The theme of the essays collected in Professor Ryszard Przybylski's book Ogrom zła i odrobina dobra. Cztery lektury biblijne / An Abundance of Evil and a Trace of Goodness. Four Bible Readings are myths fundamental to European culture and originating from the Judeo-Christian tradition. Przybylski interprets the report of Jesus' meeting with his disciples in Emmaus, takes two contrasting messages of wisdom and two visions of God from the books of Kohelet and Job, while the Book of Esther allows him to speak of experiencing identity, and he also sheds some unexpected light on the myth of the Kingdom of God and the privilege of doing good that is reserved for man. Characteristically of Przybylski, his reading of the Bible is accompanied not only by apocrypha, homilies, commentaries from biblical scholars, the words of poets and philosophers, but also paintings by great masters creating their own interpretations of mythical events. Reading about Emmaus, we take a look at Caravaggio's Supper at Emmaus or the equally famous painting by Rembrandt, while the reading of the Book of Esther is accompanied by a painted interpretation by Chagall.
Ryszard Przybylski (b. 1928 in Rowne, Volhynia) - essayist, literary historian, translator. He has published such works as Dostojewski i przeklęte problemy / Dostoevsky and Cersed Problems, Klasycyzm, czyli prawdziwy koniec Królestwa Polskiego / Classicism, or the True End of the Polish Kingdom, Pustelnicy i demony / Eremites and Demons. His works published by Wydawnictwo Sic! include Baśń zimowa. Esej o starości / A Winter's Tale. An Essay on Old Age, Rozhukany koń. Esej o myśleniu Juliusza Słowackiego / The Capering Horse. An Essay on the Thought of Juliusz Slowacki, Mityczna przestrzeń naszych uczuć / The Mythical Space of Our Feelings, Sardanapal. Opowieść o tyranii / Sardanapalus. A Story of Tyranny, Krzemieniec. Opowieść o rozsądku zwyciężonych / Krzemieniec. A Story of the Rationality of the Vanquished. He is the winner of numerous awards, including the Grand Prize of the Cultural Foundation, the Koscielski Prize, and the Jurzykowski Prize.
Source of Polish version: www.wydawnictwo-sic.com.pl
- Ryszard Przybylski
Ogrom zła i odrobina dobra. Cztery lektury biblijne / An Abunsance of Evil and a Trace of Goodness. Four Bible Readings
Wydawnictwo Sic!, Warszawa 2006
135 x 205, 174 pages, hardcover
ISBN 83-60457-13-1
www.wydawnictwo-sic.com.pl
The book has been nominated for the 2007 NIKE LITERARY AWARD.
"OGROM ZLA I ODROBINA DOBRA" / "AN ABUNDANCE OF EVIL AND A TRACE OF GOODNESS" BY RYSZARD PRZYBYLSKI
[Excerpts from the described book are translations made for the purpose of this article; for the original text go to the
link*Polish version*http://www.culture.pl/pl/culture/artykuly/dz_przybylski_ogrom_zla**]**Przybylski, an essayist, literary historian, expert on and translator of Russian literature, has chosen several of the great myths of the Old and New Testament as his latest theme. He writes about the book of Esther, the myths of Job and Kohelet: "Whoever fears God and praises his power (...), God will ultimately reward them according to human standards, with prosperity and happiness here on earth", he writes about God in the Book of Job, and contrasts this with the vision from the Book of Kohelet: "In Kohelet we will not find complaints in the style of Job, nor lamentations on our miserable existence. ...The principle of reward clearly did not exist in God's plans".
This collection of Przybylski's biblical essays begins with a treatise on the miracle at Emmaus. What really interests the writer in one of the most important and most meaningful episodes of the Gospel? It is the doubts and anxieties that the disciples felt after their teacher had been humiliated and killed; he is interested in the teacher in hiding who sees how much his disciples have understood of his teaching. The miracle at Emmaus is the first visible sign that the teaching is really being fulfilled.
But biblical events don't seem to be a matter of unconditional faith for Ryszard Przybylski. If they have any holy power, then it is more the holiness of culture than the holiness of religion. The resurrected Christ interests Przybylski primarily as the creator of an extraordinary project that gave meaning to earthly human existence. More than the divine nature of Christ, as this is something we can neither guess nor describe, the focus is on his human experience, his voluntary sacrifice, a sacrifice of good in front of a world usually ruled by evil. In another text, Przybylski quotes Simone Weil: "Even if God (...) were an illusion as far as existence is concerned, He remains the only reality where goodness is concerned".
If the great project that determined the entirety of modern culture is so important, we need to consider how it is processed by culture. Przybylski describes the painted depictions of events from the road to Emmaus by Flemish painter Lucas van Vackenborch, French Baroque painter Claude Lorrain, and Rembrandt who shows the disciples at the point where Jesus was no longer visible to them. It's as if the Bible story was not an episode, but something that re-created itself anew every day, with each new artistic, e.g. painter's, interpretation. With Caravaggio, the author is attracted to details, as if seeking himself, his own individual features in the great myth: "I was captivated by the metaphysics of matter, the paradox born of a sacred attitude to our everyday existence; specifically, it was a hole, the torn sleeve of our friend Cleophas' tunic. I am simply filled with tenderness towards the tormented companions of our existence, clothing, furnishings, pots and pans". Przybylski tries to tear the canonical text away from the classic, existing canon. He is interested in the human, individual experience, and that is how he reads these great texts. We find the same approach to reading a biblical text in the essay on the Book of Esther. The essayist describes the history of Persia and King Ahasuerus, then analyses the Holiday of Purim, the Vitebsk painting by Marc Chagall, and in the end adds his own thought: "Each time I took up this book in the gloomy silence of the night, I knew I faced reading a homogeneous story: a terrible tale which ends in a great surprise".
Author: Marek Radziwon, wiadomosci.gazeta.pl, June 18, 2007 - Polish version