Words arise without
any history. One does not need to be an anthropologist-linguist to chart this
particular mystery. One simply needs to be a parent, or an older sibling, or an
aunt or uncle. Watch a child fumble with sounds that have no meaning, and he will
begin to communicate whole lines of thought that are wholly and utterly
incoherent yet not pointless. Every tumble of the lip, every tremble of the
tongue, every throated yell, every “bah” on the mouth is the fundamental
elements from whence speech comes. And, at some juncture, to the parents’
delight, that “bah” becomes “Dah dah dah,” “Mah mah mah,” sometimes “Bah bah
bah” or “Kah kah kah,” which soon transforms into “Dadda,” Mamma,” “Babba”
(bottle), and “Kaakaa” (kitty-cat).
These are
anhistorical fragments of words, formed without meaning until they are assigned
meaning, spoken into the void of the universe and then, soothingly, lovingly,
directed by the parents toward their proper home. Signifiers floating about as
simple tones, given signifieds by the authorities. As the completed linguistic
(Saussurean) sign they enter into time rightly, connected with the past, their
lingual family; but as signifiers they are eternal mysteries. From whence do
these sounds come? From whence do these notes of a hidden song arrive?
My son
turned one year old recently. We gave him Duplos as a birthday gift.
Immediately, when we opened the box, he grabbed the pieces and tried to fit
them together. Surely Duplos are not so different from normal wooden blocks,
but then how does a child recognize that they go together when he cannot even
stack wooden blocks atop one another yet?
Following
the same path Giambattista Vico did once, one comes to the historical
boundaries of humanity, the darkness in which a mysterious light once shown and
suddenly we began talking. The primordial, pre-linguistic, pre-signifying human
existence is the definition of the unknown for us. We believe we are so
intelligent, we pierce and probe the ancient world in ways that Vico could
never have imagined; but this moment is impossible to contemplate.
Where does
the Word come from? How do a people communicating in grunts or howls suddenly
begin to formulate language? And how do a people who communicate in a language
begin to formulate its articulations, with words, with phrases, with sentences,
with paragraphs, with essays, with treatises, with entire genealogical accounts
and completed biographies?
The
question is an earnest one from an earnest questioner, first because I identify
as a part of “people of the Book,” as some say; second because I identify as a
“lover of words,” as others say. Both as a Christian and as a humanist, I take
the logos very seriously. How does
one honor the logos as one writes it?
How does one honor the Logos as one
writes on His behalf? Words are heavy. Words are dignified. Words need due
respect.
Maybe the
reason they are to be treated in such a formal manner is that they approach us
from beyond. They exist in a world
and a time far from us. They connect us into history, but they themselves exist
outside of our understanding of time altogether. We are not the authorities
over words; words come to us from authorities beyond ourselves. Words are the
ultimate agents of humility, because they remind us that none of the worlds we
have built are worlds built without the aid of some other, older, coiner of
phrases and turner of language. Worlds are built of words, and all the words we
have we have borrowed. We cannot be self-made men in the land of words, nor can
we pull-ourselves-up-by-the-bootstraps when the very bootstraps we wear have
been a gift given to us.
This makes
me think that the phrase from Seneca regarding rhetoric and the bees is even
more true than I had originally thought: every man goes about from book to book
and takes the best nectar of each to form into his honeycomb. The man who doesn’t
say such is not being honest. Even the man who has never read anything is still
referring to books that are written, to sayings that are said, and, most
importantly, to words that are not his in the first place. The words are from
beyond himself.
The Writer,
then, is a person whose art is in taming the Mystery of Words for the common
man. But the Writer knows full well that those Words are untamable. He does the
best he can with them nevertheless.
