I came to this book through the back door; that is, it was not
the “Secret History of Christianity” that grabbed me (not a unique title), but the
subtitle “the Last Inkling and the Evolution of Consciousness.” This phrase no
doubt referred to Owen Barfield and his line of thought about the evolution of
consciousness. Barfield has been on my radar for years as I’ve sought to become
more familiar with his deep insights. While Barfield is a lucid writer, his
thought dives deep and sometimes can leave the reader adrift. And unlike his
more famous Inkling companions C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien, Barfield never
reached great numbers with his works (which only included a relatively small
amount of fiction and poetry). So, I thought, perhaps this work would reveal
more about Barfield’s project to me.
Alas, it did not. After an initial cursory introduction to
Barfield’s key notion of “original participation” followed by “withdrawal
participation” and “reciprocal participation,” and a nod to French
anthropologist Lucien Levy-Bruehl about his idea of “participation mystique,”
Vernon plunges directly into a history
of the Hebrew Bible through the lens of the concept of “participation.” From
that starting point, he moves on into a review of ancient Greek culture through
the same lens. In both traditions, the earlier manifestations of those cultures
were marked by “original participation” with the world around them. As Vernon
describes it, the phenomena refer “to the felt
experience of participating in life. Original participation dominates when
there is little distinction between what’s felt to be inside someone and what’s
outside because the boundaries of individual self - consciousness, which today
we take for granted, are not in place.” (p. 3; loc. 264.) Or as Barfield
describes it: “Early man did not observe nature in our detached way . . . . He
participated mentally and physically in her inner and outer processes.” (p. 3;
loc. 269.) Vernon proceeds to take the reader through a brief history of the
Hebrew Bible to illustrate this phenomenon and the eventual shift away from a
consciousness marked by original participation to one of “withdrawal
participation,” which is marked by a shift away from immersion in the
surrounding world into a greater sense of individuality. As Vernon describes
it, “An awareness of separation, even isolation, is felt. A person will begin
to sense that they have an inner life that is, relatively speaking, their own.
(p. 3; loc. 273.)
After completing his brief but illuminating
history of the Hebrew Bible, Vernon moves across the street, as it were, and
does the same with ancient Greek culture, displaying the same
dynamic at work. Like the Hebrew prophets, the emerging Greek philosophers
(culminating in Socrates) promote a greater sense of individuality and
individual agency. The world of Achilles in the Iliad is significantly
different from that of Socrates. As Vernon points out, another way to look at
this shift is to discern a growing sense of individuality and the use of
introspection by individuals.
With the advent of the Hellenistic Age in the
wake of Alexander the Great and his successors, these two lines of
thought—Hebrew and Greek—begin to encounter one another and interact. Out of
this mixture arises the life of Jesus and the coming of Christianity. It’s at
this point that I must quibble about the first part of the title of this book,
“the Secret History of Christianity.” What Vernon writes about in this section
and the sources he draws upon is not Dan Brown material. Rather, the sources
that Vernon draws upon are neither secret nor very unorthodox. (Although he
does cite the Gospel of Thomas, which is outside of the sanctioned Scriptures, that’s about as far out of the mainstream that he goes.) Vernon’s portrait
of Jesus draws upon the Four Evangelists and Paul to demonstrate that Jesus was
taking his followers deeper into the interior life. Vernon demonstrates his
argument with quotations from the Gospels and Paul that should prove familiar
to any reader. He emphasizes the message of interiority preached by Jesus and
the desire of Jesus to prompt a metanoia—a change of mind (or heart-mind, as I’m
persuaded may prove a more adept translation). Vernon argues that Jesus didn’t
intend to set down new sets of rules to follow, but instead, he intended to
change our awareness; to find the root of our conduct on the inside. (I can’t
help but recall the scene in Monty Python’s Life of Brian where the
supposed messiah (Brian) loses a sandal while attempting to flee the crowd and
the crowd takes this as a directive to shed their sandals--or something. Ah, literalism.) In
short, Vernon provides a convincing and attractive portrait of Jesus that comports
with Barfield’s theory of “participation” and that comports with sound Biblical
scholarship. Sorry, no lost gospels or secret societies here.
Vernon continues his tour of Christian culture
and belief through the early Church on to Augustine, whose interiority further
expands this Christian insight and who develops the idea of the will to better
understand an individual’s volition. Vernon follows this path continuing up through
the Renaissance, which—contra Burkhardt—Vernon argues does not provide a
definitive break with medieval culture and belief. But the Reformation, which
follows upon the Renaissance and does alter the course of the evolution of
consciousness. The Reformation, in the words and works of Luther and Calvin and
their followers, placed a significantly increased emphasis on the individual’s
conscience. The Reformation, along with the Scientific Revolution, altered the
ways that individuals saw themselves and their world. The advent of the
printing press, like the advent of literacy and private reading in earlier
times, greatly facilitated (or perhaps more it’s more accurate to say, helped cause)
this change in consciousness. Humanity became more aware of how to manipulate
the world around it and gained an increased sense of individual agency. But these
gains came at the cost of losing much (and in some cases all) of the sense of
belonging to the cosmos that had survived through the Renaissance. Christianity,
as a result, tended more toward literalism and faith as belief rather than
trust. This trend has continued up through the present, but Vernon identifies
signs that humanity may be ready to move into a mode of “reciprocal participation.”
Vernon identifies “imagination” as the key to
reaching a state of reciprocal participation. In this argument, Vernon echoes
many of the themes that Gary Lachman identified in his 2017 publication, Lost Knowledge of the Imagination. As both authors note, imagination is not another
word for fantasy; both authors draw upon Samuel Taylor Coleridge for guidance in
describing the role and function of imagination and its distinction from what
Coleridge labeled as “fantasy.” Also, Vernon discusses the body of poetic and
visual works of William Blake as a master of informed imagination.
Thus, while I didn’t experience an in-depth dive
into Barfield’s thought (although Barfield’s work does resurface prominently
toward the end of the book), I did receive a persuasive application of how
Barfield’s perspective can apply to the history of Western Christianity. An for
those who want a helpful introduction to Barfield’s project, one can turn to
Gary Lachman, who refers to Barfield frequently, and at depth in his works ASecret History of Consciousness and Caretakers of the Cosmos. And as
to having a not-so-secret history of Christianity added to the piles of books written
about the history of Christianity, Vernon’s effort is worthwhile. The fact the sources
that Vernon draws upon are not occult doesn’t mean that the project isn’t
valuable; it is. While not secret, his understanding of Christianity is not
widespread so far as I can discern. The description that he provides is one
that could prove useful as we go forward to meet the challenges ahead. He hopes
to see Christianity (along with other wisdom traditions) bridge the gap between
our alienation from the world around us (and ourselves) and the gifts that individuality
and science have brought to us. This is a noble and vital enterprise, and one
that deserves our thanks—and our reading time.
