Intellectual Appetite: A Theological Grammar by Paul J. Griffiths is a carefully written exploration of two kinds of
intellectual appetite: curiositas (curiosity) and studiositas (studiousness).
The author, largely booting off Augustine, contrasts curiosity, an “appetite
for the ownership of new knowledge,” with studiousness, an “appetite for closer
reflexive intimacy with the gift.”
As these definitions indicate, the curious and the studious
approach the world with very different postures. The studious view the world and everything in
it as gifts of God to be received, participated in, wondered at, and given
again to others (in whatever ways are appropriate to the nature of the
particular goods given). The curious, in contrast, view the world and
everything in it, as objects to be sequestered, mastered, possessed, and owned.
“Curiosity wants possession, studiousness seeks participation.”
But where do these postures come from? What is the
catechesis that forms each one? What are their characteristic habits? This book
explores these questions and much more, first by setting curiosity and
studiousness in contrast to one another (chapters 1 and 2), and then by backing
up to systematically construct an understanding of the nature of the world and
its objects (ch 3), damaged by the fall (ch 4), yet given to us by God (ch 5),
and inviting our participation (ch 6). The author then explores the nature of
intellectual appetite (ch 7) and contrasting features of curiosity and
studiousness (chs 8-13).
Here are a few key quotes:
“The world appears as
gift. Or, more exactly, the world, being light shot through with darkness,
appears in part as gift and in part as its opposite. To the extent that light
is obscured, the world appears not as delightful gift, but as constrictively
repetitive burden whose days and nights pass with the rapidity and numbing
sameness of the weaver’s shuttle, a region of desolation and hunger composed in
equal measure of pain and boredom. But the world of light, harmony, and
liberating order, the real world, that is, rather than its negative image, its
dark twin, appears as gift that delights when it is welcomed and embraced.”
(p. 51)
“the cosmos and
everything in it participates intimately with its giver: it is, from beginning
to end, saturated with God’s glory, radiant with God’s light, made beautiful by
God’s caress, given to its gives with entreaty to see it and to rejoice in it
for what it is” (p. 73)
“This fact of damage,
and its depth, means that the image of God in the cosmos has been shattered. It
is now the vestige, the trace, hard to discern, insubstantial: the fabric of
being from which God wove the cosmos is now tattered, almost shredded, by the
threads of nonbeing woven into it.” (p. 74)
“The appetite for
knowledge, proper as it is to all ordinarily-equipped human beings, can work
well or badly, and whether it does the former or the latter depends very
largely upon how potential knowables are construed, and how, correspondingly,
the appetite for knowing them is formed and ordered. If you learn to construe
every knowable as a beautiful but damaged gift; the cosmos as an ordered
ensemble of such gifts shot through with chaos; and the knowledge of any particular,
and of the chaotically-ordered whole, as possibly only when a potential knower
seeks intimacy with the gift and thereby with its giver; - then, your appetite
for knowledge will be provoked, moved toward a horizon it can never reach, and
thereby intensified.” (pp. 137-138)
“The curious seek to
own what they know; the studious seek to act as stewards of what they know.”
(p. 140)
“the deep tendency we
humans have to divinize ourselves by thinking that we can be owners as God is
an owner needs constantly to be checked by recalling that our ownership is not
a matter of sequestration’s power of control, but rather one of grateful
receipt (and, as a matter of aspiration, stewardly use) of gift.” (p. 156)
“The novelty, once
found, is immediately no longer new; therefore, it can only fail to fulfill the
desire that sought it. The gaze temporarily frozen to its glittering surface
will at once slide away from it toward the next new thing, the next novelty.
This obvious enough in the economic sphere: the mini-orgasm of purchase
prompts, often at once, desire for another purchase. It is perhaps less obvious
in the cognitive sphere but just as real: there too, cognitive intimacy with
the new will, as soon as achieved (or apparently achieved, for it can never really
be achieved), prompt a desire for more of the same. In academia, those
especially subject to this sickness are likely to be rewarded for it because
the academy is the place where curiosity is taught as a virtue.” (p. 212)
As these quotes show, this is a difficult, philosophical
text, with very close reasoning that is sparse on illustration. Almost every
word is carefully defined, nuanced, and used in a technical way. But it’s also
a compelling book that presses into the heart of reality, as understood from a Christian
perspective. I agreed with much of it, and found it convicting, instructive,
and even in places liberating. However, I strongly disagree with distinctively
Roman Catholic presuppositions (about, for example, Mary and the Eucharist)
that frequently surface in the book.
Five stars for its basic argument and careful reasoning. Two
stars for its Roman Catholic presuppositions. Hence, my (cautious) four
stars.
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