I find myself saddened by the passing of Oscar Treadwell as I have been by few other public figures' deaths. The fact is that my life has been enriched for years by his artistry.
I can think of no other "disc jockey" who could rightly be termed an artist. But OT's taste in music and poetry, including his own poetry, his gentle delivery, his encyclopedic knowledge of music--all regularly in evidence in his broadcasts--were driven by an artistic passion.
His programs taught me and others what it is to be a human being. Being human is being an artist, one who seeks truth, beauty and love.
This quest for meaning is the very essence of our humanity, the core of what it means to have been created in God's image. It's not enough that any of us merely exist. We need something that transcends. The Creator has put that urge in every person, and he has infused our existence with things that stoke our desire for meaning, that fire our searching for what we find ultimately in Him.
In music and poetry Oscar Treadwell's passion for meaning was stoked. Jazz, an art form with roots in an oppressed culture, especially embodied the quest for truth and justice. OT heard that in the music.All art reflects the quest for beauty, and OT presented the beauty of jazz and poetry in the most beautiful manner, speaking humbly but expertly with a voice that was perfect for radio but completely unaffected by broadcasting commonplaces. When he said that a performance was "just beautiful," listeners knew that he heard something more than just an instrument played expertly. He heard the expression of the soul.
And his love for the music and the musicians and his audience was palpable. "Sweet love" was his signature sign-off phrase, and he said it like he meant it.
WVXU will continue to play OT's programs on Sunday nights. He had several in the can at the time of his death, and the station is beginning to remaster the 6500 or so shows that he had recorded during his career. OT could be on the air for another generation, even beyond.
Does anyone suppose that another radio personality will be broadcast via recording for years after his death? Who will want to hear reruns of Howard Stern or Rush Limbaugh or Paul Harvey? OT was one of a kind.
The family has a memorial site here, and the station has its own tribute here. Follow the links to find out more about this artist of the airwaves.
14 comments:
Wow...beautifully said, SWNID. I couldn't agree more. BTW - you didn't happen to record the special Sunday evening did you? I, unfortunately, missed it.
I hate to rain on your parade (the eloquent and kind thoughts for OT). I find your thoughts a little disturbing though.
My question is, what OT is there for OT? In case you are a few widgets short of a pallet, that is, what overtime is there for Oscar Treadwell? Is he in heaven?
Did OT expand the Kingdom? Did OT serve the King?
"Meaning" is found in Jesus Christ. I really, really hate to say this. The idea here is not to trample on a corpse or on the affections of those who miss the prior soul of that corpse.
But "art," "beauty," "humanity"... the "meaning of humanity"... please be careful. Whatever part human creation / creativity plays in the meaning of man, it is small in comparison to relationship with God, relationship with others, obedience, sacrifice, etc.
You couldn't have expressed the philosophy of secular humanism much better than you have (wrapped up in a Christian gift-wrapping).
Again I really hate to say it. But he is a "public" figure and SWNID has informed us that Jesus reserved his harshest criticism for public figures. What's the difference between a hypocrtical drug-addicted politician and an entertaining poetry lover in eternity?
Meaning is found in eternity only. Eternity is found only in Jesus.
Anonymous: Are you forgetting that you were a human being before you were a Christian and that it was in virtue of your humanity--grounded as it is in the image of God--that you were even able to understand the message of Christ? True, humanity apart from Christ is depraved, even lost, but it's not completely devoid of worth. Does that not imply that we can find at least some meaning in the lives of non-Christians? --And by the way, do we even know that Oscar Treadwell was not a Christian? (I'm pleading genuiine ignorance here. This is the first I can recall having heard of him.)
To answer questions 3 and 4 of anonymous's juvenalia (kind of gutless not to identify yourself), I present the following quote from Nancy Pearcey's excellent book Total Truth:
"The lesson of the Cultural Mandate is that our sense of fulfillment depends on engaging in creative, constructive work. The ideal human existence is... creative effort expended for the glory of God and the benefit of others. Our calling is not just to "get to heaven" but also to cultivate the earth, not just to "save souls" but also to serve God through our work. For God Himself is engaged not only in the work of salvation (special grace) but also in the work of preserving and developing His creation (common grace). When we obey the Cultural Mandate, we participate in the work of God Himself, as agents of His common grace."
Calus the Great:
How are loving God, loving others, obedience and sacrifice connected to "getting to heaven"?
Who said "getting to heaven" was the meaning or purpose of life?
Who said "saving souls" alone was the meaning or purpose of life?
Who said that creating or working had no value? Either or thinking is your downfall.
Work and creativity do have value. But values can be stacked against each other. There's no way work and creativity can be called "the meaning of humanity." Read any doctrine of man book. Meaning comes from being in the Kingdom. Meaning comes from the work of God (the Cross), not the work of man.
JB in CA:
No, I'm not forgetting
JB in CA:
Will you be able to place a single drop of water on the tongue of OT? If not, any encouragement coming down from your cloud to OT in the afterworld about his great meaning while on earth, what will that mean to him?
Calus the Great:
I think your juvenalia is juvenilia.
Dearest Anonymous,
If I were worried about rain on my parade, I wouldn't permit comments.
Permit me to exercise my signature condescension by saying I feel sorry for you. If your faith makes it impossible for you to enjoy and honor the creativity of a sinner whose art gives testimony the image of his Creator, even if he does it unknowingly, you are the poorer for it.
I will keep listening to Mozart and Stravinsky and Ellington and Coltrane and reading Hardy and Hemmingway and Roth and looking at Matisse and Chagall and Pollack with joy and awe and contemplate the nobility and tragedy that it is to be human.
And I will listen to Bach and even Messien and read Dostoyevski and even Updike and look at Rembrandt and even Dali and thank God for their artistry that has to some extent been redeemed further by their faith, flawed and weak as it was.
I will learn from all of them what it is to be what I am.
You say that I've expressed secular humanism in Christian gift wrapping. I condescend to remind you that Christians were humanists before secularists were. Secularists hate the "Christian gift wrapping" because they know it's not just gift wrapping. It's the essence of the thing. For secular humanists, humans are just exceptionally rational beasts. For Christian humanists, they bear the Creator's image, which, even if marred by sin, is still sublime.
Can you find even one word in my hastily prepared tribute to the man whose real name was Arthur Pederson and whose eternal destiny you deign to pronounce that implies somehow that there is something greater than knowing Christ Jesus as Lord or some assurance beyond the grave for someone who doesn't?
So what is it that disturbs you really?
SWNID:
You are the king of straw mans and false, opposite spectrum choices. I enjoy and honor your creativity.
Gentle SWNID readers:
Check out this page of the website of the American Humanist Association. Since SWNID is unable to consider the possibility that he is seldom right, you Gentle SWNID readers may benefit from a proper understanding of humanism and its relationship to Christianity.
Pay particular attention to the entries titled "Christian humanism" and "Religious humanism." Then, go outside, build a ziggurat, climb to the top, and discover what happens. I believe self-fulfillment is one of the components of Abaddon.
http://www.jcn.com/humanism.php4
To anonymous:
Whether OT was a Christian or not, his gifts came from the Almighty, and we can celebrate those gifts just like we can celebrate the gifts of any outstanding musician or author or plumber for that matter who is wonderfully good at his job. All of these gifts make me appreciate God even more, whether any of these folks are Christians or not. I am sorry for you that your world is so narrow that you cannot celebrate our loving God making man in his own image, even in those who choose not to follow him. If I were limited to only reading Christian authors and listening to Christian musicians, how poor I would be and however would I begin to reach those who need to know Christ.
To "babeliscious":
If you rely on the American Humanist Association to define humanism for you, you condemn yourself to a very inhumane existence.
Again, to history. The very impulse to understand the human condition by reconsidering and imitating classical literature and art was driven by the very Christian, very biblical understanding that human beings bear God's image. It was the source and soul of the pre-Reformation and Protestant Reformation. It led Christian scholars to sneak into the Jewish ghettos at night to learn to read Hebrew from the rabbis. It led Erasmus to publish the Greek New Testament, Luther to translate it into German, Calvin to comment on it. It toppled the oppressive authoritarianism of late medieval western European Christianity.
It also, eventually, led to the Enlightenment, which has its bad points, like its illegitimate spawn the American Humanist Association and others whose functional atheism destroys any reason to see humans of any worth whatsoever.
But shall we contemplate the likes of Francis Shaeffer? Is he un-humanist enough for you? It was Shaeffer who loved to speak of the "mannishness of man" (a phrase offensive now for other reasons), the residual nobility of humanity in its most fallen state that gives rise to great works of art, great deeds of self-sacrificial courage, great inventions of the imagination. It gives glory to God whether the subject knows it or not.
to anonyomous:
Straw man? If all you mean to say is that there is something more important that playing jazz records and reading poetry on the radio, then we have no quarrel. But why you should think my failure to explicate this obvious point is "a little disturbing" is, well, a little disturbing.
I still don't know what disturbs you. Maybe you could clarify? Or maybe the straw man was your own creation.
If you read my original posting more carefully than it deserves, you'll understand that I deliberately imply that OT was on a quest for meaning. He sought truth, beauty and love in art. He shared his quest with a devoted audience, for whom he was a teacher and friend, one whom we looked forward to welcoming into our homes via the wireless. He found glimmers of truth, beauty and love in art. But to find the final objective of the quest, one must look beyond.
I don't know whether OT found the objective or not. I don't know Mr. Pederson except as a radio personality. I hope he did, as I hope all do. If all he found was what he spoke of on the radio, then fine as that was, it wasn't the End, the telos.
But those on the quest who haven't found the objective, the exclamation point for which art has been the question mark, have an altar to the unknown god. I intend to acknowledge that such are "very religious," in the words of the apostle, not far from the kingdom.
And think we that Christianity is so weak and "secular humanism" so strong that we can't appreciate the artistry of a man who loved the human spirit and loved to share that love with others, even if there still remains a more excellent way?
Sorry, gentle readers, one more thing:
"What's the difference between a hypocrtical drug-addicted politician and an entertaining poetry lover in eternity?"
The same difference between either or both of the above and an arrogant biblical scholar or an anonymous poster on a blog. None.
The difference comes from outside all of them.
But the difference in the discourse is this: PJK's drug abuse is not an expression of humanity's greatest strivings on its quest for God. It's all brokenness, which by itself is tragic. OT's artistry was that thing that PJK's wasn't.
PJK's brokenness, if acknowledged by PJK, could lead him where he needs to go. Unacknowledged it poses a danger to himself and especially to others, for he has extraordinary power. He requires rebuke because he needs to turn around, for his own sake and others'. If OT wasn't at the goal of the quest, he still didn't need to turn around as PJK did. He needed to look just a bit beyond. "What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you."
Anonymous,
Whether or not OT is not the issue here. Although do you know for certain that he did not expand the kingdom or serve the King?
The prevailing sentiments being expressed here can be summed up with a quote from the poet John Donne -- "each man's death diminishes me".
We mourn the passing of OT not just for his musical gifts but because he, like all of us, need the grace of God.
Raymond
You can listen to the broadcast on the station's website www.wvxu.org
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