Hebrews 4:14 Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. 15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. 16 Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
On Good Friday, my church (Metro Hope in Harlem) talked about the suffering that Jesus underwent on Good Friday and integrated it with our sufferings today. The pastor’s wife has been undergoing chemotherapy, and the pastor argued that Jesus, as our empathic high priest, understands what she is going through in ways that the pastor, nor anyone else, can.
I totally agree with this Scripture, especially through the Christian Scriptures and church fathers, but I found that my pastor’s discussion to be unhelpful, and I submit instead the following considerations.
First, God is not empathic because God is omniscient. My pastor argued that Jesus knows what we’re going through because God is omniscient and Jesus is God. This entire line of reasoning is false. The pastor was right to say that each one of us suffers alone. However, the pastor was wrong to say that God knows what it’s like because of God’s omniscience – no one else knows what it’s like for me to suffer because they know about my disease or about my body. They don’t know what it’s like for me to suffer because they don’t know what it’s like to be me as I experience suffering. Abstract knowledge about something will never put someone else in my shoes.
How might one understand the Hebrew passage then? I believe that Jesus is so important because Jesus became fully human. Allow me to introduce this topic with medieval philosophy. Jesus is the perfect example of what Aquinas termed “concursis” or the coinciding of God and human. The sacraments are specific examples of God’s promise to concur with the physical objects in fulfillment of God’s divine promise. The Catholic Church leaves open God’s work in concurring with other objects or actions or individuals, but the Catholic Church proclaims God’s guarantee of working through the sacraments. Karl Rahner, the most famous Catholic theologian of the twentieth century, said that Jesus is the supreme sacrament, and other sacraments are made sacraments only through their being united with Jesus Christ. I agree with Rahner’s view, and so I conclude that Jesus is so instrumental in being empathic because Jesus is God and God experiences the fullness of humanity in Jesus.
So far, this may seem basic, but deeper considerations arise. Jesus was not a woman. Jesus never had cancer or HIV or shame around being transgendered, so far as we know. Jesus never suffered a slow and agonizing defeat by Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s. In fact, Jesus, despite being human, only suffered in particular ways within his Greco-Roman and Palestinian context. How can anyone claim, then, that Jesus is fully empathic with us as our High Priest, undergoing all temptations that we undergo but being without sin, as the verse claims? I have already argued that Jesus’ omniscience is not sufficient, instead claiming that Jesus’ human experience must hold the clue. But there are clearly problems with Jesus’ limited human experience.
I foresee two possible options. First, we could claim that Jesus’ experience of Godforsakenness makes Jesus completely empathic. Throughout Jesus’ life, Jesus experienced all kinds of pain and suffering – betrayal by his friends at his sentencing by the Sanhedrin, catching them asleep at his hour of greatest need in the garden of Gethesemane, frustration at the disciples’ lack of faith, bouts of hunger and existential loneliness, even being tempted by Satan! Jesus experienced all kinds of things that we, too, in our own lives, experience. However, on the cross, Jesus experienced Godforsakenness, crying out “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” If all suffering and pain are modes of experiencing Godforsakenness, which I believe one could claim on the basis of Scripture and church tradition, then Jesus, by experiencing Godforsakenness on the cross and entering hell (the realm of Godforsakenness) before experiencing resurrection, then Jesus could be claimed to experientially understand our pain and suffering because Jesus encountered the absolute culmination and fullness of suffering: complete Godforsakenness. I wish that Christians would emphasize Jesus’ descent into hell because this reminds us of Jesus’ experience of Godforsakenness, and if we did, then perhaps we could emphasize Jesus’ empathic love and grace and mercy towards us. Perhaps the focus on Mary and other saints is a necessary outgrowth of a view of Jesus apart from Godforsakenness, for we need other “mediators” or divine images to convey to us a sense of identity, participation, empathy, and grace. I could be wrong, of course – do I love and appreciate Mary in my own spiritual life because I don’t understand Jesus’ godforsakenness on the cross, or do I just need many images to approach the divine life? I don’t know, but it’s a thought.
My second thought is that we can understand God’s empathy towards us by emphasizing the “Jesus within” or the spark of divine life that operates within each of us. Christians are not going to adopt pantheistic conceptions, wherein the argument runs thus:
a) God is the world,
b) I am a part of the world
c) Therefore, I am God
d) Therefore, God knows what my suffering is like because God is me.
However, if Christians embrace a participation in Jesus, wherein all new creatures now are “in Christ”, as Paul reiterated over and over again, then there is a divine spark, a part that recognizes the “concursis” that occurs whenever we allow ourselves to be worked within and through by God. One way of formulating God’s working through us is, I believe, this notion of a divine spark within us. Not that there is a divine spark apart from us, or as if God and humans compete for ontological space (because I don’t believe divine space competes with natural and human space), but rather that God’s work “concurs” with human action, and the divine spark within is, I believe, one way of formulating that concept. If God’s actions concur with ours, then God knows what it’s like to be us because God’s space totally encompasses and transcends our own. We are now “in Christ” as much as a drop of water is “in” the ocean. This may sound pantheistic, which it is, but this is another way in which God can be truly be said to understand us in our situation and in our sufferings. As a pantheist, I find this understanding more appealing, but I believe that both this pantheistic-leaning conception as well as the Godforsakenness idea (which I grabbed from Jurgen Moltmann) are ways of understanding God’s empathy toward us.
And what is the significance of all of this? Well, as the verse says, now we can approach the throne of grace with boldness, that we may know that we will receive mercy and grace in our time of need. And, of course, so that we may hold fast to our confession. Understanding God’s empathy and great love toward us not only keeps us grounded in our faith, which is very important for our spiritual lives, but it also allows us to confront life boldly, with great confidence, knowing that we will receive mercy and grace. Instead of being “tossed to and fro by the winds” of ever-changing doctrines, and instead of being bowed over by a commanding and never-satisfied superego (Freud), we are confident. We do not have to wonder about our goodness being up to God’s standards. Our identity is secure in Christ, and in Christ’s salvific work on the cross.
Amen.
Saturday, April 7, 2012
Saturday, March 10, 2012
A rant on the historical Jesus
In this blog post, I am going to express my dissatisfaction with the Christian obsession with the historical Jesus.
In my experience, and especially here at Union Theological Seminary, students are especially eager to hear about the historical Jesus, as a way of reconciling themselves with their Christian upbringing. It seems to me that many Christians are disappointed with the ways in which they were disenfranchised within their previous Christian community (as I was…twice), but still have a love for Christianity and an appreciation of their upbringing. They thus choose to reconcile the two by figuring out what the “historical” Jesus believed and thought, as if this will help them become more convinced of their current (liberal/Protestant) viewpoint of Christianity and allow them to dismiss criticisms they faced at prior Christian communities because they now know the “real” Jesus.
I find this attitude to be extremely problematic on a number of levels.
First, I find it problematic that they believe there is a “true” way of understanding Jesus. Jesus is never apart from historical context, that is true. However, the historical Jesus is never apart from the interpreter’s context either. Albert Schweitzer, a famous scholar of the historical Jesus school, said that historians and theologians looked down into a well to find the historical Jesus – and they found only their reflection staring back at them. He wrote that the major German historians and theologians had made Jesus out to be just like them, with their own concerns. Jesus, for them, was one who was a moral teacher, an exemplar, a person that preached a message of love, forgiveness, and general capitalistic German ideology of the day. What the historians wanted to find, they found.
Schweitzer convincingly argued that writings about Jesus were best understood when Jesus was viewed as an apocalyptic prophet, a doomsdayer that believed the end of the world was in sight. The “historical” Jesus, Schweitzer felt, was completely unconcerned with morality or love or good works because the end is coming.
Nonetheless, Schweitzer did acknowledge that the “historical” Jesus is not good to believe nowadays; thus, his fellow German historians and theologians were right to preach a different Jesus, a Jesus of love, morality, good teaching, and exemplar living. Schweitzer’s only critique was that they should be honest and acknowledge that Jesus, in Jesus’ context and time, did not believe like them.
My reasoning for describing Schweitzer’s revolutionary book is primarily to show that there isn’t a “historical” Jesus apart from the interpreter’s context. The German theologians looked down into a well and found only what they wanted to find. Schweitzer, I believe, had good reasons for viewing Jesus as an apocalyptic prophet of judgment – that is, after all, how I personally view Jesus (mostly). However, the idea that we can leave our biases and our contexts and our upbringings and our wishes is naïve at best, and, at worst, will only cause us to become more secure in our justifications and our current views.
Secondly, I find the quest for the historical Jesus to be a fruitless venture. Not only do I believe we are going to be heavily influenced by our biases and our wishes for how we want Jesus to be, but I am convinced that there is too little information about the historical Jesus to even believe that the pursuit is worthwhile. The few fragments we have about the historical Jesus are written decades after Jesus died. Ranges for the Synoptic Gospels are between 40 CE and 110 CE, the Gospel of John is usually dated post-90 CE. In all cases, the writings are not designed to be historical anyway. Writing during the time was often polemical, and it was designed to convince one of a certain view. Historical accuracy, myth (often taken from other mythic ideas from other cultures), and personal experiences are all blended together. The idea that one could somehow, from the very few sources we have, decipher a code that will give us the infallible view of the historical Jesus is simply unbelievable. The Gospel writers were not intending to do so, and we should not strive to do so either. There is not enough evidence, as if evidence would be sufficient to convince anyone anyway.
Thirdly, I find the attitude that I described above regarding the quest for the historical Jesus to be problematic because it totally ignores the reality of the Christian Church. In all honesty, Jesus is not important because of who he was in the Judean context. Jesus is important because the Church proclaims his resurrection by God. My faith isn’t shaken if Jesus’ corpse got up, walked through walls, and then flew up into the sky behind some cloud where Jesus’ body is now hanging out in space. The portrayal of the resurrection and the ascension are vitally important for any Christian faith – but it needs not be literal corpse-raising. MAYBE Jesus’ corpse rose from the dead and flew into the sky, as the Gospel accounts say. I don’t personally believe that, and I find that idea to be ridiculous.
It seems to me that both a literal and an anti-literal view should be faulted for the same reason – they are missing the point. One does not feel secure in the Christian message because a corpse was raised, and neither is one devastated because a corpse wasn’t raised. The point of Jesus’ life and ministry, and death and resurrection, is bound up in the Church’s proclamation, as witnessed to in the Creeds, the practices, and the daily living of the Christian Church. I am not interested in Jesus, just as I am not interested in the historical fellow of Buddha or Confucius. (And at least Buddhists and Confucians do not care about the historical founder!)
But I do care about Christ.
Jesus the Christ is extremely important to me, and I will probably never lose this excitement and identity with Jesus the Christ. How one could choose to ignore church tradition (of 2000 years) is beyond me. The Christian Church makes up my identity. The Church’s followers have shaped me and my beliefs and my experiences of God. It is the height of arrogance to deny the multitude of saints any significance in the pursuit of one’s personal religion or “relationship with God”. The Confucians and the pagans were absolutely right to emphasize the importance of one’s ancestry, both for grounding of oneself but also for one’s personal edification. The idea that I would have to reinvent all of my spiritual practices, or investigate every single one of my beliefs regarding God and the Church and spiritual matters is the height of arrogance and naivete. A better response, I think, is to take what the Christian doctrines are concerning Jesus the Christ – and then compare them. Christianity is not monolithic, despite what anyone says. There are many competing traditions for understanding Jesus’ atoning work of salvation, for understanding the Ascension of Christ, for understanding the importance of Jesus Christ’s life and work. Holding them in tension, in their multiplicity, and understanding one’s experiences in light of them, and understanding others’ experiences and beliefs regarding them is, to my mind, a much greater and important and fruitful endeavor.
The Church must constantly be challenged by the revelation of Jesus Christ. The Church must always find itself in a state of confession, both of its sins and of its grounding in Jesus Christ. I feel great resonance with Barth’s emphasis on the Church proclaiming the Gospel as it has been revealed in its life and action, in holy Scripture, and, most of all, in Jesus the Christ. Though I do not agree with Barth’s conclusions, because he remains trapped in a dogmatic circle, I do nonetheless agree that one cannot separate the “historical” Jesus from Jesus the Christ, and I wouldn’t want to.
I am uninterested in the “historical Jesus.” I am, however, VERY interested in Jesus the Christ, as it has been handed down to me by Christians throughout the ages, and as it has been written down in holy Scripture. Far better to be challenged by the stumbling block of Jesus Christ than to use any historical research to justify my own position, even if I am justifying myself because of pain that I have suffered in my past. Yes, it is absolutely important to achieve healing over what others have done to you. I am still trying to do so. And yes, it is absolutely important to acknowledge where one has come from, and to appreciate one’s past for all the things one can appreciate. It is important to redeem one’s past insofar as one is able.
However, becoming attached to an impossible goal, which will only further strengthen one’s dogmatism and estrangement from Christians throughout the ages only results from misguided Enlightenment thinking and serves to undercut our unity with Christian writers and thinkers throughout the ages. The Holy Spirit binds us together, in Christ. Let no person put this connection asunder.
In my experience, and especially here at Union Theological Seminary, students are especially eager to hear about the historical Jesus, as a way of reconciling themselves with their Christian upbringing. It seems to me that many Christians are disappointed with the ways in which they were disenfranchised within their previous Christian community (as I was…twice), but still have a love for Christianity and an appreciation of their upbringing. They thus choose to reconcile the two by figuring out what the “historical” Jesus believed and thought, as if this will help them become more convinced of their current (liberal/Protestant) viewpoint of Christianity and allow them to dismiss criticisms they faced at prior Christian communities because they now know the “real” Jesus.
I find this attitude to be extremely problematic on a number of levels.
First, I find it problematic that they believe there is a “true” way of understanding Jesus. Jesus is never apart from historical context, that is true. However, the historical Jesus is never apart from the interpreter’s context either. Albert Schweitzer, a famous scholar of the historical Jesus school, said that historians and theologians looked down into a well to find the historical Jesus – and they found only their reflection staring back at them. He wrote that the major German historians and theologians had made Jesus out to be just like them, with their own concerns. Jesus, for them, was one who was a moral teacher, an exemplar, a person that preached a message of love, forgiveness, and general capitalistic German ideology of the day. What the historians wanted to find, they found.
Schweitzer convincingly argued that writings about Jesus were best understood when Jesus was viewed as an apocalyptic prophet, a doomsdayer that believed the end of the world was in sight. The “historical” Jesus, Schweitzer felt, was completely unconcerned with morality or love or good works because the end is coming.
Nonetheless, Schweitzer did acknowledge that the “historical” Jesus is not good to believe nowadays; thus, his fellow German historians and theologians were right to preach a different Jesus, a Jesus of love, morality, good teaching, and exemplar living. Schweitzer’s only critique was that they should be honest and acknowledge that Jesus, in Jesus’ context and time, did not believe like them.
My reasoning for describing Schweitzer’s revolutionary book is primarily to show that there isn’t a “historical” Jesus apart from the interpreter’s context. The German theologians looked down into a well and found only what they wanted to find. Schweitzer, I believe, had good reasons for viewing Jesus as an apocalyptic prophet of judgment – that is, after all, how I personally view Jesus (mostly). However, the idea that we can leave our biases and our contexts and our upbringings and our wishes is naïve at best, and, at worst, will only cause us to become more secure in our justifications and our current views.
Secondly, I find the quest for the historical Jesus to be a fruitless venture. Not only do I believe we are going to be heavily influenced by our biases and our wishes for how we want Jesus to be, but I am convinced that there is too little information about the historical Jesus to even believe that the pursuit is worthwhile. The few fragments we have about the historical Jesus are written decades after Jesus died. Ranges for the Synoptic Gospels are between 40 CE and 110 CE, the Gospel of John is usually dated post-90 CE. In all cases, the writings are not designed to be historical anyway. Writing during the time was often polemical, and it was designed to convince one of a certain view. Historical accuracy, myth (often taken from other mythic ideas from other cultures), and personal experiences are all blended together. The idea that one could somehow, from the very few sources we have, decipher a code that will give us the infallible view of the historical Jesus is simply unbelievable. The Gospel writers were not intending to do so, and we should not strive to do so either. There is not enough evidence, as if evidence would be sufficient to convince anyone anyway.
Thirdly, I find the attitude that I described above regarding the quest for the historical Jesus to be problematic because it totally ignores the reality of the Christian Church. In all honesty, Jesus is not important because of who he was in the Judean context. Jesus is important because the Church proclaims his resurrection by God. My faith isn’t shaken if Jesus’ corpse got up, walked through walls, and then flew up into the sky behind some cloud where Jesus’ body is now hanging out in space. The portrayal of the resurrection and the ascension are vitally important for any Christian faith – but it needs not be literal corpse-raising. MAYBE Jesus’ corpse rose from the dead and flew into the sky, as the Gospel accounts say. I don’t personally believe that, and I find that idea to be ridiculous.
It seems to me that both a literal and an anti-literal view should be faulted for the same reason – they are missing the point. One does not feel secure in the Christian message because a corpse was raised, and neither is one devastated because a corpse wasn’t raised. The point of Jesus’ life and ministry, and death and resurrection, is bound up in the Church’s proclamation, as witnessed to in the Creeds, the practices, and the daily living of the Christian Church. I am not interested in Jesus, just as I am not interested in the historical fellow of Buddha or Confucius. (And at least Buddhists and Confucians do not care about the historical founder!)
But I do care about Christ.
Jesus the Christ is extremely important to me, and I will probably never lose this excitement and identity with Jesus the Christ. How one could choose to ignore church tradition (of 2000 years) is beyond me. The Christian Church makes up my identity. The Church’s followers have shaped me and my beliefs and my experiences of God. It is the height of arrogance to deny the multitude of saints any significance in the pursuit of one’s personal religion or “relationship with God”. The Confucians and the pagans were absolutely right to emphasize the importance of one’s ancestry, both for grounding of oneself but also for one’s personal edification. The idea that I would have to reinvent all of my spiritual practices, or investigate every single one of my beliefs regarding God and the Church and spiritual matters is the height of arrogance and naivete. A better response, I think, is to take what the Christian doctrines are concerning Jesus the Christ – and then compare them. Christianity is not monolithic, despite what anyone says. There are many competing traditions for understanding Jesus’ atoning work of salvation, for understanding the Ascension of Christ, for understanding the importance of Jesus Christ’s life and work. Holding them in tension, in their multiplicity, and understanding one’s experiences in light of them, and understanding others’ experiences and beliefs regarding them is, to my mind, a much greater and important and fruitful endeavor.
The Church must constantly be challenged by the revelation of Jesus Christ. The Church must always find itself in a state of confession, both of its sins and of its grounding in Jesus Christ. I feel great resonance with Barth’s emphasis on the Church proclaiming the Gospel as it has been revealed in its life and action, in holy Scripture, and, most of all, in Jesus the Christ. Though I do not agree with Barth’s conclusions, because he remains trapped in a dogmatic circle, I do nonetheless agree that one cannot separate the “historical” Jesus from Jesus the Christ, and I wouldn’t want to.
I am uninterested in the “historical Jesus.” I am, however, VERY interested in Jesus the Christ, as it has been handed down to me by Christians throughout the ages, and as it has been written down in holy Scripture. Far better to be challenged by the stumbling block of Jesus Christ than to use any historical research to justify my own position, even if I am justifying myself because of pain that I have suffered in my past. Yes, it is absolutely important to achieve healing over what others have done to you. I am still trying to do so. And yes, it is absolutely important to acknowledge where one has come from, and to appreciate one’s past for all the things one can appreciate. It is important to redeem one’s past insofar as one is able.
However, becoming attached to an impossible goal, which will only further strengthen one’s dogmatism and estrangement from Christians throughout the ages only results from misguided Enlightenment thinking and serves to undercut our unity with Christian writers and thinkers throughout the ages. The Holy Spirit binds us together, in Christ. Let no person put this connection asunder.
Sunday, February 19, 2012
Transfiguration Sermon
Today’s lectionary discussed the Transfiguration of Christ. I want to bring out certain aspects of the text that would have been important for a Jewish listener and see what can be adapted for us, even though we no longer live in that time and space.
In the story, Jesus is accompanied by Peter, James, and John and goes on top of the mountain. Jesus led them up to a high mountain, apart by themselves, and then he was transfigured before them. His clothes shone, more white than snow, and Elijah and Moses appeared with Jesus. Peter spoke, saying “Master, it is good for us to be here; let us make 3 tabernacles, one for thee, and one for Moses, and one for Elijah…” After the voice came out from the cloud, only Jesus was left with them.
To a Jewish audience, Jesus being flanked by Moses and Elijah was extremely important. Moses, for the Jews, represented the Law since he received the Law from God. Now, the Law for the Jews was not just a list of commands. Rather, the Law emphasized the Jewish covenant with YHWH, and because of God’s gratuitous election, the Jews were God’s chosen people and they incurred certain obligations. For instance, they were to not eat pork, to circumcise their children, to have Levite priesthood, etc. These obligations were understood as setting them apart from other nations and peoples surrounding them. Moreover, the Law embodied many of their ethical and moral principles. Children were not to talk back to their parents; women were supposed to obey their husbands; girl teenagers were often “given” in marriage to young men at the ages around 12-14. The patriarchal society was grounded, in many respects, by the Law of Moses. The Law thus not only expressed the Jewish society, but it also validated its form. The Law was inextricably tied to the culture, and the Jewish culture was extremely important to the Jews.
But Jesus was also flanked by Elijah. Elijah signified the prophets. Now, what role did the prophets play in Jewish culture? Well, there are numerous examples of prophets in the Hebrew Scriptures. I would argue that some of them became judges. Most of them were raised up by God for a time, to announce a particular message (oscillating between hope and despair, though a few had only negative pronouncements). Many of them decried the general lack of justice, and the written prophets we have (Amos, Isaiah, Hosea, Jeremiah, etc.) were written during periods of exile. Foreign invaders had entered Israel, conquered the cities and the surrounding villages. They would kill many people, pillage the villages and the cities, wreck havoc upon the sacred shrines and holy places, and in the important case of Babylon, take away many of the most talented individuals. Desperate times called for desperate measures, and I don’t want to just dismiss the acts of injustice lightly. Many times it’s easy to condemn others when we don’t understand the situation that they find themselves in, but, nonetheless, many (if not all) prophets lamented the many injustices that were taking place, specifically against the most vulnerable. The prophets represented the prophetic call against injustice.
So what might we take away from the Transfiguration story? I would like to offer three main lessons.
First, Jesus, in being represented by Moses and Elijah, showed his grounding in the Jewish history, narrative, culture, and identity. Jesus was a Jew, and he showed his groundedness in the Transfiguration. He aligned himself with the Mosaic law as well as the Hebrew prophets. What grounds us today? What unites us with others across time and space? Is it our ancestors? Is it the Christian faith? Is it the Christian rituals, such as the Eucharist or Baptism, which Christians have literally done for thousands of years? Whatever we might value as part of our heritage, our past, our forefathers and foremothers, I believe that it is important that we have a grounding. Jesus, after all, did.
Secondly, Jesus in being represented by Moses and Elijah, but particularly Elijah, displays his regard for justice. The Mosaic Law was important in setting the Jewish people apart because of God’s covenant with them, but it was also designed to prosper them. I see many similarities with the Islamic Sharia law, which is law that is oriented toward producing justice. The Mosaic law was intended to produce justice, though justice was not separable from God’s covenant with them. Similarly, the prophets represented the prophetic call against injustice. They represented God’s favor and concern for the oppressed – today, we might understand them as the felons, the poor, the homeless, the undernourished, the GLBTQ community, immigrants, etc. How can we concern ourselves with the poor and the oppressed, as God would have us do? What are ways that we already do this? If God, or our ancestors, or Christians in previous times, or whatever community that we feel grounded in, came to us and asked us “What have you done with your one, precious life?”, what would we say? Would we be ashamed, or would we be proud? What are ways that we can proudly respond, and what are ways that we can improve? A Jewish saying from Rabbi Zusya goes like this: “In the world to come, I shall not be asked, "Why were you not Moses?" I shall be asked, "Why were you not Zusya?"
One of the wonders of God’s sovereignty is that God doesn’t need us. God does not need you. The Christian story says that God created us apart from any necessity. God, in God’s perfect freedom and love, created all things, redeemed all things, and will eventually glorify all things. God’s plan was focused in Christ, but since all things are in Christ, God’s plan of redemption is not just for all Christians, or all humans, but for the entire cosmos. God does not need us, and we are set free from trying to make the world perfect. I submit that even if we could make the world as we saw fit, according to the ways in which we measure perfection, the world would still be tremendously messed up. God does not need us, but God invites us to participate in the ultimate plan of glory. In what ways can we participate in the work of God in the world?
Thirdly, I would urge us to consider the other person whose face shone like Jesus’ did in the Transfiguration account. Moses, after seeing God on Mount Sinai (in Exodus 34:29-33), came down from the mountain, but he was not aware that his face was radiant because he had spoken with the LORD. When Aaron and the Israelites saw Moses, his face was radiant, and they were afraid to come to him, but Moses called to them and so they came closer to speak with him. When Moses finished speaking, he put a veil over his face, but whenever he entered the LORD’s presence to speak with God, he removed the veil until he came out. In both cases, the radiance came from speaking with God. In what ways do we find radiance in others? Radiance, at least in my mind, brings images of light, of warmth, of comfort, of passion. In what activities, in which people, in what times of the day or images in our mind do these feelings come over us? How can we, as individuals and as a community, find greater radiance in our lives? What activities do you perform, or what people do you fellowship with, in which these feelings of warmth, comfort, passion, and light enter? Whatever they may be, pursue those. Seek to bring greater radiance into your life, your work, your relationships, your activities. Great people have encountered a glorifying radiance from God’s presence – let us leave this place and pursue greater radiance in our own lives.
I believe that if we pursue radiance in our lives, we will find that it is linked with our grounding in something bigger than ourselves (i.e. our talk about Moses and the grounding of Christ within the Jewish culture and tradition) and with our justice work (i.e. our discussion of the prophets and our participation with God in the kingdom of God).
In the story, Jesus is accompanied by Peter, James, and John and goes on top of the mountain. Jesus led them up to a high mountain, apart by themselves, and then he was transfigured before them. His clothes shone, more white than snow, and Elijah and Moses appeared with Jesus. Peter spoke, saying “Master, it is good for us to be here; let us make 3 tabernacles, one for thee, and one for Moses, and one for Elijah…” After the voice came out from the cloud, only Jesus was left with them.
To a Jewish audience, Jesus being flanked by Moses and Elijah was extremely important. Moses, for the Jews, represented the Law since he received the Law from God. Now, the Law for the Jews was not just a list of commands. Rather, the Law emphasized the Jewish covenant with YHWH, and because of God’s gratuitous election, the Jews were God’s chosen people and they incurred certain obligations. For instance, they were to not eat pork, to circumcise their children, to have Levite priesthood, etc. These obligations were understood as setting them apart from other nations and peoples surrounding them. Moreover, the Law embodied many of their ethical and moral principles. Children were not to talk back to their parents; women were supposed to obey their husbands; girl teenagers were often “given” in marriage to young men at the ages around 12-14. The patriarchal society was grounded, in many respects, by the Law of Moses. The Law thus not only expressed the Jewish society, but it also validated its form. The Law was inextricably tied to the culture, and the Jewish culture was extremely important to the Jews.
But Jesus was also flanked by Elijah. Elijah signified the prophets. Now, what role did the prophets play in Jewish culture? Well, there are numerous examples of prophets in the Hebrew Scriptures. I would argue that some of them became judges. Most of them were raised up by God for a time, to announce a particular message (oscillating between hope and despair, though a few had only negative pronouncements). Many of them decried the general lack of justice, and the written prophets we have (Amos, Isaiah, Hosea, Jeremiah, etc.) were written during periods of exile. Foreign invaders had entered Israel, conquered the cities and the surrounding villages. They would kill many people, pillage the villages and the cities, wreck havoc upon the sacred shrines and holy places, and in the important case of Babylon, take away many of the most talented individuals. Desperate times called for desperate measures, and I don’t want to just dismiss the acts of injustice lightly. Many times it’s easy to condemn others when we don’t understand the situation that they find themselves in, but, nonetheless, many (if not all) prophets lamented the many injustices that were taking place, specifically against the most vulnerable. The prophets represented the prophetic call against injustice.
So what might we take away from the Transfiguration story? I would like to offer three main lessons.
First, Jesus, in being represented by Moses and Elijah, showed his grounding in the Jewish history, narrative, culture, and identity. Jesus was a Jew, and he showed his groundedness in the Transfiguration. He aligned himself with the Mosaic law as well as the Hebrew prophets. What grounds us today? What unites us with others across time and space? Is it our ancestors? Is it the Christian faith? Is it the Christian rituals, such as the Eucharist or Baptism, which Christians have literally done for thousands of years? Whatever we might value as part of our heritage, our past, our forefathers and foremothers, I believe that it is important that we have a grounding. Jesus, after all, did.
Secondly, Jesus in being represented by Moses and Elijah, but particularly Elijah, displays his regard for justice. The Mosaic Law was important in setting the Jewish people apart because of God’s covenant with them, but it was also designed to prosper them. I see many similarities with the Islamic Sharia law, which is law that is oriented toward producing justice. The Mosaic law was intended to produce justice, though justice was not separable from God’s covenant with them. Similarly, the prophets represented the prophetic call against injustice. They represented God’s favor and concern for the oppressed – today, we might understand them as the felons, the poor, the homeless, the undernourished, the GLBTQ community, immigrants, etc. How can we concern ourselves with the poor and the oppressed, as God would have us do? What are ways that we already do this? If God, or our ancestors, or Christians in previous times, or whatever community that we feel grounded in, came to us and asked us “What have you done with your one, precious life?”, what would we say? Would we be ashamed, or would we be proud? What are ways that we can proudly respond, and what are ways that we can improve? A Jewish saying from Rabbi Zusya goes like this: “In the world to come, I shall not be asked, "Why were you not Moses?" I shall be asked, "Why were you not Zusya?"
One of the wonders of God’s sovereignty is that God doesn’t need us. God does not need you. The Christian story says that God created us apart from any necessity. God, in God’s perfect freedom and love, created all things, redeemed all things, and will eventually glorify all things. God’s plan was focused in Christ, but since all things are in Christ, God’s plan of redemption is not just for all Christians, or all humans, but for the entire cosmos. God does not need us, and we are set free from trying to make the world perfect. I submit that even if we could make the world as we saw fit, according to the ways in which we measure perfection, the world would still be tremendously messed up. God does not need us, but God invites us to participate in the ultimate plan of glory. In what ways can we participate in the work of God in the world?
Thirdly, I would urge us to consider the other person whose face shone like Jesus’ did in the Transfiguration account. Moses, after seeing God on Mount Sinai (in Exodus 34:29-33), came down from the mountain, but he was not aware that his face was radiant because he had spoken with the LORD. When Aaron and the Israelites saw Moses, his face was radiant, and they were afraid to come to him, but Moses called to them and so they came closer to speak with him. When Moses finished speaking, he put a veil over his face, but whenever he entered the LORD’s presence to speak with God, he removed the veil until he came out. In both cases, the radiance came from speaking with God. In what ways do we find radiance in others? Radiance, at least in my mind, brings images of light, of warmth, of comfort, of passion. In what activities, in which people, in what times of the day or images in our mind do these feelings come over us? How can we, as individuals and as a community, find greater radiance in our lives? What activities do you perform, or what people do you fellowship with, in which these feelings of warmth, comfort, passion, and light enter? Whatever they may be, pursue those. Seek to bring greater radiance into your life, your work, your relationships, your activities. Great people have encountered a glorifying radiance from God’s presence – let us leave this place and pursue greater radiance in our own lives.
I believe that if we pursue radiance in our lives, we will find that it is linked with our grounding in something bigger than ourselves (i.e. our talk about Moses and the grounding of Christ within the Jewish culture and tradition) and with our justice work (i.e. our discussion of the prophets and our participation with God in the kingdom of God).
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Various philosophers on justice
This first post will explore what the good and just life is according to various philosophers and groups throughout history. I’ve been reading Alasdair MacIntyre’s book Whose Justice? Which Rationality? It’s been such a good book that I decided to synthesize some of my thoughts on it in this post. Assume that this post is preliminary, and I may make addendums in later posts.
The Homeric period raised various questions concerning justice and virtue, attempting to answer them through “success”. The Homeric answer generally assumed a cosmic order. To be “dikaios” means to conduct one’s actions and affairs in accordance with this order (page 14). To know what is just is to know what is the overarching and cosmic structure as well as one’s role within the structure. “Agathos” can loosely be translated as “good” and “arête” can be translated as excellence or virtue. Though the words are distinct, there is certainly some relation between “good” and “virtuous”. In the Homeric tradition, thinking well (what might be termed “phronesis”) is a matter of discerning what arête and “dike” require. It also requires subjecting one’s “thumos” (passion, spirit, etc.) to reason and to the cosmic order. Individuals always acted qua host, or some other role. Conflict within oneself arose when these roles contradicted, and that is when phronesis needed to determine that “dike” and one’s response to align one’s actions with the “dike”. Excellence, in the Homeric tradition, was evaluated by fairness in competition and usefulness of standards. The best person would subject himself to the fair rules of the game, and the onlookers would recognize who performed most excellently within these standards. These types of activities that determined excellence involved qualities of mind, body, and character. Achievement was knowing how to apply the rules of the game but also make the game fair. Therefore, achievement proceeds both by rule-breaking (in the course of determining what rules are fair for all members) as well as rule-keeping.
Now, holding in abeyance all questions of determining what rules are fair and how the rules ought to be changed for each discipline and competition, one might ask how one could compare different goods to each other? The Homeric answer is the polis, or the city. The polis identifies the place of each good within the patterns of the day, month, and year – for all individuals (which, one must remember, is always qua certain roles). Under normal conditions, each person can only hope to be effective in obtaining what they want as well as being excellent in what they do by cooperating with others. This cooperation will always seem as if it was the result of some contract, which eventually played out with the Socratic condemnation.
I admit that this introduction is quite long, but please recognize that one can only understand later thinkers against the backdrop of their own context and running assumptions.
At this point, I want to discuss Plato. Plato put forth a more cosmic view of justice. Perhaps because of his concern with Socrates’ death, Plato argued that justice need not be recognized by others to still be intrinsically valuable. Whether or not others recognize it, justice is still cosmically-recognized insofar as it is intrinsically valuable. Plato believed that Socrates was condemned unjustly, and he argued that Socrates was still better off being a just man that was condemned than, in Plato’s counterfactual situation, a man who is unjust but viewed as just (with all the benefits, honors, and recommendations that accompany being well-liked and recognized as just). Secondly, Plato believed that reason was best performed by a dialectical questioning. At least for Socrates, the best answer was one that was coherent, consistent, and non-contradictory. Plato assumed a Socratic “priority of definition” principle, which maintained that one cannot teach what one does not know, and one’s knowledge is determined by how one’s definition stands up to criticism. Socrates, the lovely gadfly, would criticize and question others’ definitions (such as of justice) through dialectical questioning. Thirdly, Plato also believed that reason was useful in determining how to live, for it was only by ordering the passions and the thumos into a coherent self that justice was attained. Justice in the polis corresponded to justice in oneself, and Plato agreed with the Homeric assumption that the polis requires organization of certain roles, roles that must be played in order for the polis to prosper and succeed. Lastly, Plato argued that “like produces like”, so he posited forgetfulness to maintain knowledge. All humans “know” everything, so recollection is how one can get back to knowledge. And recollection, I mentioned earlier, occurs through dialectical questioning.
Aristotle both furthered Plato’s thoughts but made his own crucial (and distinctive) additions. Aristotle was more polis-centered than Plato because the good life, he argued, requires more than just justice. The good life also requires a modicum of external goods (such as wealth, honor, recognition, prestige, etc.) The virtue of magnanimity requires wealth, favors, and recognition – according to Aristotle, the good life requires being recognized as great and virtuous and one displays one’s wealth and virtuousness by one’s generosity. Aristotle also ordered the passions and the thumos by reason in accordance with the polis. Whereas Plato seemed to think that justice in the self was sufficient, Aristotle emphasized the role of the polis in organizing all of society’s members and in valuing each of the roles and goods within the society. Aristotle encouraged a polis where fair rules of the game are organized, where excellence is recognized, and the just state required proper satisfaction of these requirements. Aristotle also recognized the diversity of “arête” by concluding that the polis is necessary for organizing and recognizing excellence in the diversity of goods. Whereas Plato could be seen as having a more cosmic focus, Aristotle provided a meaningful balance back to the polis and to the proper ordering of society.
Epicurus entered the scene with his exhortation to achieve pleasure. However, Epicurus did not mean pleasure in the sense that many associate with hedonism. Epicurus actually believed that the highest pleasure required first a basis in peaceful non-pain. I forget what the actual Greek word is, but Epicurus believed that without this peaceful state of non-pain, one cannot have true and meaningful pleasure. Only after one has subjected one’s many desires to achieve this peaceful state can one actually pursue (or at least meaningfully pursue) pleasure. Epicurus did not seem to care much for the polis or the society in which he lived, instead exhorting a more individualistic or commune-centered perspective. The polis did not hold as strong of a draw for him as it did for Aristotle.
Various sectarian groups, such as the Cynics or the Skeptics, arose that questioned many of the assumptions ruling the day. They questioned how far reason should go in controlling the passions and one’s thumos. Some would brave the cold by walking in the snow barefoot, or wearing a bare coat as a way of controlling their body and their desires. Others questioned the good of the polis, or the value of justice that is not recognized by society (such as Glaucon’s counter-example). Some simply decided that power ought to be pursued, and justice un-valuable. Others just gave up on providing any answer and taught their students how to use rhetoric to achieve whatever their students desired (while making money off their teachings).
The Stoics, particularly as expressed in Marcus Aurelius, argued that reason is harmony with the universe, with “dike”, with fate. In many ways, they are similar to Plato’s thought, which valued cosmic justice even when no humans recognized it. The Stoics also bore striking resemblances to Epicurus’ peaceful, non-want, non-bliss state as the foundation of pleasure. Marcus Aurelius focused on working as hard as one could to achieve one’s desires, but he always reminded his audience that one is subject to fate’s capricious dictates. As long as one’s reason is aligned with cosmic reason, though, one has nothing to fear. The gods do not exist, and they do not punish us, he said. Therefore, we are free to live in the world as we will, knowing that as long as we live in accordance with the universal dike, we shall be acting in harmony with it and receiving peace from this knowledge. This reminds me a lot of Baruch Spinoza, if one is looking for a modern philosopher that blends metaphysics with ethics (in particular, with Stoic metaphysic and Stoic ethics). The Stoics certainly had a cosmic emphasis, not a polis emphasis.
Augustine brought the tide back to an Aristotelian primacy upon the polis. Augustine believed that there must be a certain societal order in which to place all goods. He believed there must be a universal GOOD that unifies and relativizes and values each other smaller good. He termed it the City of God. In the City of God, rules and societal regulations and societal roles are ordered by God’s decree. He also believed that a restless heart only finds itself in God. As compared to the Stoic or Epicurean answer, Augustine believed that all searching for rest could only properly be satisfied by resting in God. Justice and morality was realized not by dialectical reasoning or by a priori truths or by aligning oneself with fate; rather, Augustine argued that justice and morality was made possible only by divine revelation. Augustine also changed human phenomenology with his notion of the will. Prior to Augustine, so MacIntyre writes, people assumed that bad behavior was the result of bad values or ignorance. People either valued money, so they stole, or they laundered money because they didn’t know it was wrong. Augustine argued, from his own experience, that one can know the right thing, and desire to do the right thing, but still not do it because one is enslaved to sin.
I’m going to skip over Aquinas right now. Sorry.
Immanuel Kant reinforced a primacy of reason, though still agreeing with the generally-Enlightenment dictates of universalization, reason’s power, and individual autonomy. In Kant’s thinking, justice was achieved by every individual following the categorical imperative (which is essentially a universalism doctrine). If you can universalize a maxim, then that is the moral thing to do. And treating people as ends and not as means, just as one does for oneself, is another formulation he gives later. Essentially, I argue, contra many Kant scholars, I might add, Kant’s ethics was simply an ethics of universalization. Whereas previous philosophers had grounded justice in some all-encompassing Good that organizes all other goods, or in some polis that organizes other goods, or in justice that is personal to the individual and intrinsically valuable apart from societal recognition, Kant grounds justice in reason, particularly practical reason. Kant ignores all passions, saying that passions may accord with the right behavior, but they are purely tangential and should not be taken into account for proper moral behavior. Kant was also extremely individualistic, just as most Enlightenment folk were. Proper justice for all was achieved by each individual following reason (as Kant understood it).
The Scottish Common Sense School reverted back to Cartesian doctrines. They believed that there are certain universal principles that all reasonable people agree with, and if everyone obeyed these principles, then society would achieve the perfectly just state. (Some of these principles entail the belief in the Christian God.) The Scottish Common Sense philosophers disagreed with Kant’s strict limits concerning reason, saying that one could actually prove the existence of God, not merely make room for it for “practical” reason’s purposes. They also believed that a just society was based on people obeying the reason that is “clear” and before their eyes. Just societies are not divinely-ordained or ordered by divine revelation, as Augustine believed, nor are they by following the cosmic “dike” of the Homeric imagination. In some ways, the Scottish common sense school agreed with Kant’s priority on the individual, on individuals obeying reason (though they disagree, of course, on what this reason actually is), and on Kant’s focus on obeying reason.
Postmodernism is largely a rejection of Enlightenment thought. Postmoderns reject all claims to universality, to all appeals that claim to be a priori or “obvious”. Postmoderns also reject a strongly individualistic bias, arguing in favor of community or groups that operate according to paradigms. Postmoderns typically view traditions (whether religious, philosophical, ethical, social, etc.) as being cohesive, coherent, and final. They also typically view traditions as “sticky,” which means that one cannot get out of them. Because everyone is trapped within their own social context and tradition, one is not in a place to judge or condemn other traditions or perspectives. Essentially, without a big picture, all traditions are isolated and isolating.
Contemporary society, it seems to me, rejects many of these postmodern claims. There is an emphasis on community, yes, which is a residue of postmodernism. However, there is also a balance on the individual – questions, such as “what is your individual experience?” are extremely important in today’s contemporary society. People are less prone to ask “are you Christian” and more prone to ask “What are your thoughts about God?” More and more academics are claiming double-identity for religious traditions, which isn’t possible in a postmodern context which assumes traditions are isolating and isolated. Contemporary society seems more focused on the polis if the polis is understood as family, friend circles, work circles, etc. and not the lump sum of “society” or “city” “city of God” or “Christians”.
In all these cases, I believe that the question of the good life is being questioned and being explored. What is justice, and what does it look like? What should I do? Should I accord myself with the universe, or with others, or with myself? Are these interrelated? Is the universe against me, and I must struggle against it? Or is the universe hanging out by itself, and it just leaves me alone? Is the universe something I ought to harmonize myself with? These are all questions that philosophers have been asking, and discussing, for thousands of years. These questions I find personally very interesting, and perhaps my later thoughts will discuss more of my answers to some of these questions.
And other questions, of course, too.
The Homeric period raised various questions concerning justice and virtue, attempting to answer them through “success”. The Homeric answer generally assumed a cosmic order. To be “dikaios” means to conduct one’s actions and affairs in accordance with this order (page 14). To know what is just is to know what is the overarching and cosmic structure as well as one’s role within the structure. “Agathos” can loosely be translated as “good” and “arête” can be translated as excellence or virtue. Though the words are distinct, there is certainly some relation between “good” and “virtuous”. In the Homeric tradition, thinking well (what might be termed “phronesis”) is a matter of discerning what arête and “dike” require. It also requires subjecting one’s “thumos” (passion, spirit, etc.) to reason and to the cosmic order. Individuals always acted qua host, or some other role. Conflict within oneself arose when these roles contradicted, and that is when phronesis needed to determine that “dike” and one’s response to align one’s actions with the “dike”. Excellence, in the Homeric tradition, was evaluated by fairness in competition and usefulness of standards. The best person would subject himself to the fair rules of the game, and the onlookers would recognize who performed most excellently within these standards. These types of activities that determined excellence involved qualities of mind, body, and character. Achievement was knowing how to apply the rules of the game but also make the game fair. Therefore, achievement proceeds both by rule-breaking (in the course of determining what rules are fair for all members) as well as rule-keeping.
Now, holding in abeyance all questions of determining what rules are fair and how the rules ought to be changed for each discipline and competition, one might ask how one could compare different goods to each other? The Homeric answer is the polis, or the city. The polis identifies the place of each good within the patterns of the day, month, and year – for all individuals (which, one must remember, is always qua certain roles). Under normal conditions, each person can only hope to be effective in obtaining what they want as well as being excellent in what they do by cooperating with others. This cooperation will always seem as if it was the result of some contract, which eventually played out with the Socratic condemnation.
I admit that this introduction is quite long, but please recognize that one can only understand later thinkers against the backdrop of their own context and running assumptions.
At this point, I want to discuss Plato. Plato put forth a more cosmic view of justice. Perhaps because of his concern with Socrates’ death, Plato argued that justice need not be recognized by others to still be intrinsically valuable. Whether or not others recognize it, justice is still cosmically-recognized insofar as it is intrinsically valuable. Plato believed that Socrates was condemned unjustly, and he argued that Socrates was still better off being a just man that was condemned than, in Plato’s counterfactual situation, a man who is unjust but viewed as just (with all the benefits, honors, and recommendations that accompany being well-liked and recognized as just). Secondly, Plato believed that reason was best performed by a dialectical questioning. At least for Socrates, the best answer was one that was coherent, consistent, and non-contradictory. Plato assumed a Socratic “priority of definition” principle, which maintained that one cannot teach what one does not know, and one’s knowledge is determined by how one’s definition stands up to criticism. Socrates, the lovely gadfly, would criticize and question others’ definitions (such as of justice) through dialectical questioning. Thirdly, Plato also believed that reason was useful in determining how to live, for it was only by ordering the passions and the thumos into a coherent self that justice was attained. Justice in the polis corresponded to justice in oneself, and Plato agreed with the Homeric assumption that the polis requires organization of certain roles, roles that must be played in order for the polis to prosper and succeed. Lastly, Plato argued that “like produces like”, so he posited forgetfulness to maintain knowledge. All humans “know” everything, so recollection is how one can get back to knowledge. And recollection, I mentioned earlier, occurs through dialectical questioning.
Aristotle both furthered Plato’s thoughts but made his own crucial (and distinctive) additions. Aristotle was more polis-centered than Plato because the good life, he argued, requires more than just justice. The good life also requires a modicum of external goods (such as wealth, honor, recognition, prestige, etc.) The virtue of magnanimity requires wealth, favors, and recognition – according to Aristotle, the good life requires being recognized as great and virtuous and one displays one’s wealth and virtuousness by one’s generosity. Aristotle also ordered the passions and the thumos by reason in accordance with the polis. Whereas Plato seemed to think that justice in the self was sufficient, Aristotle emphasized the role of the polis in organizing all of society’s members and in valuing each of the roles and goods within the society. Aristotle encouraged a polis where fair rules of the game are organized, where excellence is recognized, and the just state required proper satisfaction of these requirements. Aristotle also recognized the diversity of “arête” by concluding that the polis is necessary for organizing and recognizing excellence in the diversity of goods. Whereas Plato could be seen as having a more cosmic focus, Aristotle provided a meaningful balance back to the polis and to the proper ordering of society.
Epicurus entered the scene with his exhortation to achieve pleasure. However, Epicurus did not mean pleasure in the sense that many associate with hedonism. Epicurus actually believed that the highest pleasure required first a basis in peaceful non-pain. I forget what the actual Greek word is, but Epicurus believed that without this peaceful state of non-pain, one cannot have true and meaningful pleasure. Only after one has subjected one’s many desires to achieve this peaceful state can one actually pursue (or at least meaningfully pursue) pleasure. Epicurus did not seem to care much for the polis or the society in which he lived, instead exhorting a more individualistic or commune-centered perspective. The polis did not hold as strong of a draw for him as it did for Aristotle.
Various sectarian groups, such as the Cynics or the Skeptics, arose that questioned many of the assumptions ruling the day. They questioned how far reason should go in controlling the passions and one’s thumos. Some would brave the cold by walking in the snow barefoot, or wearing a bare coat as a way of controlling their body and their desires. Others questioned the good of the polis, or the value of justice that is not recognized by society (such as Glaucon’s counter-example). Some simply decided that power ought to be pursued, and justice un-valuable. Others just gave up on providing any answer and taught their students how to use rhetoric to achieve whatever their students desired (while making money off their teachings).
The Stoics, particularly as expressed in Marcus Aurelius, argued that reason is harmony with the universe, with “dike”, with fate. In many ways, they are similar to Plato’s thought, which valued cosmic justice even when no humans recognized it. The Stoics also bore striking resemblances to Epicurus’ peaceful, non-want, non-bliss state as the foundation of pleasure. Marcus Aurelius focused on working as hard as one could to achieve one’s desires, but he always reminded his audience that one is subject to fate’s capricious dictates. As long as one’s reason is aligned with cosmic reason, though, one has nothing to fear. The gods do not exist, and they do not punish us, he said. Therefore, we are free to live in the world as we will, knowing that as long as we live in accordance with the universal dike, we shall be acting in harmony with it and receiving peace from this knowledge. This reminds me a lot of Baruch Spinoza, if one is looking for a modern philosopher that blends metaphysics with ethics (in particular, with Stoic metaphysic and Stoic ethics). The Stoics certainly had a cosmic emphasis, not a polis emphasis.
Augustine brought the tide back to an Aristotelian primacy upon the polis. Augustine believed that there must be a certain societal order in which to place all goods. He believed there must be a universal GOOD that unifies and relativizes and values each other smaller good. He termed it the City of God. In the City of God, rules and societal regulations and societal roles are ordered by God’s decree. He also believed that a restless heart only finds itself in God. As compared to the Stoic or Epicurean answer, Augustine believed that all searching for rest could only properly be satisfied by resting in God. Justice and morality was realized not by dialectical reasoning or by a priori truths or by aligning oneself with fate; rather, Augustine argued that justice and morality was made possible only by divine revelation. Augustine also changed human phenomenology with his notion of the will. Prior to Augustine, so MacIntyre writes, people assumed that bad behavior was the result of bad values or ignorance. People either valued money, so they stole, or they laundered money because they didn’t know it was wrong. Augustine argued, from his own experience, that one can know the right thing, and desire to do the right thing, but still not do it because one is enslaved to sin.
I’m going to skip over Aquinas right now. Sorry.
Immanuel Kant reinforced a primacy of reason, though still agreeing with the generally-Enlightenment dictates of universalization, reason’s power, and individual autonomy. In Kant’s thinking, justice was achieved by every individual following the categorical imperative (which is essentially a universalism doctrine). If you can universalize a maxim, then that is the moral thing to do. And treating people as ends and not as means, just as one does for oneself, is another formulation he gives later. Essentially, I argue, contra many Kant scholars, I might add, Kant’s ethics was simply an ethics of universalization. Whereas previous philosophers had grounded justice in some all-encompassing Good that organizes all other goods, or in some polis that organizes other goods, or in justice that is personal to the individual and intrinsically valuable apart from societal recognition, Kant grounds justice in reason, particularly practical reason. Kant ignores all passions, saying that passions may accord with the right behavior, but they are purely tangential and should not be taken into account for proper moral behavior. Kant was also extremely individualistic, just as most Enlightenment folk were. Proper justice for all was achieved by each individual following reason (as Kant understood it).
The Scottish Common Sense School reverted back to Cartesian doctrines. They believed that there are certain universal principles that all reasonable people agree with, and if everyone obeyed these principles, then society would achieve the perfectly just state. (Some of these principles entail the belief in the Christian God.) The Scottish Common Sense philosophers disagreed with Kant’s strict limits concerning reason, saying that one could actually prove the existence of God, not merely make room for it for “practical” reason’s purposes. They also believed that a just society was based on people obeying the reason that is “clear” and before their eyes. Just societies are not divinely-ordained or ordered by divine revelation, as Augustine believed, nor are they by following the cosmic “dike” of the Homeric imagination. In some ways, the Scottish common sense school agreed with Kant’s priority on the individual, on individuals obeying reason (though they disagree, of course, on what this reason actually is), and on Kant’s focus on obeying reason.
Postmodernism is largely a rejection of Enlightenment thought. Postmoderns reject all claims to universality, to all appeals that claim to be a priori or “obvious”. Postmoderns also reject a strongly individualistic bias, arguing in favor of community or groups that operate according to paradigms. Postmoderns typically view traditions (whether religious, philosophical, ethical, social, etc.) as being cohesive, coherent, and final. They also typically view traditions as “sticky,” which means that one cannot get out of them. Because everyone is trapped within their own social context and tradition, one is not in a place to judge or condemn other traditions or perspectives. Essentially, without a big picture, all traditions are isolated and isolating.
Contemporary society, it seems to me, rejects many of these postmodern claims. There is an emphasis on community, yes, which is a residue of postmodernism. However, there is also a balance on the individual – questions, such as “what is your individual experience?” are extremely important in today’s contemporary society. People are less prone to ask “are you Christian” and more prone to ask “What are your thoughts about God?” More and more academics are claiming double-identity for religious traditions, which isn’t possible in a postmodern context which assumes traditions are isolating and isolated. Contemporary society seems more focused on the polis if the polis is understood as family, friend circles, work circles, etc. and not the lump sum of “society” or “city” “city of God” or “Christians”.
In all these cases, I believe that the question of the good life is being questioned and being explored. What is justice, and what does it look like? What should I do? Should I accord myself with the universe, or with others, or with myself? Are these interrelated? Is the universe against me, and I must struggle against it? Or is the universe hanging out by itself, and it just leaves me alone? Is the universe something I ought to harmonize myself with? These are all questions that philosophers have been asking, and discussing, for thousands of years. These questions I find personally very interesting, and perhaps my later thoughts will discuss more of my answers to some of these questions.
And other questions, of course, too.
First Post - Why I'm doing this
The most crucial question for me in beginning a blog is answering the following questions:
1. Why am I doing this?
2. What should the title of my blog be?
3. How should I start?
I decided to answer these questions with the following answers:
1. I’m doing this because I want to be creative by synthesizing my thoughts on various subjects and posting them in a public sphere. It’s okay if no one reads this, but the mere fact that it’s “public” makes me feel like it’s valuable and that I’m contributing.
2. I feel like my whole seminary experience (at Union Theological Seminary) is about me figuring out what the good life is. How ought I live? This question is, of course, closely related to how I view the universe. Is the universe against me? Is the universe indifferent to me? Is the universe something to which I can harmonize myself? Can the universe validate and recognize me? I agree with Hegel, who once said that the more he finds out about the universe, the more he finds out about God. I’ve already given up on the evangelical Christian view of God, but I’m still working out what view of God and the universe I’m working with.
3. I’ll start with this introduction. Well, then I’ll follow up with a short historical discussion of what the “good life” is through philosophers. Why NOT start strong?
1. Why am I doing this?
2. What should the title of my blog be?
3. How should I start?
I decided to answer these questions with the following answers:
1. I’m doing this because I want to be creative by synthesizing my thoughts on various subjects and posting them in a public sphere. It’s okay if no one reads this, but the mere fact that it’s “public” makes me feel like it’s valuable and that I’m contributing.
2. I feel like my whole seminary experience (at Union Theological Seminary) is about me figuring out what the good life is. How ought I live? This question is, of course, closely related to how I view the universe. Is the universe against me? Is the universe indifferent to me? Is the universe something to which I can harmonize myself? Can the universe validate and recognize me? I agree with Hegel, who once said that the more he finds out about the universe, the more he finds out about God. I’ve already given up on the evangelical Christian view of God, but I’m still working out what view of God and the universe I’m working with.
3. I’ll start with this introduction. Well, then I’ll follow up with a short historical discussion of what the “good life” is through philosophers. Why NOT start strong?
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