Journey to the Center of the Earth and Christian Coffee
Ultimately, the search for Eden is a search for reality, which the professor articulates throughout. It is not an attempt to go back in time but to learn from time past and re-articulate a new future
My first exposure to Jules Verne was not through his monumental fiction Around the World in 80 Days. Instead, it came through his 1864 work Journey to the Center of the Earth. The work details the adventure of a passionate geology professor named Otto Lidenbrock. Lidenbrock is a notorious lecturer, always seeking the voyages extraordinaires.
The 1959 movie adaptation featuring the lovely Arlene Dahl vividly depicts the journey. There are additional characters and several other plots that forsake the book, but it was worth every moment, especially to see science through storytelling applied on the screen. I doubt I will try Eric Brevig’s 2008 theatrical adaptation, though I have always admired Brendan Fraser’s youthfulness and dexterity as an actor.
The Journey
The book begins with the acquisition of an Icelandic manuscript by Professor Lidenbrok. The manuscript reveals a piece of parchment with a cryptogram. His nephew, Alex Lidenbrock--also the narrator of the entire journey--offers his curiosity and eagerness to decipher the parchment. Once they decipher the meaning, a map emerges, which provides a dangerous yet enticing road to the very center of the universe.
As they begin their journey, they find a steady and unstoppable guide, Hans, whose lucid capacity to persevere adds tremendous hope to their survival and success. Hans is the faithful guide who takes the professor and his nephew through many trials. He is a guide who advocates on behalf of the weary travelers. He only desires his day’s wages and does not complicate the travel in any way but heightens the journey with joviality and creativity. He serves and seeks the good of the two companions. He is a type of Spirit-figure who is indefatigable requiring basic allegiance from those he guides.
The journey is fraught with remarkable moments of psychological despair as Axel and the Professor fight their deepest fears—trapped under the rummage of rocks, lost in the maze of volcanic eruptions, and thirsty for sustenance. Their journey offers pre-historic sights, haunted scenes with luminous forests, staffed giants watching over the mastodons, sea creatures battling for oceanic supremacy, and a longing to be home.
The Two Central Themes
Two themes are prevalent in Verne’s fantastical labor: Edenic and Relational.
The first theme comes through at various stages of the journey. In some ways, their journey is a quest to find an alternative world, the Genesis world. The puzzling feature of this journey is that even when the Professor and Axel do come in contact with this primordial life, they hesitate to engage but rather fear it. They may take relics back, but they believe there is something sacred about this world. They want the journey, but they do not wish to touch the architecture of the ancient. Eden is better left untouched to avoid dealing with its true and, at times, chaotic nature.
The journey is punctuated by moments of ideology. For instance, there is a clear attempt to divinize science throughout the book. Common to 19th-century literature, the book provides several biblical quotations and a clear sense of providence:
“I thanked God for having led me through the labyrinth of darkness to the only point at which the voices of my companions could reach me. (p. 122)”
Axel sees his lostness in this underground world as an act of providence and his discovery as an act of the divine as well. But that sense of transcendence is also confronted with the professor’s profound trust in the scientific inquiry:
“When science has uttered her voice, let babblers hold their peace.”
Science holds the ultimate authority. And, perhaps, like 19th-century theologians, there is still a common sense that modern scientific inquiries followed previous centuries in harmonizing the revelation in the Scriptures and nature. That dichotomy and antagonism are much more profound today. To the sane 21st century evangelical, science has become a source of betrayal to true Christian thought. Science has become messianic; a foreign thought to many in the 19th-century church.
But the book also makes a blatant admission of the limitations of science from the lips of the renowned professor:
“Science, my boy, is made up of mistakes, but they are mistakes which it is useful to make, because they lead little by little to the truth.”
Science is divinized, but science falters. We need to see science’s failures to accept science’s primacy. We must learn from those mistakes and enter into more profound truth. Ultimately, the search for Eden is a search for reality, which the professor articulates throughout. It is not an attempt to go back in time but to learn from time past and re-articulate a new future.
The second clear theme is the relational component. From beginning to end, there are abundant examples of the love between the Professor and his nephew. They are initially academically united, but they become emotionally bound throughout the journey. There is an unmistakable paternal union formed that allows the eccentric professor to speak into the life of his nephew with boldness. Axel receives the sage wisdom of his uncle:
“While there is life there is hope. I beg to assert...that as long as a man's heart beats, as long as a man's flesh quivers, I do not allow that a being gifted with thought and will can allow himself to despair.”
When Axel is given to despair, the Professor uses such an opportunity to add his Solomonic gems, almost as if he needed no prompting. Instead, his wisdom flows to distinct circumstances:
“If at every instant we may perish, so at every instant we may be saved.”
A relational dimension keeps the young and amateur sojourner strong throughout when hope is quickly vanishing and when the strong can quickly overtake the weak. Yet, the professor builds on his relationship and, at every moment, guides him through the oceans of despair.
Their labor is rewarded at the end. They entered through a volcanic cave and they went back through a volcanic wind, pulling them to the true world where their accomplishments were extolled, where Axel finds his true love, and where science is vindicated from the skeptics of the age.
Eden remains untouched, and the journey proves that humans can walk side-by-side even amidst the most terrifying moments. It’s this movement forward that can put humanity back to its glory. We shall not go back, but we can move forward with the knowledge that our past has shaped us. And for the Christian, this is the center of all existence, Jesus Christ, earth’s true meaning who takes the past and builds a more excellent future for his servants.
Notations
My interview with Brandon Lansdown is now LIVE on various platforms. You can listen here. We had a casual discussion on the nature of coffee and our experiences.
Christiane Tietz’s biography of Barth is considered one of the finest. She is meticulous without indulging in Barthian fanaticism. I have been slowly working my way through it. I have now arrived at his first pastorate and find some level of sympathy with his project.
For Barth, “True Christian joy exists when one shares with others.” But that this entire endeavor is something “that must be learned.” There is a developed pietism in Barth’s pastoral practice and a heavy dose of catechesis from which he developed his ideas of Christian discipleship.
His embrace of socialism as a political model caused quite a stir in his local ministry, leading to a broad spectrum of opinions on the young Barth, who later realized he should have been more of an observer than an interpreter. He was wisely counseled to stay away from unnecessary quarrels. He was encouraged not to fight crudeness with crudeness, which would lead to the principle of vengeance. Barth later noted that upon reflection, “my gesture appeared less heroic to me.”
My traveling schedule will put me in Idaho, Virginia, California, and possibly D.C. in the next 120 days.
My Priesthood book should be published just in time for Christmas. It is far from my ideal, but my schedule has delayed my editing work.
I baptized nine children this past Sunday, which was a moving experience. I suppose it was the lyrics and melody of this Reformational piece that ultimately crushed my soul in all the right ways:
Satan, hear this proclamation:
I am baptized into Christ!
Drop your ugly accusation,
I am not so soon enticed.
Now that to the font I've traveled,
All your might has come unraveled,
And, against your tyranny,
God, my Lord, unites with me!
Be at peace. The Lord your God is with you.
Uriesou Brito