Modernism and Its Endless Returns to the Source, was Re: ...

[Carrol Cox <cbcox@xxxxxxxxx>]

"Devine, James" wrote:
>
> [clip]
> BTW, I now understand the point about Taliban being post-modern. I guess I
> misunderstood "post-modern" as having connotations as being "good" in some
> way to some people.
>

I'm not yet convinced that there is enough difference between
"modernism" (which in English Literature I date to the mid-17th century)
and "post-modernism" to justify the use in any sense of the latter term.
Fundamentalism is a modernist tendency -- one can see, for example,
close parallels between the manner of proceeding in Pound's _Cantos_ and
early 20th-century protestant fundamentalism. But as someone on the
Milton list pointed out to me off-list, ". . .did not the original
Protestants use this same process of "going back" to alleged ancient
practices when they broke from the Catholic Church?" The answer to that
question is of course yes; but Marx & Arendt both comment on how the
18th century revolutionaries imagined themselves in classic Roman terms
-- and Pound imitates that imitation (e.g., in the title of his book
from the '20s, _Jefferson and/or Mussolinii_). Crudely put, modernism is
a series of (illusory) returns to an original purity of motive and of
social relations.

Carrol
======

Post from Milton List (off-list: name of sender suppressed)

Carrol Cox wrote:

>P J Stewart wrote:
>
> > There was a reversal at some point, else how explain the fact that the
> > centre of gravity of fundamentalism is in the South? (I think I've got it
> > right, though to my British ear it sounds like 'funamenalism').
>
>
>This is somewhat of a misuse (though a common misuse) of the term
>"fundamentalism." Fundamentalism is a _modern_ development, primarily of
>the 20th century, and indicates _not_ a clinging on to past
>"fundamentals" but a more or less newly forged and artificial set of
>principles and practices _alleged_ by the promoters as a "going back."
>It only occurs in a context of rapid social change. (Several thousand or
>10s of thousands of pages could now be devoted to expanding, qualifying,
>revising this . . . .).
>

I hope you don't mind my asking, and to an extent my question is a mark
of my ignorance of the nuances of the history of Christianity as much as
anything else, but did not the original Protestants use this same
process of "going back" to alleged ancient practices when they broke
from the Catholic Church? I realize that is a very broad statement, but
did not at least some early Protestant denominations claim to be
hearkening back to a time before such Catholic practices as venerations
of saints?

If so, then might the very idea of idealizing (and indeed making up) a
past "purer" form of Christianity and attempting to live up to that
invented ideal be built into Protestantism? In which case, the
contemporary Fundamentalist movement is not 'new' but a more recent
manifestation of an old phenomenon.

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