People of the Library

Jesus loves me, yes I know,
Cuz the Bible tells me so,
Little ones to him belong,
They are weak but he is strong.
Yes, Jesus loves me,
Yes, Jesus loves me,
Yes, Jesus loves me,
The Bible tells me so.

Before I offend everyone I know by saying things I'll later regret, let me just say that this is probably the first song I learned to sing. I clearly remember singing it in Sunday School at Middle Class Methodist Church in River City, Wisconsin, probably in kindergarten. It was foundational in our training as nice kids. Do kids still sing it? Does it still have the epistemological effect of teaching us that we know that x is true because it says so in a book?

I'm completely sure that this lesson was taught with the best intentions. I also remember that as the place where I learned to color inside the lines. And they say art isn't as basic as reading and math. The minister was the kindly Rev. Winslow Wilson, whom I've always associated with the scholarly Pres. Woodrow Wilson, go figure. I seriously doubt whether Rev. Wilson or any member of his flock was deliberately waging cultural imperialism, although there is no doubt they were on a mission.

These days, the culture wars are not between Asia and the West, the Haves against the Have-nots, fundamentalist Christianity against fundamentalist Islam, northern hemisphere capitalists vs. southern hemisphere colonials, or conservative Right vs. liberal Left. I think it's the People of the Book versus the Other People.

I'm not sure what to call the unorganized, uninstitutionalized, non-card-carrying rabble who do not base their beliefs, policies, and practices on a single inerrant, authoritative text. The POB have plenty of choice names, however, for the OP: primitive, anarchist, pagan, heathen, savage, you've heard them all. It seems every 'ism' spends most of its time proving itself superior to those lesser creatures, that is, when they're not killing them.

Notwithstanding the long and cherished rivalry between various peoples of various books, well known and thoroughly chronicled in their heated accounts of crusades, jihads, purges, reformations, inquisitions, purifications, revivals, awakenings, schisms, holocausts, hejiras, and diasporas, it's the noncombatants who have suffered most. The folks who haven't bought into either rival faction touting either rival text.

Despite their sectarian conflicts, these cultural warriors were all monotheists, imperialists, authoritarians, and People of the Book. They have so much in common! They were all on a holy quest to convert, subdue, civilize, educate, save, and enlighten the poor, confused, benighted, ignorant, deluded, uninformed Other People. Their major premise was: In the beginning was the word. The minor premise is: And the word was written in my book. Completing the syllogism is the conclusion: Buy my book and do what I say.

The irony for me, personally, is that I'm in the book business. I edit books, I read books, and I like books. I choose to spend most of my time with books. I was in school (and occasionally out for recess) the first 40 years of my life. I liked school, and the bulk of my schooling consisted of the traditional readin' and writin'. I've always encouraged that bookish model of formal education, and to some extent it has rubbed off. My kids work in bookstores. Books pay the bills. Talk about biting the hand that feeds you.

Like making laws or sausages, however, if you get inside the process even a little bit, you lose the idealized notion of the book as a pure source of wisdom. Please. There are good books and bad books, like there is good and bad art, music, movies, and theater. There's only bad TV, sorry. All have their flaws, and all have a point of view, a bias, an agenda, a historical context, and a market. Most could use a good editing, and many are either lies or bullshit or a combination of the two.

The difference hit me in the face on a Friday evening at the end of a long and exhausting work week. I was sitting in the back yard enjoying a Rogue Amber Ale and slowly letting the sensations of being in the garden return me to myself from the workaday discursive drain. Birds flew in and out of the yard, light and shadow played on pine and redbud trees, hosta and daylilies danced their quiet riot in opposite corner beds. I wondered out loud what I would do without this space where words don't rule.

Of course I will return to work on Monday morning and complete the terms of my sentence. But this is not the name of the game, it's an epiphenomenon within the world-as-garden, and the Other People, who are not People of the Book, know this.

So to put this in a logical framework: there are two kinds of people in the world. Some actually believe that in the beginning was the Word, and then God created the heaven and the earth, rivers and seas, grasses and trees, birds and beasts, and two innocents in a garden. Others believe that earth and sky, wind and water, flora and fauna, naked apes pulling weeds came before language. The flesh made word.

Let me end this on a note of affirmation, even if it's too little too late. Just as humankind once turned the corner from neolithic to agrarian culture, then turned another corner in the Gutenberg revolution of printed text, we are in the throes of a digital revolution, yet books are still valuable treasures. Not just one book, but lots of them. Let a hundred flowers bloom. There's a library in the garden.