A History of Heaven
Russell, Jeffrey Burton
Paradise illuminated A History of Heaven The Singing Silence Jeffrey Burton Russell Print e tat: tJ n rgit u Pre ». ;24.95, _7 20 pp. Sara Maitfand S ometirnes when I pick up a book I find I...
...But Russell's sense of paradox and tension helps him through...
...Call a bcxok something bold, and at the same time as profoundly paradoxical as A History of Heaven (since one thing that eternity simply cannot have is a history), and 1 think that any reader is doomed to frustration on d iscovering that the book ends in the early fourteenth century and (apart from a background nod in the direction of Judaism and Islam) deals only with Christian concepts...
...I just wish tha t either he had pushed on to more modern concepts of heaven, or had chosen a more acc-ur a tc title...
...and by slipping a justification for his premature ending to his survey into the opening of chapter 13: "The Paradise of Dante Alighieri (126-1321) is the most sublime portrait of heaven from the Book of Revelation to the present...
...The book is not a history_ of heaven, it is a background study to the third book of Dante's Divine Comedy...
...I've labored this point a bit because 1 think it is important, The expectations which the title sets up put particulardemands on the reader-for instance, anticipating a far longer sweep, the opening half of the book feels awkwardly paced and over-detailed...
...I have not left much space, nor do I have the academic competence, to critique Russell's readings of the various theologians whose ideas he presents, but at this level the book carries an air of authority which enables even a lay reader like me to feel a reposed confidence in the guide...
...A History of Heaven had this effect on me, and my irritation was not entirely arbitrary...
...It is also a book grounded in the particular, and in a clear acceptance of the mystery at the heart of Russell's research enterprise...
...This sort of commitment, strong enough to dance on the page, is rare among academics (and particularly, I have to say, theeologians) and delightful...
...This is a book about joy...
...Once I had disciplined myself to accept that my expectations were not going to be met, I had a wonderful time reading this book...
...I conclude this history of heaven with Dante, because beyond Dante no merely human word has gone...
...All this is a particular pity because what Russell has done is quite remarkable: He has produced a detailed, scholarly work which is alive with passion and poetry...
...Heaven itself," he writes, "cannot bedescribed, but the human concept of heaven can be.•' Russell clearly believes in heaven and is unashamed of saying so...
...I did enormously enjoy and also learned a lot from this book...
...This would have allowed me easier access to the delights that Russell so joyously presents...
...Sara Maitland's most recent ["A- is Angel \Ia r-The (olleete~tiShortStories(Ffernry F hill...
...Co,nweunu-col 1 9 ~rpt'rnbe•r26, 1997...
...When th:• notion proves incorrect Isufferfrom an irntated disappointment which gets between me and the author's real intentions and achievements...
...the book has the wrong title...
...he is singing the delights of heaven...
...Russell sort of acknowledges the problem by saving in his preface that he sees A History o f Heaven as a "prolegomenon toa detailed, mu ltivolume study of heaven...
...Sara Maitfand S ometirnes when I pick up a book I find I have already io rmed an arbitrary notion of what it is about...
...A careful balancing of a chronologically developing cultural history against the apophatic tradition (the spiritual approach which says we can know and say nothing whatever about the essential nature of God), rather wonderfully reflects what appears to be his personal conviction-we can't know and we must tell everything we do know...
...The earlier traditional Jewish and Christian understanding of "literal" and "metaphorical" truths is di ffereut from ours...
...Of course it is rather tricky to write a whole book demonstrating that it is impossible to say anything actual about you r subject...
...Like any engaged lover lie wants to tell usall about it, and if sometimes this means a certain excess of detail at theexpense of pace and analysis, one is carried along by the creativity of the writing and the underlying sense of theauthor's o,%-nenthusiasticdelight...
...Russell, it seems to me, is particularly good at explaining mindsets radically different from our own, and in creating a functional vocabulary to address this material...
...Russell's decision (and explanation of his decision) to avoid the word "literal" and replace it with "overt" and his development of the expression "metaphorical ontology" is helpful not just in reading his book but in understanding and decoding lots of pre-Enlightenment writing, particularly poetry and mystical texts...
...It is impossible not to feel that Russell brings such care and clarity to his subject because he comes to it more as lover than as teacher...
Vol. 124 • September 1997 • No. 16
