Uploaded June 2019 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Chesterton is one of the greatest Christian thinkers of all time. This episode of the ThinkingWest Podcast (formerly Coffee Break Philosophy) breaks down G.K. Chesterton's idea in his book Orthodoxy that "man can understand everything by the help of what he does not understand." Christian talks about reason, religion, Christianity, and symbolism recognized by Chesterton, particularly with regard to Christian mysticism.
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thinkingwest.com
PURCHASE "Orthodoxy" by G.K. Chesterton:
amazon.com/Orthodoxy-G-K-Chesterton/dp/1515241394/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=orthodoxy&qid=1559994708&s=gateway&sr=8-1
MUSIC CREDIT
Golden Alley by Nicolai Heidlas and Francesco Rea | nicolai-heidlas.com
Music promoted by free-stock-music.com
Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
So how to understand the world around us? Do we construct a purely logical framework with which to overlay our experiences on? Or do we also partly rely on the supernatural, religion, and that which we don't fully understand to better grasp the world around us? According to philosopher and writer G.K. Chesterton, it is almost certainly the latter. In this series of videos, we'll be exploring some of the great ideas he had to share with the world, but for this video we're going to be talking all about how we understand through the unknown - coming up.
G. K. Chesterton, also known as the "Prince of Paradox", was a master of wit and turning an argument on its head. He wrote his book Orthodoxy in response to criticism to his previous book called Heretics in that it criticized his contemporaries without providing any overarching philosophy of his own; thus, he responded to the challenge to write the book about his own beliefs, and a great book called Orthodoxy was born. Now, in it he wrote "man can understand everything by the help of what he does not understand" and this he claimed was the secret of mysticism. Now, mysticism, in all honesty, is kind of a tricky thing to define, because it's very definition has been debated by scholars for quite some time. But, here we're talking specifically about Christian mysticism as opposed to a secular mysticism that we hear about more today. In Christian mysticism it's more about a way of thinking with God behind all things, or a consciousness of God in all things. In the secular view, it's kind of an occult or supernatural existence: for example in fortune-telling or generally taboo practices of that sort. So, Chesterton's quote summarizes the idea that we can better understand the world around us by accepting the few things that we don't fully understand, namely that Christianity in all of its mysteries give us the understanding of why we're here, our purpose on earth, and ultimately our destination: the things that the secular world alone does not give you, the purely logical view of the world doesn't answer for us, the science alone won't ever tell us. It's about purpose and meaning. Our belief in a God and a Christian God in particular answers those deep questions about why we're here and where we're going. An analogy that Chesterton gave was the Sun, and he gave a great many examples throughout his book Orthodoxy and in his writings elsewhere. Now, the Sun is so bright that you can't look directly upon it. It's brightness and intensity of light illuminates the entirety of the Earth along with providing warmth for the Earth, and it's this clarity that allows us to function throughout our everyday life. Now, contrast the Sun with the moon. The moon is a very weak light when it's there at all and in truth is reflecting only a fraction of the light which originally comes from the Sun in the first place. So, the moon is a weak light; it's not actually a source of light, while the Sun is a source of light and a very intense source of light at that. Now, an additional point that Chesterton makes is that the moon - you can you can break out a telescope out at night and stare at the moon all you want and observe its its features throughout the entirety of the night. The Sun - you can't do that - you'll go blind. But this - but the moon - you can stare at. You can focus on. You can learn everything there is to know about it, and you can see a circular shape, for example, at night. And, the circular shape was what Chesterton was connecting to his second chapter called 'The Maniac', and in 'The Maniac' he details the circular logic that defines their mode of thinking. Now, Chesterton also said that mysticism keeps men sane and he connected this with twilight. Now, twilight is a period of time where the Sun is still just below the horizon was just before sunrise and just after sunset. The Sun still illuminates the lower sky with those red, yellow, and orange hues, and the twilight has always had an association in lore and fantasy writings with the magical and the mysterious...
#chesterton #orthodoxy #chestertonsociety
Chesterton is one of the greatest Christian thinkers of all time. This episode of the ThinkingWest Podcast (formerly Coffee Break Philosophy) breaks down G.K. Chesterton's idea in his book Orthodoxy that "man can understand everything by the help of what he does not understand." Christian talks about reason, religion, Christianity, and symbolism recognized by Chesterton, particularly with regard to Christian mysticism.
VISIT US
thinkingwest.com
PURCHASE "Orthodoxy" by G.K. Chesterton:
amazon.com/Orthodoxy-G-K-Chesterton/dp/1515241394/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=orthodoxy&qid=1559994708&s=gateway&sr=8-1
MUSIC CREDIT
Golden Alley by Nicolai Heidlas and Francesco Rea | nicolai-heidlas.com
Music promoted by free-stock-music.com
Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
So how to understand the world around us? Do we construct a purely logical framework with which to overlay our experiences on? Or do we also partly rely on the supernatural, religion, and that which we don't fully understand to better grasp the world around us? According to philosopher and writer G.K. Chesterton, it is almost certainly the latter. In this series of videos, we'll be exploring some of the great ideas he had to share with the world, but for this video we're going to be talking all about how we understand through the unknown - coming up.
G. K. Chesterton, also known as the "Prince of Paradox", was a master of wit and turning an argument on its head. He wrote his book Orthodoxy in response to criticism to his previous book called Heretics in that it criticized his contemporaries without providing any overarching philosophy of his own; thus, he responded to the challenge to write the book about his own beliefs, and a great book called Orthodoxy was born. Now, in it he wrote "man can understand everything by the help of what he does not understand" and this he claimed was the secret of mysticism. Now, mysticism, in all honesty, is kind of a tricky thing to define, because it's very definition has been debated by scholars for quite some time. But, here we're talking specifically about Christian mysticism as opposed to a secular mysticism that we hear about more today. In Christian mysticism it's more about a way of thinking with God behind all things, or a consciousness of God in all things. In the secular view, it's kind of an occult or supernatural existence: for example in fortune-telling or generally taboo practices of that sort. So, Chesterton's quote summarizes the idea that we can better understand the world around us by accepting the few things that we don't fully understand, namely that Christianity in all of its mysteries give us the understanding of why we're here, our purpose on earth, and ultimately our destination: the things that the secular world alone does not give you, the purely logical view of the world doesn't answer for us, the science alone won't ever tell us. It's about purpose and meaning. Our belief in a God and a Christian God in particular answers those deep questions about why we're here and where we're going. An analogy that Chesterton gave was the Sun, and he gave a great many examples throughout his book Orthodoxy and in his writings elsewhere. Now, the Sun is so bright that you can't look directly upon it. It's brightness and intensity of light illuminates the entirety of the Earth along with providing warmth for the Earth, and it's this clarity that allows us to function throughout our everyday life. Now, contrast the Sun with the moon. The moon is a very weak light when it's there at all and in truth is reflecting only a fraction of the light which originally comes from the Sun in the first place. So, the moon is a weak light; it's not actually a source of light, while the Sun is a source of light and a very intense source of light at that. Now, an additional point that Chesterton makes is that the moon - you can you can break out a telescope out at night and stare at the moon all you want and observe its its features throughout the entirety of the night. The Sun - you can't do that - you'll go blind. But this - but the moon - you can stare at. You can focus on. You can learn everything there is to know about it, and you can see a circular shape, for example, at night. And, the circular shape was what Chesterton was connecting to his second chapter called 'The Maniac', and in 'The Maniac' he details the circular logic that defines their mode of thinking. Now, Chesterton also said that mysticism keeps men sane and he connected this with twilight. Now, twilight is a period of time where the Sun is still just below the horizon was just before sunrise and just after sunset. The Sun still illuminates the lower sky with those red, yellow, and orange hues, and the twilight has always had an association in lore and fantasy writings with the magical and the mysterious...
#chesterton #orthodoxy #chestertonsociety
