Drawing on apophatic theology, this essay argues that some twentieth-century texts invite an apophatic approach by revealing the limits of language and hinting at some understanding of God, without doing so directly. First, Leif Enger’s Peace Like a River shows a divine encounter but, in the process, underscores the limits of language to describe this experience. Second, in a sort of parallel to negative theology, Walker Percy’s Lancelot points readers toward God by having Lancelot descend into sin and evil, an affirmation of God through negation. Finally, in Joseph Heller’s Catch-22 , a novel without explicit Christian interests, characters parody prayer, rail against the world’s unfairness, and deny God, but in these interactions they actually reveal something about belief and God. These texts reveal that an apophatic understanding can enrich our reading of twentieth-century novels.

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启示神学与二十世纪小说

本文以世界末日神学为依据，认为某些二十世纪的文本通过揭示语言的局限性和暗示对上帝的某种理解而直接采取了一种世界末日的方法。首先，雷夫·恩格（Leif Enger）的《河流般的和平》展现了一种神圣的遭遇，但在此过程中，强调了描述这种经历的语言限制。其次，沃克·珀西（Walker Percy）的《兰斯洛特（Lancelot）》与否定神学平行，通过让兰斯洛特（Lancelot）陷入罪恶和邪恶中来，将读者指向上帝，这是对上帝通过否定的肯定。最后，在约瑟夫·海勒（Joseph Heller）的Catch-22中，这本小说没有明确的基督教徒兴趣，没有模仿人物的性格祈祷，反对世界的不公平，否认了上帝，但是在这些互动中，它们实际上揭示了关于信仰和上帝的某些东西。