The King and I and the Collision of Worldviews
Chelsea and I watched The King and I recently, which was the first time either of us had seen it since we were kids. I honestly hadn’t remembered anything about it except the song “Getting to Know You,” and I was caught off guard by how good the ending is. You didn’t expect Yul Brynner to die, since he wasn’t old or sick, but once he does you realize it was inevitable. And through his death, this movie actually says something significant that we should pay attention to.
On one level, Yul Brynner died of a broken heart, or more precisely, a heart that ripped itself in two. With half of his heart he was a traditional king of Siam, proud of his own culture and his place in it. But with the other half of his heart, he wanted to be European. He was just as attached to the idea of being scientific and forward-looking as he was to traditional values and heritage. He thought that he could hold on to both of these at the same time, but the inherent contradictions led first to puzzlement (“There are times I almost think I am not sure of what I absolutely know”) and eventually to the fatal crisis when the moment of decision was forced upon him. In this moment, unable to commit to one way or the other, his heart was snapped in two.
On another level, his death is inevitable because he is the king of Old Siam, and Old Siam itself is dying. A New Siam, fundamentally different in its worldview and values, is coming into being and bringing to an end the Old Siam. Yul Brynner himself instigates this transition; he is the father of the New Siam, but he does not belong to it. He is the last king of Old Siam, and he cannot outlive his own kingdom. New Siam needs a new king, formed from youth with the values of the new worldview. Even as Yul Brynner takes his last breaths, his son begins his reign by abolishing the practice of prostrating before the king.
There’s a lesson here about the inherent coherence of worldviews. Yul Brynner wanted to import some modern science and European learning, without realizing that in so doing, he was also bringing in a fundamentally different view of human dignity and equality. He wanted his children to speak English, and what he got were children who were thinking “in English” on such questions as slavery and royalty. It turns out that worldview commitments and values do not come à la carte. Ideas are rooted in a worldview, and when you take a flower that you find attractive, you tend to get more than you bargained for.
For example, you might think you’d rather live without the God who claims authority over your sex life, but that also means doing away with the image of God that makes you anything other than an “ugly bag of mostly water”.1 Or you might think you’d prefer karma to sin, but eventually you discover that you’ve got rid of redemption as well.
In the same way, you might like this or that aspect of Jesus. You might like the Sermon on the Mount, or the way he elevated women, children, and the poor. But Jesus will not be taken à la carte. The same Jesus who said “Let the little children come unto me,” (Mt 19.14) also said, “Unless you believe that I AM, you will die in your sins” (Jn 8.24).2 We can’t go in two different directions at the same time. Either Jesus is Lord and we follow him with all our heart, or he’s not we go our own way. And either way, it’s this decision that sooner or later decides all the rest. “For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will save it” (Mk 8:35).
English translations typically add the word “he” not present in Greek. Cf. verse 58 and Ex. 3:14.