397 “Gottes Ursprache”. Hugo Ball’s Theology of Sound Frank G. Bosman Kurzfassung: Der deutsche Autor Hugo Ball (1886–1927) zählt zu den bedeutendsten Vertretern des „Lautgedichts“. Den Schrecken des Ersten Weltkrieges entflohen, wurde er 1916 in Zürich zum Mitbegründer der Dada-Bewegung. Deren „Cabaret Voltaire“ wurde zu einem populären Podium für Kunst, besonders für die „Lautpoesie“, bei dem die gewöhnliche Sprache hinter den „inneren Klang“ (Wassily Kandinksy) eines Wortes zurücktritt. In dem Maße, in dem die Semantik verschwindet und der Klang in den Vordergrund tritt, nähert sich diese Poesie der Musik an. Am 23. Juni 1917 stellte Ball sein berühmtes Lautgedicht gadji beri bimba vor. Nach seiner eigenen Darstellung in Die Flucht aus der Zeit (1927) war es für ihn eine ekstatische Erfahrung. Er erkannte in der Darbietung Anklänge an die „uralte Kadenz der priesterlichen Lamentation“ wieder. Dies markierte für Ball in einer gewissen Weise die Abkehr von Dada und die Rückkehr zum katholischen Glauben seiner Jugend. Von der Echtheit seiner Bekehrung überzeugt und getrieben vom Wunsch, seine Rechtgläubigkeit gegenüber den wieder gefundenen Glaubensgenossen unter Beweis zu stellen, begann Ball mit der Verfassung einer Reihe von Artikeln und Essays über Glaube, Gesellschaft und Religion, zu deren bekanntesten Zur Kritik der deutschen Intelligenz (1919), Byzantinisches Christentum (1923) und Die Folgen der Reformation (1924) gehören. Von den Kritikern nicht geschont und von den Wissenschaftlern kaum beachtet, enthält Balls „Theologie des Lautes“, die er in Byzantinisches Christentum entfaltet, Spuren der patristischen Theologie, der jüdische Mystik der Kabbala sowie der Sprachphilosophie Walter Benjamins. In diesem Beitrag werden Balls „Theologie des Lautes“ vorgestellt und deren vielfältigen Quellen aufgezeigt. Sommaire : L’écrivain et poète allemand Hugo Ball (1886–1927) est réputé pour ses « poèmes sonores ». Après avoir fui l’horreur des tranchées de la Première Guerre Mondiale, il fonda le mouvement Dada à Zurich en 1916. Son « Cabaret Voltaire » était un podium populaire pour l’œuvre d’art totale mais plus spécialement pour les « poèmes sonores » dans lesquels le langage traditionnel est déconstruit en faveur d’une « sonorité intérieure » (Wassily Kandinsky) de la parole intérieure. Le 23 Juin 1917, Ball récita le plus célèbre de ses « poèmes sonores »: Gadji beri bimba. Selon son propre témoignage, dans Die Flucht aus der Zeit (1927), Ball fit là une expérience extatique, au cours de laquelle il entendit des échos de la « cadence ancestrale de lamentation sacerdotale ». En un certain sens, ce fut la fin de Dada pour Ball, puisqu’il se reconvertit à la foi catholique de sa jeunesse. Convaincu de l’authenticité de sa reconversion et animé par la volonté de prouver son orthodoxie à ses nouveaux compagnons de religion, Ball commença à publier toute une série d’articles et d’essais sur la foi, la société et la religion, parmi lesquels Zur Kritik der deutschen Intelligenz (1919), Byzantinisches Christentum (1923) et Die Folgen der Reformation (1924) furent les plus importants. N’ayant pas la faveur des critiques, très souvent négligée par les spécialistes, la théologie sonore de Ball, proposée dans Byzantisches Christentum, contient des traces de théologie patristique, de mysticisme de la Cabbale, et de la philosophie du langage du célèbre spécialiste Walter Benjamin. On trouvera dans cet article une présentation de, la « théologie sonore » de Ball et ses nombreuses sources. 398 Frank G. Bosman Sommario: Il poeta e autore tedesco Hugo Ball (1886–1927) è molto conosciuto per la sua “poesia sonora”. Fuggito dagli orrori delle trincee della prima guerra mondiale, egli fondò nel 1916 il movimento dadaista a Zurigo. Il suo “Cabaret Voltaire” era un palcoscenico aperto a tutte le espressioni artistiche ma in special modo alle “poesie sonore”, in cui il linguaggio convenzionale era disgregato a favore di un “suono interiore” (Wassily Kandinksy), della parola nascosta. Il 23 giugno 1917 Ball rappresentò il suo poema più famoso: gadji beri bimba, in cui – secondo quanto riportato da lui stesso in Die Flucht aus der Zeit (1927) – poté sperimentare un momento di estasi. In questo spettacolo Ball riconosce reminiscenze di una “antichissima cadenza della lamentazione sacerdotale”, un riconoscimento che in un certo senso coincideva con la fine della sua fase dadaista, e apriva la strada a una ritrovata conversione alla fede cattolica professata in gioventù. Certo dell’autenticità della sua conversione e intenzionato a dar prova della sua ortodossia ai suoi nuovi compagni di fede, Ball iniziò a comporre un’intera serie di saggi su fede, società e religione, tra cui i più noti furono Zur Kritik der deutschen Intelligenz (1919), Byzantinisches Christentum (1923) e Die Folgen der Reformation (1924). Non godendo di particolare favore presso la critica e quasi ignorata dagli intellettuali, la teologia postulata da Ball nel Byzantinisches Christentum contiene spunti di teologia patristica, misticismo cabalistico e della filosofia del linguaggio del noto studioso Walter Benjamin. In questa presentazione si illustrerà la “teologia del suono” di Ball e le sue numerose fonti. The German author and poet Hugo Ball (1886–1927) is best known for his “sound poems”. Having fled from the horrors of the First World War’s trenches, he founded the Dada movement in Zürich in 1916. It’s Cabaret Voltaire was a popular podium for Gesamtkunst but especially for “sound poems” in which conventional language was destroyed in favor of an inneres Klang, of the “Word within”.1 On the 23rd of June 1917 Ball performed his most famous sound poem: gadji beri bimba. According to his own account in his diaries Flucht aus der Zeit (1927), Ball went through an ecstatic experience. In this performance Ball recognized the shadows of the uralte Kadenz der priesterlichen Lamentation. In a certain way it meant the end of Dada for Ball, for he reconverted to the Catholic faith of this youth. Convinced of the authenticity of his own reconversion and with the intention to prove his orthodoxy to his newly found fellow-believers, Ball started to write a series of and essays about faith, society and religion, of which Zur Kritik der deutschen Intelligenz (1919), Byzantinisches Christentum (1923) and Die Folgen der Reformation (1924) were the most prominent. On the 14th of September 1927 Ball died of cancer. In this article I will argue that the core of Byzantinisches Christentum consists of an implicit “theology of sound”. For Ball the theological concept of an “adamic”, unconventional Ursprache Gottes (“primordial divine speech”) is the answer to his quest of finding God beyond the nihilistic experiments of Dada, without refuting them altogether. This “theology of sound” shows the continuity between the “old”, Dadaistic artist and the “new”, Roman-Catholic author in the historical figure of Hugo Ball. 1 Kandinsky, W. (1963), 45. “Gottes Ursprache”. Hugo Ball’s Theology of Sound 399 1. The book Byzantinisches Christentum The book Byzantinisches Christentum was published in 1923. Among all of Ball’s works, this book has received the least amount of attention both from critics as from scholars. Thomas Ruster, one of the foremost scholars on Hugo Ball, described the “treatment” of Byzantinisches Christentum in the reception history of Ball as stiefmütterlich.2 Ball himself regarded the three books he wrote after his reconversion (Kritik, Byzantinisches Christentum and Die Folgen der Reformation) as a literary unit.3 This sets Byzantinisches Christentum right in the heart of Ball’s neo-Catholic period. Ball’s Byzantium book consists of three parts, without any prologue or epilogue, or without any other hint about its character, the composition or the criteria of the selection of the material. Initially, the book should have had many more subjects, but with the exception of an unpublished part about Saint Antony the Abbot, nothing is known.4 Ball had planned to write a prologue, but nothing but a very short (and unpublished) draft remains.5 The three parts of the book are named after their primary subject matter: John Climacus, Dionysius Areopagita, and Simeon Stylitus. John Climacus (circa 579– 649) was an Egyptian monk and anchorite, who has become famous because of his monastic master piece Scala Paradisi (“the ladder to Paradise”), an intriguing “voyage of the soul” written for young desert monks. Dionysius Areopagita (better known as Pseudo-Dionysius) was an anonymous theologian and philosopher from the 5th or 6th century, taking the name of the convert mentioned in Acts 17,34. Simeon Stylitus (390–459) was the first of a whole range of “pillar-saints”, who realized the idea of ‘seclusion from the world’ to its max. As Bernd Wacker has already pointed out, Ball’s knowledge of the old languages as well as his academic skills were by far not sufficient to understand the ancient source material, nor was he capable of entering into an international scholarly discourse about the subject matter, despite all his efforts to prove the contrary by referring extensively to primary and secondary sources.6 Scholarly theologians like Stiglmayr, Bigelmair, Guardini, Casel, Viller, Przywara and Dempf criticized Ball’s work, pointing to his lack of scholarly expertise, the poor use of secondary sources and the tendency to make sharp distinctions between opposites – like heaven/earth, man/God, male/female – which seems more appropriate within a Gnostic than a orthodox Catholic context.7 2 Ruster, T. (1996), 183–206. 3 Ball, H. (1946), 292. Schütt-Hennings, A. (1957), 138. 4 Ball, H. (2003), 333. 5 Ball, H. (2011), 269–272. 6 Ball, H. (2011), 552–556. 7 Stiglmayr, J. (1923), 580–503. Bigelmair, A. (1925), 348–349. Guardini, R (1923/24), 256–263. Casel, O. (1924), 373–374; Przywara, E. (1923/24), 347–352. Dempf, A. (1925). 400 Frank G. Bosman Within the reception of the works of Hugo Ball (in which the interest in the Dadaistic period is dominant over Ball’s Catholic period) Byzantinisches Christentum received mixed but extremely little attention. It was not until the eighties of the 20th century that scholars began to publish about Ball’s Byzantium book. Manfred Steinbrenner (1985) was one of the first. He claimed that Ball had applied the form criticism of Dadaism to his personal life, making the whole world into a piece of art, to be reflected upon by the artists. Friedrich Kantzenbach pointed out that the scholarly approach to Ball’s work had clouded the academic judgment and that the book should be read more as a “personal credo”. 8 Philip Mann in his “Intellectual Biography” from 1987 focused on the new attention for the monastic tradition in Byzantinisches Christentum: “Ball’s interpretation of asceticism was very idiosyncratic: while this might well be seen as a means of steeling the intellect against the temptations of the flesh, he obviously regarded it as a means of obliterating the ego, the seat of human vanity, altogether. In his Byzantinisches Christentum he was to glorify a monastic discipline and asceticism whose strictness is grim, if not sinister.”9 Stephan Hegglin continues on Mann’s interpretation of Ball’s love for the ascetic life as a continuous search for the “new man”.10 Others like Werner Hülsbusch, Thomas Ruster, Cornelius Zehetner, and Rajesh Heynickx continued on this path of a more positive reevaluation of Ball’s book, praising its spiritual content and literary qualities.11 2. The Pseudo-Dionysius and the historical Gnosis In the second part of Byzantinisches Christentum, Ball is engaged in a difficult and often more associative than coherent discussion with the texts of Pseudo-Dionyisius about “good” and “bad Gnosis”. Ball himself was well aware of the pseudo-status of Dionyius, but this insight seems to remain without consequences.12 Ball tried to canonize his own dualistic tendencies by claiming one can find them equally in the corpus Dionysiacum. And because of the “canonical” state of Dionysius, those tendencies cannot be heretical. Therefore, so he seems to argue, Ball himself cannot be a heretic. The fact that Ball put so much effort in establishing his own orthodoxy seems to imply that he himself was well aware of his own heterodox thinking. Ball claims that the initial concept of “good Gnosis” is to be found in Judaism. Paul, the Essenes and the Therapeutae were all historically dependent on Judaism. 8 Kantzenbach, F. (1987), 87–137. 9 Mann, P. (1987), 147. 10 Hegglin, S. (1988), 47. 11 Hülsbusch, W. (1992), 51. Ruster, T. (1996), 183–206; Zehetner, C. (2000). Heynickx, R. (2010), 1272–1292. 12 Ball, H. (2011), 65. “Gottes Ursprache”. Hugo Ball’s Theology of Sound 401 This “Oracle of Judaism” is accountable for the all “Hellenistic wisdom” and all “oriental, secret teachings”.13 As said before, Ball is not renowned for his detailed historical of philosophical knowledge. “Philo [of Alexandria] führt alle hellenische Weisheit auf die jüdischen und orientalischen Geheimlehren zurück […]. [N]ach seinem Urteil […] rührt doch alle Wahrheit der Griechen vom Sinai und vom Karmel her. Orpheus ist mit Moses, Pythagoras mit den Schülern des Jeremias in Ägypten bekannt geworden. Die griechischen Gesetzgeber kannten den Pentateuch. Wo sie aber von ihm abwichen, da ist die Lehre Moses ohne Bedenken die bessere.”14 Ball has found, so it appears, an ally in this construct of a “Jewish-Christian tradition” for his own battles against materialism and bourgeoism. His disdain for the material world, focusing on and caused by the horrors of the First World War, is embodied in this “Gnosticized” figure of Pseudo-Dionysius. In his view of the historical Gnosis Ball found a new, religious Vernichtigung of the old world, just like Dada before, but even more vigorously. Ball’s preference for rigid ascetism and contempt for everything “worldly” are also distinctly traceable in his chapters about John and Simeon. 3. The sound prayer of the Pistis Sophia Within the complex reasoning about “good” en “bad Gnosis”, a very interesting passage appears in regard of Ball’s theology of sound. On page 131, amidst the second part of Byzantinisches Christentum, Ball seems to disqualify Gnosis as being “closer to the antique philosophy than to the ecclesiastical Christendom”.15 But at the same time Ball uses quite intriguing qualifications for Gnosis: it would contain “magic spells” (Zauberformeln), “secret names” and “sound images” (Lautgebilde) which ensured “the victory of the mind over the flesh”. All these qualifications are very close to Ball’s own ideas in both his Dadaistic and his neo-Catholic period. “Diese extatische, hymnische Gnosis ist der Gebetsbestandteil des Gottesdienstes. […] Jene Formeln uralter Weisheit, denen eine über die Natur erhebende Gewalt innewohnt.”16 These positive qualifications of Gnosis are more deeply explained in the corresponding footnote 23. In this note Ball quotes the so called Fourth Book of a Gnostic apocrypha, written in Coptic, known as the Pistis Sophia (2nd half of the 4th century).17 The quotation is from the 142nd chapter of the Pistis.18 It is very instructive to 13 Ball, H. (2011), 67. 14 Ball, H. (2011), 71. 15 All English translations of German texts are made by the author of this article. 16 Ball, H. (2011), 133. 17 Bock, T. (2004), 111–112. 18 The content of the Pistis Sophia is so“hermetic” that a simple summary cannot be given. Basically, the Pistis is a kind of ‘travel report’ given by the risen Jesus to his disciples about his descent into the “aeons”. The rest of the text of the Pistis contains a number of very difficult to understand monologues by Jesus to 402 Frank G. Bosman compare the text of Ball’s footnote with the German translation of Carl Schmidt (1905), used by Ball when writing Byzantinisches Christentum. The original Syrian text is not of our interest, because of Ball’s inability to read it. “Im IV. Buche der ‘Pistis Sophia’ findet sich folgende Schilderung eines gottesdienstlichen Aktes: Jesus steht am Altar, um ihn herum seine Jünger in weißen Gewändern. Eine große Offenbarung bereitet sich vor.” (Ball, H. [2011], 133) “Jesus aber sprach zu ihnen: ‘Bringet mir Feuer und Weinzweige.’ Sie brachten sie ihm: er legte das Opfer auf und stellte zwei Weinkrüge hin, einer zur Rechten und den andern zur Linken des Opfers. Er stellte das Opfe vor sie hin und stellte einen Becher Wassers vor den Weinkrug, der zur Linken, und legte Brote nach der Anzahl der Jünger mitten zwischen die Becher und stellte jenen Becher Wassers hinter die Brote. Es stand Jesus vor dem Opfer, stellte die Jünger hinter sich, alle bekleidet mit leinenen Gewändern, und in ihren Händen war die Zahl des Namens des Vaters des Lichtschatzes… (Schmidt, C. [1925], 243–244) In his paraphrase of the beginning of the 142nd chapter of the Pistis Sophia, Ball interprets Jesus’ acts as “religious acts” (eine gottesdienstlichen Akte). And he places Jesus “at an altar” (Jesus steht am Altar), proclaiming a “great revelation” (eine große Offenbarung). While the text of the Pistis clearly hints at an Eucharistic celebration, Ball is contemporizing the scenery to a modern-day Roman-Catholic Eucharistic celebration. The word “revelation” is missing all together in Schmidt’s translation. We continue reading Ball’s text. Dann bricht er in folgende Zauberklänge und -worte aus: aeä iuo iao aoi oia psinoter ternops nopsiter zagura pagura netmomaoth nepsiomaoth marachachta tobarabbau tarnaschachau zorokotora ieoü sabaoth. (Ball) P_t fkpt f_t _tf tf_ sfite¡l e¡ltsfi tsfe¡li¡qek+_tei¡qefk+_te+_l_j_j< e_+_l+_l_je_fd_i_+¡i_+_ides Himmels okp kpl_ikp  fbl_f Amen, Amen _+di_+di – (Pistis Sophia) Now Ball goes far beyond merely following Schmidt’s translation of the Pistis. Ball characterizes the rest of Jesus’ prayer as “magical sounds and words” (Zauberklänge und -worte), while Schmidt’s text just renders the words of Jesus. The text of Schmidt renders the “sound prayer” of Jesus in Greek letters. Ball transcribes the Greek letters to the Latin alphabet (often poorly). Ball uses the word sabaoth in his text, while Schmidt uses “tou ouranou” (“of the heaven”). This is not without meaning, even though both words could be each other synonym, because the word sabaoth is also used in every Roman-Catholic liturgy (the “Sanctus”-prayer), thus enforcing the his disciples. Cf. Schneemelcher, W. (1991), 361–369. “Gottes Ursprache”. Hugo Ball’s Theology of Sound 403 already dense parallel between the scene form the Pistis and the Roman-Catholic tradition. In the footnote Ball seems to be influenced by both his Dadaistic legacy and his newly found Roman Catholic orthodoxy by combining elements from both traditions. His Catholic faith urges him to establish a reputation of orthodoxy (the discussion with Pseudo-Dionysius, Jesus behind an altar praying to God, the use of the word “sabaoth”, etc.), but his Dadaistic impulses got the better of him (“magic spells”, “sound prayers”, etc.) This intertwining of the Dadaistic and the Catholic Ball becomes even more apparent when looking at his earlier sound poems. 4. Gadj beri bimba. Ball’s sound poems The Jesus praying to his God in the form of a sound poem must have been quite an attraction to the Dadaistic inspired Ball. This sound prayer of the Pistis Sophia, especially in Ball’s rendering of the text, reminds a careful reader of Ball’s own sound poems of Cabaret Voltaire. On the night of the 23rd of June 1917 Ball performed his most renowned poem gadji beri bimba. Dressed in clothes of cardboard, he recited a poem of only rhythm and sound, without any “normal”, conventional meaning. I quote the first lines. gadji beri bimba glandridi laula lonni cadori gadjama gramma berida bimbala glandri galassassa laulitalomini gadji beri bin blassa glassala laula lonni cadorsu sassala bim gadjama tuffm i zimballa binban gligla wowolimai ben beri ban According to Edmund White this poem expresses a “brief, intensely lyric state”. Associations are identified by scholars to bells (bimba - bimbala - bin – bim), to childish magical words (simsalabim), drums, trumpets and violins. White writes: “Ball’s fame as a poet rests today largely on six sound poems or Lautgedichte, written in 1916 […]. Together they form a work unique in feeling and novel in construction.”19 For Ball the conventional language had become (in his own words) öde, lahm and leer, incapable of communicating deeper emotions.20 Ball’s biographer Mann writes: “Noun-centered language was static and inflexible and so helped to preserve the status quo.”21 Dada expert Martin Korol links Ball’s sound poems to “primitive languages”, magic spells, the Hindu primordial word Ohm and to the unpronounceable name of God in Judaism.22 In Ball’s diaries Die Flucht aus der Zeit (published and edited after his reconversion to Catholicism) he describes his feelings when proclaiming gadji beri bimba. 19 20 21 22 White, E. (1998), 103. Ball, H. (1946), 107. Mann, P. (1987), 87. Korol, M. (2001), 132–135. 404 Frank G. Bosman “Da bemerkte ich, daß meine Stimme, der kein anderer Weg mehr blieb, die uralte Kadenz der priesterlichen Lamentation annahm, jenen Stil des Meßgesangs, wie er durch die katholischen Kirchen des Morgen- und Abendlandes wehklagt […] und ich wurde vom Podium herab schweißbedeckt als ein magischer Bischof in die Versenkung getragen.”23 Ball was strongly reminded of his Catholic youth, with the lamentations of the Requiem Mass. His performance was “charged” with a new, spiritual dimension. The chaos of the old world and the absurdity of his own performance were exorcized by the old ecclesiastical tradition. According to himself this performance was the beginning of his departure from Dada and of his reconversion to Catholicism. On the 7th of December 1917 (six months later) Ball describes what is happening to him when he listens to the Credo during Mass. “Heute Abend sang ich das Credo unvermittelt, wie es mir immer wieder in diesen letzten Wochen durch den Sinn geht. […] Die Worte berauschen mich. Die Kinderwelt steht auf. Es kämpft und tobt in mir. Ich beuge mich tief, ich fürchte, diesem Leben, diesem Überschwang nicht gewachsen zu sein. Das hätte ich früher nicht glauben können. Glauben können, glauben können. Vielleicht sollte man alles glauben: was einem zu glauben vorgestellt, und was einem zu glauben zugemutet wird. Und sollte sich selbst, zu glauben, täglich unglaublichere Dinge zumuten. […] Was ist das doch für ein wunderbarer Gesang! Alle Vokale geben sich hier, in der Kirche, ein rauschendes, ewiges Stelldichein.”24 “All the vowels are present”, Ball writes. The Credo as a “Catholized” version of his former sound poems. Earlier in his life Ball already compared the work of an artist with that of a priest. After his reconversion he repeats: “Die Liturgie ist ein Gedicht, das von Priestern zelebriert wird. Das Gedicht ist die übertragene Wirklichkeit. Die Liturgie ist das übergetragene Gedicht. Die Messe ist eine übertragene Tragödie.”25 Ball – in his diaries – links the Roman Catholic Eucharistic celebration with a poem, exactly as he did in Byzantinisches Christentum, when he placed the risen Jesus at the altar (as a priest saying Mass), proclaiming a sound prayer to his heavenly Father. The notion of “sound” (Klang) is what combines all these quotes, from Flucht to Byzaninisches Christentum. 5. Ball’s theology of sound When one carefully ponders over the primacy of the word Sprache in both Ball’s Dadaistic and neo-Catholic period, one is tempted to read Byzantinisches Christentum in the same light. In Ball’s Byzantium book notions like Gottes Ursprache, Paradies, Hieroglyphen(sprache), Wortgewalt and Sprachschatz are very frequently used. These notions form 23 Ball, H. (1946), 100. 24 Ball, H. (1946), 255–256. 25 Ball, H. (1946), 162. “Gottes Ursprache”. Hugo Ball’s Theology of Sound 405 the basis of Ball’s sound theology, which in itself consists of three dimensions: a creational-theological, an incarnational and an anthropological-eschatological dimension. The incarnational dimension of Ball’s theology of sound consists of the synchronizing of the categories of “prophets”, “saints” and “artists”. Ball characterizes John as “poet”, “musician” and “scholasticus”. And according to Ball, John’s hagiographer Daniel of Raithu ‚ “honored the saint especially as an artist”.26 Ball uses phrases as “the power of words” (Wortgewalt) and “the treasure of speaking” (Sprachschatz) to characterize both Climacus and Daniel, and their respective works (the Vita of John and John’s own Scala Paradisi). “Eine Sprachkunst, in kostbaren Agraffen mehr als in Worten brillierend, gemahnt an die höchsten Beispiele neuerer Dichtung und übertrifft sie an Ruhe und Einfachheit.”27 When Ball tries to describe the Scala Paradisi he uses an alchemical metaphor. “Dann erstarrt unter zarten Hämmern die Sprache. Dann ist ein metallisches Kunstwerk da. Nichts ist darin Ornament und Zutat, alles ist Wesen, Kante und Wölbung. Der Heilige selbst spricht von Smaragden, der er ins Diadem seiner Rede fügt.”28 Ball’s John Climacus is foremost a saintly artist who is able to connect with the divine realm. “Wenn Paraklet in Person das Leben des Heiligen leitet, spricht ja Gott selbst aus ihm. Keine Sprachkunst kann hoch genug sein, das Wort Gottes im Worte wiederzugeben.”29 The “saints” of Byzantinisches Christentum have the same purpose as the artists of the new era: to understand, repeat, interpret and, most of all,to present what Ball calls the Ursprache Gottes. Ball sketches a tradition from the “mystagogues of the Old Testament” (figures like David, Solomon and Ezekiel), via John, Dionyius and Simeon to the modern day artists, in which the pure “primordial sound” of God himself is preserved. Ball thinks of them as a kind of incarnation of the Ursprache, not only by the works they have left us, but also because of their existence as such. Ball also refers to the life of Simeon Stylitus as “hieroglyphs”. “Wir haben die Hieroglyphensprache verlernt. Ihr Schlüssel ging uns verloren. Die Sprache Gottes ist höchster Begriff. Wir begreifen nichts mehr.”30 Without saying explicitly so, Ball regards himself and his fellow Dadaist as belonging to this tradition of incarnated “saintly artist”. Only the saints and Ball himself are capable of translating and interpreting the primordial language we have now forgotten. The hieroglyphs are nothing but a metaphor for the Ursprache Gottes. In this way, 26 27 28 29 30 Ball, H. (2011), 16. Ball, H. (2011), 15. Ball, H. (2011), 14. Ball, H. (2011), 15. Ball, H. (2011), 223. 406 Frank G. Bosman Ball makes an interesting connection between his Dadaistic and Catholic inspirations. The creational-theological dimension of Ball’s theology of sound revolves around the same notion of the Ursprache Gottes. This divine Sprache should not be considered as referring to the indirect conventional languages of mankind, but to the immediate “soundification” of the divine real. According to Ball in God’s Ursprache sound (the signifier) and meaning (what is signified) are identical.31 This is illustrated by the hieroglyphs metaphor in the chapters about Simeon in Byzantinisches Christentum, that was discussed above. The ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs are basically a “sign language” in which is depicted what is meant to be communicated. Traces of this dimension can be found in the chapters about Pseudo Dionysius. Ball is fixated on words with Ur (“primordial”): Urgottheit, UrGnosis, Urchristentum, urgöttlicher Offenbarung, urgöttlicher Seligkeit, urgöttliche Sakramente, Urwesen, Urseligkeit, Urfreiheit, Urgesetze, Urfriede, Ursonne, Urbilder der Schriftdeutung, Urguten, Urstoff, Urharmonie, Urteil, Ursprung, Urtext, Urform, Ursprache, Urbild and Urgott. Ball seems to suggest that God (at the beginning of time) did not create the universe through language, but the sound (Sprache) of God himself became all that exists. The Ursprache Gottes is the metaphysical foundation of the universe. A number of associations arise when one reads these passages from Byzantinisches Christentum. First of all the Romantic interest in the concept of “adamic language”, the primordial language which was spoken by Adam in Eden when he gave the animals their names. (Gen 2,19-20a). The many conventional languages of mankind are nothing but a “shattering” of this Ursprache into innumerable parts. The story of the Tower of Babel (Gen 11) is often quoted in this respect. The linguistic scholar Rudolf Kuenzli claimed that Ball tried to create an adamic language with his sound poems. “Through his production of a ‘new’ sign system, i.e. the creation of one of the oldest myths concerning adamic language, Ball hopes to lay the foundations for signs that would not be any more signs, but the object, thereby overcoming the necessary falsification, the lies produced by the cultural arbitrary sign system.”32 It was the Theosophist Jakob Böhme (whom Ball had read according to his diaries) who presented a more mystical dimension to the adamic language (which he called Natur-Sprache, “natural language/speech”). When he was in rapture, Böhme saw, as he claimed, the very nature of things, because he understood the primordial language. As Aarsleff summarizes: “Each word revealed the nature of the thing, almost as a chemical formula does to us.”33 When we remember the “alchemical metaphor” from Byzantinisches Christentum, the influence of Böhme and the concept of adamic language is even more visible. 31 The German word Sprache can be translated in English with two distinct words: “language” and “speech”. Ball identifies the word Sprache as “speech” and not as “language”. 32 Kuenzli, R. (1979), 52–70. 33 Aarsleff, H. (1982), 282. “Gottes Ursprache”. Hugo Ball’s Theology of Sound 407 The third and last dimension of Ball’s theology of sound is the anthropological-eschatological dimension. The saintly artist’s mission is to visualize the Ursprache Gottes for the entire world. In the text of Byzantinisches Christentum the notion of the primordial speech/sound of God is linked to the notion of “paradise” or – more precisely – to the “paradise-like man”. One example can illustrate this concept. The final paragraph of the chapters about John is named Verklärung (“glorification”). The monk, reaching the final stages of John’s divine ladder of the soul, has become “a living dead”. Ball and Climacus do not want to suggest that the monk has turned into a zombie, but because of the rigorous training of body and soul he is able to “die before dying”, that is to receive a glimpse of paradise (heaven) before actually dying. John’s “perfect monk” is realized, according to Ball, in the exalted monk Simeon Stylitus. Simeon has reached paradise before his death, that is: on top of his lonely pillar. While man has been chased out of paradise because of Adam’s primordial sin, Simeon appears to have risen above sin. He is clean, exalted, sinless. Ball describes a well known anecdote of a snake coming to Simeon’s pillar to ask for his prayer. “Was bedeutet sie, diese Heilung der Schlange? Ist sie ein Zeichen dreieiniger Allmacht? Frohe Botschaft dem Juden- und Christentum? Reicht des Styliten Bußgewalt bis zum Geheimnis der Erbsünde hin?”34 The snake is the symbol of the Fall of Man, and therefore of the sinful state of all people. However, the snake that is coming to Simeon is not dangerous. It is the opposite: the snake needs the help of Simeon. Both John and Simeon are “personifications of Christ”, who re-enact the sacrifice of Christ on the cross: John in his Scala Paradisi and Simeon on his pillar. Man, according to Ball, has fallen from paradise into the material world of every day. Man has lost contact with God, that is, he has forgotten to recognize the Ursprache Gottes as the actual fabric of life. Man’s mission on earth is to return to Paradise Lost. Those people who succeed – the monks, the saints, the artists – are to be recognized as God’s “holy primordial text”. 6. Sound poems, “nomina Barbara” and glossolalia Ball’s fascination with sounds – both in his Dadaistic sound poems as in Byzantinisches Christentum – has also parallels with two other phenomena in the Jewish-Christian tradition. The untranslatable phrases in the Pistis Sophia, quoted by Ball, are known as the so called nomina barbara, the exact meaning and purpose of which are still the object of ongoing academic debates.35 Michael Swartz links the nomina barbara to the act of prayer, which is exactly the context of the sound prayer in the Pistis. This particular prayer does not want to communicate a certain message; its purpose is primarily to “get something done”.36 As J. L. Austin earlier claimed, prayer is foremost a “perfor34 Ball, H. (2011), 258. 35 Poirier, J. (2010). 36 Swartz, M. (1992), 2. 408 Frank G. Bosman mative act”, both to express a mystical state of being and as a vehicle of reaching such a state.37 Swartz points to the Kabbalistic treaty Ma’aseh Merkavah in which prayer is characterized by the use of synonyms, a “hypnotic rhythm” and a “numinous quality”. Both Bloch and Scholem share this opinion.38 A good example is given by Swartz in his “translation” of a prayer of the Merkavah. The punction is Swartz’s. “My spirit is entrusted to You, My breath is placed into your hands For You are the Lord of all, The glory of all those above. Holy, Holy, Holy, Rock of Eternity, YH YH YH YHW YHW YHW YHW YH YHW YHW YH YHW YHW YHW NWR’ D’N NWR’ D’N NWR’ D’N ‘RY ‘ZY DRWSYY’L KSS KSSH NWSY QLWSY HYWH WHN W’ZBWHY DGN HGG’L.”39 There is a very interesting analogy – in appearance and in content – between the old nomina barbara, Ball’s sound poems of Cabaret Voltaire, and the quoted passage of the Pistis. The parallels are very clear. They all try to avoid the conventional language because of its inherent shortcomings to express what is truly important to communicate. All three are used to express a mystical, ecstatic experience and to stimulate such experiences. Is it possible that Ball borrowed from Jewish mysticism for both his sound poems and his later theology of sound? Ball quotes from Kabbalistic tradition in Byzantinisches Christentum, for example when he puts a certain prayer in the mouth of Simeon. “Sein [Simeons] weinender Mund kündet den Willen dessen, ‘der Adam kannte, eh er geboren; den Führer der Irrenden, Lenker der Cherubim; der Joseph führte gleich einem Lämmlein; der David die Grazie schenkte prophetischer Sprache; der Lazarus nach vier Tagen vom Tode erweckte’; dessen Tiefe und Ruhe der schlafende Ozean nicht ermißt.”40 In the corresponding footnote Ball comments: “Diese Art der Benediktion ist die charakteristische Äußerungsform des Styliten. Er steht im magischen Kreise der Säulenplattform. Vgl. Bischoff, […] wo von den Gottesnamen als Vorschule des magischen Wissens die Rede ist.” The author named in Ball’s footnote is Erich Bischoff, a scholar in the field of Kabbalism from the end of the 19th / beginning of the 20th century, whose book Elemente der Kabbalah is often used by the Ball in his Byzantinisches Christentum.41 And there are more vague references to Kabbalistic texts, which are too varied and require too much explanation to be mentioned here. Much more concrete was Ball’s friendship with the famous German-Jewish writer Walter Benjamin and their mutual friendship 37 38 39 40 41 Austin, J. (1975). Bloch, P. (1893), 18–25, 69–74, 257–266. Scholem, G. (1955), 59–60. Swartz, M. (1992), 218. Ball, H. (2011), 236. Bischoff, E. (1913). “Gottes Ursprache”. Hugo Ball’s Theology of Sound 409 with Gershom Scholem.42 Benjamin and Scholem were familiar with Ball’s Byzantinisches Christentum.43 In a letter dated 28th of January 1948 to Scholem, the German scholar of Judaism Jacob Taubes writes about a passage from Scholem’s work Major Trends that quotes Byzantinisches Christentum, but without a reference to Ball’s work. 44 According to David Biale, Benjamin and Scholem both shared the “word orientated-ness” of the Kabbala. “Language itself is of divine origin […] the experience of revelation is linguistic. Since language is equivocally both human and divine, a basis exists for using language to communicate an experience of the divine.”45 Benjamin was especially impressed by Ball’s Zur Kritik der deutschen Intelligenz.46 If Benjamin knew any other works of Ball is not certain, but Marc de Wilde suggests that Benjamin did influence Ball in a passage in Die Flucht aus der Zeit.47 Benjamin’s own early, “hermetic” work Über die Sprache überhaupt und über die Sprache des Menschen (1916) seems to share certain characteristics concerning the concept of language and the Ursprache Gottes. Scholem shares a certain memory about Über die Sprache and Benjamin. In 1917 Scholem translated Über die Sprache in Hebrew, a language Benjamin did not master. Benjamin insisted that Scholem should read him the Hebrew text, to hear the Ursprache. “Benjamin wollte unbedingt, dass ich ihm die ersten Seiten, die ich geschrieben hatte, vorlese, um den Klang seiner Sätze in der, wie er halb scherzhaft sagte, ‘Ursprache’ zu hören.”48 In his later work Die Aufgabe des Übersetzers (1923), Benjamin attributes a “messianic potential” to translators, which “travel” between source and translation to find the Ursprache behind all the conventional languages.49 Historian Frank van de Veire connects Benjamin’s notion of the human language to the Fall of Man.50 Benjamin thinks of translators as being able the restore (temporarily and partially) the primordial situation. Ball uses the word Dolmetscher (“translator”) as one of the images for his “saintly artist”.51 Conclusions In this article I have argued that Ball’s Byzantinisches Christentum contains a new (though implicitly formulated) “theology of sound”. Being notoriously difficult to 42 Bürkli, A. (2008), 53. Korol M. (2001), 215–227. Kambas, C. (1996), 69–92. Ross, B. (2009), 231–238. 43 Korol M. (2001), 156–157. 44 Taubes, J. (2006), 98–101, 398. 45 Biale, D. (1979), 81. 46 Scholem, G. (1992), 101. 47 Wilde, M. de (2004), 73–74. 48 Scholem, G. (1992), 53. 49 Benjamin, W. (1923), VII–XVII. 50 Veire, F. van de (2002), 174. 51 Ball, H (2011), 27. 410 Frank G. Bosman understand, Ball’s Byzantium Book is in fact one lengthy commentary on the notion of the Ursprache Gottes. For Ball the universe was not created by words, but consists of God’s speech. This Ursprache is not a language in the conventional sense, a language one could master by training, but a primordial “sound” in the tradition of the Romantic concept of the “adamic language” (creational-theological dimension of Ball’s theology of sound) and the sound experiments of Cabaret Voltaire. The only persons who are capable to “hear” this Urklang are the saints (more specifically the desert monks John and Simeon) whose whole existence is to be thought of as an incarnation of the primordial divine speech. Ball identifies his saints primarily as “artists”, placing them on the same level as “secular” artists like Kandinsky and – ultimately –Dadaists like Ball himself (the incarnational dimension of Ball’s theology of sound). Looking back into his Dadaist past, the reconverted Ball reinterprets the sound poems from Cabaret Voltaire as preeminent examples of his later sound theology, making use not only of his Dadaist criticism on conventional language, but also of the Kabbalistic tradition of the nomina barbara. The exalted ascetic monks of the desert – John and Simeon – are examples for all humankind, because in their physical and spiritual rigor they have entered paradise “before their deaths”. When a devout Christian trains his body and soul hard enough, he is eventually capable of comprehending the Ursprache Gottes, that is to say, he reaches the insight that he is made of God’s primordial sound (the anthropological-eschatological dimension of Ball’s theology of sound). Ball may have left the Dada movement after his ecstatic experience in Cabaret Voltaire out of despair about the nihilistic experiments with the deconstruction of language which ultimately were not able to overcome the horrors of the materialistic world. Yet, he actually never stopped being a Dadaist. As I have argued in this article, it is only possible to understand Ball’s life work when combining the two constitutive elements in his life: the religious elements in his Dada period and the Dadaistic elements in his neo-Catholic period. 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