Enter Hugh Nibley

Since I quoted Hugh Nibley in my last posting I thought I’d let you become a little more familiar with him today.

As I turn to my office bookshelf at eye level on my right are twelve volumes by this eminent scholar and Christian disciple. I can reach out and touch them and hold on to them as an anchor of cultural stability when I need to. Nibley placed my faith in the context of world history and science and unflinchingly took on whatever the pundits and skeptics had to offer. I knew Dr. Nibley—slightly—and had several conversations with him (actually he did almost all of the talking after my opening remark or question to him). I gained at every encounter. I would encourage any reader of mine to seek out and if you are fortunate enough to find the wise among us really listen to their take on life. As I indicated in my posting, “Grist,” a good starting point would be to take one of these luminaries, read what they had to say, look at their bibliographies and go from there.

Taking a volume of Nibley’s, at random, and flipping through it to where the page happens to fall open I find this (Here is your typical Nibley):
“If one makes a sketch of a mountain, what is it? A few lines on a piece of paper. But there is a solid reality behind this poor composition. Even if the tattered scrap is picked up later in a street in Tokyo or a gutter in Madrid, it still attests to the artist’s experience of the mountain as a reality. If the sketch should be copied by others who have never seen the original mountain, it still bears witness to its reality.
“So it is with the apocryphal writings. Most of them are pretty poor stuff and all of them are copies of copies. But when we compare them we cannot escape the impression that they have a real model behind them, more faithfully represented in some than in others. All we ever get on this earth, Paul reminds us, is a distorted reflection, but it is a reflection of things that really are. Since we are dealing with derivative evidence only, we are not only justified but required to listen to all the witnesses, no matter how shoddy some of them may be.” (from The Expanding Gospel, Collected Works of Hugh Nibley, 12:203-4)

Fact: With hurricanes and tsunamis (as well as volcanic eruptions, tornados, and earthquakes) seemingly increasingly part of our international experience, the speed of these elements may be of some interest to you: Water speeds—Mississippi River 2 mph; Gulf Stream 4.6-5.8 mph; Lava Falls, Colorado River 30 mph; common sea waves 15-56 mph; tsunamis up to 490 mph. Air speeds—light breeze 4-7 mph; moderate breeze 13-18 mph; strong gale 47-54 mph; storm 64-75 mph; hurricane >75 mph.