Of morale and angels, Kiev and Ragnarok

January 17th, 2015 by Charles Cameron

I’m still not convinced that contemporary minds will “get” morale from any graphic image yet devised.. I can’t help remembering the M-16 manual I picked up one day at a library sale or flea market, titled The M16A1 Rifle: Operation and Preventive Maintenance:

Treat your rifle like a lady

My guess, however, is that we’ll wind up with something closer to this:

Powerpoint for McChrystal

**

Image sources:

  • Andrei Rublev, icon of Archangel Michael

  • Archangel Michael, Especial Forces graphic

  • Sculpture, Archangel Michael, Kiev

  • Peter Nicolai Arbo, Aasgaardreien

  • M16 manual, DA Pam 750-30

  • Powerpoint, Afghanistan Stability

  • The photo of the Kiev St Michael is by Mstyslav Chernov, used under CC-BY-SA-3.0 license

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    Posted in Afghanistan, army, Charles Cameron, christianity, graphical thinking, iran, myth, norse, powerpoint, russia, sacred, schuler, symbolism, ukraine, Uncategorized | 3 comments

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    1. Dave Schuler:

      January 18th, 2015 at 7:34 pm

      There’s a story from the fairly recent past that you may never have heard. It’s about one of Switzerland’s several patron saints, Niklaus von Pflue, also known as Bruder Klaus, a distant ancestor of mine.
      .
      In 1939 the German army was advancing on the Swiss border. The Swiss mobilized rapidly and the Swiss Army rose to defend its border. As they looked down on the advancing German army, they knelt in prayer, asking for the intervention of Bruder Klaus, who had also fought to defend their country. They saw a light in the sky and the German army withdrew. Despite being surrounded by hostile forces from 1940 to 1944 Switzerland maintained its independence and it was the only German-speaking country to do so.
      .
      That’s the miracle that put Bruder Klaus over the top in his canonization process. I suspect that the support of the papal guard didn’t hurt, either.

    2. Charles Cameron:

      January 18th, 2015 at 8:57 pm

      Fascinating.
      .
      I note that Carl Jung & Marie Louise von Franz took a considerable interest in your ancestor:

      Sources focusing on eremitism and mysticism include C. G. Jung: “Bruder Klaus,” in Jung’s Collected Works, v. 11, p. 474-487; New York: Pantheon, 1958, and Maria-Louise von Franz: Die Visionen des Niklaus von Flüe. Einsiedelin, Switzerland: Daimon, 1980 (not translated into English) and her “The Transformed Berserker: Union of Opposites” in Archetypal Dimensions of the Psyche; Boston: Shambhala, 1999.
      .
      http://www.hermitary.com/articles/flue.html

      That’s some lineage!

    3. Dave Schuler:

      January 18th, 2015 at 9:19 pm

      A dear friend (a well-known scholar of medieval mysticism) once told me that he was one of the most important medieval mystics.
      .
      According to legend, he spent the last twenty years or so of his life living in a cave, surviving on nothing but the Eucharist. In some way or other he and his wife Dorothy managed to have twelve children. She was canonized, too. She’s the patroness of difficult marriages which seems fitting enough.