Emile Zola: Therese Raquin

 I am, perhaps more than most, a very susceptible reader.  I find myself, without meaning to or resisting, absorbing whatever I encounter, including books, movies, and people.  After reading a nineteenth century novel, I am far more likely to use "whence" in an email than not, and equally likely to refer to somebody as "gurl" after watching RuPaul's Drag Race.  The other day I got into a lengthy and, at times, heated conversation with a black friend about the extent to which it was appropriate for me to use snippets of AAVE in our conversation.

So it is not a surprise at all that my take on this book is heavily colored by the movies I watched this week, specifically Guillermo Del Toro's Crimson Peak and El Espinazo del Diablo.  On almost every page, I saw Zola's gruesome and vivid prose as filmed by that auteur, and speculated how the latter might revel in filming the water-logged greens and creeping, malevolent reds found there.  Camille's corpse especially lends itself to  Del Toro's take on ghost stories, never jumping or shrieking cheaply at the reader, but waiting in clear view and all the more sinister for it.

And what made the book ever so slightly dissatisfying was, or seemed to be in my heavily influenced mind, the same as that which occasionally detracts from Del Toro.  Especially in Crimson Peak, though the journey never seems false or contrived, it is often far too clear.  In watching that movie, it was not clear how the doomed siblings would die, or at whose hand, but the journey they would take to get there, and the process the movie would go through, was certain from the beginning.

Likewise in Therese Raquin, one couldn't say for certain whether the two murderous lovers would die at each other's hands, at the scaffold, or, as was ultimately the case, by their own hands.  It was certain, however, what steps would take them there.  Even though Zola crafted every moment flawlessly, once it became apparent where the story was going, I found myself less interested in arriving. 

조현용: 우리마로 깨닫다

제가 배운 한국어에 대한 것 중 가낭 많은 게 조현용 때문이다. 작가로서 쓰신 책이든 교수로서 전달하신 강의든 학자로서 발표하신 연구든 가장 많이 도와주신 분.  이 책은 제외가 아니다.  한국어 어원을 바탕으로 내성 하는 이 책이 철이 있게 한국인의 개념을 반사한다.  한국이 조현용과 같은 사람으로 가득차게 되면 얼마나 좋겠네요.

Arthur Schopenhaeur: The Wisdom of Life

". . . if a man finds himself in possession of great mental faculties, such as alone should venture on the solution of the hardest of all problems--those which concern nature as a whole and humanity in its widest range, he will do well to extend his view equally in all directions" (105).  With these words, Schopenhauer declares himself to his audience, urging those worthy of reading his treatise to pursue the universal, rather than the specific.  He would have done well to follow his own advice.

What he chooses to focus on, namely the task of taxonomizing all that a man has at his disposal, that which "makes" a man, so to speak, he treats insightfully and which a certain amount of panache.  I'm especially fond of his takedown of so-called "knightly honour", that system of chivalry which was popular in 19th century Europe which would brook the bearing of no insult among the civilized classes.  The result of this social paradigm, he rightly notes, "The rudest is always right . . . However stupid, bad or wicked a man may have been, if he is only rude into the bargain, he condones and legitimizes all his faults" (75).  Such a state of social affairs cannot be said to have any merit, as he goes on to illustrate, and is akin to trying "to prove he warmth of your room by holding your hand on the thermometer and so make it rise" (80).

The vigor with which he eviscerates the social mores of his time, however, gives evidence that he has not achieved his aim to treat "humanity in its widest range."  His attention is myopically limited to a specific period of time, and furthermore to those levels of society which are concerned with honour in the sense that he means.  The modern reader has no need of being convinced that a duel to satisfy some perceived insult is barbaric and pointless.  Schopenhauer unknowingly preached to the choir of posterity.  He did it with wit and vigour, but as he observes, "the strongest arm is unavailing to give impetus to a featherweight" (96).

Which is merely one example of the larger problem with this work.  When he chose as his topic that which makes a man, he did so literally and in earnest.  It does not occur to him, for example, that women are part of the fabric of humanity as well.  He does this largely by omission, but when he does address the fact that perhaps women also exist, he does so in a tone so dismissive as to make this reader seethe.  "The most essential feature in woman's life is her relation to man," seems to summarize his opinion of the matter, and he says little more than that (67).  Neither is he content to limit himself to humans with a penis, living in 19th century Europe, and possessed of some level of social status.  He for all intents restricts himself to a test group of one: himself.  For example, if I were to list that which a man has at his disposal, friends and family would be high on the list.  Having never experienced these pleasures, Schopenhauer makes the unforgivable assumption that all men are like himself, and comes to the conclusion that "what one human being can be to another is not a very great deal" (30).

I am often tempted by this line of reasoning myself.  Having never really experienced romantic love, it would be easy for me to assume that it did not exist.  But I have seen it.  I have seen the miracle of two good people working together for some even greater good, and even my ardent cynicism cannot deny that there are happy, loving, admirable couples in my acquaintance.  Schopenhauer assumed that his human experience was the only one, and there but for the grace of whatever go I.

The 3rd Letter of John

I took the liberty of reading this brief item through once before beginning on a verse by verse inspection. I find that it has very little in the way of theology to recommend it, and has very much the flavor of a brief email "keeping in touch", as one says.  One must wonder what John said to this fellow when and if they met in person.

1:1 In keeping with his opening in the previous epistle, the writer refers to himself merely as "the elder".  This sobriquet opens itself to multiple possibilities.

• This is an official title. If so, it's noteworthy that he is "the" elder, not "an" elder.  Would Peter object to this seeming demotion?
• This is merely a nickname.  The affectionate tone of the note is compatible with opening the book "from your old friend."
• This is a way of distinguishing himself from some other John, of which there are many.  Insofar as his name is nowhere mentioned, this seems unlikely.
• This is something of a code word, and truthfully, this is not the only place where the writer seems to be judicious in disclosing identities.
• I'm seriously overthinking it.

1:4 There is no mention, either the Bible or in church tradition, of John having literal sons--or even a wife.  It's a tempting reading, however, to look at this as a work of actual paternal care.  Indeed, there is nothing to prevent such.

1:5 In contrast to Paul's proscriptions, which are often doctrinal, this seems rather personal.  Diotrephes' offense lay in his lack of charity--both toward John and to others in the early church.

1:11 It is easy to see why John was seen as closer to Christ than the other disciples.  This admonition mirrors the work of his mentor both in its simplicity and its spirit.  Additionally, like much of what Christ is reported to have said, it is incompatible with much of modern Christian doctrine.

In short, not much here to comment upon, but nothing to give offense either.

Taxi Driver

Well, I suppose I have my answer.  Either by virtue of having found the perfect proof for my theorem, or of having become bored with the question, I feel like putting the idea of "greatness" in a movie to bed.

Everything about this movie was great.  The performances: iconic.  Aesthetic elements, cinematography, score (Scorsese's real gift, if you ask me), set design, costumes, everything: flawless.  And yet the movie itself was not great, in my mind.  It was good, flawlessly executed, even a masterpiece, but I can't bring myself to say that it was great.  What could possibly have been lacking? 

I have come to the conclusion that the sine qua non of a great movie is the script.  To be specific, the very idea of the movie must be great for the movie itself to achieve greatness.  If I were in a more mathematical frame of mind, I would write a formula wherein the potential quality of the movie lies in its central idea, and it can never rise above that, but can sink below it based on the quality of other factors.  But I am not in such a frame of mind.  I will simply say that Taxi Driver had a good idea, a good reason for existing, but not a great one, and although no one involved with the movie could have done zir job better, it was never going to be great.

Nagai Kafu: Life and Writings (Edward Seidensticker, ed.)

When we speak of something as an acquired taste, often it is a backhanded way of saying that its virtues are not obvious, or even readily found.  When I say here that the writing of Nagai Kafu in particular, and Japanese literature in general, is an acquired taste, however it is not in that sense.  Rather, it is to say that to appreciate it, one must step entirely out of everything one has learned from a lifetime of Western literature.

I recall a similar experience reading The Tale of Genji and Soul Mountain many years ago.  I failed to appreciate either of them because I kept expecting something that wasn't going to happen.  I'm used to good books having a narrative, a plot, and interesting structure, a resolution of some sort, lifelike characterization, and other things that Western literature does so well.  It was very much like missing the forest for the trees, failing to appreciate the journey due to an obsessive focus on the destination.  In Eastern literature, at least as far as I've experienced, the point is in the moment, not in the momentum.  The joy of reading Genji, or Li Po, or Tu Fu, etc. is the same joy as that of sitting in a park and watching the leaves blow.  This is a quiet, still joy, and one that Kafu exemplifies.

In his excellent editorial and biographical comments, Seidensticker well highlights these joys, found everywhere in Kafu's writings.  Narratively weak and filled with bald, unremarkable characters, his stories might well seem to be poorly written.  Indeed, if one reads them as stories, such a judgement is more than fair.  If, however, one reads them as poems, as insightful, touching descriptions of subtle moments in the life of a man growing weary with the world, but still determined to record its pleasures faithfully, one ceases to care about the plot, characters, structure, and everything else that a Western approach to writing has indoctrinated us to believe is important.  One is able to sit in the yard of this self-described scribbler, and watch the leaves.

Second John

1:1 Well this is obfuscatory.  Who is this lady?  I'm sure that most will take it as a metaphor for the church as a whole, but a reading that assumes an individual audience might be revelatory.

1:3 More anti-trinitarian theology from John.

1:4 This leads one away from a metaphorical interpretation of the "lady".  If she is the church as a whole, then surely it would be less than an overjoy that only some of her children were walking in the truth.

1:5-6 This is beginning to read almost like an Abelard and Heloise situation.

1:12 And there is no way that John was going to meet the entire congregation face to face.  This simply must be an individual.

1:13 Especially considering that the church proper has no metaphorical sister . . . this verse especially makes me sympathetic to the reading that John was writing to Mary herself.

Philip K. Dick: Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said

There's a reason why Philip K. Dick is in my trinity of science fiction, alongside Vonnegut and Asimov.  While he can match the other two for creativity and vision, the latter are simply better writers--more consistent, more unified, and more erudite in every way.  But unlike Vonnegut and Asimov, the power of Dick (phrasing!) is that somehow he reaches beyond the page and reads you back.  Every time I read something by him, I find it reflected in my own life, and his books answer the questions that you didn't even think to speak aloud. 

This book, like all of Dick's, is flawed.  My reaction the first time I read it holds true six years later: that it could have done with a whole lot less explaining.  But this second reading finds me in a less analytical mood.  I forgive the author for caving to what were no doubt the demands of his publisher and tying things up at the end in a way that doesn't seem to match the rest of the book.  I forgive him because the other 90% is a work of breathing, staring philosophy, and it would not surprise me at all if it grew a pair of legs and walked off my desk of its own accord.

Richard Jackson Harris (ed): Cognitive Processing in Bilinguals

Generally there are three reasons to read a research anthology of this sort:

1. Because there is a single article that is seminal in its field, and unavailable elsewhere.  In this case, the article in question was Kroll and Shull: Lexical and Conceptual Memory in Fluent and Nonfluent Bilinguals. Although I spent a good portion of my thesis tearing it up, there is no doubt that this work on the so-called "translation asymmetry" is a crucial and influential piece of research.
2. To get a nice set of references for your bibliography and give weight to what you want to say, since you are a lowly master's candidate and you are making some rather bold claims.  Hypothetically, of course.
3. To figure out what you want to read next.  In this case, I was most taken by Brian MacWhinney's discussion of the Competition Model, and Jacqueline Thomas' treatment of explicit and implicit knowledge (via Bialystok).  The bite-sized morsels offered here were enough to tempt me in those directions without having to slog through dreary textbooks on cerebral lateralization or phonological processing.

All three goals were met successfully, and I don't regret slogging through this volume in its entirety, although I can't say that I would recommend it save to a very select few.   What I did not expect to find was a link between linguistics and my other, more literary pursuits.  I often say that you will not likely find someone who knows more about English than I do.  There are people whose knowledge of English from a theoretical linguistic viewpoint eclipses my own, to be sure.  By the same token, any honest assessment of my knowledge of English literature would find me a dabbler.  It is rather rare, however, to find someone who knows both sides of the language: the grammar, syntax, and semantics of the theoretical side; and the literature, style, and culture of the applied side.  Most experts are one or the other, and they rarely overlap.

Nick Ellis of the University of North Wales seems to be an exception.  In his article on Linguistic Relativity, a subject in which I have little innate interest, I found a quote from Joyce sticking out like a sore thumb.  What was Ulysses doing in this starchy tome?  Although the quote in question was simply about doing mental calculations, and was altogether unnecessary in this volume, it reminded me of my own take on that monstrous novel.  To say that Ulysses is a stream of consciousness work is only partially correct.  There are parts of it that treat the serial circuit of human thought, but it is equally devoted to the parallel process of human experience.  Joyce gives us a typically obtuse way of thinking about this in section 3:

"Stephen closed his eyes to hear his boots crush crackling wrack and shells. You are walking through it howsomever. I am, a stride at a time. A very short space of time through very short times of space. Five, six: the nacheinander. Exactly: and that is the ineluctable modality of the audible. Open your eyes. No. Jesus! If I fell over a cliff that beetles o'er his base, fell through the nebeneinander ineluctably."

It is the interaction of the nacheinander and the nebeneinander that make up life.  Those things we experience, perceive, and feel happen all at once, and those things we think and remember happen one after the other.  Insofar as this holds for all human activity, it is no surprise that it applies equally to the field of language acquisition. Krashen's "monitor" and Chomsky's "language acquisition device" work together simultaneously, and this dichotomy is observable everywhere in the literature on the subject: the aforementioned implicit and explicit knowledge, learning and acquisition, form and meaning, all these are simply names for the two ways in which the mind works with language--and not incidentally, the left and the right hemispheres.  If I can get my students to use both, and consciously so, I should probably write a paper on it.  Perhaps Mr. Harris will be interested including it in his next anthology.

Emile Zola: Germinal

Up until the last chapter, I was prepared to write about how masterfully Zola ropes the readers in, enticing her or him with the prospect that things might just turn out--even though he clearly has no such intention.  This was my take on L'assommoir, and combined with his thoroughly believable, though not necessarily relatable, characters I saw a pattern developing.  Even the ostensible villains of the novel react in perfectly human ways to representatively human circumstances.  The mine collapse in Part VI seemed the perfect resolution to this vector, and this gutsy and unexpected turn reminded me of The Mill on the Floss or Empire Falls.  Had he stopped there, I would have put him right up there with Balzac, ahead of Flaubert and Stendahl, as the very best of French writers.

But he didn't stop.  He went on for another hundred or so pages, and that last chapter undid everything.  Whereas L'assommoir sacrificed nothing to Zola's social ideas, and in fact worked with them nicely, it would seem that he simply could not help himself in Germinal.  What was an inspiring narrative that needed no help to make its point, turned into a manifesto.  I don't like being told what to think; it insults my pride of readership and chafes against my rather typically American rebelliousness.  It is for this reason that Germinal, though it could have been even better than L'assommoir, wound up being merely The Jungle.

Honore de Balzac: La Comedie Humaine

Baaaaaaaaalzac! It's funny for so many reasons.  One can hear Eulalie Mackechnie Shinn clucking it alongside Chaucher and Rabelais.  And let's not forget its giggle-inducing homophone.  It's a wonder, considering how long the name has been in my consciousness, that it has taken me so long to get around to reading this author.  At last I have, though, and glad I am that I did.  I found him to be not only an engaging and epigrammatic storyteller, but also a complete original, treating the subject of men and women in a way that I don't recall experiencing before.  An enjoyable mix of Hemingway's brutal honesty and George Eliot's vibrant philosophy.  One can see, of course, why Mrs. Shinn would have objected to the content--had she ever read it.

In The Human Comedy, Balzac does not shy away from the darkest sides of human love and sexuality; rather, he embraces them.  Even the most brutal aspects, however, are never treated brutally. The themes are straight out of (or rather into, considering timing) Bret Easton Ellis: revenge, rape, jealousy, lust, sadism, and even bestiality.  But the style and treatment are more Tennyson: the heights and depths of human spirit that drives those themes.  Even arguably the most substream of the stories, the (metaphorically?) bestial "A Passion in the Desert", ends with the stunning explanation for the allure of one's wild nature: "It is God without men."

This tension between the human and the divine only partly sets up Balzac's cosmology, however.  In "The Duchesse de Langeais", Balzac thoughtfully and systematically lays out the real structure of his universe: "What man, in any rank of life, has not felt in his soul an indefinable pleasure in a woman he has chosen, even dreamed of as his own, who embodies the triple moral, physical, and social perfections that allow him to see in her the satisfation of all his wishes?"(327).  Society, this third element of Balzac's trinity, has just as clear a voice in his stories as the other two.  It is only in "Langeais", though, that he fully unfolds his meaning.  Peppered throughout are subtle references through imagery--the triple sconces of the Duchess' cloister, the three masked figures of her vision--and explicit reference to the three divinities, though always wearing different masks.  In fact, the patten is so consistent that one could make a chart were one inclined to that sort of thing . . .

p. 291          p. 303          p.327         p.366
love             men             social         horse
music          principles     moral        bull
religion       things           physical    lion

Perhaps the most stimulating part of this cosmology is its ability to be simultaneously clear and vague.  There is no doubt that Balzac's intention is to set up a trinity; great writers never do this sort of thing on accident.  But there is considerable doubt as to the precise nature of the three elements.  Although the above chart draws a perfectly acceptable corollary between the various mentions of these elements, it is by no means the only possible one. Do things belong to the physical world? Or the social one?  What about men?  At times they operate according to their animal passions, at others according to their social constructs. One would assume that religion is a moral force, but in Balzac (in "A Passion in the Desert", for example) God is nature, and therefore well within the physical realm.  It is tempting, in fact, to construct a narrative wherein Montriveau of "Langeais" and the general of "Desert" are in fact the same person, the latter taking place during the former's trek across the desert (322-323).  One is further tempted to this reading by Balzac's constant acsription of animal qualities to the two lovers in "Langeais".  Montriveau even goes so far as to say to the Duchesse, "perhaps you are like the tigers in the desert, who lick the wounds they have first inflicted" (373).  Rather an irresistible reference to the general and his panther.

At any rate, the line between the members of Balzac's triumvirate is far too blurry to allow any parallel with the Catholic trinity.  It rather feels more like a threefold version of yin and yang, one constantly running into and becoming the other.  For him, the world is not run by a constant tension between light and dark; it is far from so binary.  It is, rather, the constant and blurry interplay between love, lust, and romance that drives all humans to behave in the way they do. 

First John

Well, here goes.  I'm definitely near the end of this little project, and have been putting it off, as I tend to do with all things resembling completion.  The rest of this Bible belongs to John, a figure who could be described as either fascinating or enigmatic.  In some ways he feels to me like the narrator of the Hebrew scriptures.  A fellow whose voice is felt on every page, but who we never really get to know directly.  Kinda the Nick Carraway of the Bible.  Peter and Paul both come through loud and clear in their books, but John seemed to take great care to remove himself, even referring to himself in the third person, and never by name in his gospel account.  I look forward to seeing what pokes through in these last four books, or whether he maintains that mysterious objectivity.

1:1 The unnamed plural here is an interesting choice.  Different from Peter, James or Paul.  If any of them had written it, no doubt this would have begun with their names.  John already seems set to let this letter stand on its own merit.

1:3 Really, this trinity thing is out of hand.  I've discussed John's treatment extensively in my discussion of his gospel account, and here is further indication that he had no concept of Jesus and God as being the same person.

1:4 I really like this approach.  This is how prayer should work.  Not asking for anything, just saying it because to not say it is to be incomplete.

1:5 Again, exactly like a prayer--my version at least, which is heavily influenced by Ernest Holmes.

1:8-10 A concise and accessible treatment of a weighty theological topic.

2:1 Now this is interesting.  A sudden shift to the first person singular.  Fitting, in that his topic now seems to be taking a turn away from the rhetoric of theology and toward the personal appeal.

2:2 And back to "we" here, but now it feels less like the royal we, and more like the addressee-inclusive we.   I wonder if Greek makes that distinction like Mandarin and Hawaiian, or leaves it unmarked like English.  Update: unmarked.

2:4 The second use of this expression already.  It is as if for John "the truth is not in you" is the ultimate proscription.  I will be on the lookout for future treatment of "truth", but it feels important to him in a way that it did not to Paul et al.

2:9-11 And the same can be said for "light".  In fact, truth and light already seem to be synonymous for John.

2:12-14 A beautiful little stanza, with a good measure of poetic quality.  I am intrigued especially by  "him who is from the beginning" in 14.  As he is addressing the "fathers' in the congregation, no doubt he means those who saw Christ with their own eyes.  This dovetails nicely with the theology in his gospel account.

2:15-17 Verses that still ring in my head from the memorization of my youth.  Interestingly, little deviated from the New World Translation that I remember.

2:18 and here is a nice pin in the balloon of those amateur theologians who predict/await/identify the antichrist.  There was never such a figure in the Bible.  It's an adjective, not a title.

2:21 More emphasis on truth, and in a way that is indistinguishable from the treatment of light.  A nice set of dichotomies he is setting up here:  truth and lies, light and darkness, the world and the will of God.

2:24 Using syntax to make his reference clear here.  John loves this word "abide".  Wonder if the same Greek word is being translated each time here.  Update: indeed it is.  Menein in 2:6, menetw and meinh in 2:24.  This is a great little point.  In 6, the reader abides in God.  In 24, truth abides in the reader, even as the reader abides in the son and the father.  A potentially revealing nesting doll arrangement.

2:27 And the same verb here, time used for anointing.  That indirectly conflates "truth" with spirit, which makes sense given his next words.  If we are to extend John's pattern here, that would mean spirit has to have an equivalent darkness.  Let us see if there is mention of such a contrast.

2:29 Now this is a potentially incendiary verse.  John has put the cart in its rightful pre-equine position here.  It is not that those who have been born of God must do right.  It is that those who do right are by definition born of God.  Those who do not do right are simply not of God, and are liars if they say otherwise, as in 1:8 and 2:4.  The most telling point, however, is that it is the doing of right that is the deciding factor.  Although such distinctions would have been meaningless in John's context, one can extrapolate that creed, faction, and silly recited declaration of belief are irrelevant.

3:2-3 I'm going out on a limb here.  Brace yourself.  Taken in a certain way, this is a rather revealing metaphysical statement.  Those who are properly constituted have the ability to see based on their similarity to that seen.  This could be taken sociologically, to mean that we only understand what we are conditioned to experience; or literally, to mean that one must be  . . . vibrating? at the right frequency?  Ok, I'm gonna stop now.  That sounds too woogity woogity to be supportable.

3:4-10 Waaaaaaaitaminnit, here's where it gets a bit fuzzy.  This seems to directly contradict what is goin on back in 1:8-10.

3:14 And here's the other half of the dichotomy that we were looking for in 2:27.  The opposite of light is darkness, and the other side of spirit is death.  Same verb and everything.

3:15 Oh, but now he's set up another one.  Gotta backtrack on that last statement.

3:23 This is the only thing that saves the earlier contradiction.  John's definition of sin in 1:8-10 and his definition here do not seem to be the same thing.  It's entirely possible that he was speaking Mosaically earlier.  Linguistic clues from the Greek: sin in Greek is not a separate concept like it is in English.  It just means to miss something, although even this translation is fuzzy because of the multiple meanings of "miss" in English.  In any case, John is probably just using it as a general lexical item, not a concrete theological construct, which makes some contradiction more understandable.

4:1 Okay, hold on.  I have to take issue with this translation decision to capitalize Spirit in 3:24 and not here.  This is a clear editorializing that is in no way indicated in the Greek.  It's the same word.

 4:2-3 Now we are pretty clearly speaking of actual spirit beings here, not some metaphorical spirit of brotherhood or Saint Louis.  This always intrigues me when the Bible hits these areas, because it seems like there's something almost scientific about it.  Like the discovery of a new species.  What are the characteristics of these creatures?  They can clearly communicate.  There's even a taxonomy given here.  This remains a huge blind spot in my own personal experience though.  I always look at this sort of thing with a pretty heavy dose of side-eye, as though Teresa of Avila were in front of me spouting her silliness. 

4:10-12  You can almost feel John's passion here, like the rising cadence of a really good sermon.  I could wish that he gave us a little more to go on here, but it's compelling nonetheless.

4:14-15 Sadly, these verses that are so central to modern Evangelicalism also hold some pretty strong rationale for not believing in a trinity.  It's a shame what is picked and chosen.

4:16 Here's the best part of the whole abiding thing: it's reflexive.  The reader abides in God, and vice versa.  One is simultaneously the vessel and the contents.

4:17 We get a whiff here of John's earlier visions.  He has likely already written the Revelation by the time this epistle is composed, and his warning to be ready bears a very specific urgency.  Those things that he saw cannot be unseen.

5:3 Indeed.  They're contained in one verse.

5:5 John has taken a turn away from "truth" to the less attractive "belief" here. 

5:6 And we're back.  Phew. 

5:11 I'm quite interested in knowing exactly what John's concept of eternal life was.  Is he intimating something he observed as one of the few who actually might have seen into the beyond and lived to write about it?  Sadly, he does not elaborate here.

5:16-17 Wow, these verses are pretty fresh to me.   Lots of interesting implications here:

• the reader has the power to forgive sin 
• but only of a certain type, for there are evidently magnitudes
• mortal sin is super super bad, and it exists, and John is not going to tell us what it is

5:18  Again, these verses only work if we take sin as a general term, not a theological construct.

5:19 And here's another tantalizing bit of metaphysics.  For lack of any other candidate, I'm going to go ahead and say that this evil one is the corollary to spirit in John's lengthy dialectic.

5:20 The perfect ending,

5:21 but this is just weird.