Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
Evangelical
Courage, Jim, and Huck (Interactive Reading of Karen Swallow Prior 5/12)

Courage, Jim, and Huck (Interactive Reading of Karen Swallow Prior 5/12)

Last updated on: September 10, 2018 at 6:13 am by John Mark N. Reynolds

Courage, Jim, and Huck (Interactive Reading of Karen Swallow Prior 5/12) 2018-09-09T23:53:22-04:00 John Mark N. Reynolds

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

The best professors make you see in a new way, consider again old opinions you thought settled. Mark Twain blasts his ideas about reality in such an obvious way, while posturing as transgresssive, and yet was treated reverently by his contemporaries. He hated Victorian values so much he got rich making fun of them and other than his remarkable Joan of Arc, his work and especially his humor is often as predictable as Internet atheist memes.

And yet Leo Tolstoy also postured as a social critic while getting prizes and his books are marvels regardless. Am I being too hard on the old hypocrite?

Karen Swallow Prior has written a marvelous book on reading well and she got me thinking about Twain in a new way like a good professor would. I pulled out my Twain and realized: he is better than I recollect. Thank you Professor KSP.

More important than getting me to overcome my aversion to the man and his memoirs, KSP taught me about courage through The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn . . . A book I would otherwise be tempted to think the most overrated in American history.

Courage: Not Rashness or Boldness

KSP has written a chapter on courage that is just so. This makes it hard to interact. Should I simply say: “Amen” and then attend to wisdom?

Perhaps.

But I am an academic by training, so I will think about this little jewel of a chapter, as complete a picture of the virtue of courage as one is going to get in a few hundred words.

KSP defines courage in opposition to bravery, brashness and boldness as:

Courage is measured not by the risk it entails but by the good it preserves.

Put more expansively:

The person who is virtuously courageous displays not merely a single act of courage but the habit of courage. Courage—or fortitude, as it is often called—is defined most succinctly by moral philosophers and theologians as the habit that enables a person to face difficulties well.

This is just so. Anyone who thinks to call Adolph Hitler courageous is a person to be avoided. The Iron Cross he won in World War I is real, but he was in the service of a bad cause and a bad man. He was brave, but in the service of the Kaiser against civilization. He was a bad man, bold, in the service of a bad cause.

There is nothing to commend here and KSP shows us why. The virtue of courage cannot be found in the service of a bad cause. All the virtues interlock and left apart from justice, practical wisdom, or moderation, courage is a Lego left out on the floor that is stepped on in the middle of the night.

There is nothing good there. Courage is in the service of justice. Justice never serves courage.

In Which I Note Something I Wish I did not have to Note.

KSP rightly says that classically courage historically is:

The word courage comes from the same root word that means “heart.” To be encouraged is to be heartened or made stronger. When we exhort a person to “take heart,” we mean for her to stand strong and be of good courage.

Just so.

Yet I must point out what KSP knows . . . The Greeks would have thought that this virtue was manliness and only available (except in rare cases) to biological males. The man with courage was a man with a chest: a male chest. The term is not just heart, but also maleness.

This is quite evil, but the idea infects us still.

KSP generously is silent about this abuse of language, but fools rush in and so I will simply state: our ideas of courage are too limited as a result. Courage like any human virtue is for all of us.

That is so obvious, I apologize for stating it, particularly as a man of no particular courage. The man who cannot see the courage in a woman has abolished humanity. That person will never be surprised by joy, instead looking only to a few stereotypical versions of courage. KSP avoids this error.

We need many voices from many nations to do our best to emulate Paradise. How could we ever tolerate, let alone encourage, the error that half of humanity can be ignored or be without any virtue?

God have mercy on me a sinner.

I have much to learn.

A Tension Between Courage and Justice

KSP says:

Huckleberry Finn is a boy who is all heart. And Huckleberry Finn is the story of that boy getting his heart in the right place as he learns to rightly order his desires.

Twain masterfully (if KSP is correct) shows that courage comes unexpectedly:

In depicting this attainment of virtue through a combination of consequence and coincidence, Huckleberry Finn reflects the way life falls out for most of us most of the time: some choices we face are the result of our own doings, others completely outside of our control, most some combination of the two. How much nicer it would be not to face difficulties at all. Given the impossibility of that, the next best thing is to face hard circumstances with the virtue of courage.

There is a tension here. When discussing justice KSP has rightly shown us that we need to be just to self, but courage often features self-sacrifice. How does this balance out?

KSP shows us, though it was hard for me to see. Self-sacrifice is the choice that justice gives us when a broken world cannot be fixed in any other way. We need not give our life: no person is forced to self-sacrifice. We can. If we are courageous, we will. We might even act courageously to save our own life!

All our choices depends on justice. Huck struggles with this, because as KSP points out, his twisted slave-based culture teaches him injustice as justice. He has natural bravery, unlike Tom Sawyer he is not merely tricksy, but his bravery is muted. Why? Society has taught him to use his bravery in service to evil: slavery. Bravery tied to evil is merely brash. Huck may become courageous, but I am still unsure.

Huck never knows that he is serving justice. He thinks in helping his friend Jim, the only obviously courageous person in the book, that he is serving evil. Does Huck ever know he is serving justice? Can you do “evil” that is really good and still be courageous?

I am unsure. After all:

Because courage is always connected to justice, and because justice is judged by reason, philosophers refer to courage as “a work of reason.”

Jim the Hero

Mark Twain wrote one character who is surely brave: the enslaved man Jim.

He is never passive, he is patient. Jim is brave in the service of virtue, never rash in selfishness. He is not on an adventure, he is looking to save his family.

KSP is right: to the extent Twain can understand an enslaved man, Jim is the best person in the story. He is in a culture whose vice is to break him and he will not be broken. He is a man and a man endures as a man:

Jim exhibits the virtue of courage throughout, but the fortitude he shows at the end of the story illustrates particularly well one of the essential qualities of courage: endurance.

Jim is good or as good as he can be in his situation.

The Theosis of Huck Finn

KSP shows that Huck has gone on a hero’s journey, a Christian trip becoming more like God. This is Theosis, being like Christ who (as Athanasius puts it) became a man so we could become God. Of course, this is not God in His essence, but God in His energies.

By the end of the novel, Huck stands transfigured:

Huck’s transformation from ne’er-do-well into a boy whose developing fortitude drives him to stand against a great wrong supported by his society has made Huck Finn one of the most paradigmatic characters in all of American literature.

KSP has changed my view of this book. I see that Samuel Clemons, the soul created in the image of God, came through the Mark Twain posturing, and gave us a book about courage.

Buy the book.

————————————-

This will be a twelve part series: Introduction, Prudence, Temperance, Justice, Courage,

Culture

Education

On Books

Previous Post

September 9, 2018

The Just City (Interactive Reading of Karen Swallow Prior 4/12)

Next Post

September 11, 2018 Piercing Faith (Interactive Reading of Karen Swallow Prior 6/12)

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Apologetics Art Culture Education On Books On Education Philosophy Politics Pop Culture Spiritual Reflections Uncategorized

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 July 2025 June 2025 September 2024 July 2024 June 2024 December 2023 June 2023 September 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

Who dreamed of a ladder reaching to heaven?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Daniel Joseph Paul Jacob

Books by This Author John Mark Reynolds

See All Titles »