Modern Aesthetics as Sola Fide

This post requires background. For Christian thought in the current State, I recomment this post and especially (as the post is quite long) this link within the post. Teh Wik can help us define sola fide. If you need more info, contact this guy. Suffice it to say that the flippant version of sola fide is "I'm saved because I say I'm saved."

This was a fairly radical notion when it was invented by Martin Luther. Indeed, it became the cornerstone of Protestantism. The traditional thought on salvation is that though "faith is the beginning of human salvation," "faith without works is dead." The sola fide folks just skip that second part. They don't have to do any work to get saved, so why should they do any work at all?

Why is this important, you ask? What does this have to do with poetry? Easy. If you did the above reading, you'll know that an de-Jesussed form of Protestant Christianity is the dominant religion in the West. Ever wonder why Barack Obama sounds so much like a preacher? It's because he is.

Since Godless Christianity cannot use sola fide to justify salvation, it uses it to justify something just as undefinable:

art.

That's right. It didn't happen overnight. Luther introduced sola fide in the early 16th century. It began to catch on in the arts at the beginning of the 19th century, concurrent with another silly idea. It was gaining solid ground by the Victorian age and was firmly entrenched by the middle of last century.

The mantra of the artist is no longer "I am an artist because I work hard to create works of art." It is "I am an artist because I say I am."

In this feeble tautology there is no work, there is no schooling, there is no difficulty. There is only shoddy work, quackery, and showmanship.

I have often wondered what happened to craft and hard work in art.
Now I know.