From My Nature Journal: ‘Perpetual Wildness’ and the Human Heart

A few months ago I finished a book my son Jarrett had recommended, one I finally ended up borrowing from my Chicago brother John, Jared Diamond’s Guns, Germs and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies. (Which reminds me, I need to return it!) It’s a fascinating read, and chronicles the impact of the three named things on societal development down through human history, and, ultimately, their ongoing influence on world politics and culture, even geography, to the present day. I am jazzed by history, both human and natural, and Diamond did not disappoint. It’s a fine book…

As might be imagined, Diamond also addressed prior steps in societal and cultural development that made possible the eventual impact of guns, germs and steel. Of course, the recruitment of fire as a manufacturing method was a necessary advancement, making possible the refining of metals. Another was the development of agriculture, which brought people together to settle in closer proximity with others, in contrast to those societies in which independent and widespread hunting and gathering predominated in family groups. This sped up further social evolution: with farmers now able to produce more food than they could alone eat, simple market economies developed, allowing in time the establishment of such things as specialized guilds, skilled artisans, even civic leadership. Few things, however, had the technological ability to advance a settled ancient culture more quickly than the domestication of animals. And we’re not just talking horsepower.

Picture it. A helpful canine companion for the hunt, or feline friend for rodent control... Ox power in the field… Reliable milk and meat in the pen or shelter… Wool and skins for clothing… Surefooted and seemingly inexhaustible steeds for travel… But interestingly, animal domestication also came with a drawback. Coupled with the greater proximity of people in close settlement with each other, it was intimate animal contact that also brought about the development of serious communicable diseases, the germs part of the triumvirate. I guess some bitter almost always comes with the sweet.

But back to animal domestication, my subject of interest du jour. Historians are united in their agreement that the first animal to be domesticated was the dog, bred, of course, from wild wolves and dingoes. This had already long taken place by 10,000 BC, with the date of domestication difficult

to pin down with precision. What followed then was the domestication of what has been called the ‘ancient fourteen,’ the great, domestic, herbivorous, utilitarian land mammals, in the following likely order and timing:

·      sheep, goats and pigs by 8000 BC

·      cows by 6000 BC

·      horses, donkeys and water buffalo by 4000 BC

·      llamas and alpacas by 3500 BC

·      camels by 2500 BC

·      reindeer, yaks, gaurs (oxen native to India and Malaysia) and bantengs (oxen native to Bali), dates unknown

Cats were in there somewhere, likely by about 8000 BC, though this is also more speculative. But I’ve never been sure they’re really domesticated anyhow. They just let us live in their house. Perhaps, in their way, they have domesticated us…

Other attempts have been made at the domestication of additional mammals, but without success. Individuals can be tamed, of course, even carnivores, but bred domestication is something else altogether. It doesn’t matter how tame a wild animal has become: some of the wild remains in it, and its offspring will be wild. I recall an interesting article in National Geographic several years ago about efforts established in Russia over a century ago, and still ongoing, to domesticate the fox, but it has not yet been successful. No doubt successful domestication took much longer than a hundred years. Who knows how long it actually took? And thousands of additional years have passed since, breed upon breed developed in some cases. Can you just imagine both Chihuahuas and St. Bernards from the same ancestors?

But here’s what I wanted to get at. I found a couple of comments in reference to domestication that were fascinating -- obvious, but fascinating, and thought provoking in relation to my nature and Christian spirituality blog. Jared Diamond says that there were animals that “…presented insuperable obstacles to domestication.” Insuperable. That means ‘impossible to overcome.’ Diamond quoted British scientist Francis Galton as putting it this way: "It would appear that every wild animal has had its chance of being domesticated, that a few… were domesticated long ago, but that the large remainder, who failed sometimes in only one small particular, are destined to perpetual wildness.”

Destined to perpetual wildness. Insuperable obstacles to domestication.

Intense.

“…Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, prone to leave the God I love…” is the way the hymn writer said it.  The Prophet Jeremiah, speaking forcefully within a deeply degraded culture, put it much more severely: “The heart is deceitful above all things, and exceedingly corrupt. Who can know it? (Jeremiah 17:9)" Or elsewhere in Genesis 6, “The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.”

Can my wildness, my proneness to wander,

be softened, tempered, or at least tamed?

How ‘destined to perpetual wildness’ am I?

Hmmm. Evil continually. Can my wildness, my proneness to wander, be softened, tempered, or at least tamed? How ‘destined to perpetual wildness’ am I? Are we? Lord, have mercy. Jesus:

Purify my heart. Touch me with Your cleansing fire.

Take me to the cross: Your holiness is my desire.

Breathe Your life in me. Kindle a love that flows from Your throne.

Lord, purify my heart, purify my heart.

~~ RGM, February 13, 2017

Blowin' in the Wind: In the Woods with Wendell Berry

("Blowin’ in the Wind" is a regular feature on my blog consisting of an assortment of nature writings – hymns, songs, excerpts, prayers, Bible readings, poems or other things – pieces I may not have written but that inspire me or give me joy. I trust they’ll do the same for you.)

Some books take you where you want to be in the middle of a snowy winter, but can't easily make it there for the weather. Such a book to me is Wendell Berry’s A Timbered Choir: The Sabbath Poems 1979-1997.

Some books take you where you want

to be in the middle of a snowy winter, but

can't easily make it there for the weather...

It is a collection of short pieces he wrote on or after Sunday walks on his Kentucky farm, and it’s filled with natural images and passions, deep environmental respect, and an ethic that reaches out and draws a person into ardent embrace of the land. One reviewer says his meditations here "...express a rich personal spirituality and affinity with the natural world," and yet I find the same holy reverence in his fiction as I do his poetry and essays; cases in point: Hannah Coulter, That Distant Land, and, one of my most favorite novels of all time, Jayber Crow.

I confess I’ve always struggled with poetry, but, interestingly, A Timbered Choir is a book that makes it easy for novices like me; yet it also invites more seasoned readers to its thoughtful woodlot saunters. I wrote once before on Berry, and will do so again, but you can find my previous blogpost featuring him by clicking this link, which will not only tell you a bit more about Berry himself but also shares another notable forest image.

The poems are without title, only separated by the year in which they were written and then numbered. Here is 1995, number 2, the complete poem. Let it take you to a place of peace and thoughtful repose.

The best reward in going to the woods

Is being lost to other people, and

Lost sometimes to myself. I'm at the end

Of no bespeaking wire to spoil my good;

I send no letter back I do not bring.

Whoever wants me now must hunt me down

Like something wild, and wild is anything

Beyond the reach of a purpose not it’s own.

Wild is anything that's not at home

In something else's place. This good white oak

Is not an orchard tree, is unbespoke,

And it can live here by it’s will alone,

Lost to all other wills but Heaven’s -- wild.

So where I most am found I'm lost to you,

Presuming friend, and only can be called

Or answered by a certain one, or two.

Of course, for me, that ‘certain one’ can only be the One I call the lover of my soul.

And here’s an excerpt from 1991, number 9.

To rest, go to the woods

Where what is made is made

Without your thought or work.

Sit down; begin the wait

For small trees to grow big,

Feeding on earth and light.

Their good result is song

The winds must bring, that trees

Must wait to sing, and sing

Longer than you can wait.

Soon you must go. The trees,

Your seniors, standing thus

Acknowledged in your eyes,

Stand as your praise and prayer.

Your rest is in this praise

Of what you cannot be

And what you cannot do.

In the midst of what seems my constant labor, I’ve often found the forest just the place of rest I need to help put all my work into perspective.

I pray you’ve enjoyed these.

~~ RGM, January 30, 2016

P.S. Each time I post to my blog, I send out an announcement of such on my Facebook page. Frequently there, I will ask my friends to consider sharing my post with others of their friends or family members whom they know may also find nature an important spiritual pathway to God. Let me place that request here for a change: do you know others, whether followers of Jesus or not, and perhaps particularly the latter, who find (or might find) these posts inspiring? Please consider sharing my site with them, www.rickmylander.com. I would treasure nothing more than that these words be shared as ongoing testimony to the creative glory of our good God. Thank you.

QOTM...*: Parker Palmer

(*Quote of the Month)

The soul is like a wild animal -- tough, resilient, savvy, self-sufficient, and yet exceedingly shy. If you want to see a wild animal, the last thing we should do is go crashing through the woods, shouting for the creature to come out. But if we are willing to walk quietly into the woods and sit silently for an hour or two at the base of a tree, the creature we are waiting for may well emerge, and out of the corner of an eye we will catch a glimpse of the wildness we seek.

~~Parker J. Palmer

Rocky Mt Bighorn near the trail

Parker Palmer is a Christian writer, educator and activist who has focused his career on issues of education, social change, community and faith. A Quaker, and founder of the Center for Courage and Renewal, his most recent book addresses the importance of civil public discourse, and is titled Healing the Heart of Democracy: The Courage to Create a Politics Worthy of the Human Spirit. The above quote, however, was taken from page seven of a book my pastor and good friend Paul recommended to me a couple years ago, Let Your Life Speak: Listening for the Voice of Vocation.

Black bear ambling through our campsite 

What I appreciate about the quote is that it is a quality expression of something natural and something spiritual at the same time.  I have sat in those woods at the base of a tree and I have crashed through them, both literally and spiritually. Of course, sometimes it is even literally sitting at the base of a tree that my soul discovers the spiritual meaning it seeks. It’s why I write this blog.

So, are you soul-searching these days like me? If you find it a struggle, as I sometimes do, perhaps you are looking for God

Hidden newborn whitetail fawn

in all the wrong places. Perhaps nature will speak to you as it does me and you will find God there. Or perhaps you will find God by pursuing a new spiritual practice, asking a friend to pray with you, reading through the Psalms or the Gospels, connecting with a Bible study or Bible discussion group, engaging a spiritual director, or reading a spiritual classic. Whatever, remember that there is often a wildness to that search, and a wild One to meet at every search’s end. Though that One can speak in a still small voice, he can also roar like Susan and Lucy’s Aslan.

~~RGM, September 27, 2013

P.S. Next up? From My Nature Journal...