Popeye
as Deity
Possibly
the most endearing of all anthropomorphic manifestations of
the godhead is the archetypal hero re-created as a gruff yet
winsome character which sings:
I yam what I yam
And that's all what I yam.
What
this ostensibly fictitious cartoon persona, created early in
the second fifth of the twentieth century, enunciates in his
ditty is, of course, nothing less than a jaunty echo of the
Divine Declaration:
I Am That I Am.
In
accordance with the universal law of parsimony, the most profound
utterance is couched in the simplest phraseology.
How
does the modest scholar cognize the profundity of the Popeyeic
periphrasis? Obviously, it is a statement of germinal identity,
the sonic boom of the Genisisistic Word which signals the projection
of the uninitiable, illimitable, essential substance of the
supreme Atziluthic existence. The humble English sentence, "I
yam," is a modern, mundane re-creation of the pregnant
I AM, which sound reiterates the Big Bang, the overflowing of
cosmic energy from Kether to Chokma, from the Supreme Non-manifest
into the yet unmanifest by seminal dissemination of creative
puissance, from the unknown no-thing to the potentially knowable
res, from the topmost Sphere of the Tree of Life to the
Second Supernal.
In
proclaiming, "and that's all what I yam," the Divine
Sailorman is renewing his confirmation of his universality,
the simple yet absolute unity and identify of deity and universe,
the parameterless Being. From the very beginning, before any
humanly cognizable primordium, the Deity projected the universe;
it is that projection which subsumes the entirety of the galaxy,
nay, of the very cosmos itself. As has been stated in another
cartoonic context, "That's all, folks."
The
portion of the Popeyeic Utterance is also an authentication
of the individuality of the hero, a simple and evident yet somehow
mysterious universal yawp signifying that he personally apprehends
his eternal identity, recognizes his own essence, and is satisfied
thereby to be what he is (and, possibly, dissatisfied to be
less than "all what" he is). How, however, could he
be less, being all? No neo- or pseudo-analytic identity crisis
here. Popeye is declaring—nay, is vociferously announcing—that
he has attained his full potential: that which he is, is, and
that which he is, is all that he is, indeed all that he can
possibly be. He has, as it were, topped the Maslovian hierarchy.
He has attained succinctity in the brevity of his expression
of his isness.
It
is in the very name "Popeye" that we are able to discern
additional evidence for our conclusions concerning the divinity
of our brave, gallant, and resourceful being. Let us examine
the two syllables of that Name: "pop" and "eye."
The first syllable, "pop," is onomatopoeic; and what
else is a "pop" but a diminutive expression of the
aforementioned Big Bang? How appropriate is this reductio
to one whose persona has voluntarily entered the human level
and sphere and absurdum. How charming an example of noblesse
oblige: the cosmic thunderclap minified to our puny human
aural capacity and understanding so that as children of a loving
Father we may indeed begin to hear and understand that which
we stand under.
For,
as we consider this initial syllable of the Great Name in its
familial context, we soon infer that parental implication: the
Hero is the archetypal father figure, once more manifested in
human guise: the Father of All the Universe is the careful and
foresighted father of the postmodern age, for as Zeus, for example,
zealously endeavored to populate the whole of his petty universe
by fathering heroes and monsters galore, our modern Popeye is
chastefully faithful to his Olive Oyl, and our "Pop"
thus engenders not mere heroes and base monsters but rather
inspiring spirit and towering essence, the spirit of courage
and the essence of fidelity.
