PBS高端访谈:宗教礼节不仅仅体现在祷告上

JUDY WOODRUFF: Religion and its effects permeate¹ the work of novelist Nathan Englander. Raised in a highly observant Jewish family, Englander turned away from religion and made a decision to live a secular² life. But the rituals of religion stayed with him, not in prayer, but in the way he lived his daily life. Tonight, Englander shares his Humble³ Opinion on the discipline and focus he found, and joy that comes with it.

朱迪·伍德拉夫：宗教及其影响充斥着小说家内森·英格兰德的每部作品。英格兰德在一切循规蹈矩的犹太家庭长大，放弃了原本的宗教，决定做一个无宗教信仰者。但各种宗教礼节依然与他如影随形。这种礼节并不体现在祷告本身上，而是体现在他日常的生活方式上。今晚，英格兰德将与我们分享他关于自律与专注的心得，以及自律与专注带给他的快乐。

NATHAN ENGLANDER, Author: When I left the religious community, I left it with a vengeance⁴. Like a rubber band stretched to breaking and then released, I shot off in the other direction, landing as far as I could from the Orthodox Jewish world in which I had been raised. Instead of being faithful about faith, I turned super faithful about fiction. And for a long time, I saw it as a zero sum game. But the more I wrote, the more i began to realize how the religious rituals of my childhood, they fed the creative routines of that writing life. That is, I may have left the fold, but I seem to have brought two pillars of Orthodox Judaism, sacred time and sacred space, along with me. The time element was an obvious fit. I adopted the six days for creation and a seventh for rest model. I figured, if it worked for building this world, it should work for fictional⁵ ones as well. As the writing years piled on, I noticed something else: how I would wait to sit at the same table at the same coffee shop every day, how I would stake out my spot in the library, and I can hardly express how much I now cherish my chair and my desk and my unchanging office window view. This is where the sacred space comes in. I finally understood the bigger idea behind what I was doing. It related directly to the notion of what's called in Hebrew the makom kavua, one's set place. It reminded me of sitting next to my dad in synagogue, how we sat in the same seats in the same row every week, in front of these little brass⁶ tags with our last name engraved⁷ upon them. I thought that reserved space for my father was about respect. I thought it was about honor. But it was more about engaging with worship or the writing from a fixed⁸ place, because it's the combination of those two elements, the daily rituals and the physical routines, that I am convinced are key to whatever kind of transcendence it is you're after. Whether you race to a 6:00 a.m. yoga class or morning mass, whether you need the window seat in your own coffee shop or your shoes kicked off so you can better feel the floor under your feet, providing that kind of continuity for the body is the best way to free up the mind. For the writer, honestly, it helps you build up a kind of creative reflex, so that those synapses⁹ fire off, and the images come. And from there, all you need to do is sit back and watch your fingers fly.

内森·英格兰德，作家：我放弃宗教信仰的时候，大有一去不回头之心。就像拉扯到极点的橡皮筋脱离了拉力一样，我向反方向飞驰而去，到了完全没有犹太教的地方，虽然我是在犹太教的影响下长大的。我不再像以前那样对信仰无比忠诚，而是对虚构的世界痴迷。有很长一段时间里，我认为虚构的世界里只有零和博弈。但随着我写作量的增大，我愈发认识到：我童年时候所经历过的宗教礼节正是我写作的创意源泉。说的具体些，虽然我不再是犹太教徒，但正统派犹太教的两大支柱似乎一直深深影响着我。这两大支柱就是：神圣的时间与空间。时间这个支柱十分明显：我会花6天来进行创作，第7天就来完成余下模型的架构。我在想，如果这种方法适用于现实世界，那么也应该适用于虚幻世界。随着我写作年头的累积，我注意到了另一件事：我每天都等待着坐在同一家咖啡厅的同一张桌子上，我也会对自己在图书馆的位置念念不忘，我也无法用言语表达自己有多么珍爱现在的桌椅以及从办公室窗外眺望到的四季如一的风景。这里就不得不提到神圣的空间了。我从自己所做的事情上体会到了更大的意义。它与希伯来语中的一个概念直接相关——个人的空间（makom kavua）。它让我想起了曾经跟爸爸并肩坐在犹太会堂里的场景。那时候，我和爸爸每周都会坐在同一排的同一个位置。在铜制的名牌上有我们的姓刻在上面。我认为，对我父亲来说，保留给个人的空间就是尊重。而我认为这关乎荣誉。但其中更大的意义在于全身心朝拜或者在一个固定的地点写作，因为日常礼节与每日惯性的组合，在我眼中是一个人是否卓越的关键。无论是早上6点赶瑜伽课或者早课，亦或坚持在咖啡馆坐靠窗座位，亦或习惯光脚踩在地上来感受地板的存在，这些都是身体的惯性使然，是解放大脑的最佳方式。说实话，对作家来说，这样的惯性可以打造富有创造性的肌肉，让神经突触保持兴奋，然后画面自然就来了。一旦灵感因此而来的时候，我们只需要坐在那里用笔尖记录飞扬的思绪便好。

JUDY WOODRUFF: Nathan Englander, we thank you.

朱迪·伍德拉夫：感谢内森·英格兰德的分享。

1 permeate   

v.弥漫，遍布，散布；渗入，渗透

参考例句：

• Water will easily permeate a cotton dress.水很容易渗透棉布衣服。
• After a while it begins to permeate through your skin.过了一会，它会开始渗入你的皮肤。

2 secular   

n.牧师，凡人；adj.世俗的，现世的，不朽的

参考例句：

• We live in an increasingly secular society.我们生活在一个日益非宗教的社会。
• Britain is a plural society in which the secular predominates.英国是个世俗主导的多元社会。

3 humble   

adj.谦卑的，恭顺的；地位低下的；v.降低，贬低

参考例句：

• In my humble opinion,he will win the election.依我拙见，他将在选举中获胜。
• Defeat and failure make people humble.挫折与失败会使人谦卑。

4 vengeance   

n.报复，报仇，复仇

参考例句：

• He swore vengeance against the men who murdered his father.他发誓要向那些杀害他父亲的人报仇。
• For years he brooded vengeance.多年来他一直在盘算报仇。

5 fictional   

adj.小说的，虚构的

参考例句：

• The names of the shops are entirely fictional.那些商店的名字完全是虚构的。
• The two authors represent the opposite poles of fictional genius.这两位作者代表了天才小说家两个极端。

6 brass   

n.黄铜；黄铜器，铜管乐器

参考例句：

• Many of the workers play in the factory's brass band.许多工人都在工厂铜管乐队中演奏。
• Brass is formed by the fusion of copper and zinc.黄铜是通过铜和锌的熔合而成的。

7 engraved   

v.在（硬物）上雕刻（字，画等）( engrave的过去式和过去分词 )；将某事物深深印在（记忆或头脑中）

参考例句：

• The silver cup was engraved with his name. 银杯上刻有他的名字。
• It was prettily engraved with flowers on the back. 此件雕刻精美，背面有花饰图案。 来自《简明英汉词典》

8 fixed   

adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的

参考例句：

• Have you two fixed on a date for the wedding yet?你们俩选定婚期了吗？
• Once the aim is fixed,we should not change it arbitrarily.目标一旦确定，我们就不应该随意改变。

9 synapses   

n.（神经元的）突触( synapse的名词复数 )；染色体结合( synapsis的名词复数 )；联会；突触；（神经元的）触处

参考例句：

• Nerve cells communicate with one another at the synapses, where their membranes almost touch. 神经细胞在突触部位彼此沟通，在这里它们的膜几乎接触到一起了。 来自辞典例句
• Glutamatergic synapses are common excitatory chemical connections in mammalian central nervous system. 谷氨酸性突触是哺乳动物神经系统的主要兴奋性突触。 来自互联网