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Whoa! I had knowledge!
—Buffy Summers
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Where is human nature so weak as in the bookstore?
—Henry Ward Beecher
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When I am dead, I hope it may be said: ''His sins
were scarlet, but his
books were read.''
—Hilaire Belloc
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All the best stories in the world are but one story in reality -- the story of escape. It is the only thing which interests us all and at all times, how to escape.
—Arthur Christopher Benson
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The failure to read good books both enfeebles the vision and strengthens our most fatal tendency—the belief that the here and
now is all there is.
—Allan Bloom
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The oldest books are still only just out to those who have not read them.
—Samuel Butler
________________
After all manner of professors have done their best for us, the place we
are to get knowledge is in books. The true university
of these days is a
collection of books.
—Thomas Carlyle
________________
God be thanked for books; they are the voices of the distant and the dead, and make us heirs of the
spiritual life of past ages.
—William Ellery Channing
________________
A good novel tells us the truth about its hero; but a bad novel tells us the
truth about its author.
—G. K. Chesterton
________________
A room without books is
like a body without a soul.
—Marcus T. Cicero
________________
Next to acquiring good friends, the best acquisition is that of good books.
—Charles Caleb Colton
________________
The great American novel has not only already been written, it has already
been rejected.
—Frank Dane
________________
We should be as careful
of the books we read, as
of the company we keep. The dead very often have more power than the living.
—Tryon Edwards
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Excerpt from:
Restless Pilgrim:
The Spiritual Journey of Bob Dylan
Introduction
Back in 1968, an already unpredictable Bob Dylan released his most unusual
album to date—John Wesley Harding, a spiritually saturated country-folk-rock
effort that marked his comeback from a near-fatal motorcycle crash eighteen
months earlier. His fans—many of whom still thought he might be dead, so
reclusive was he—breathed an almost audible sigh of relief. Dylan was out
on vinyl once again, and all was right with the world.
 And the album contained some really good stuff, including one
of his most
enduring songs ever, “All Along the Watchtower.” Soon enough, though, reviewers
and critics began analyzing the biblical thread that ran through the lyrics.
True, Dylan had been known to write and perform songs that contained scriptural
references, but somehow, this was different. Hearing dozens of allusions
to Scripture on a single album—and hearing a Jewish guy sing “I Dreamed I
Saw St. Augustine”—raised more than a few eyebrows.
What was going on here?
John Cohen, for one, was determined to find out. A folksinger and a longtime
friend of Dylan’s, Cohen speculated that perhaps Bob had fallen under the
literary influence of Franz Kafka’s parables. No, Dylan told him, that wasn’t
it, adding that the only parables he was familiar with were those found in
the Bible. The Bible? That’s right. Dylan told Cohen he read the Bible often.
“I don’t think you’re the kind of person who goes to the hotel, where the
Gideons leave a Bible, and you pick it up,” Cohen said.
“Well, you never know,” Bob answered. It was a wonderfully Dylanesque answer,
the kind that would come to characterize the legendary musician in countless
interviews for decades to come. And in one way or another, it’s the answer
Dylan has been giving for years to those people who think they’ve got him
all figured out.
Never was there greater speculation about the enigmatic icon than after his
much-publicized conversion to Christianity in 1979. It’s all over for Dylan,
the music industry decreed; he’s a right-wing fundamentalist, and there’s
no way he can keep his creative edge in that dull, stifling camp. Well,
you never know.
Meanwhile, the church was shouting “Hallelujah!” over the news that this
high-profile rebel—the very symbol of an entire generation gone to pot—had
renounced his evil ways and joined the ranks of true believers. Just wait
till he gets his act together, the church said; he’ll be a model Christian,
the kind we can parade in front of the world to show how good we are at turning
an ex-hippie into an exemplary believer. Well, you never know.
And then, Dylan was spotted in Jerusalem, participating in the bar mitzvah
of one of his sons. The word was out: Bob Dylan had renounced his faith in
Christ and returned to his Jewish roots. After all, what else could his presence
at such a holy rite of passage mean? Well, you never know.
Finally, for those who still cared enough to be confused about his spiritual
life, there was the no-small matter of Dylan’s lifestyle. Come on—the man’s
been married and divorced several times, he doesn’t go to church, he hangs
out with all the wrong people. How can he call himself a Christian? Well,
you never know.
And that’s what Dylan has been saying all along. You never know what’s going
on in another person’s interior life. You can try to judge by the external
signs, but you’re likely to be wrong.
Just look at David, the shepherd boy who became the king of Israel. Imagine,
if you can, how he’d come across if the only bits of information we had about
him were the external facts found in the historical accounts of his life
and his reign. He’d still be a national hero, of course, and he’d still be
likable despite his obvious failings. But David left far more than mere facts
about his life. He left a legacy that maps out his soul’s interior journey,
a collection of songs that express the cry of his heart. Even people with
little knowledge of the Bible know something about the book of Psalms. Through
the Psalms, we get to see a different side of David, the very private life
of a very public figure.
And so it is with Bob Dylan. Journalists and photographers have at times
followed him around and reported on his every move, drawing conclusions from
what they observed. All too often, though, their powers of observation have
been either limited or downright flawed. Some have judged him by what they
saw, or worse, what they assumed—ignoring the Psalm-like evidence of Dylan’s
interior life found in the songs he’s written and performed. Others have
tried to sift the evidence of his spirituality through a cultural grid, whether
that culture be evangelical Christianity or Judaism or secularism. And they’ve
always come up short.
Bob Dylan refuses to be categorized—or, perhaps better, simply cannot be
categorized. Those who early on pigeonholed him as a folksinger eventually
realized their mistake, since his music clearly extended beyond the confines
of that genre. To this day there are many who think of Dylan as a 1960s anti-war
protestor, even though he has never considered himself to be a pacifist.
Also during the ‘60s, even his most ardent fans—who probably should have
known better—would have labeled him a hippie, which he also never was. Bob
Dylan has always simply been his own man. More accurately, Bob Dylan has
always been God’s own man, long before he knew it.
Despite the pride America likes to take in being known as a nation of rugged
individualists, our society has a difficult time dealing with people who
fail to fit into the dominant culture’s notion of how they should live their
lives. What’s even worse, though, is that the dominant religious culture
has the same problem—often, with devastating eternal consequences. If you
don’t come to faith in Christ in a certain way, if you don’t look and think
and act and worship in a particular manner, well, then, you’re probably not
even a Christian. It’s that kind of thinking, that kind of judgmentalism,
that has turned many a prospective or new believer away from the church—and
away from Christ, since all too many people see the church and Christ as
one and the same. They see the church’s rejection of them as Christ’s rejection
of them.
Dylan is among those who do not fit the mold created by the dominant religious
culture in America. Bob Dylan knows who he is and where he stands in relation
to God, even if the church doesn’t. He’s been finding his way spiritually
since he was a teenager, largely on his own. There are those within the church
who consider the solitary spiritual journey to be a dangerous one, and they
can point to any number of shipwrecked lives to support their position. At
the same time, though, they fail to make allowances for those who manage
to maintain a relationship with God apart from the traditional church, those
who actually have the wisdom and common sense and discernment to read the
Bible on their own with insight and accuracy. Since Bob Dylan is not exactly
known for being superficial or shallow, it’s reasonably safe to assume that
he brings the same philosophical depth to the Bible that he exhibits in his
lyrics. His profound respect for the Word of God all but guarantees his careful
handling of the truth it contains.
Whether Dylan likes it or not—and he clearly does not—he is a prophet for
our time. And prophets tend to make people nervous, very nervous. They live
on the margins of society, unrestricted by the expectations of others. They
disturb the status quo. They challenge us to be better than we are, to think
more deeply, care more passionately, live more radically. They serve as mirrors
that reflect the images of the worst that we are and the best we can possibly
hope to be.
Musically, Dylan’s voice has been perhaps the most prophetic voice in the
last half century. He led the folk genre out of the beatnik coffee houses
and onto the airwaves of major pop-rock radio stations. He plugged his band
into amplifiers, ignored the subsequent criticism, and paved the way for
an entirely new musical style, folk-rock. He was country when country wasn’t
cool, lending credibility to yet another groundbreaking style, country-rock.
He defied recording industry executives by releasing a string of gospel albums.
And he continued to create fresh material long after other aging musicians
had resorted to recycling their old hits; he beat the odds by releasing one
of his best albums ever a full year after his sixtieth birthday. But most
of all, it was Bob Dylan who showed the world that popular musicians had
something significant to say. He gave every future songwriter the license
to marry substantial and thoughtful lyrics to the beat of contemporary music.
Spiritually, Dylan’s prophetic role has served primarily as a sign of things
to come. Two decades ago, he walked away from the particular brand of evangelicalism
that initially captured his attention, and apparently, his departure was
amicable. He simply moved on, quietly taking the next step on his spiritual
journey, one that led him to explore his Jewish roots. Today, neither the
church nor the synagogue knows what to make of him. His personal expression
of faith is larger than any limitations others try to place on him.
And that is precisely where many believers find themselves right now, with
an expansive view of faith that threatens to disturb the status quo of the
church. And once again, Dylan’s got a head start on the rest of us, this
time a twenty-year lead. Even so, as far ahead of the pack as Dylan has always
traveled, there’s something almost first century about him. It’s not hard
to imagine Bob Dylan sitting under the teaching of the Master on a Palestinian
hillside, listening attentively, questioning respectfully, analyzing thoughtfully.
Could it be that this is where Dylan has been getting his insights all along?
Well, you never know.
—Marcia Ford
Read Chapter 1
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