Anxiety

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

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• From Shunned (2018)

  Her support was unwavering. “If Richard ever talks to you directly about this, don’t let him get to you,” she said. “You’re doing all the right things, so just keep at it.” My ego took a beating every time the monthly sales report came out. It listed the salespeople in order of most sales year-to-date, and my name had been at the bottom five months in a row. Several coworkers were new hires, just like me, and they were tallying up the wins, making my lack even more conspicuous. These coworkers had been hired to sell to a direct client base, and Catherine reminded me that always yields faster results. She was convinced that I should stay focused on the bank network, which she likened to hunting elephants: it may take a while, but when you get one down, it’s big. Despite her assurances, my confidence suffered. Banks are infamous for their hierarchical structure, which fosters an overemphasis on titles. I came in with the same assistant vice president title I’d earned in Portland. Besides Catherine and Dave, our longtime leading sales people, both vice presidents, I was the only person on the team with an officer designation. People work years to get that sort of recognition, and I’d walked in with it. Coworkers with “lesser” titles were outselling me, and I was sure Richard was not the only one to notice. I’d lie in bed at night, imagining month after long month passing, zeros swirling around my head. Had I bitten off more then I could chew? Was God punishing me for doubting? I’d imagine the day Richard would emerge from Catherine’s office, point to the flat line next to my name, and fire me on the spot. What a disappointment I’d been, after all my hubris, all my big plans. My freedom was tied up in this job, and I was petrified of failure. My base salary was enough to cover my expenses, but I’d counted on my commission checks to pay off debt, build savings, and eventually fund grand vacation adventures. These would now come later than I’d expected, if at all. But there was more at stake. In the wee hours of the morning, I played out mental scenarios where I lost my job, then became penniless and dependent upon my parents. I’d have no choice but to return to Portland in defeat, Mom shaking her head, lamenting how the world will always let you down. They’d invite me to sleep in my old room until I could get back on my feet. They’d welcome me back, of course, and drag me to the Kingdom Hall. Dreams vanquished, I’d acquiesce, receding once again into a dull, methodical life. Chapter 12 The first cure for illusion is despair. —Phillip Slater The days were getting shorter and colder. It was dark when I left home for the office, and it was dark when I returned.

• From Martin Luther (2016)

  For Luther, by contrast, political responsibility meant obedience first of all; “Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s.”5 The emperor was set in authority over the princes, and like all authority, he must be respected. But by 1530 Luther was beginning to reconsider, a process that would go through many twists and turns over the coming years. Luther’s Saxon ruler and his advisors had realized that if they were to continue passively obeying the emperor, the evangelical movement would not survive. In late December 1529 Luther told Elector Johann it was too soon to be thinking of resisting Charles—a formulation that seemed to allow that eventually, and in the right circumstances, the time might come. But, Luther insisted, they must not prepare for such an eventuality by taking to the field or arming themselves—a position that might seem to put principle above practicality. Yet Luther was probably correct in thinking that if Charles got to know of any such preparations, he would at once move against Saxony.6 Saxon politics continued to be overshadowed by the struggle between ducal and electoral Saxony, and Johann’s anxiety that the emperor might simply hand everything—land and the electoral title—to his Catholic rival Georg. This was a fear that the much more secure Philip of Hesse did not face. Luther’s unwillingness to countenance resistance was made clear in a letter of advice he wrote to the Elector on March 6, 1530.7 Resisting the emperor, he wrote, taking a much firmer line than the previous year, was inconceivable. It would be as if the mayor of the Saxon town of Torgau were to decide to protect his citizens against the rightful authority of the Elector himself.8 The comparison was unlikely to persuade any proud urban citizen, long used to the adage that “city air makes you free,” and to defending their rights against rapacious princes and nobles.9 But loyalty to the emperor, who so often protected those rights, ran in the bloodstream of towns: Nuremberg housed the jewels of the Reich, Augsburg had close financial ties to the empire, and imperial cities gloried in hosting the splendid Diets.

• From Shunned (2018)

  I felt the room closing in on me, followed by the intense need to bolt. I escaped to the restroom and splashed my face with cool water. I could hear the others’ laughter from a distance, as though it were coming from a far horizon, not the room next door. Collecting myself and taking a few deep breaths, I reentered the living room to find Ray organizing the group for charades. I forced a smile and excused myself, saying I needed to work the next day, denying myself the fun so as to escape the discomfort I felt in their company. Part of me envied their certainty, the black-and-white clarity of a long-established set of beliefs. My thinking had pushed beyond that, and their company reminded me of how many questions I was living with. I wasn’t even praying anymore, shying away from the face of Jehovah, not even sure what to pray for, yearning for a sense of innocence I thought I’d lost, innocence I imagined this group still possessed. Deborah saw me to the door, her long, wavy hair still pulled into a ponytail, showing the full bevel curve of her cheeks. “Perhaps we’ll see you at the Hall soon,” she said in a breezy, offhanded manner. “And we have weekly book study here on Tuesday. You’re always welcome. Most of the regulars are people who were here tonight.” “Thank you,” I said. “We’ll see.” I was numb to any feelings about going to the Kingdom Hall. I didn’t want to go, per se, but felt compelled to keep the option open. At the very least, it felt good to be known by such a warm soul. I could have a good friend in her if I wanted, I thought. [image "Images" file=Image00000.jpg] Traffic along Lake Shore Drive was at a standstill in both directions. I’d slipped out of the office early that afternoon, my first week back after the holiday break, feeling frail and small, possibly coming down with a virus, vacant any ambition, in no condition to conduct business. The lake was at my right, the wind stirring it into a mean, choppy stew that spread out empty, as far as the eye could see. It started to rain. Traffic reports and news blurbs gave way to music and the beat of my windshield wipers. I had no appointment to keep. No one was waiting for me. My only plan for the evening was to hibernate. There was little else to do but creep forward, following the taillights ahead of me, getting lost in my thoughts. Earlier that week, I’d received a phone call from my former boss Brian Martin in Portland. He was involved in a new business venture that was recruiting sales talent. He’d thought of me. “Just in case things aren’t working out as you’d hoped,” he’d said.

• From Shunned (2018)

  I wiggled in my chair, legs crossed this way, then the other, slipping my hands under each thigh, looking at my watch. It was dark outside, and the day was slipping away. Unlike Cinderella, I was very aware of the time, unable to lose myself in the night. This was a limited opening, with maybe two or three hours of grace remaining and no glass slipper to leave behind. The conversation was unambitious yet jovial. We never ventured too deep into emotions or ideology. It had been a long day for everyone. We discussed current property values and how the nearby neighborhoods had changed. Lory told us about her proselytizing at the local women’s prison, but only to make a point about crystal meth’s stranglehold on the community. The food was gooey, warm, and solid, and I enjoyed how it filled and grounded me, softening my edges. My watch showed 9:00 p.m. Randy had not returned from his own family mission. I helped Mom clear the table and bring out dessert. The friends had brought two cakes and a huge tray of cookies. It seemed like the right time to speak about Grandma, to hear some of the family lore, so I asked Dad and Uncle Jim to tell their favorite stories about her and whether they thought she was a strict mother. They both smiled with the wistfulness of bygone memories and started talking over each other. According to my dad, he was always running from the strap, while Jim got away with murder. “It’s true,” Jim said. “Mom and Dad spoiled me rotten.” “The youngest always gets away with murder,” Lory said, looking at me. Uncle Jim pushed back from the table as he and Paulie excused themselves to go home. They were the only people that night who asked for our phone number, for use if they happen to pass through the Bay Area. The front door closed behind them. It would have been a natural time for us to leave, too; it was almost ten o’clock, it had been a long day, and everyone was exhausted. But Mom invited everyone to sit down in the living room. “Maybe for a few minutes,” I said. “I was hoping Randy would return before we left.” Bob sat between Dad and me on the couch. Lory and Ove sat across from us on the stone shelf of the fireplace. Mom kicked off her shoes and rested in the wingback chair near the television. Her intensity lessened, the way a fountain ebbs down to a trickle. I figured we had twenty minutes tops; then we’d need to go, not because I felt unwelcome, but everyone was winding down. Bob would leave whenever I was ready. We’d come this far. No sooner had Mom sat down than she was up again, bringing framed photographs off the walls of the back room, two at a time, and showing them to Bob.

• From Shunned (2018)

  “Before you go too far with this,” Mom continued, “I want you to talk to your sister. Lory will tell you how hard it is to go through a divorce. Don’t you remember what a terrible time that was for her?” “Yes,” I said. My sister married her first husband when she was nineteen, and by her late twenties she’d grown very unhappy. As the marriage lost its luster, she had an affair with her boss. When the marriage ended, the congregation elders officially reproved Lory for her sin. She was very sorry for what she’d done, ended the affair, quit her job, and moved back to my parents’ home until she could get back on her feet emotionally and financially, but especially spiritually. That had all happened about ten years earlier, but her story continued to fuel and validate all fears that working full-time in the world exposed a person to real dangers. “This is a bit different, Mom,” I said. Lory had never expressed doubts about The Truth; she’d merely become distracted by life. “Of course everyone always thinks their own situation is different,” Mom said. “For starters,” I said, “there is no one else. I have not been unfaithful.” “Okay,” Mom said, and her tone softened. She shifted to a different tack. “I understand if you’re unhappy in your marriage. Your father and I have had our unhappy periods, so we understand how difficult that can be. But, Lindy, honey, don’t give up on your relationship with Jehovah.” I could feel my entire body tightening, my defenses building, and my voice was rigid and controlled when I responded, “When did I say I’d given up on my relationship with Jehovah? I only said I was taking a break from the meetings. Those are two separate things. Getting some space from an unhappy marriage and the relentless routine of meetings feels like a smart and healthy thing to do. It’s an act of self-preservation.” “Self-preservation or selfishness?” Mom said. “Getting space is going to hurt a lot of people and will only take you further away from Jehovah. You’ll only get more caught up in your job and being with worldly coworkers. It’s bound to take its toll. It already has. Yes, you must promise me you will talk to your sister, and soon.” To appease her, I said I would. “And, Lindy, you’ve gotta be careful out there in the big, bad world. You are going to find out that your only true friends are in The Truth. You can’t count on worldly people for lasting friendship. They’ll let you down every single time. It’s just the way it is.” Dad was twitching his lips. He turned to Ross. “Ross, what are your plans?” Ross half laughed and shook his head. “I don’t know, Frank. Survive. Get a roommate so I can afford the mortgage. See what happens.” “Well, you’re always welcome here,” Dad said. “Yes,” Mom said. “You’ve been a good son-in-law.

• From Shunned (2018)

  I noticed that no one had remembered to start the first load of laundry. I considered getting up, and the thought preoccupied me for the longest while, as I chewed my eggs and watched Lory spread jam on her toast. But I didn’t get up. I sat where I’d sat the night before, next to Mom, across from Lory and Ove, Dad at the head of the long table. Soon the dining table was cluttered with empty plates and rumpled paper napkins. The pace of the conversation was winding down. I sensed anxiety and expectation hanging over the group, like a tiger waiting to pounce. I knew this was the moment. We were all together. It’s now or never. A knot formed in my stomach, like tennis shoes tossed in a clothes dryer, each thud pulsing in my ears. I was feeling small, wanting to curl up in a ball and forget my name. “I suppose we should start washing the first load of towels,” Mom said, listless. “No, wait,” I said with a start, resting my hand on her arm. She looked at me, expectant. “I want to give you all that update I promised.” Mom’s shoulders dropped, and everyone settled in. I rested both hands on my lap, gazed down at them as I gained my composure. When I glanced up, all eyes were on me. They’d been waiting for this moment, too. A breeze came through the open screen door, curling pages of the newspaper stacked at the far end of the table. I started by looking directly at Mom. Her eyes still had some of the hopeful bounce of the night before, when she had shot the moon and won. But this was no game. I knew my words would be difficult to absorb or accept, so I spoke slowly. “First, I want you to understand—really hear—that Ross and I will never, ever, ever, ever get back together.” The light in her eye flickered out to a hard darkness. “That relationship is over. Really over.” There was a long pause, a cloak of gloom slipping in where the lightheartedness had been. “When Ross and I had breakfast, I told him he was free. I told him that I’d met someone else, been with someone else.” Mom, Lory, and Ove looked at me in stunned silence. Dad stared out the window, arms crossed at his chest. My heart was tightening, and I could feel little compartments of each chamber shrinking to close. “In anticipation of my visit here, I met with two elders in Chicago. They came by my apartment to discuss this.” “What did they say?” Ove perked up at the mention of elder business. “Of course, they were looking for some expression of remorse,” I said, my voice flat, matter-of-fact now, detached from my body. “But I’ve searched my heart and can find no regrets. If I told them I was sorry, it would be a lie.

• From Shunned (2018)

  I lobbed a round ball across the carpet and watched Leo trace it with his eyes. “Has anyone ever gone this long without making a sale?” I asked. “It’s been six months.” “I’m not sure,” she said. “No one can figure out why it’s taking you so long.” This question consumed my private thoughts. It had never been this hard or taken me this long to make my mark at work. Was Jehovah punishing me? “Join the party,” I said. “As far as I can tell, I’m doing everything I can, following all the classic sales techniques. I’ve got several banks so close. But they keep dragging their feet.” “We’re all rooting for you, and we know Catherine’s behind you. That’s the biggest thing you have going for you right now.” God, I don’t want to let Catherine down. “Richard can’t be happy,” Cindy added. “Has he said anything to you?” “I plan to beat him to the punch,” I said. “I’ve spent too many sleepless nights worrying about what Richard thinks of me or relying on Catherine to be my mouthpiece. I gave Catherine a heads-up and approached Richard about having a meeting to review everything I have in the pipeline.” “That took guts.” She stared at me in disbelief. “He seemed pleasantly surprised by my request. I’m going to walk him through all the deals I’m working on and what I think it will take to close each one. I want him to come out on a few appointments with me, get him involved, show executive support, and see if we can’t close a sale or two.” “When is this happening?” Cindy asked, an intrigued smile on her face. “Next week.” One dreary afternoon, I scrambled some eggs and sat at the dining table to eat and thumb through an audio catalog. I wanted to find a new program to listen to during my two-hour workday commute. In the “Spiritual Growth” section, the approachable smile of one of the speakers, Marianne Williamson, caught my eye. She had done a series of lectures based on something called a Course in Miracles and was described as a dynamic and uplifting spiritual teacher who’d helped transform the lives of millions. The description of the Course was intriguing: a thought system based on love, instead of fear, in which forgiveness of self and others could free you from judgment, guilt, and anger. The teachings combined spiritual psychology, Christianity, and Eastern philosophy, which I’d always found fascinating but had always been discouraged from exploring. My long-ingrained suspicions of Christendom lingered, so it was inconceivable for me to attend another church. I was leery about replacing one set of religious dogma for another. But listening to a self-study guide on tape was doable. If I heard anything that seemed too weird or found myself overcome with a feeling of betrayal, the eject button was right there.

• From Shunned (2018)

  Sipping from my mug, I watched two deer milling about in the meadow. I wished Dad was there to see them. How many times in my future will I wish the same thing? I busied myself in the kitchen, cracking the eggs and setting up everything for Dad to make omelets, his specialty. Still alone, I poured a second cup of coffee, grabbed a blanket, and went outside to sit on the deck. I hope this comes out all right. How will I begin? When? Before breakfast? After? Will they stop talking to me right away? None of these were new thoughts. I’d rehearsed different phrases over and over, but it was always a mental exercise. Surrounded by such bucolic conditions, did I really want to spoil everything? A sound came from the kitchen. The doe and her speckled fawn froze in place for a moment, then resumed chewing. Dad poured himself a cup of coffee and then came outside. He’d dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, but his hair was uncombed. “We have company,” I said softly. “I see,” he said, sitting down on the lounge chair next to mine. Just then, another sound came from the kitchen. It was Lory, pouring herself some orange juice. Mom was up next, and soon we four were all sitting on the deck, lined up in a row, looking out at the deer. It meant so much to be there, together, in peace. Every cell in my body was alive, knowing I stood on the edge of a moment that would change everything. We engaged in idle chatter and read the Sunday paper. “You got up early,” Mom said to me. Behind the comment, I felt her anticipation. She would not have forgotten my promise from two days earlier, to tell them all about my conversation with Ross. There wasn’t much time left at the house; it was our tradition to begin washing linens during breakfast, then throw them in the dryer while we took a final bike ride together. This morning was all I had left. “I guess I’m still on Chicago time,” I said. The screen door slid open, and Ove emerged barefoot in his bathrobe, coffee mug in hand. “My head hurts,” he said. “I’m not used to drinking that much wine.” “I’ll be sure to make your omelet extra greasy,” Dad said, then stood up and went in to the kitchen. Soon the scent of bacon and hash browns was floating around and drew us inside. Lory set the table, and I made more coffee. We sat down, and Dad served us up one by one.

• From Martin Luther (2016)

  72. See WB 5, 1708, Aug. 29, 1530 (Melanchthon to Luther); on the Eucharist, the Lutheran side was insisting that it could never be right to give Communion in one kind only, and that those who did so sinned, though those laity who received Communion in one kind only did not sin; that is to say, they were not willing to accept Communion in one kind for the rest of the Church. They would also not accept private Masses, or the canons of the Mass that presented it as a sacrifice. However, monks and nuns who were living in monasteries could, the Lutherans agreed, continue to live there, and in monasteries that were empty, new members could be taken on, but they should not follow rules or orders—a solution that might have permitted compromise. Fasting should not become an issue of conscience, but secular authorities might make regulations about it. See also Philip of Hesse’s understanding of what was on offer (1709, Aug. 29, 1530). He was particularly concerned about the concessions on fasting and the power of bishops. Schnepf, his preacher, thought it would be very dangerous to concede to the bishops their previous power, though in other respects he agreed with Melanchthon. The model of peaceful coexistence Schnepf had in mind was like that with the Jews (Förstemann, Urkundenbuch, II, 311–12, late August), but this model became one the Lutherans would reject. 73. WB 5, 1711, Sept. 4, 1530. He also worried that the Lutherans’ allies were starting to sympathize with the Swiss, and so it was even more important to conclude peace soon. 74. Later it gained support from Heilbronn, Kempten, Windsheim, Weissenburg, and Frankfurt. 75. WB 5, 1720, Sept. 20, 1530, 624–25, Introduction to letter; and see Walch, XVI, 1482–84, first letter of Hieronymus Baumgartner to Lazarus Spengler, Sept. 13, 1530; and see also cols. 1523–25, complaining Melanchthon “has become more childish than a child”; and second letter of Hieronymus Baumgartner to Lazarus Spengler, Sept. 15, 1530, accusing Melanchthon of cursing, shouting, and insisting on his own authority. Baumgartner begged Spengler to take the matter up with Luther, and Spengler did so in person, becoming the messenger taking the letters to Jonas and Melanchthon. The complaints had gone on for three weeks: Luther had written to Spengler to defend Melanchthon on August 28 (WB 5, 1707) and then, shortly after, Melanchthon had complained to Luther that Baumgartner, furious about their concessions on bishops, had written to him that if he had been massively bribed by the Roman papacy he could have found no better way to reinstitute papal rule (WB 5, 1710, Sept. 1, 1530). 76. WB 5, 1721, Sept. 20, 1530, 628:23. 77. WB 5, 1722, Sept. 20, 1530, 628:4–5. Yet on the same day, Luther also wrote to Linck defending Melanchthon against the complaints that he had conceded too much. 78. WB 5, 1726, Sept. 28, 1530. Spengler knew that the letters would only split the movement pointlessly.

• From Martin Luther (2016)

  For Melanchthon, it was imperative to consider every option, for he was convinced that, if no agreement could be reached, the ultimate result would be war. By September he was worrying constantly about impending catastrophe, aware of how few princes and cities supported the evangelicals, although he underestimated how much the Catholic princes were fearful of giving too much power to an already overmighty emperor.73 On the evangelical side were only a handful of rulers: the dukes of Lüneburg and Brandenburg, the prince of Anhalt, the Saxon Elector, Philip of Hesse, and only Nuremberg and Reutlingen had signed the confession; the sacramentarians did not sign.74 Moreover, Philip might turn to the Zwinglians at any time, and Nuremberg was unlikely to risk opposing the emperor. Melanchthon understood, in ways that the isolated Luther could not, just how desperate the evangelical position would be, politically and militarily, if there was no deal. For Luther, however, compromise was now out of the question. Letters he wrote just before the end of the Diet reveal just how far relations with Melanchthon had deteriorated.75 On September 20, Luther told Melanchthon that people had been complaining about his conduct of the negotiations, and asked for more detail “so that I can stop the mouths of your detractors.”76 On the same day he wrote to Jonas without beating about the bush: He and Melanchthon had been entrusted with defending the gospel, “but now from some of our people, important and many of them, thunder and lightning has reached me, that you betrayed the matter and for the sake of peace would concede more….So that I’m driven to say, if this is how things stand, then the Devil himself has made a pretty division among us.”77 Luther knew that Melanchthon and the other Wittenbergers would most likely read this letter. Both were given to the Nuremberger Lazarus Spengler, but the Diet ended before he could deliver them. Spengler sent them back to Luther as soon as he realized there was no more opportunity for Melanchthon to make the damaging concessions Luther feared.78

• From Martin Luther (2016)

  Ill and weak, he knew that travel was putting his life at risk but he was determined to go because the counts of Mansfeld wanted him to settle a dispute between them: Albrecht was at loggerheads with his brother Gebhard, while Counts Ernst and Johann Georg had fallen out with him over the administration of the mines. Although Luther had rejected his father’s plans for him, he had never relinquished his obligations to protect the family business. 1 The copper and silver mining, “given by God, so that there is nothing like it in all Germany,” and once so thriving, was in chaotic decline. 2 Mansfeld had been a boom town, its fabulous riches paying for the three Renaissance castles towering up on the hill. The five counts had divided responsibilities for the territory, and not surprisingly this had led to bitter disputes. Albrecht and Gebhard were doughty supporters of Luther, as were the new counts, Philip and Johann Georg, but the old counts Hoyer, Günter, and Ernst had been Catholics, so the chapel had two entrances, one for the Lutherans, the other for the Catholic counts. The old count Ernst had used his patronage rights over St. Andreas Church in Eisleben to appoint Luther’s bitter enemy Georg Witzel as pastor, while Albrecht had appointed Caspar Güttel, one of Luther’s early associates, as preacher; one can only wonder what the congregation made of this. 3 The counts had run the mines collectively until 1536, when Albrecht persuaded the others to divide them up as well. For years they had puzzled over how to increase their revenue as their own incomes were declining, while the mine owners and the capitalists of Nuremberg appeared to be amassing huge wealth. In 1542—seized by “miserliness,” as Luther’s physician and later biographer Matthäus Ratzeberger put it—they had revoked all the temporary leases, one of which Luther’s father had held; now they wanted to run the mines themselves and turn the smelters into their employees. 4 The Lutheran Albrecht had come up with the policy, but Luther was determined to protect the rights of the smelters, even attempting to get the count’s overlord, Duke Moritz of Saxony, to intervene. It was all caused by jealousy, Luther argued, “because whoever has something, has many people who envy them.” Once again, he took things personally: The Devil was behind the plan, as Luther’s enemies wanted to see the whole country reduced to poverty, “so that they could boast: look how God curses all those who support the gospel and lets them fall into ruin, and as a sign, [Luther’s] own fatherland has been utterly ruined.” 5 Despite serious illness, therefore, Luther had traveled to Mansfeld in October 1545 to stop the scheme from going ahead. 6 He failed, and in the end he was proved right: The counts’ experiment in running the mines was a disaster.

• From The Battle for God (2000)

  In any case, for some three days he kept a low profile. But when Bazargan realized that he could not get Khomeini’s support for the evacuation of the embassy, he recognized his political impotence and resigned on November 6, together with the foreign secretary, Ibrahim Yazdi. Rather to their own surprise, the students, who had expected their siege to last only a few days, found that they had spearheaded a major confrontation between Iran and the United States. Khomeini and the Islamic Revolutionary Republic threw their support behind the students. The huge publicity surrounding the hostage crisis worldwide gave Khomeini a new assertiveness. In the event, even though the women hostages and black Marine guards were released, the remaining fifty-two American diplomats were held for 444 days and became an icon of Iranian radicalism. For Khomeini, the hostages were a godsend. By focusing attention on the Great Satan, an external enemy, their capture and the post-revolutionary hatred of America that ensued united Iranians behind Khomeini during a period of internal turbulence. The departure of Bazargan removed, at a stroke, the most vociferous opponent of the draft constitution, and weakened the strength of the opposition. Accordingly, the new constitution was passed in the December referendum with an impressive majority. Khomeini saw the hostage crisis simply in terms of his own domestic situation. As he explained to Bani Sadr, his new prime minister, at the outset: This action has many benefits. The Americans do not want to see the Islamic Republic taking root. We keep the hostages, finish our internal work, then release them. This has united our people. Our opponents do not dare act against us. We can put the constitution to the people’s vote without difficulty, and carry out presidential and parliamentary elections. When we have finished all these jobs, we can let the hostages go. 4 This was a policy dictated not by the mythos of Islam, despite Khomeini’s fiery rhetoric, but a piece of pragmatic logos . Nevertheless, the crisis also changed Khomeini’s own profile.

• From The Battle for God (2000)

  Because of the Christian concern with doctrine, Protestant fundamentalism had set out in a different direction from the other movements we have considered. The Jewish and Muslim emphasis on practice had meant that fundamentalists in these faiths had turned the myths of their traditions into ideologies. Some of their worst excesses had come about because they had tried to realize these mythologies literally in the practical world of affairs. They had sought to meet the modern criterion of efficiency, in which a “truth” had to work effectively in order to be taken seriously. Jewish and Muslim fundamentalists had turned their mythoi into pragmatic logoi designed to achieve a practical result. Protestant fundamentalists had perverted myth in a different way. They had turned the Christian myths into scientific facts, and had created a hybrid that was neither good science nor good religion. This had run counter to the whole tradition of spirituality and had involved great strain, since religious truth is not rational in nature and cannot be proved scientifically. Because Protestant fundamentalists tended to overlook the intuitive and the mystical, they had also lost touch with the unconscious, deeper impulses of the personality. As a result, American revivalism had sometimes been anarchic and neurotic. By the late 1980 S , some fundamentalists were ready to revolt against the constraints of this rationalistic faith. Sex, as we have seen, was problematic for fundamentalists, many of whom appeared to be anxious about potency and gender boundaries. It was not surprising, perhaps, that the rebellion, when it came, took a sexual form. Television and the public adulation that sometimes comes with it are also traps for the spiritually unwary. Not only is the narcissism involved in a personality cult incompatible with the transcendence of ego that should characterize the spiritual quest, but the televangelist could also lose touch with reality. The vast sums of money that the more successful networks could command sat uneasily with the Gospel demand to abandon the pursuit of material wealth. Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker of PTL (Praise The Lord and People That Love) network in North Carolina had attracted adverse criticism for their extravagant lifestyle. The Charlotte Observer had for some years been pointing out that while they urged their viewers to make sacrifices and give their money to the needy, the Bakkers themselves had spent $375,000 on an ocean-front condominium and $22,000 on floor-to-ceiling mirrors. 112 All this was a far cry from Jerry Falwell’s regime in Lynchburg, which was characterized by sobriety and self-restraint. The Bakkers were chiefly known for their Christian theme park, Heritage USA, which portrayed the evangelical experience of North America Disney-style, and attracted huge numbers of visitors.

• From Shunned (2018)

  In his eyes, I’m still married, until either Ross or I die or one of us goes outside the marriage for sex. If anyone sees me with you, news will travel and I’ll be forced to answer questions about our relationship.” “How is it anyone’s business but ours?” The light had turned green, and the car behind us honked. I looked ahead and continued to drive the last few miles home. “That’s your point of view—one I agree with, by the way. But, Geoff, it’s not that simple. The elders are required to keep the congregation clean of immoral activity. Technically speaking, we’re immoral people. But I’m worse than you, because I’m a member of the congregation.” “But I still don’t understand. You’ve left the religion, so what difference does any of this nonsense make?” I parked the car in my assigned space and turned off the ignition. My anxiety grew; I feared he would think my family and me gullible fools. “I voluntarily stopped participating, which doesn’t break any biblical laws, per se. But if they found out I’d committed adultery, I could get disfellowshipped.” “Disfellowshipped? What does that mean?” I really wanted him to understand my dilemma. “It means I’d be excommunicated, completely shunned, by everyone I know— even the people closest to me, my mom and dad, Lory.” Saying their names was painful. I saw each of their faces in my mind’s eye and lost my breath, unable to speak for several moments. My shoulders trembled, and I started to cry. “My brother is already shunning me. He won’t return my calls. He refuses to come to my home. It’s terrible, just terrible.” My voice trailed off. I put my hand over my mouth to keep from falling apart completely. Geoff pulled a cotton handkerchief from his jean pocket. “Here you go,” he said, unfolding it for me. I covered my whole face with it and started to cry so hard I got the hiccups. Geoff didn’t try to stop me. He just sat there, gallant and waiting. After what seemed like an eternity, my breathing slowed and I wiped my eyes dry. We were both leaning against our door windows, looking at each other. Every few seconds, I hiccuped. Geoff’s face was filled with compassion and bewilderment. “Take your time. But I want to hear the rest.” I nodded my head as more tears came.

• From Shunned (2018)

  The norms of my family. What an interesting term. Black pants it was. We set out to purchase wine at the Fred Meyer in my old neighborhood. Here, memories clashed with reality, reminding me of all that had irreversibly changed. Nothing in the store was as it once was. Produce was where the pharmacy used to be, and wine racks stood horizontal to where refrigeration units once held dairy. Gone were the metal bins holding recycled pop cans. As kids we used to collect beer and soda cans and turn them in here for five cents each, then go to the candy department and buy a handful of Jolly Ranchers. The candy section now housed lottery kiosks, and a lineup of people were holding dollar bills, waiting to enter their magic numbers. I might as well have been in a foreign place. Our motive for purchasing wine was twofold. First, there was the matter of etiquette and the desire to contribute something, anything. My parents had taught me never to show up as an empty-handed dinner guest. Equal to that, I wanted to have some choice in what we drank, as discovering, drinking, and collecting wines is part of Bob’s and my lifestyle. In homage to my family, we chose pinot noirs made in Newberg and the Dundee Hills, where both of my parents grew up. If the evening was a complete bust—a fear I had not yet shaken—we would find consolation in a good wine. I parked on the street across from my parents’ house. Their driveway was full of cars, and street parking would allow us an easy exit whenever that time came. “This is it, Bobby,” I said. “This is where I lived from the ages of three to twenty.” My eyes came to rest on the rhododendrons hugging the edge of the living room picture window. This was where Lory, Randy, and I had stood for the photograph that sits near my writing desk, the day my childhood self had imagined the faceless hooded riders coming to get my dad. I remember my urgent need to convince him not to be stubborn, to change his mind, to convince him how much safer he would be if only he’d just believe. If only. Just believe. Please. Now I understood how much that was to ask of him. Now there were people in my parents’ home worried the faceless hooded riders would come to get me. They could come any day now. How foolish we all had been, each in our own way. Bob grabbed the two bottles of wine, and we walked through the driveway, past several parked cars. The only car I recognized was Dad’s Trooper. The living room was lit up, and through the sheer curtains I could make out several people standing around, huddled in pockets of conversation.

• From The Battle for God (2000)

  He longed to take part in the German Enlightenment, became a personal friend of Kant’s, and spent all his free time in study. His first book, Phaedon (1767), was an attempt to prove the immortality of the soul on rational grounds, and had nothing particularly Jewish about it. Against his will, however, Mendelssohn found himself obliged to defend Judaism when he encountered Enlightenment hostility to the Jewish faith. In 1769, Johan Casper Lavater, a Swiss pastor, challenged Mendelssohn to defend Judaism in public; if he could not refute the rational proofs of Christianity, Lavater declared, he should submit to baptism. Mendelssohn was also disturbed by the anti-Semitic prejudice in a pamphlet written by a Prussian state official, Christian Wilhelm Van Dohm, On the Civic Improvement of the Condition of the Jews (1781). In order to function effectively and competitively in the modern world, Van Dohm argued, a nation must mobilize the talents of as many people as possible, so it made sense to emancipate the Jews and integrate them more fully into society, even though they should not be granted citizenship or permitted to hold public office. The underlying assumption was that Jews were objectionable and their religion was barbaric. Reluctantly, Mendelssohn felt bound to respond, and in 1783 he published Jerusalem, Concerning Religious Authority and Judaism . The German Enlightenment was quite positive toward religion, and Mendelssohn himself seemed to share the same serene deist faith as Locke, though it is difficult to recognize it as Judaism. Mendelssohn seemed to find the existence of a benevolent God a matter of common sense, but insisted that reason must precede faith. We could only accept the authority of the Bible after we had demonstrated its truth rationally. This, of course, totally reversed the priorities of traditional, conservative faith, which took it for granted that reason could not demonstrate the truth of the kind of myths found in the scriptures. Mendelssohn also argued for the separation of church and state, and for the privatization of religion—a solution that was very attractive to Jews who longed to shake off the restrictions of the ghetto and become involved in mainstream European culture. By making their faith a purely personal affair, they could both remain Jewish and become good Europeans. Mendelssohn insisted that Judaism was a rational faith that was eminently suited to the temper of the times; its doctrines were based on reason. When God had revealed himself to Moses on Mount Sinai, he had brought the Jewish people a law and not a set of doctrines.

• From Martin Luther (2016)

  Beyond it, other reformers emerged who would take his Reformation in different directions. In the Wartburg, Luther began to suffer from severe constipation, which had first affected him at Worms. As he wrote to Spalatin, “the Lord strikes me in my posterior with serious pain.” The pains were his own special “relic of the Cross,” he quipped. 9 He went for four, sometimes even six days without a bowel movement and the excrement was so hard that it caused bleeding. “Now I sit in pain like a woman in childbirth, ripped up, bloody and I will have little rest tonight,” he wrote. 10 Just as he was in isolation from the outside world, so his body also seemed sealed off, unable to “flow”—the process humoral medicine considered fundamental to physical health. The condition lasted until the autumn and must have added to Luther’s sense of physical discomfort, with a different diet, a sedentary lifestyle, and clothing that constantly constricted the body. But perhaps, after the fevered rush of the period leading up to the Diet of Worms, the constipation reflected his own turning inward, entering a period of inactivity as essential as it was difficult, before he could become creative again. 11 He also experienced attacks of the Devil. The story that was to become famous, of Luther throwing an inkpot at the Devil—the stain still visible today on the wall of his castle room—almost certainly rests on a misreading of Luther’s remark that he would fight the Devil with ink: that is, the printed word. But there was a new urgency about the Devil’s attacks, partly because without his friends and colleagues to talk to, Luther’s inner world loomed larger. “In this leisurely solitude” he was “exposed to a thousand devils,” he wrote. In one sense he was a monk because he was alone, he told Spalatin, and yet “I am not actually a monk [that is, a hermit, alone], because I have many evil and astute demons with me; they ‘amuse’ me, as one says, but in a disturbing way.” 12 What were these attacks of the Devil about? During his time in the Wartburg, Luther had to come to terms with his body in new ways. “I sit here like a fool and hardened in leisure, pray little, do not sigh for the church of God, yet burn in a big fire of my untamed body. In short I should be ardent in spirit, but I am ardent in the flesh, in lust, laziness, leisure and sleepiness.” 13 It was not just constipation that made him painfully aware of the flesh; nor was Luther describing sexual lust alone.

• From Martin Luther (2016)

  To Luther, this merely showed that there was not one, but five or six different sects, and for him this was proof that “they would soon perish.” 15 It was not obvious, however, that the Lutherans were winning. They certainly published more, and in more places. And they had censorship on their side. In Leipzig and Erfurt, almost nothing was published that deviated from the Lutheran line; in Nuremberg and Basle, Karlstadt’s works on the sacrament were banned, with Nuremberg prohibiting Zwingli’s works for good measure. But Luther heard from all sides that it was the sacramentarian pamphlets that were selling and setting the intellectual agenda. Those loyal to Luther—Amsdorf, Bugenhagen, his Nuremberg friend Andreas Osiander—were men with personal ties to him; he was therefore overjoyed when, without any urging, “the very learned Swabians” took up the cause and wrote “excellently” against Zwingli and Oecolampadius. 16 For the first time, however, Luther and his supporters were on the defensive, with Luther no longer the first to develop new and intellectually exciting positions. As a result, his mood became increasingly apocalyptic, and his tone to correspondents more and more strident. In early January 1527 he worried that even his old friend Nikolaus Hausmann might be falling for the sacramentarians. When reassured by Hausmann, Luther replied that he had not credited the rumor, “for I always believed this about you,” going on to ask for his friend’s prayer that God might guide his pen against Satan. 17 Even a rumor that the town council of Memmingen had decided to abolish Communion as a compulsory sacrament was enough to make Luther pick up his pen and hector the councilors: “Oh dear lords, act before matters become worse! The Devil, let in this far, will not rest until he has made things yet worse. Be warned, watch out, dear friends. It is time, it is an emergency.” 18 Luther’s relief when Michael Stifel in Tollet, a long-standing correspondent, turned out to have remained “constant in faith” leaps off the page. Luther goes on to tell him that it is because of “God’s anger” that so many are persuaded by the “absurd and childish” arguments of those who say that since Christ is at God’s right hand, he cannot be in the bread. 19 In a letter to Johann Hess in Silesia in 1526, he mourned the loss of Crautwald and Schwenckfeld to “these evils” and warned that the fight with the dragon of the Apocalypse was at hand. 20 In another letter to Thomas Neuenhagen in Eisenach, whom he hardly knew, Luther admonished him not to follow the Eisenach preacher Jacob Strauss. “You should serve Christ, he has served Satan,” he wrote. 21 Shortly afterward, he wrote to Nikolaus Hausmann that the heresies were Satan’s “ragings,” for “the Last Days are at the door.”

• From Martin Luther (2016)

  For reformers like Luther, who insisted that the Word of God must be the sole religious authority, it was not easy to counter beliefs that derived so firmly from the letter of Scripture. Luther’s argument that godparents could make profession of faith on behalf of the infant had no basis in the Gospels, and instead rested on Church tradition—this from the man who at Worms rejected any argument derived from a nonscriptural source. On the whole, though, he did not spill much ink refuting Anabaptism itself, perhaps because he felt uncomfortable about his argument, perhaps because the prime concern was fighting the sacramentarians. In 1528 he wrote a pamphlet in the form of a letter to two pastors who had asked for help refuting Anabaptism. Written at speed, its argument is contradictory, mainly claiming that the Anabaptists took a spiritualist approach to baptism. The authoritative Lutheran tract was written by Justus Menius in 1530, with Luther merely supplying an approving preface.10 But the encounter with Anabaptism was important because it highlights Luther’s thought about the role of baptism and the nature of the Church, as he set about establishing the Church in Saxony. Baptism raised the fundamental question of who was a member: everyone in the community, or a minority, those who had been saved. Luther wanted an inclusive Church, with universal infant baptism, yet in his gloomier moments, he also thought that the true Church of genuine Christians was invisible and comprised only a handful of souls. Infant baptism cemented that universal membership of the Church and it aligned the community with the congregation: Everyone who was baptized automatically belonged to it. Baptism and the Eucharist were the only two of the seven Catholic sacraments that Luther regarded as scriptural; he remained unsure about the status of confession. A conservative, he made few changes to the rite because he shared much of the Catholic view of it. He believed deeply that baptism initiated the struggle against the Devil, and it is striking how often he referred to baptism when writing about Satan. Baptism is the promise made to us by God, and faith is not required to merit it: This was the deeper reason why he rejected Anabaptism. Luther’s theology shared nothing of the later Protestant emphasis on the experience of “being saved,” with which his insistence on “faith alone” is so often confused. This also gave secular authority a role in regulating the external parameters of the Church and underpinned the alliance of ecclesiastical and political authority. Rejecting infant baptism would have meant disestablishing the Church and removing the partnership with the state; it was something that Luther would never contemplate giving up.

• From The Battle for God (2000)

  It represents a widespread disappointment, alienation, anxiety, and rage that no government can safely ignore. So far, efforts to deal with fundamentalism have not been very successful; what lessons can we learn from the past that will help us to deal more creatively in the future with the fears that fundamentalism enshrines? * This became even more evident in the summer of 1999, when Iranian students came out onto the streets to demand more democracy and an Islamic government that is not impeded by reactionary ulema . NOTES I ntroduction 1. Abdel Salam Sidahared and Anonshiravan Ehteshani (eds.) Islamic Fundamentalism (Boulder, Colo, 1996), 4. 2. Martin E. Marty and R. Scott Appleby, “Conclusion: An Interim Report on a Hypothetical Family,” Fundamentalisms Observed (Chicago and London, 1991), 814–42. 3. Johannes Sloek, Devotional Language (trans. Henrik Mossin; Berlin and New York, 1996), 53–96. 4. Mircea Eliade, Patterns in Comparative Religion (trans. Rosemary Sheed; London, 1958), 453–55. 5. Sloek, Devotional Language , 75–76. 6. Ibid., 73–74; Thomas L. Thompson, The Bible in History: How Writers Create a Past (London, 1999), 15–33. 7. Sloek, Devotional Language , 50–52, 68–71. 8. Karen Armstrong, Holy War: The Crusades and Their Impact on Today’s World (London, 1988; New York and London, 1991), 3–75, 147–274. 9. Sloek, Devotional Language , 134. 1. J ews: T he P recursors ( 1482–1700 ) 1. Paul Johnson, A History of the Jews (London, 1987), 229; Yirmiyahu Yovel, Spinoza and Other Heretics. I: The Marrano of Reason (Princeton, N.J., 1989), 17–18. 2. Johnson, A History of the Jews , 230; Friedrich Heer, The Medieval World 1100–1350 (trans. Janet Sondheimer; London, 1962), 318. 3. Yovel, The Marrano of Reason , 17. 4. Johnson, A History of the Jews , 217–25. 5. Ibid., 217–25; Haim Maccoby, Judaism on Trial: Jewish Christian Debates in the Middle Ages (Princeton, N.J., 1982); Haim Beinart, Conversos on Trial: The Inquisition in Ciudad Real (Jerusalem, 1981), 3–6. 6. Johnson, A History of the Jews , 225–29. 7. Ibid., 230–31. 8. Gershom Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism (London, 1955), 246–49. 9. Gershom Scholem, Sabbatai Sevi, The Mystical Messiah (London and Princeton, N.J., 1973), 118–19. 10. Ibid., 19. 11. Ibid., 30–45; Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism , 245–80; Gershom Scholem, “The Messianic Idea in Kabbalism,” in Scholem, The Messianic Idea in Judaism and Other Essays on Jewish Spirituality (New York, 1971), 43–48. 12. Johannes Sloek, Devotional Language (trans. Henrik Mossin; Berlin and New York, 1996), 73–76. 13. Scholem, Sabbatai Sevi , 24. 14. Ibid., 23–25; R. J. Werblowsky, “Messianism in Jewish History,” in Marc Saperstein (ed.), Essential Papers in Messianic Movements in Jewish History (New York and London, 1992), 48. 15. Scholem, Sabbatai Sevi , 37–42. 16. Richard L. Rubinstein, After Auschwitz: Radical Theology and Contemporary Judaism (Indianapolis, Ind., 1966). 17. R. J. Wenlowsky, “The Safed Revival and Its Aftermath,” in Arthur Green (ed.), Jewish Spirituality , 2 vols. (London, 1986, 1989), II, 15–19. 18. Gershom Scholem, On the Kabbalah and Its Symbolism (New York, 1965), 150. 19.