The distance between you and I

The personal and the philosophical

This past weekend yielded some important realisations for me. I had always assumed that, because you never had unmediated access to another person’s mind, that this rendered you alone in the world, without hope, that it was bad, bad, bad. However, I have learned to think of this a different way. The distance between you and I is a good thing. We were created that way. The separation between myself and the next person is productive of so many things; love and concern, art and beauty. It’s not a huge realisation, or it doesn’t seem so now, but it had important implications for how I see myself and for my relationships.

Being so happy in my discovery, I thought I’d indulge in a little book buying. I picked up James K.A. Smith’s The Fall of Interpretation, (for the handy price of $7.95!) which, as it happens, carries a parallel argument. Have you ever wondered about why people have different interpretations of things? Indeed, have different interpretations of interpretation? We tend to see the need to interpret things as bad, bad, bad. As a fall from a hermeneutical paradise. But we need not see it like that. Difference of opinion – while acknowledging not every interpretation might be a good one – can actually be something to celebrate. It can actually be something productive. I’ve only just started the book, (and have discovered a treasure in Smith’s wealth of detailed footnotes!), but it looks a promising read.

Filed under: James K.A. Smith, Philosophy, books, hermeneutics, personal