My problem with Barfield is the whole Steiner connection and his Monism. At base, it has to do with his difficult relationship with fiction. Despite his association with Lewis, Saul Bellow, Nemerov, Coleridge, his philosophy that portrays the nature of consciousness as a fiction mutable by evolution and volition- he hates fiction. Here is what his confidante and biographer wrote:
The fact is, of course, that Barfield thoroughly disliked fiction. Not only did he say as much in personal conversations, it is apparent both in his whole approach to imaginative writing and in his overall philosophical attitude to life. - Owen Barfield A Biography, p. 204
In the introductions and Rainbow chapter of Saving the Appearances, Barfield starts out with some reassuring common ground- affirming that he believes what he calls the particles (kind of Kant's noumenal world) and they exist independent of our awareness. He excuses himself from much further consideration of that, claiming that a theory of reality is not what he is advancing and besides, it is outside our awareness so there is not much more we can meaningfully say about it.. The bubble is all we know, so let's not talk of what is outside of it because any conceptualization automatically becomes part of the bubble. I am OK with that dodge. Psychologically, I can go with him that Nature and Mind are the same because from the phenomenological perspective, what we know are mental representations of nature, not nature itself, so that you can interpret his intended meaning is the straightforward point that Mind and mental representations of nature are both Mind. Fine. I can even go with him into Steineresque bending of spoons type statements concerning assertions that you can bend stuff in the bubble because it is all the stuff of mind. Also, that these examples of spoon bending are indistinguishable from any more conventional pound-the-fist-on-the-table concrete reality you care to bruise your hand on. Because more conventional positivist empirical points of view are the stuff of mind as well. So I am ok with that too, although the going starts to get weird for those trying to make sense of how I think it makes any sense at all.
I have very tolerant friends. I don't know if they trust me that whatever it is that I am blathering about, they think of me as a sensible fellow and that I have not taken leave of my faculties. If they are, they are probably being very generous. I don't know how I would look upon such a writing from perspectives I had 2 decades ago. This is less for anyone's edification other than perhaps my children who might want to know the jigsaw puzzle that I was working on. It is esoteric and I don't yet know how to bring it down to earth for others.
So, where I part company with the Steiner portion of Barfield concerns humility. It's Novalis' "man is the messiah of nature" thing and it comes out in Steiner's construction of a new mythology with a grandiosity befitting his personal visions. I am more open than others to such Gnostic visions, but I enter it only with a grave sense of caution. It is not just that in this highly individuated world, everything devolves into a kind of cobbled up personalized religion for each individual. That was scary for the control freaks in the early church, and Tillich has commented well (in his excellent history of Christianity set of lectures) on how dogmas were put in place to place a check on the Gnostics who were basically saying Christ was who they said he was, without feeling much constraint by the accounts of those who actually had been there. But that is not the danger I see. The one I see is the lack of epistemological humility of the prophet. I could see how Moses actually believed that God instructed that his forces commit genocide against the Amalekites. What about the commandment Thou shalt not kill. The prophet does not even have to conform to the pronouncements that he himself made. It is exactly the kind of self absorbed behavior I saw from would be eastern mystic prophets that I ran into in the 70s. Those particular ones seemed like egomaniacs that said profound things, but still involved in the sort of activity of attempting to float the universe back into a pre-Copernican orbit around their egos. They were the antithesis of enlightened consciousness they purported to represent. I have not studied Steiners work in depth, but every word I have read of his has up to know only further reinforced this sort of view. It could change, but that is how I see it now. One could object that I really have no interested in Barfield in his essense- the man who is inseparable from Steiner and philosophy. It could be said I am interested in perhaps one of Barfield's alter egos who believes in the beauty of fictions and their ability to signify. The Barfield Prime who believes all the monism statements are like Tillich's symbols of God- only markers that signify and only apply to the phenomenal world. God (if you like) or Reality's real nature is Tillich's God above God. But this is a dualist view, the kind that the real Barfield decries as double think. He said that Saving the Appearances was not for them. Barfield Prime's is everything minus the Steiner and plus the Tillich God above God meta level. He shares the view of language and the evolution of consciousness, but does believe that if Steiner's visions are true, that they be falsifiable and reproducible independently by other researchers.
I am on Tillich's side on this question. There is a Monism inside the epistemological bubble that is populated by a set of (what for me) religious symbols. But as does Tillich, I recognize that if God is infinite, then he is not to be constrained by any human constructs describing his essence. This was the truth that Lao Tsu struck me with in the first poem of the Tao Te Ching. In his dissertation, Martin Luther King picked up a very concise statement Tillich made on the same point. I should really insert it here later when I dig it up. Anyway, the desire to draw God into the subject-object dichotomy is natural, but an expression of our hubris- How humanity tries to haul God down to his level. Besides being epistemologically impossible, it is bad theology. This is a crucial insight Tillich makes. Steiner purports to go beyond those limits. Well. That's what prophets always say. In this post Luther world, it is our responsibility to see the light for ourselves, and not through some intermediary.
If someone understood Tillich on this matter would they understand my point of view? I think it would get them most of the way there. That's not to say I am at all comfortable with some things he has to say. What I am currently trying to fathom is how any everyday person can relate to a spiritual life in this way. For those non philosophers non poets who do not feel God speaking to them through such complex thoughts or symbols, how is it that they can take such constructs (symbols) of spiritual life seriously (personally) if they do not take them literally? That was MLK's critique, and he has a point. Tillich's mind was such that he took this way of perceiving very personally. It was a personal relationship for him. How do we succeed in making that sort of personal connection while avoiding the literalism, and while avoiding utterly alienating others with such philosophical esoterica?
You got me. It is still a huge mystery to me, but somehow it must be done.
