Graven image3/22/2023 Historically, this emphasis on the Word has had a deep impact on Western culture. We address Him in the language of prayer, and He addresses us in the language of Scripture. "It takes conversation to share thoughts and personalities."Ĭhristians are meant to have an ongoing conversation with God. We cannot know people intimately merely by being in their presence," Veith says. Gene Edward Veith, in "Reading Between the Lines," explains why: The heart of our religion is a relationship with God- and relationships thrive on communication. Judaic Christianity alone insists on the primacy of language. Yet most teach that the way to contact the divine is through mystical visions, emotional experiences, or Eastern-style meditation. Many religions have a scripture, of course. This is the God Christians worship today-a God known principally through His Word. As a young man, he read the Ten Commandments and was struck by the words: "You shall not make for yourself a graven image." Postman says he realized that the idea of a universal deity cannot be expressed in images but only in words.Īs he writes, "The God of the Jews was to exist in the Word and through the Word, an unprecedented conception requiring the highest order of abstract thinking." Postman says he first discovered this connection in the Bible. The medium of communication actually helps shape the way people think. But television, with its fast-moving images, encourages a short attention span, disjointed thinking, and purely emotional responses. The printed word requires sustained attention, logical analysis, and an active imagination. Postman's thesis is that different types of media encourage different ways of thinking. A few years ago, Neil Postman wrote a devastating critique of television called "Amusing Ourselves to Death." The book was welcomed by critics and reviewed in all the right magazines, but not once did we learn where Postman got his ideas.
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