Wei,

You wrote:
>
> I think "Religio" is a rather early work (1916), and represents a somewhat
> incomplete expression of Pound's outlook.  For instance, elsewhere in that
> work, he  begins with the question and answer, "What is a god?/A god is an
> eternal state of mind" (SP., 47).

> By itself, this [Pound's statement you quoted above] seems to imply the
> existence of purely subjective gods.

I think not. I would agree with you if Pound had written "a state of mind"
but he wrote "an _eternal_ state of mind." He's talking about
rchetypes  --the collective unconscious, if you will-- not purely individual
subjectivity.

> As Pound would have it, man himself
> can become a god by entering one of these "eternal states."
>
>   When is a god manifest?
>   When the states of mind take form.
>   When does a man become a god?
>   When he enters one of these states of mind
>         (SP., 47).
>
**************************************************************
**** These axiomata relate directly to the experience recounted in The Tree.
****
**************************************************************

> What follows brings us inevitably into the area of the the social
> organization of religion, which has political implications.
>

Wei, you should have written, "What follows brings _me_ inevitably into the
area of the social organization of religion...."

> >Second, Pound's emphasis, in the remark Wei has given us below, is on the
> >death of the _mysterium_. Translation of the rituals into the vernacular,
> >Pound implies, gives people the false and even dangerous impression that
> >they've understood the meaning of the rituals.
>

Wei, you replied:
> Dangerous!  Do you believe it is dangerous?  Is it not far more dangerous
to
> give people the impression that a clergy with vested social and political
> interests UNDERSTAND THE MYSTERY better than anyone else.
>
> Pound thought so in his early period:
>
>   Historically the organization of religions has usually
>   been for some ulterior purpose, exploitation, control
>   of the masses, etc.
>     (S.P., 50).
>
> [Later he appears to abandon this view]


Wei, I anticipated that you would leap to this (false and
counter-reactionary) conclusion.  I wrote:

> >One might be tempted to put Pound into the camp of the Mass-in-Latin
> >central-authority Church, were it not for "clargimint" (an echo of
> >"varmint") and the phrase "any abracadabra" which shows that it was not
the
> >language that was sacrosanct to Pound, but the _experience_.

and

> >Dangerous because the
> >lifeblood of religious experience, for Pound, is its celebration of
> >mystery.
> >An attempt to prevent the death of mystery!
>


> The lifeblood of religious experience, I would think, for Pound (or anyone
> else) would be communion with God (or with gods).  The ORGANIZED
celebration
> of mystery -- so-called -- is, as Pound implied early in his life, just a
> concealed attempt to control or exploit.  I honestly don't see how holding
a
> ceremony in an incomprehensible language does anymore than create a sense
of
> Mystery as to what in God's name is going on!  It is a way of putting up
> walls between the "masses" and authority, fostering the illusion that
> clerics have a  deserved spiritual authority.
>

And I anticipated your remarks above. I knew you would have trouble seeing
that an attempt to preserve mystery could be anything more than an
authoritarian attempt to control the masses. I am pleased that, after
consideration, you granted the possibility that there "may be some truth" in
my contrary opinion:

> >One might understand Pound's
> >seemingly reactionary position here with the threat to the soul which he
> >perceived from 20th c. mechanistic Psychology and the scientific
> >explanation
> >of all things human.
> >
>
> There may some truth in this.

Indeed, there may be. Mechanistic psychology is one of Pound's arch-enemies.
He associated it with communism and materialism.

> But William Blake's reaction to the same
> phenomena, and his personal solution, make more sense to me than an
> admonition to hold more religious services in ancient languages.
>

For precision sake, Pound wrote "any abracadabra".  Blake created his OWN
abracadabra and his own myths.  Pound was a man of letters. Blake was a
visionary.


> >Pound is a
> >pan-religionist, a non-denominational self-appointed high-priest who is
> >trying to protect the human capacity for religious experience from the
> >onslaught of the 20th c -- communism, science, advertising, consumer
> >culture, mechanized war.
>



> "Pan" in the word "pan-religionist" means ALL.  But Pound does not embrace
> ALL religions.  He decidedly rejects certain religions and embraces
others.
> For instance, during most of his mature adult life he vociferously rejects
> three religious world views which are most compatible with democracy in
the
> social order.  These are Buddhism, Taoism, and Protestantism.

Pound rejects religions which have an eschatological focus or which
undermine individual and collective enduring human achievement.  Their
amenability to representative democracy has, I believe, very little to do
with it.  Buddhism is also amenable to oppressive dictatorships.  The
essence of Buddhism is Amenability.


> (One might
> also note his rejection of Hinduism, since India is one of the most
> successful political democracies in the third world).  These are all major
> world religions which Pound scoffs at, precisely because they are not as
> hierarchical as Confucianism, Catholicism, and Greco-Roman Paganism (as
> Pound conceives it --- Greek gods, he says, do not love all men, they only
> love the elect, men like Odysseus).
>

What Pound is saying is that the Gods smile upon dynamic men who by their
actions attempt to shape the world. In effect, you're criticizing Pound
because his view is not that the gods are all-compassionate and
all-accepting. The gods, according to Pound, are not all-forgiving. This is
why he does not champion Hinduism.

> >His predilection for fascism is to be understood,
> >in part, in terms of the threat world Communism posed to religious
> >experience and the free practice of religion.
> >
>

> The notion that Pound cared about any sort of political freedom, or
> universally guaranteed right to practice ones religion, is highly suspect.

Fact: communism posed a threat to religious expression
Fact: religious experience (of some kind)  was very important to Pound
Conclusion: To the extent that communism and religious experience are
anti-thetical, Pound was anti-communist.

Pound was, of course, anti-communist for other reasons as well.

> Analyze his views in the light of this passage:
>
>
>   The higher bureaucrats should be grounded in
>   the TA HIO and in the analects of Confucius,
>   apart from which they need only a specialist's
>   'education.'  In the ideal state no Christian should
>   ever be permitted to hold executive office
>      ("Bureaucracy, the Flail
>       of Jehovah," SP, 221).
>
> Of course, Pound later decided that "only basically in Catholic/Pagan
Italy
> has Christianity avoided becoming a nuisance".  If anyone could find any
> evidence that Pound gave a fig about guarantees for religious freedom, I
> would be quite surprised.   (The China Cantos are incomprehensible apart
> from the celebration of countless attempts of Confucians to wipe out
> Buddhism and Taoism, which threaten imperial hegemony).
>

Pound's rejection of Buddhism and Taoism has little or nothing to do with
Chinese politics. He's thinking of these religions in much more idealized,
abstract terms.  The essence of these religions, as Pound viewed them, is
that they encourage men to think in terms of the afterlife and to renounce
worldly things. The encourage men to be as manageable as sheep. They do not
produce men like Odysseus.  The axis of Pound's mind is this:  Heaven _on
earth_   .....  Paradiso _terrestre_.

>
> [quote which provoked this exchange]:
>
> > >    Re European belief:  Neither mass nor communion
> > >   are of Jew origin.  Nowt to do with that nasty old
> > >   maniac JHV [Jehovah] and are basis of Xtn. religion.
> > >   Mass ought to be in Latin, unless you could do it in
> > >   Greek or Chinese.  In fact, any abracadabra that no
> > >   bloody member of the public or a half-educated ape
> > >   of a clargimint cd. think he understood
> > >    (Letter to Rev. Henry Swabey, Mar. 1940).

Jehovah, for Pound, was the wrathful (hence "manaic") god of semi-barbaric
herdsmen.

Regards,
Tim Romano