The Bible is not interested in arguing, because if you state a thesis of belief you have already stated it's opposite; if you say, I believe in God, you have already suggested the possibility of not believing in him. [p.250]
Interpretation
This quote suggests that expressing a belief inherently acknowledges the possibility of doubt or disbelief.
Northrop Frye's quote reflects a philosophical perspective on belief and doubt. By stating a belief, such as faith in God, one also implies the existence of its contrary—doubt or disbelief. This duality highlights the complexity of faith and the human condition, where beliefs cannot be entirely separated from doubts.
In practice
In a discussion about faith and belief systems, you might use this quote to illustrate the complexity of human belief.
A reader who quarrels with postulates, who dislikes Hamlet because he does not believe that there are ghosts or that people speak in pentameters, clearly has no business in literature. He cannot distinguish fiction from fact, and belongs in the same category as the people who send checks to radio stations for the relief of suffering heroines in soap operas.
Literature is a human apocalypse, man's revelation to man, and criticism is not a body of adjudications, but the awareness of that revelation, the last judgement of mankind.
To bring anything really to life in literature we can't be lifelike: we have to be literature-like
The world of literature is a world where there is no reality except that of the human imagination.
We do not live in a centred space any more, but have to create our own centres.
Just as a new scientific discovery manifests something that was already latent in the order of nature, and at the same time is logically related to the total structure of the existing science, so the new poem manifests something that was already latent in the order of words.
Great nations write their autobiographies in three manuscripts - the book of their deeds, the book of their words and the book of their art.
If two angels were to receive at the same moment a commission from God, one to go down and rule earth’s grandest empire, the other to go and sweep the streets of its meanest village, it would be a matter of entire indifference to each which service fell to his lot, the post of ruler or the post of scavenger; for the joy of the angels lies only in obedience to God’s will, and with equal joy they would lift a Lazarus in his rags to Abraham’s bosom, or be a chariot of fire to carry an Elijah home.
My space chums think my unique hookup with humanity could be evolution's awkward attempt to jump-start itself up again. They're thinking just maybe, going crazy could be the evolutionary process trying to hurry up mind expansion. Maybe my mind didn't snap. Maybe it was just trying to stretch itself into a new shape. The cerebral cortex trying to grow a thumb of sorts.
If there were no way into God, I would not have lain in the grave of this body so long.
The spectacle is capital accumulated to the point where it becomes image.
Where there is no strife there is decay: 'The mixture which is not shaken decomposes.'
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.