THE BLASPHEMIES OF A. M. KLEIN

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$\s mYevtew KALEIDOSCOPE - University of British Columbia$

$\s mYevtew ELECTRONIC ADDITION - University of British Columbia$

KLEIN S BLASPHEMIES At this point it would be appropriate to go on to examine later poems such as "Of Remembrance", "Stance of the Amidah", "Elegy" and others which can hardly be termed anything other than religious poems on the basis both of theme and attitude. 18 But this would take us too far away from the criticism of Miriam Waddington and leave her emphasis of Klein's religious doubt unexamined. I should like, therefore, to leave a more thorough analysis of Klein's religious poetry for another time and to return to the questions of Klein's doubt and unbelief. I use the plural "questions" here deliberately because while unbelief may be thought of as doubt grown into certainty they are not necessarily connected and they are certainly not identical. Doubt, indeed, or a certain disquieting questing after "proof" is one of the characteristics of faith which by its very nature leaves the mind thirsting after the sureness of vision. Theology itself is born of this need of faith to seek understanding but the coolness of the traditional phrase — fides quaerens intellectum — hides the personal anguish that is so often part of the individual's maturing process. It is a paradox that the naive faith of the child must give way to the adult's faith-in-tension to be resolved finally into the mature faith that says its amen in the darkness of unconditional acceptance. If the childhood faith is never doubted, never challenged by the questions that life throws up then it remains truly a therapeutic retreat from reality and can never come to tranquil maturity. 18 L LEIN's POETRY provides ample evidence of the three stages of faith's growth. 20 There are poems that remember an untroubled childhood faith, 21 others that grapple with God's silence 22 and finally those that accept the darkness of incomprehensibility that is an inescapable part of believing. 23 The first division is represented by many poems which look back nostalgically on the simple faith of childhood or find this faith preserved in simple people. But Klein has gone beyond this and he can only look back at an earlier time or upon an unquestioning faith with the realization that his questioning has separated him from such simplicity and caught him up in turmoil. This surely is a common experience of believers and so I cannot agree with Miriam Waddington that in "The Cripples" Klein deals openly with his loss of faith because he reacts to the extraordinary trust shown by the pilgrims to St. Joseph's Oratory by saying: And I who in my own faith once had faith like this but have not now, am crippled more than they (299) 2 * I would think rather that his sense of weakness has been shared by many a Christian who has watched in wonder what seems the less complicated, stronger faith of his fellow believers and that this poem is accordingly akin to those which look back nostalgically on the religion of his childhood. 62
KLEIN S BLASPHEMIES Such simple faith is admirable perhaps but for most men faith must eventually grapple with questions that trouble its tranquillity: Nothing was difficult, О Master, then, No query but it had an answer, clear, — But now though I am grown, a man of men,... There is Much that I cannot grasp, and much that goes amiss (232) Most painfully of all, faith must suffer the silence of God who refuses to justify himself to man. This is the theme of "Reb Levi Yitschok Talks to God". In this poem the renowned Hasidic rebbe who was famous for his faith and blunt questioning of God turns to him to complain of the suffering of Israel. But after his raging: He suddenly went mild Begging the Lord to lead him through the fog; Reb Levi Yitschok, an ever-querulous child, Sitting on God's knees in the synagogue, Unanswered even when the sunrise smiled. (147) The same burden of silence is apparent in "Psalm I" of the "Psalter of Avram Haktani": Where in this dubious days shall I take counsel, Who is there to resolve the dark, the doubt? (210) There is no denying the burden of these lines in which the poet finds nothing to give him the clarity of insight that he seeks. The darkness is a fact and yet faith continues despite the irony and weariness. And so we have poems of mature, tranquil faith. Here, for example, are lines from "Stance of the Amidah" : Psalm XXIV which begins: Oh, give us such understanding as make superfluous second thought; and at Thy least, give us to understand to repent (346) О incognito God, anonymous Lord, with what name shall I call you? concludes : I have no title for your glorious throne, and for your presence not a golden word, — only that wanting you, by that alone I do invoke you, knowing I am heard. (224) Although much of the doubt that Klein's poetry reveals seems to belong within the context of faith rather than outside it, there is no denying that there are lines in which doubt seems to have given way to unbelief. One might point, for instance to "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage" where we read 63
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THE BLASPHEMIES OF A. M. KLEIN

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