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Originally Posted by Aiwendil
All right - if this is the charge against Eru, then I think it makes perfect sense. It also should be noted that the charge applies generally to omnipotent deities. I was merely pointing out that there is a worse charge made by some (most relavantly, by Pullman) against the God of Abraham - namely, that he is petty, ill-tempered, jealous, and vengeful.
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Indeed, for some Christians, that kind of God is the God they have, so Pullman's justified in that criticism as it's a type of God in the Real World anyway. And in this day and age of religion-driven hatred and violence it's a very pertinent point to make as some wish to hasten the end of the world because of what they perceive God to be. In that respect, Pullman is doing a wonderful thing by raising such difficult questions.
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Originally Posted by Aiwendil
Yet the thrust of the analogy is very clear. I have to say that I am not at all surprised at the outrage; that the Magisterium is a metaphor for the Catholic Church (or Christian Church, as this is a world without the Reformation) is fairly transparent. And if the metaphor is dealt with subtly in The Golden Compass, it is not so in the second and third books. This is not intended in any way as a criticism. On the contrary, I am very much in sympathy with Pullman on the matter of organized religion (though I certainly do have other criticisms for HDM). But if one considers the degree of 'offence' taken at, for instance, The Life of Brian, one will not be shocked at an outcry over a series of books in which . . . well, I won't say it, as I don't wish to spoil The Amber Spyglass for anyone - but consider the Authority as portrayed in that book.
And yet, as you pointed out earlier, Pullman does not, in the end, come across as anti-religion in HDM. Anti-Islamo-Judeo-Christianity, even anti-organized religion, yes, but anti-religion no. And I suspect that for many Christians of the less extreme sort, the Dust comes closer to their conception of God than does the Authority. Whether this is a virtue or a flaw in HDM is another matter, of course.
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Yes, and there is the quite beautiful thing about His Dark Materials - that in the end God is to be found in the very fabric of existence, not merely in the anthropomorphic figure of an aged man. This where davem's derided Republic of Heaven comes in - it is a state of existence which all share, not just those who have paid the subscription fees - and that in itself is yet another message from these stories, that God cannot simply be accessed by putting your cash onto a brass dish; the Magisterium is also a symbol of money and how it has done and very much still does corrupt churches.
The only way anyone can honestly form a criticism of these books is to go out and read them - and read them a couple of times as they are incredibly complex and ambitious and draw on so much more than mere criticisms of religions (they draw on philosophy, poetry, psychology, science, myth, art and literature amongst other things).
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Originally Posted by davem
So what I'm asking is, is HDM really a good, entertaining story (as Pullman likes to claim) or is it actually an average/poor story which relies on a controversial message to attract readers?
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Well I read them when they were very much 'just books' and hadn't heard of any of the controversy. I just saw them in a bookshop, noticed they had won several of the literary prizes and thought they looked interesting. I found I was deeply moved by them, fascinated by the new ideas (and these are very hard to come by in fantasy, how often do you think "Oh yawn,
another sword wielding village boy?!
Another Dark Lord?!") and have to say that I found it completely refreshing that they had a girl as the lead character, and not only that, but a girl who wasn't stereotyped and who was admirable.