Filed under: Books I'm Reading
I’m reading Czech classic ‘The Good Soldier Svejk’ by Jaroslav Hasek, before a planned trip to Prague next year. It is hilarious, sarcastic and witty.
A Religious Debate: Antipodes. (pg139)
Note: ‘antipode’ refers to an opposite pole, and is used commonly to refer to the southern hemisphere; St Augustine is the writer of a famed medieval religious autobiography where he finds God after much sinning.
Svejk is telling a story, on request, to two chaplains.
“Humbly report, sir,” said Svejk, “near Vlasim there was a dean who had a charwoman, when his old housekeeper ran away from him with the boy and the money. And this dean in his declining years started studying St. Augustine, who is said to be one of the Holy Fathers, and he read there that whoever believes in the Antipodes will be damned. And so he called his charwoman and said to her: ‘Listen, you once told me that your son was a fitter and that he went to Australia. That would be in the Antipodes and according to St. Augustine’s instructions everyone who believes in the Antipodes is damned.’ ‘Reverend sir,’ the woman answered, ‘after all my son sends me letters and money from Australia.’ ‘That’s a snare of the devil,’ replied the dean. ‘According to St. Augustine Australia doesn’t exist at all and you are just being seduced by the Anti-Christ.’ On Sunday he anathematized her publicly and shouted out that Australia didn’t exist.”
