With the recent release of Steven Wilson’s (Aka Porcupine Tree, Blackfield) latest solo album, I took some time to do a little searching via old interviews (via wikipedia…). I confirmed a few things i had felt via lyrics coming from Porcupine tree that Wilson doesn’t like organized religion, but that he doesn’t necessarily shut out spirituality (defined in an Atheistic framework) completely. Through songs like Lazarus and Prodigal, there seems to be echoes of themes from stories found in the Gospels. Especially the calling of Lazarus from the grave found in John.
These lyrics were never endorsements, but sharing some themes, I at least felt that Wilson perhaps appreciated “truth” behind some of the stories, but “truth” as not fact, but as something true in the sense that it speaks to the human heart…
So, finding Steven Wilson to be an Atheist never struck me as odd and he also doesn’t seem to be in attack mode regarding religion, but he does seem to think it to be nonsense…and obviously so. He then goes on to talk about the New Testament being written 200-300 years after the fact by governments/systems of power. And these comments I think both surprised me and disappointed me. I think I had expected more understanding regardless of his conclusions, but he seems to accept this narrative that I’ve heard thrown around here and there. It is that the New Testament was written really late, far after the events around Jesus’ life. But what strikes me strange is that no scholars, Atheist or Christian or Muslim, would ever date the Gospels so late as the dates often thrown around by people like Wilson. I wonder where these dates come from and I also wonder why they are accepted so naturally.
Listening to the music and lyrics written down by Wilson, I often find myself nodding along with his views and insights and had considered him (and still do to an extent) a very deep and thoughtful person. But his comments made me remember that a person can be an expert in one field but ignorant in other areas. A person can be deep in some areas of life, but shallow on other fronts. Because a person is an expert scientist does not give them authority surrounding history. Because a person is a great historian and knows so much about a place and time, it does not necessarily mean they will then be a well-trained sociologist or even know a thing about history in Asia or other areas out of their field.
But we often come with expectations that movie stars are well-informed about global politics and musicians will be deep philosophically. But, of course not! Neither are we experts in all trades. But we sometimes make the mistake of listening a little too much to people who really don’t know too much.
And again, the last thing that i often notice is that people discount religion on account of it being intellectually absurd, but they often do while giving out information to back their case that is verifiably incorrect. And so while they come to the issue under the mantle of knowledge and intellectual integrity and realism…often it comes from a narrative that they have been fed…it comes from faith.
Quinby 