"Reading For the Love of God" (Jessica Hooten Wilson)

TITLE: Reading for the Love of God: How to Read as a Spiritual Practice
AUTHOR: Jessica Hooten Wilson
PUBLISHER: Grand Rapids, MI: Brazos Press, 2023, (208 pages).
 

Why do we read? Some read for mere information. Others read for leisure. A few might read for spiritual formation. The latter reason is what this book is about. Spirituality, spiritual disciplines, or spiritual practice all come under spiritual formation. A key question that asks of us is this: Are we reading for the purpose of utility or for enjoyment? With this theme, author Jessica Hooten Wilson takes us through several different ways in which people read before showing us the way forward to better reading. By comparing and contrasting the various forms of readings, she helps us deal with the whys of reading rather than settling merely for the whats. This calls for some paradigm changes in the way we read. Gradually, she turns our attention toward the art of reading well. There are lots of gems in this book that merit not just reading this book, but also reading in general. First, we learn about ourselves and our reading attitude. She invites us to question ourselves on what kind of reader we are, pointing out the many varied reasons people read in the first place. Her hope is that once we recognize what kind of readers we are, we can then see the difference between where we are and Wilson's proposal about where we ought to go. One key feature is the distinction between "critic" and "reader." The former binds one to conquer, master, or manipulate the text for self-purposes while the latter keeps one open for learning and understanding. One uses the text while the other learns from the text. Such a problem has become bigger since the advent of the Internet and digital screens. Second, the debunking of  reading "only the Bible argument." She tackles the common questions asked by certain fundamentalists who claim that we should not read any other stuff apart from the Bible. As she points out the differences between the Bible and other literature, she guides us that the key difference is that of authority in the order of Sacred Text (Bible), Trustworthy Authors, and followed by the rest. For believers, this is an important question that Wilson deals with eloquently to argue that any Christian should recognize that God speaks not only through the written Word but also through the language of Truth. Third, Wilson hones in on the difference between enjoying and using, something that should make us pause to reflect on our reading habits. Reading for pleasure and enjoyment is more than simply gaining facts or information. Just as beauty prompts us to behold rather than analyze, reading for love and enjoyment turns us toward love and to God. Fourth, Wilson asks the question "Do good books make a person good?" In short, not necessary, but it provides the fodder to grow in that direction. Fifth, Wilson draws our attention to the Reading Trinity: Author, Reader, Text (the ART). She describes these three ways of reading before making a case for a discerning use of all. Sixth, she introduces to us another reading paradigm via the four senses of reading, more specifically, how the early church reads the biblical text: "Literal, Figurative, Moral, and Anagogical" before showing us the four spiritual ways of reading, as advocated by the 12th Century spiritual master, Guigo II: Lectio, Meditatio, Oratio, and Contemplatio. Finally, reading aids memory, and in turn helps a culture to flourish. Going back to the Old Testament, she reminds us that memory-keeping is a moral responsibility. Lest we forget, we risk repeating old mistakes. Against the over-reliance on our digital devices, she lists for us the various ways in which we can exercise our memory: Liturgy, copying, reciting, illustrating, mapping, repeating, and so on.

My Thoughts

This is one of the best books I have read about learning to read. Those of us who have read Mortimer Adler's classic work, "How to Read a Book" would recall the four different levels of reading. Each level represents a more advanced kind of reading or intelligent reading. Wilson's contribution is not to supplant but to supplement this book with an emphasis on reading spiritually. While Adler's work is a non-Christian perspective of the world of reading, Wilson's book approaches from a Christian perspective about reading books of both spiritual and secular origins. Non-Christians can also benefit because Wilson takes special care to point out that as far as Truth is concerned, there is no dichotomy between Christian versus non-Christian books. She not only draws material from popular Christian authors like Augustine, St Teresa of Avila, Søren Kierkegaard, Flannery O'Connor, G.K. Chesterton, CS Lewis, Eugene Peterson, etc; she encourages us to read Albert Camus, Confucius, Frederich Nietzsche, George Orwell, Jean-Paul Sartre, Lao Tzu, Plato, etc. Her recommended list is a great resource to begin practicing our reading abilities. It comprises both children's and classic works; fiction and non-fiction; poetry and prose; novels and short stories, spiritual and others, etc. Why do I recommend this book? Let me offer three quick reasons. 

First, we need to bring back the love for reading good books. Today, more people are reading stuff off the Internet. They mine websites for information. They comb social media for updates. They search for news to read. It is increasingly our way of seeing the world through the tiny screens of our phones, tablets, and conventional computers. Some even claim that they are always reading books, such as FaceBook! It has been reported that people trying to read off the Internet or eBooks, tend to browse rather than read. Eyeballs on digital screens tend to skim words on the page instead of actually reading from top to bottom. Statistically, people read more on the top half of the screen instead of the bottom half. She calls for us to turn away from the "seduction of screens" toward the "love of the book," in particular, the love of God that drives our reading. This brings us to the second reason why this book is highly recommended: It motivates one to read widely. By addressing concerns about whether to read Christian books vs non-Christian books, secular or spiritual, Wilson peels away the superficial labels to help us prioritize Truth over simplistic labels. Such labels include the tendency to avoid certain authors on the basis of their beliefs or prejudices. In a society that is increasingly intolerant of any kind of perceived discrimination, people are practicing a new form of "book-burning" by ostracizing books written by authors accused of blatantly unacceptable practices like gender inequality, racial prejudice, white supremacy, etc. Increasingly, mainstream views are painting alternative views as pariahs to be banned. For instance, people and book distributors supporting the LGBTQ rainbow movement are starting to marginalize books from authors who disagree or dissent from the mainstream. (See J.K Rowling.) This is where Wilson's trinity of reading is helpful. Do not let the "Reader-Response" emotion overwhelm the other two branches of authorial intent of the book, and the text itself. Hopefully, this book can calm down passionate advocates from all sides to learn to view books based on their merit rather than label-tainted colours. 

Finally, Wilson does not just tell us what to read, she shows us how to read. Using examples from the lives of Augustine, Julian of Norwich, Frederick Douglass, Dorothy Sayers, and many more, readers learn to connect the text with the author. In doing so, she subtly shows us how to bring in the third party: Us. Good reading means we learn to read well and enjoy the reading process.  We learn not just the mere mechanics of reading but also the motivation for reading. We let the love of God help us to read not just the Bible, but other good books. We can play our part by pushing back against the superficial reading and browsing that many people do nowadays. We learn not to read in order to control or criticize but to adopt a stance of humility and willingness to learn. Many people are satisfied with mere summaries of a book or article. When they do that, they reduce the beauty of a book to pointers and memorable quips. We need to shun such attitudes to move away from information-seeking toward using reading to help us be better readers and better people. In an Internet world, information reigns supreme. We need something better, like spiritual discernment, wise selection, Spiritual formation into Christlikeness, and so on. This book shows us the way. 

Jessica Hooten Wilson (PhD, Baylor University) is the inaugural Visiting Scholar of Liberal Arts at Pepperdine University in Malibu, California. She previously taught at the University of Dallas. She is the author of The Scandal of Holiness, Giving the Devil His Due: Demonic Authority in the Fiction of Flannery O'Connor and Fyodor Dostoevsky (winner of a 2018 Christianity Today Book of the Year Award), and two books on Walker Percy. She is also the coeditor of Learning the Good Life and Solzhenitsyn and American Culture. Wilson speaks around the world on topics as varied as Russian novelists, Catholic thinkers, and Christian ways of reading.

Rating: 5 stars of 5.

conrade

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This book has been provided courtesy of Brazos Press and NetGalley without requiring a positive review. All opinions offered above are mine unless otherwise stated or implied.