and outgunned. Courage is what enables you to take one more step toward your goal even though you know you'll never make it.

If not courage, then sheer orneryness for some people!

edit: I tried to google "naturalist" and got offered "naturist" which is entirely different!

[Dave_LF]

I'm not using the word Naturalist in any technical sense; I mean someone who lacks belief in the supernatural. It should probably be further qualified to "pessimistic Naturalist"; i.e. someone who believes nature is not just indifferent but ultimately hostile to human needs.

[axordil]

This conversation really does remind me of the sample of medieval Scandanavian poetry (in translation of course) included with Cvltvre made Stvpid:

We sail down from our frozen shores
And havoc wreak on you pallid bores
We cut off your hands and laugh
We cut off our hands and laugh
That's the kind of things we do
Boy damn, it's cold here