Can art save souls?

[_Hoops]

Maybe within ourselves? Or things that exist both within and without ourselves (connected in some way?).

I agree.

I don't think there is any material advantage to the experience. No evolutionary advantage, either.

Me neither.

I'm humbled.

Don't expect it ever again.

Ah, but do they really? To me, the words fall short.

For you, maybe not. Fortunately, we have all kinds of expression, one or several of which will speak to you. I think words are often adequate, and even better. But that's me. That's why we have art. (artists feel free to weigh in and tell me how wrong I am - with prerequisite "how can you be such an ignorant boob")

[_just me]

How so?

Based on her Catholic upbringing. I am unaware of her saying that she isn't Catholic. Plus, she refers to god in many a song.

That just doesn't seem very atheist to me.

I would have to assume that her expressions are informed by her spirituality, past and present.

Plus, atheism isn't a religion. So it can't be the religion that inspired her. It could be something else that inspired her, but not a religion.

[_Blixa]

If you are trying to rip on atheism then I'm sad about this.

I am.

And why?

I don't get you.

[_Jersey Girl]

Oh, enough of the back and forth. What's the question?

Morely

I spent four days at the Louvre, one day in each wing. I spent ten days in Paris with its museums and baguettes and bare-bosomed statues. Did art save my life? Did a museum save my soul?

I don't know. You didn't tell us the impact that Paris, the art or the bread had on you.

Can art and literature and music save lives and souls as readily as religion?

Can it inspire us? Yes. Save your soul? I'm thinking, no.

Or are some of us kidding ourselves?

Yes, most of us. Most of the time.

:-)

p.s. I have to go measure a dog's neck so don't all of you be in a 5 alarm hurry to reply.

[_Hoops]

Based on her Catholic upbringing. I am unaware of her saying that she isn't Catholic. Plus, she refers to god in many a song.

Ok.

That just doesn't seem very atheist to me.

Ok.

I would have to assume that her expressions are informed by her spirituality, past and present.

Ok.

Plus, atheism isn't a religion. So it can't be the religion that inspired her. It could be something else that inspired her, but not a religion.

Believe it or not, I'm aware.

[Guest]

Don't expect it ever again.

I'll revel in my one moment :).

For you, maybe not. Fortunately, we have all kinds of expression, one or several of which will speak to you. I think words are often adequate, and even better. But that's me. That's why we have art. (artists feel free to weigh in and tell me how wrong I am - with prerequisite "how can you be such an ignorant boob")

Words don't really do it. THAT'S why we have art.

[_Hoops]

Words don't really do it. THAT'S why we have art.

Words are not art? I would respectfully disagree.

DEATH, be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so:
For those whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow
Die not, poor Death; nor yet canst thou kill me.
From Rest and Sleep, which but thy picture be,
Much pleasure, then from thee much more must flow;
And soonest our best men with thee do go--
Rest of their bones and souls' delivery!
Thou'rt slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell;
And poppy or charms can make us sleep as well
And better than thy stroke. Why swell'st thou then?
One short sleep past, we wake eternally,
And Death shall be no more: Death, thou shalt die!

John Donne

[_Jersey Girl]

Words don't really do it. THAT'S why we have art.

Gadzooks! Tell that to Bob:

The Lovely Shall Be Choosers

The Voice said, “Hurl her down!”

The Voices, “How far down?”

“Seven levels of the world.”

“How much time have we?”

“Take twenty years.
She would refuse love safe with wealth and honor!
The lovely shall be choosers, shall they?
Then let them choose!”

“Then we shall let her choose?”

“Yes, let her choose.
Take up the task beyond her choosing.”

Invisible hands crowned on her shoulder
In readiness to weigh upon her.
But she stood straight still,
In broad round earrings, gold and jet with pearls,
And broad round suchlike brooch,
Her cheeks high-colored,
Proud and the pride of friends.

The Voice asked, “You can let her choose?”

“Yes, we can let her and still triumph.”

“Do it by joys, and leave her always blameless.
Be her first joy her wedding,
That though a wedding,
is yet—well, something they know, he and she.
And after that her next joy
That though she grieves, her grief is secret:
Those friends know nothing of her grief to make it shameful.
Her third joy that though now they cannot help but know,
They move in pleasure too far off
To think much or much care.
Give her a child at either knee for fourth joy
To tell once and once only, for them never to forget,
How once she walked in brightness,
And make them see it in the winter firelight.
But give her friends, for then she dare not tell
For their foregone incredulousness.
And be her next joy this:
Her never having deigned to tell them.
Make her among the humblest even
Seem to them less than they are.
Hopeless of being known for what she has been,
Failing of being loved for what she is,
Give her the comfort for her sixth of knowing
She fails from strangeness to a way of life
She came to from too high too late to learn.
Then send some one with eyes to see
And wonder at her where she is,
And words to wonder in her hearing how she came there,
But without time to linger for her story.
Be her last joy her heart’s going out to this one
So that she almost speaks.
You know them—seven in all.”

“Trust us,” the Voices said.

—Robert Frost

[_Jersey Girl]

For that matter, tell it to Paul:

1 Corinthians 13

If I speak in the tongues[a] of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast,[b] but do not have love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

Words are not enough? I think not.

[_Quasimodo]

Can it inspire us? Yes. Save your soul? I'm thinking, no.

I guess it might depend one's definition of "soul".

p.s. I have to go measure a dog's neck so don't all of you be in a 5 alarm hurry to reply.

How long can it take to measure a dog's neck?