Making History

"History is philosophy teaching by examples."

- Henry St. John Bolingbroke

Last week I had the pleasure of attending a talk by the brilliant author and historical biographer – David McCullough. He has been awarded Pulitzer prize for his biographies of Truman and John Adams.

During his talk McCullough spoke of the increasing ignorance of our society regarding matters of history and geography. He recounted that even among college history majors there is a lack of appreciation for the historical legacy that others have left for us to follow.

By ignoring our cultural history we dishonor our humanity and fail to apply the lessons learned by our forefathers and deprive our civilization of continued social evolution in the directions that they pioneered.

21^st Century culture may yet be an oxymoron. Our attention spans are growing shorter and our role models are those that the media chooses for us.

OTHER PEOPLE’S MAIL

One of the observations that David McCullough made was that much of his biographical material comes from the disciplined letter writing and journal-keeping of his subjects. No mean feat given that these were mostly written by candlelight or under extremely difficult circumstances.

These days we tend to write e-mails rather than letters, and use a Blog instead of a journal. This is a good thing from a time saving perspective – but ultimately e-mails and blogs fall short of revealing the deeper thoughts and emotions that surface when the mind is slowed down by the limiting speed of a moving pen or pencil; and when the author writes only for him or herself.

I HATE JOURNALING...but

Since my early teens I’ve made a concentrated effort to keep a journal – I generally have to force myself to write and mostly the entries are too personal for me to share – but I think that that is ultimately the point. As I look over my past journals from time to time, I re-experience emotionally, the situations that I was writing about, and although this can sometimes be painful, it often creates an opportunity to reflect on how fortunate I have been. It’s also fascinating to see how often circumstances that I was struggling through turned out for the very best.

THE SPIRITUAL EXPERIENCE OF HISTORY

When I read the Bible, especially the Psalms, Proverbs and Epistles (Letters) – I see these first as journals of experience – not as Scripture in the sense of being the ACTUAL words of God – but as the observations and thoughts of those EXPERIENCING God as immediate reality, and therefore I can see that the authors were flesh and blood like me. Their words record the authors’ experiences of history and not just the events themselves.

There is a tendency in our day and age to consider the Bible as the source of the Church and to try and apply the literal meanings to our age and culture unreservedly. There is a tremendous case to be made that this is a false assumption on many levels.

The Church first began as a small group of Jesus’ followers around 33 AD.

1. The first New Testament books didn’t appear in circulation until around 50AD at the earliest. (These being letters TO EXISTING CHURCHES.)
2. The Gospels are mostly NOT a sequential record of the events of Jesus’ life. Rather they are the eyewitness accounts of those who observed Jesus, and as such they are called “The Gospel ACCORDING to Matthew, Mark, Luke or John. (Most modern “translations” leave out this important aspect of the title.) Each book records the experience of living with Jesus from a different perspective, with the intentional purpose of expressing an interpretation of His life for the readers.

So, historically speaking – The Bible is based on the Church and NOT the other way around.

There is also a tendency to try and read science into the Bible – giving the Bible a focus that it was never intended to have. I’d say it’s fair to say that even a Scientist’s personal journal would be an unlikely source for trying to learn about science.

HISTORY CAN CHANGE THE WORLD

David McCullough makes the case that the study of history helps us discover the value and truth of our past and helps us better prepare for the future. When we study history and observe it through the eyes of those who were there – it can change our understanding of the world.

Click here for more info on David McCullough and his books.