Shuffling towards Epiphany: T.S. Eliot and the state of the world and of ourselves

Epiphany is the sort of culmination of the Christmas season (unless you are one of the die-hards who are holding out for Candlemas, which I may be). The Wise Men finally get to the stable to present their prophetic gifts to the Child: gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Treasure, to be sure, and all symbolic, regarding kingship and his ultimate sacrifice. 

All jokes about casseroles, diapers, and asking for directions aside (though those are funny), the idea of a truly epiphanic moment intrigues me. We are all looking for the Holy Aha! moment, aren't we? The world is a chaotic, violent place, at least for far too many people. Our own country is in some sort of fever dream. And even our local towns are rife with grumbling and divisiveness. This can't be all there is, can it? I sure hope not. 

T.S. Eliot (yes, that poet, and yes, I know about his personal beliefs, which I do not hold with) wrote a poem titled "The Hollow Men," which ends with 

This is the way the world ends

This is the way the world ends

This is the way the world ends

Not with a bang, but a whimper.

Grim. He wrote it right after World War I, and the soul-shaking that was the obvious aftermath that came with it. It seems we are too inured to war, now. O, there's upheaval in the Middle East. That sucks. O, the war in Ukraine? Hope it doesn't disrupt the supply chain again. I can't even. How did we get to such a place, emotionally and spiritually, that such devastation and cruelty barely register? 

We need an epiphany. We need to understand that humanity is supposed to take care of each other. This much anger and death is truly evil. 

Eliot also wrote another poem, titled "The Journey of the Magi" which is in the voice of one of the Kings. The speaker of the poem is grumbling about the difficulty of the journey to the Child; not just about the physical hardships, but also about the ending of their role as kings in the human sphere. He understands that their way of running things is coming to an end, as it must and should. The poem ends with this:

                                                        ...this Birth was
Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.
We returned to our places, these Kingdoms,
But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation,
With an alien people clutching their gods.
I should be glad of another death.

The understanding we should come to by the end of this poem is that the path ahead should not, cannot, lie in a social order that relies on a "strong man" abuse of power. That is not the Star we want.

And that, I think, is an Epiphany we should listen to.

Have a good day,

C