The Beginning

Hello and welcome!

The whole idea for this blog was inspired by this post by my friend Elisabeth Jessen on her blog Theologian Astray (the blog is written in Danish so I'm somewhat reliant on good old Google Translate to read her posts).

More specifically, points 3 and 5 resonated with me most strongly. I have just completed the first term of my DPhil and it has been a whirlwind of seminars, reading and grappling with exactly what kind of project I want to spend three years on. Already that panicked feeling of "how on Earth am I going to keep track of all this material?!" has begun to creep in. Having a place in which to note down thoughts and ideas I'm having as I go through the project, I think, will be utterly invaluable.

There's also Elisabeth's (much more laudible) purpose of blogging, whereby her blog provides a forum to articulate and communicate to the wider world what the state is allowing her to research. Often in academic study, it's very easy to get bogged down by the more selfish insticts and questions. To fixate on "what do I want to do?" "what do I want to get out of this?" and so on. Ultimately, it is not (or rather, it ought not to be) the final 100,000 word distillation of three years reading and researching which becomes one's contribution to knowledge. Over the course of even just a term, I have unearthed a few pockets of information which have inspired and heartened me, but which I know ultimately won't make it into the bound thesis which will sit and gather dust in the Bodleian Library. So this is also a space to share and reflect upon those discoveries, regardless of how integral they become to my wider academic work.

That's the theory, anyway.

All that's well and good, but a few words of introduction are needed. Firstly, about the project. My inspiration to do a DPhil was, in the main, sparked by the final two chapters of the book of Revelation. In these chapters, the author of the book (who we simply know as "John... on the island called Patmos" in 1:8) sees "a new heaven and a new earth" become installed (21:1) and "the new holy city Jerusalem" descend from heaven (21:2). The ensuing description of the structure and life in this new city is utopic. It's a life which is characterised by a unity with God and an idealised, harmonious society which shares in the restored gifts of the Garden of Eden (by way of Ezekiel 40-48, but I'll get to that some other time). This optimistic vision, immediately follows around 18 chapters of judgement, conflict and suffering, envisaged as part of a final, cosmic battle between what I like to call "the good guys" (God, Jesus, the angels, the faithful followers etc) and "the bad guys" (the Devil, the beasts he summons, people taken in by the beasts he summmons). Those cycles of destruction and judgement are in part inspired by John's favourite books of the Hebrew Bible (most notably Ezekiel, Daniel and Isaiah). But in the visions recounted in the text, glimmers of John's contemporary context show through, and so the book in part tells the story of John's dissatisfaction with the Roman Empire, and its activities both within Asia Minor (essentially Turkey and the area surrounding it) and in the wider world. The vision in chapters 21-22, then, are a contrast to John's current situation, in which God is separated from humanity by the problems of the present, evil age. It is, at least in my view, a vision which gives the author hope for the future, that he will be able to participate in an idealised world, free from all of the problems posed by life under the demonically-inspired Roman Empire.

Revelation stands today as one of the most controversial, and perhaps most misunderstood text in the Bible. It has also, however, been a highly influential text which has inspired writers, artists and theologians at every stage of its transmission and reception. My research seeks to look at the ways in which writers during a specific period of British history were inspired by the book, and how the book's climactic chapters helped them to formulate their expectations for the resolution of the crises they were experiencing. In particular, I am looking at how the poet and artist William Blake, his contemporary Samuel Taylor Coleridge, the prophetess Joanna Southcott and the prophet Richard Brothers (who actually tried to build the New Jerusalem) are inspired by the utopic blueprint set down in Revelation 21-22. The period of history these figures lived through (late eighteenth and early nineteenth century) was one which was blighted by revolution, both in America and in France. It was also an era which was at the very heart of the enlightenment with its corresponding advances in print technology and (crucially for Coleridge, in particular) the foundation of the modern critical methods by which we approach biblical studies in the academy today.

So that's the project (it's not quite the one I first imagined I would be tackling, but that's a story for another day). What about me?

Well, this is now my seventh year in Oxford. I originally did my undergraduate degree in Theology here, before working for two Oxford Colleges as their outreach/schools liaison officer. After that, I returned to do a one year Masters course and now I'm doing a PhD. There are days when 7 years seems like a long time. Too long. That may well be a recurring theme. On the other hand, though, it has also felt like no time at all since I first moved to the city. Originally, I'm from the North East. In the widest sense possible. I was born in Sunderland and until I was 7, lived in Washington before moving to Dishforth in North Yorkshire. Then I lived in Gutersloh in Germany for just under two years before moving back to Durham where, mercifully, I stayed put until I came to university.

Being a Theology student, particularly one working in New Testament studies, immediately tends to raise a few eyebrows. It carries with it a few assumptions. Principal among them is the assumption that I'm religious. I'm not. In the slightest. I was technically raised as a Catholic but beyond certain, mainly cultural, quirks, that's not really a very strong part of my identity. I'm certainly not an atheist in the Richard Dawkins or Christopher Hitchens mode, either. I suppose that means I'm agnostic. I prefer to think of it as apathetic. Religion is a part of my life in so far as it is the subject of my academic work, but that's it. Obviously, I'm very curious about it. I'm particularly curious about how the biblical texts came together, the language that their authors used and their varied and diverse afterlives in the imagination and inspiration of those who read it in the centuries after. But beyond that, Christianity plays little-to-no part in my life outside of the library. As far as I'm concerned, that's the way I'd like it to stay.

I saw all of this by way of a warning to any readers (God willing, as the cliche goes) who stumble across this blog. Theology is not a confessional, or a faith-based, activity for me. Don't expect the biblical text to be treat with absolute reverence. Certainly, I won't go out of my way to be offensive or anything like that. Suffice to say that when you spend a long time looking at and reading about a particular text or a particular author, it's fair to say you're likely to develop a bit of a love/hate relationship with them. Similarly, don't expect "bible" or "God" talk to dominate the discussion here. As the project outline above indicates, I spend just as much of my [academic] time in the 18th and 19th centuries as I do in the 1st and 2nd. This is a virtual scrapbook for a whole plethora of thoughts and musings. Expect things to go fairly off-topic at points.

With those caveats in mind, I hope whoever may read this finds some enjoyment in it. For my own sanity, I will try not to limit the discussion to my work. There's enough going on in this city to distract my attention at the best of times so I'm sure of the wider Oxford context will shape and affect what gets discussed here.

Welcome.