Weakness is Power: The Musical

There's a funny bit in an old Jet Li film where he plays a village idiot. This character finally grasps that one cannot even hold an inflated ball underwater, so strong is Nature compared to muscles.

Then, I swear, said village breaks into a chorus line, belting out: "Mercy is Merciless" in the key of F# and doing jazz hands. Ok, no jazz hands, but, um, lots of tai chi hip-hop. Seriously.

For some reason, this reminded me of John C. Caputo's understanding of "weak theology":

On the classical account of strong theology, Jesus was just holding back his divine power in order to let his human nature suffer. He freely chose to check his power because the Father had a plan to redeem the world with his blood. ... That is not the weakness of God that I am here defending. God, the event harbored by the name of God, is present at the crucifixion, as the power of the powerlessness of Jesus, in and as the protest against the injustice that rises up from the cross, in and as the words of forgiveness, not a deferred power that will be visited upon one’s enemies at a later time. God is in attendance as the weak force of the call that cries out from Calvary and calls across the epochs, that cries out from every corpse created by every cruel and unjust power. The logos of the cross is a call to renounce violence, not to conceal and defer it and then, in a stunning act that takes the enemy by surprise, to lay them low with real power, which shows the enemy who really has the power. That is just what Nietzsche was criticizing under the name of ressentiment.

– John D. Caputo, The Weakness of God: A Theology of the Event

And if anyone doubts the power of this radical choice, watch this:



Aikido literally exerts no force. Since energy cannot be destroyed, Aikido rechannels it. However, this is far from some vaguely Christian notion of sublimation. The technique is so precise, so logical, that I feel sorry for someone who exerts strain against a disciplined Aikido practitioner (Aikidoka)... such an aggressor would actually, literally hurt himself--while the Aikidoka, in a very kinetic sense, does nothing.

[Chorus: Reprise "Mercy is Merciless!"]

[Dance break: Do Tai Chi hip-hop. Exit All Stage Left.]

Yeah, yeah, yeah! Next time I'm in the dojo, I'm going to ask sensei if we can warm up by singing some Ella Fitgzerald:

You can try hard
Don't mean a thing
Take it easy, greasy
Then your jive will swing

I think sensei will not like this idea.