Will Durant says that the essence of humanism is that belief of which the Renaissance philosopher, Pico della Mirandola seems never to have doubted, “that nothing which has ever interested living men and women can wholly lose its vitality—no language they have spoken, nor oracle beside which they have hushed their voices, no dream which has once been entertained by actual human minds, nothing about which they have ever been passionate, or expended time and zeal.” For Pico, the studia humanitatis was not a matter of surveying knowledge and collecting up answers. As he searched the ancient manuscripts, he was not so much interested in cataloguing what the ancients knew as in knowing who the ancients were. For Pico, spending time with the ancients was not a matter of extracting information, but rather of expanding his own imagination and vision by surveying Esi Umano, of what it is to be human. Pico della Mirandola passionately worked to resurrect the ancients for their inspiration and timeless ability to infuse what we deem unimaginable with the vitality of their imagination and the mystery of their creativity.
Will Durant says that the essence of humanism is that belief of which the Renaissance philosopher, Pico della Mirandola seems never to have doubted, “that nothing which has ever interested living men and women can wholly lose its vitality—no language they have spoken, nor oracle beside which they have hushed their voices, no dream which has once been entertained by actual human minds, nothing about which they have ever been passionate, or expended time and zeal.” For Pico, the studia humanitatis was not a matter of surveying knowledge and collecting up answers. As he searched the ancient manuscripts, he was not so much interested in cataloguing what the ancients knew as in knowing who the ancients were. For Pico, spending time with the ancients was not a matter of extracting information, but rather of expanding his own imagination and vision by surveying Esi Umano, of what it is to be human. Pico della Mirandola passionately worked to resurrect the ancients for their inspiration and timeless ability to infuse what we deem unimaginable with the vitality of their imagination and the mystery of their creativity.
It is a foundational Christuman theme that we are imago Dei and “each becomes Human by becoming a creator, created in the image of our Creator.” I think of an image impressioned on photographic film carrying the likeness of the original but requiring a process to develop the image to give it full color and dimension. The imago Dei is an image impressioned on our soul and the process of mixing that image with the earth of us allows us to give full color, full dimension, full expression to our origo—that which is most original to us is at the same time most like the imago Dei. This is not confined to a snapshot image—the noun of God imbedded in God’s direct object—man. Instead the development of the human being is revealed through the imagining—the imagination of God.
This verb form of the Creator creating is the same “verb form” who moved over the surface of the waters and from out of the formless and the void and the darkness called into being light. This verb pattern imagining waters that teem with swarms of living creatures and fashioning skies that fill up with flocks of birds is the verb pattern that some call “flow” but is best conceived as an active imagination—active in and upon all varieties of media, active in and upon all those creatures who are called to become human.
Mastering an art lies in loss of self in the art—as in the art of living. Pits come when we are thinking most about ourselves. Pain makes us self-aware. Joy makes us other-aware; joy makes us aware of life—of the dance. When I am in the pits, if I forget myself, I can always do my greatest thinking, my greatest creativity.
William M. Boast
On This Day…
Louise Gluck born 1943 in New York City: poet, Poet Laureate. Works: The Wild Iris, A Village Life: Poems, Vita Nova Quotes: “Of two sisters, one is always the watcher, one the dancer.” “We look at the world once, in childhood. The rest is memory.” “Even before you touched me, I belonged to you; all you had to do was look at me.”
Christuman will be being created until it is no longer in existence. We all, individually and communally, create it every minute.
Donna Piper Leichtling
Karen Blixen (Isak Dinesen) born 1885 in Denmark, died 1962: writer Works: Out of Africa, Seven Gothic Tales, Winter’s Tales Quotes: “The cure for anything is salt water – sweat, tears or the sea.” “God made the world round so we could never be able to see too far down the road.” “I don’t believe in evil, I believe only in horror. In nature there is no evil, only an abundance of horror; the plagues, the blights and the ants and the maggots.”
