The Universe Next Door A BASIC WORLDVIEW CATALOGUE
For any of us us to be fully conscious conscious intellectually, intellectually, so that that we can first understand and then genuinely communicate with others in our pluralistic world, we should not only be able to detect the worldviews of others but be aware of our own – why it is ours and why in light of so many options we think it is true.
As long as we are are alive, we will will live the examined examined or unexamine unexamined d life. It is the assumption assumption of this this article that that the examined examined life is better.
September 2010
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The source of ch. 1, & chs. 4-12 was derived from James W. Sire's The Universe Next Door: A Basic Worldview Catalog, 3 rd 1997, 4th 2004, & 5th 2009 eds. The ch. 3 summary was taken from an article posted on Scribd.com. The source of ch. 2 was adapted from Sire's Naming the the Elep Elepha hant nt:: Worl Worldv dvie iew w as a Conc Concep ept. t. The The post postsc scri ript pt was was writ writte ten n by (the (the auth author or of) of) scribd.com/takeittothestreets. The annotated bibliography is taken from the footnotes of Sire's books.
Contents 1.1 Of the Definition of a Worldview........... Worldview....................... ........................ ........................ ............................................. ................................. 4 1.2 On Choosing a Worldview.............. Worldview.......................... ........................ ........................ ........................ ........................................ ............................ 5 4.1 Basic Christian Theism................... Theism............................... ........................ ......................... ......................... ........................ ......................... ............. 10 4.2 The Grandeur of God...................... God.................................. ........................ ........................ ................................................. ..................................... 13 5. Deism: The Clockwork Universe............... Universe............................ ......................... ........................ ........................ ............................. .................14 14 5.1 Basic Deism................... Deism............................... ......................... ......................... ........................ ........................ ......................................... ............................. 14 5.2 An Unstable Compound.............................. Compound.......................................... ........................ ................................................. ..................................... 16 6. Naturalism: The Silence of Finite Space............................ Space........................................ ........................ ............................. ................. 16 6.1 Basic Naturalism............ Naturalism........................ ........................ ......................... ......................... ........................ ........................ ............................. ................. 17 7. Nihilism: Zero Point................... Point............................... ......................... ......................... ........................ ........................ ........................ .................... ........ 18 7.1 The First Bridge: Necessity and Chance.................... Chance................................ ........................ ...................................19 .......................19 7.2 The Second Bridge: The Great Cloud of Unknowing..................... Unknowing................................. ............................ ................ 19 7.3 The Third Bridge: Is and Ought............................ Ought........................................ ........................ ........................................ ............................ 19 7.4 Inner Tensions in Nihilism................ Nihilism............................ ........................ ......................... ......................... ................................... ....................... 20 8. Existentialism: Existentialism: Beyond Nihilism............... Nihilism........................... ......................... ......................... ......................................... ............................. 20 8.1 Basic Atheistic Existentialism Existentialism ....................... ................................... ......................... ......................... ........................ ......................20 ..........20 8.2 How far Beyond Nihilism?.......................... Nihilism?...................................... ........................ .................................................. ...................................... 21 8.3 Basic Theistic Existentialism............ Existentialism........................ ........................ ......................... ......................... ................................... ....................... 21 10. Pantheistic Monism: A Journey to the Far East................................ East.........................................................26 .........................26 10.1 Basic Eastern Pantheistic Monism.................... Monism................................ ........................ ........................ ..............................27 ..................27 10.2 The Buddhist Difference............... Difference........................... ........................ ........................ ......................... ......................... .........................28 .............28 10.3 East and West: A Problem in Communication........................... Communication.................................................... .............................29 ....29 11. Postmodernism: The Vanished Horizon.............................. Horizon.......................................... ......................... .......................... .............29 29 11.2 The Death of Truth and the Power of Language........................... Language....................................... ..........................30 ..............30 11.3 The Death of the Substantial Self and Being Good without without God.......................... God.............. ..............30 ..30 11.4 The Panoramic Sweep of Postmodernism.............. Postmodernism........................... ................................................ ................................... 30 11.5 Postmodernism: Postmodernism: A Critique................ Critique............................ ........................ ......................... ......................... ........................ ....................30 ........30 12. The New Age: A Separate Universe...................... Universe.................................. ........................ ......................... ............................31 ...............31 11.2 The Basic Tenets of the New Consciousness.............. Consciousness.......................... ........................ ................................31 ....................31 12.5 Cracks in the New Consciousness.............. Consciousness.......................... ........................ ........................ .................................... ........................ 33
God Loves You............................................................................................38 1. Introduction: A World of Difference The most fundamental issues we as human beings need to consider have no academic departmental boundaries. This article is about worldviews – in some ways more basic, more fundamental, than formal studies in either philosophy, theology, or comparative religion. Few people have anything approaching an articulate philosophy - at least as epitomized by the great philosophers. Even fewer, it is suspected, have a carefully constructed theology. But everyone has a worldview. Whenever any of us thinks about anything – from a causal thought to a profound question – we are operating within our own worldview, our frame of reference for all thought and action. For any of us to be fully conscious intellectually, we should not only be able to detect the worldviews of others but be aware of our own – why it is ours and why in light of so many options we think it is true. Therefore, use this article as a stepping-stone for self-conscious development and justification of your own worldview. The purposes of this article are: (1) to give a basic outline the some worldviews that underlie the way we think; (2) to encourage us all to think in terms of worldviews, that is, with a consciousness of not only our own way of thought but also that of other people, so that we can first understand and then genuinely communicate with others in our pluralistic world.
1.1 Of the Definition of a Worldview Essentially, a worldview is a commitment, a fundamental orientation of the heart, that can be expressed as a story or in a set of presuppositions (assumptions which may be true, partially true or entirely false) which we hold (consciou (consciously sly or subconsci subconsciously ously,, consisten consistently tly or inconsist inconsistentl ently) y) about the basic basic constitu constitution tion of reality, reality, and that provides us the foundation on which we live. The biblical concept of heart includes heart includes the notions of wisdom (Prov
2:10), emotion (Ex 4:14; Jn 14:1), desire and will (1 Chron 29:18), spirituality (Acts 8:21), and the intellect (Rom 1:21). According to David Naugle it is “the central defining element of the human person.” All worldviews first assume that something is there rather than that nothing is there. And, if we expect to know anything, we must assume that we can know something. If we don’t recognize this, we can’t move forward. The apprehension that something is there is the beginning of conscious life – as well as of two branches of philosophy: metaphysics (the study of being) and epistemology (the study of knowing). What we quickly discover however is that once we have recognized that something is there, we have not necessarily recognized what that something is. There is, of course, a way things are but we can often be mistaken or inconsistent. And that is where worldviews begin to diverge. While worldviews may at first appear to proliferate, they are made up of the various answers to questions that have only a limited number of answers. A worldview is then the set of answers to these seven questions: (1) what is prime reality? (2) what is the nature of external reality? (3) what is a human being? (4) what happens to a person after death? (5) Why is it possible to know anything at all? (6) how do we know what is right and wrong? (7) what is the meaning of human history? However, these seven questions are too theoretical and do not adequately address the nature of the worldview as a committment worked out through our choices in everyday life. Therefore, the 5 th edition edition added the following following question: question: (8) What personal, personal, life orienting orienting commitment commitmentss are consistent consistent with this worldview.? When stated in such a sequence the questions can boggle the mind. If we feel that the answers are too obvious to consider, then we have a worldview but have no idea that many others do not share it. Alternatively, if we feel that none of the questions can be answered without cheating or committing intellectual suicide, then we have already adopted a sort of worldview – a form of skepticism which in its extreme form leads to nihilism. Also, refusing to adopt an explicit worldview will turn out to be itself a worldview or at least a philosophic position. In short, we are caught. So as long as we are alive, we will live the examined or unexamined life. It is the assumption of this article that the examined life is better partly because our own worldview may not be what we think it is. It is rather what we show it to be by our words and actions. Our worldview could lay so deep within our subconscious that unless we have reflected long and hard, we are unaware of what it is. And even after we lay it out in clear propositions we may well be wrong for our very actions may belie our self-knowledge.
1.2 On Choosing a Worldview Unless each of us begins by assuming that we are in our present state the sole maker and meaning-giver of the universe – a position held by few even within the New Age – it would be wise to accept an attitude of humility, not skepticism, because we do tend to adopt positions that yield power to us, whether true or not. Whatever worldview we adopt will be limited because our finitude as human beings will keep us both from total accuracy in the way we grasp and express our worldview. However, to say that we can know something to be true does not mean we must know exhaustively exhaustively what is true. true. Knowledge Knowledge is subject subject to refinemen refinement, t, but if it is true knowledge, knowledge, there must have been at least a grain of truth in one’s unrefined conception. And with that assumption other elements are entailed, primarily the so-called laws of thought: the laws of identity, non-contradiction and the excluded middle. By following such laws we are able to think clearly and be assured assured that our reasoning reasoning is valid. valid. Such assumptions, assumptions, then, lead to the first characteris characteristic tic that our adopted worldview should possess – inner intellectual coherence. If a conceptual system contains as an essential element a set of propositions which is logically inconsistent, it is false. A second characteristic of an adequate worldview is that it be able to comprehend the data of reality – data of all types – that which each of us gleans through our conscious experience of daily life, that which is reported to us from the experience of others, and that which is supplied by critical analysis and scientific investigation. All of this data must, of course, be evaluated at the lowest level first (is it veridical? is it illusory?). But if the data stands the test, we must be able to incorporate it into our worldview. To the extent that our worldview denies or fails to comprehend the data, it is falsified, or at least inadequate. Third, an adequate worldview should explain what it claims to explain. How does the worldview explain the fact that humans think but think haltingly, love but hate too, are creative but are also destructive, wise but often foolish and so forth? What explains our longing for truth or personal fulfillment? Why do we usually want more – more money, more love, and more ecstasy? How do we explain our human refusal to operate in an amoral fashion? These are huge questions but that is what a worldview is for – to answer such questions or at least provide the framework within which such questions can be answered. Finally, a worldview should be subjectively satisfactory. A worldview satisfies by being true. But, to determine the truth of a worldview, we are cast back to the first three characteristics. Still, subjective satisfaction is important, and it may be lack of it that causes us to investigate our worldview in the first place. We find, in fact, that it is only when we pursue our doubts and search for the truth that we begin to get real satisfaction. satisfaction.
2. A Brief History of the Worldview as a Concept Of the great philosophers, Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) was the first to use in his writings the idea of a worldview. But he did so only in passing unlike Wilhelm Dilthey (1833-1911) who was the first to use it centrally. Dilthey considered a worldview to develop through a thought process that begins with the riddle(s) of life, then proceeds to consider a ‘cosmic picture’, and then onto an understanding of consciousness & the external world, who we are as humans, values, and the good in order to describe the ideal life and society. Dilthey suggested a reflectivity between internal & local makeup of humans with one’s macro-vision. He had an emphasis on mental structures/categories structures/categories arising from experience. Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900), the bold nihilist, saw the effects on man and society of life without God and therefore declared God’s death. This infamous claim was made because people were living, as he observed, as if there wasn’t a god, that is, without a guide, goal, or purpose. As an existentialist he asserted the power of his will to overcome nihilism by imposing his own values on others. Nietzsche thought that people create their own models of reality and become dependent, subordinate products of them after they forget that truth is just canonized illusion. In this manner, Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) considered worldviews, at least in his later years, to be mutually exclusive, unverifiable, non-competitive, linguistic constructions of reality. By the 1970s was beginning to be fleshed out and one of its major proponents was Michel Foucault (19261984). Foucault considered truth to be a set of rules or a way of reasoning that generated and governed all patterns of thought. Significantly, he proposed that truth is in a dynamical relation with the power systems that produce, sustain, and are affected by it. Effectively, people are trapped in language structures and knowledge regimes that are inescapable, oppressive, power plays. James Orr (1844-1913 (1844-1913)) was the first first to introduce introduce the concept of worldview worldview into Christian Christian theology. theology. Orr considered worldviews to originate deep within the constitution of human nature and involving the intellect and the actions we perform. He observed the attacks against the Christian worldview on multiple fronts and held that a proper theological exposition of it was actually its main defense. Orr demonstrated that a Christo-centric, rational, self-authenticating self-authenticating system of biblical truth can adequately address all the issues related to human flourishing. Abraham Kuyper (1837-1920) extended Orr’s approach by demonstrating Calvinistic Christianity as an allembracing life system. Kuyper said that each worldview addresses three fundamental relationships: man to God, man to man, and man to world. Kuyper went on to discuss how the Christian worldview illuminates and stimulates culture (i.e. religion, politics, science, and art) to its highest peak of perfection. One of Kuyper’s main contributions was that he held to the need for all thought to proceed from a single principle. Herman Dooyeweerd (1894-1977) was the most philosophic of Christian thinkers and most insistent that theoretical thought is not the not the basis of worldviews. Rather, he held each worldview as proceeding from a spiritual & volitional commitment, of which there are only two: man converted to God or man averted to God. Personally, I (of article) have added my thoughts in the postscript about these key points of Kuyper’s and Dooyeweerd’s.
3. Summary of the Worldviews A worldview is a commitment, a fundamental orientation of the heart, that can be expressed as a story or in a set of presuppositions (assumptions which may be true, partially true or entirely false) which we hold (consciously or subconsciously, consistently or inconsistently) inconsistently) about the basic constitution of reality, and that provides us the foundation on which we live.
Choosing A Worldview How well does the worldview relate to itself? Consistency - It does not violate the law of non-contradiction. Coherence - Do its parts fit together; do separate statements support one another? (For instance the following statements are true [grass is green; 2 + 2 = 4, Springfield is the Capital City of Illinois] however they do not support one another in any way and therefore taken holistically they are not coherent) How well does the worldview explain the world? Comprehensiveness - Does it cover all the bases? Congruence - Does it fit with reality; does it fit the data? How well does the worldview explain humanity? Compensation - Does it provide a sense of satisfaction; is the worldview livable?
Is the worldview the best alternative? Comparability - Does it do the best job of answering all the questions?
Christian Theism God/ultimate reality: Creator, infinite, personal, triune, rational. Transcendent and immanent. Sovereign and good. Cosmos/prime reality: Created ex nihilo. Operates with a uniformity of cause and effect. Open system (miracles possible through god’s immanence). Fallen world.
Not currently dependent upon god’s involvement. Knowledge/revelation: Cosmos is knowable via human reason. God is knowable only through natural revelation. Ethics: Moral principles based on god’s transcendent nature. Knowable only through natural revelation. What “is” must be “right”.
Death: Humans: Possibly devine judgment with rewards and punishment Created in the image of god based on merit. Possess self-transcendence, rationality, personality, morality, Possibly death as the end of personal existence. creativity, sociability. Originally good, now fallen but capable of redemption. History: Linear. Knowledge/revelation: Determined at creation. Can have adequate knowledge of the world and god. God does not act in history. Available through general and special revelation. Optimistic naturalism (secular humanism) Ethics: God/ultimate reality: Transcendent. Eternal or self-generated matter. Based on the character of god as good (holy and loving). No god. Some ethical principles are universal (not relative). Given by general and/or special revelation. Cosmos/prime reality: Uncreated. Death: Operates with a uniformity of cause and effect. Gateway to eternity with or eternity separated from god. Closed system (miracles not possible because there is no Outcome determined by relationship with christ. god). Individuality retained. Everything is within the “box” of the universe. History: Linear. Meaningful. Leading to the fulfillment of god’s purposes. Guided by god’s providence and miraculous intervention. Deism God/ultimate reality: Creator. Transcendent not immanent. Not fully personal. Cosmos/prime reality: Created. Operates with a uniformity of cause and effect. Closed system (miracles not possible/actual possible/actual because god lacks immanence). Not fallen. Humans: Personal. Part of the clockwork universe. Capacity for morality is “built in”.
Humans: “fee yet “complex machines”. Personality not yet understandable. Appears to be nothing more than the interaction of physical and chemical properties. Knowledge/revelation: Possible to discover. Important to effect progress. Not divinely revealed. Ethics: Created by human consensus. Autonomous (not dependent on any god). Situational. Death: Extinction of consciousness, personality, and individuality. History: Linear stream of events linked by cause and effect. No overarching purpose.
Pessimistic naturalism (nihilism) God/ultimate reality: No god. A cosmos that appears not to care, to value goodness, or to be rational. Absurd. Cosmos/prime reality: Operates either from necessity or chance. No inherent value or meaning. Provides no answers. Absurd. Humans: No value, meaning or self. Freedom and consciousness undermined. Knowledge/revelation: No foundation for knowledge. No reason to think the brain as pure matter would give “truth”. Truth and illusion indistinguishable. indistinguishable. Ethics: No basis for moral values. Values relative. Cannot produce “oughts” from what “is” the case. Death: Extinction of consciousness, personality, and individuality. individuality. Final absurdity. History: No direction or purpose. Individual and world history are meaningless.
Atheistic existentialism God/ultimate reality: Two disunited forms objective (matter) and subjective (my experience of freedom).
Good actions are those that are consciously and freely chosen. Death: Undeniable absurdity. Face it boldly as the final exercise of revolt. History: World history is meaningless. Temporary individual meaning may arise through choices and personal encounters.
Theistic existentialism God/ultimate reality: God is personal, transcendent, immanent and good. Accepted without proof through a leap of faith. Cosmos/prime reality: Paradoxical. Gives no meaning. Offers no evidence for god. Humans: The “personal” i-thou is valuable. Finite. Fallen. Not satisfied apart from surrender to god. Knowledge/revelation: Often paradoxical. God believed without reason or proof. Revelation is personal encounter not revealed propositions or doctrines. Ethics: Understood primarily in “personal” terms. Emphasis on personal relationship not moral values. Death: Personal encounter with god can prompt hope over the absurdity of death. Literal continued life uncertain.
Cosmos/prime reality: Consists of objective “essences” which are governed by nature’s law and logic. Absurd.
History: Uncertain and unimportant. Can provide a model to live by.
Humans: Existence precedes essence (for humans alone). Man free to define himself. Alienated from the world.
Eastern pantheistic monism God/ultimate reality: All reality is “divine oneness” (brahman). This “god” supersedes all rational/moral distinctions. distinctions.
Knowledge/revelation: Objective knowable by logic and science. Self removed from analysis.
Cosmos/prime reality: Cosmos is one. Not perceived as it is, it is thus maya (illusion).
Ethics: Humans must “revolt” against absurdity and create value.
Humans: Real self is not psycho-physical self (jiva).
Real self is a passive observer (atman) that is one with brahman. Atman is brahman.
Cosmos/prime reality: Visible (accessible by normal consciousness). Invisible (accessible by altered consciousness).
Knowledge/revelation: Transcends logic, language, physical senses. A direct experienced knowledge of one’s oneness with the universe.
Humans: Individual more important. Atman is brahman. Growing cosmic consciousness leads to superior human race.
Ethics: Distinction between good and evil abandoned due to oneness Knowledge/revelation: of reality. Experiencing true reality in its unity is the goal. Accomplished through altered states of consciousness. Death: Assisted by meditation, mantras, mediums, etc. Cycle of rebirth (samsara) that is only stopped when oneness is achieved. Ethics: Future life determined by karma. Good is whatever facilitates a cosmic consciousness of oneness. History: Often involves ecological and human sensitivity. Individual and cosmic history are cyclical. Everything part of mother earth. Time is unreal as one passes beyond it in the experience of Death: the one. Not the end of self. What lies beyond unclear. Many opt for repeated reincarnations. New Age God/ultimate reality: History: Self linked to a permeating force throughout the universe. Cosmos and man have entered a new age. No transcendent god, only the good within. Some stress a one-world government and coming one-world leader.
4. Christian Theism: A Universe Charged with the Grandeur of God Up to the end of the seventeenth seventeenth century, century, the theistic theistic worldview worldview was clearly clearly dominant. dominant. The intellectua intellectuall squabbles that existed did so within the circle of theism, for most parties still held the same basic presuppositions. The reason is obvious. Christianity had so penetrated the Western world that whether people believed in Christ or acted as Christians should, they all lived in a context of ideas influenced and informed by the Christian faith. This cultural consensus, that gave a sense of place and dominion, and the basis for meaning, morality, and identity, no longer exists as worldviews have since proliferated. It is import important ant to note note that that Christ Christian ian theism theism was cultur culturall ally y abando abandoned ned not becaus becausee it was inadeq inadequat uately ely understood, forgotten completely or not applied to the issues at hand. Moreover, not everyone abandoned theism. There remains at every level in society, every academic discipline, and every profession, those who take their Christian theism with complete intellectual intellectual seriousness and honesty.
4.1 Basic Christian Theism
1) God is infinite, transcendent and immanent, omniscient, sovereign, personal (triune) and good. God is infinite: He is beyond scope, measure. No other being can challenge his nature – all else is secondary. He is the only self-existent being and is the be-all and end-all of existence. God is the one prime existence, the one prime reality, and the source of all reality. As God spoke unto Moses out of the burning bush, “I am who I am” (Ex.3:14). God is transcendent. This means that God is beyond all, yet in all and sustaining all. Yet God is not so beyond that He bears no relation to us and our world. It is likewise true that God is immanent , and thus He is with us. For God is not matter, but Spirit. The Bible says that Jesus Christ is “upholding the universe by His word of power” (Heb 1:3). God is omniscient. This means that God is all-knowing, the ultimate source of knowledge and intelligence. He is the alpha and the omega, knowing the beginning from the end (Rev. 22:13). God is sovereign. This is another ramification of God’s infiniteness, but it emphasizes the fact that nothing is beyond God’s interest, control, and authority. God is personal: This means that God is not mere force or energy or existent “substance”. God is He, He, that is, God has a personality, which requires two basic characteristics: i) self-reflection, ii) self-determination. God is personal in that He knows Himself to be (He is self-conscious) and he possesses self-determination self-determination (He “thinks” and “acts”). One implication is that God is not simple unity, an integer. He has attributes, characteristics. In fact, He is a unity, but a unity of complexity. Another implication of the personality of God is that He is like us. (In fact we made in His image, see proposition #3). This means that there is someone ultimate who is there to ground our highest aspirations, our most precious possession - our personality, which means that we find our true home in a relationship with Him. “There is a God-shaped vacuum in the heart of everyman,” wrote Augustine. “Our hearts are restless till they rest in thee,” wrote Pascal. God fulfills our ultimate longing by being the perfect fit for our very nature, by satisfying our longing for interpersonal relationship, by being in His infiniteness the end to our search for knowledge and refuge from all fear, by being in His holiness the righteousness ground of our quest for justice, by being in His infinite love the cause of our hope for salvation, by being in His infinite creativity both the source of our creative imagination and the ultimate beauty we seek to reflect as we ourselves create. Actually, in Christian theism (not Judaism or Islam) God is not only personal, but triune . That is, within the one essence of the Godhead we have to distinguish three ‘persons’ who are neither three gods nor three parts or modes of God, but coequally and coeternally God. The Trinity confirms the communal, “personal” nature of ultimate being. God is not only there – an existent being – he is personal and we can relate to Him in a personal way. To know God, therefore, means knowing more than He exists. It means knowing Him as we would our own father! God is good. This is the prime statement about God’s character and from it all else follows. There is no sense in which goodness surpasses God or God surpasses goodness. As being is the essence of His nature, goodness is the essence of His character. Although God is totally unconstrained by his environment, God is limited (we might say) only by his character. God, being good, cannot lie, be tempted, act with evil intent and so forth. But, God is free to do as He wills, and His will is in control of His character. God’s goodness is expressed in two ways, through His holiness and His love. God’s goodness means that there is an absolute standard of righteousness, which is found in God’s holy character. Also there is hope for humanity because God is love and will not abandon His creation. This twin observation becomes especially significant as we trace the results of rejecting the theistic worldview. 2) God created the cosmos ex nihilo to operate with a uniformity of cause and effect in an open system. It is important to understand that God did not make the universe out of Himself or out of some pre-existence chaos (if it were really “pre-existent”, it would be as eternal as God). Rather, He spoke it into existence and created it out of nothing. For “God said, ‘Let there be light’; and there was light” (Gen 1:3). Also, God’s universe and God’s
character are closely related. God does not present us with confusion but with clarity as the universe has an orderliness and regularity to it (this is expanded in proposition #5). Furthermore, the system is open, meaning it is not programmed. God is constantly involved in the unfolding pattern of the ongoing operation of the universe. And so are we as humans: each decision to pursue one course rather than another, changes or rather “produces” the future. We find the universe dramatically altered at the fall, when Adam and Eve made a choice. But God made another choice in redeeming people through Christ. If the universe were not orderly, our decisions would have no effect. If the course of events were determined, our decisions would have no significance. So theism declares that God’s universe is orderly and undetermined. 3) a) Human beings are created in the image of God and thus possess personality, self-transcendence, self-transcendence, intelligence, morality, gregariousness, and creativity. The key phrase here is the image of God, a conception highlighted by the fact that it occurs three times in the short space of two verses (Gen. 1:26-27). That people are made in the image of God means we are like God. We are personal because God is personal. That is, we know ourselves to be and we are capable of acting to change the course of both human and cosmic events as opposed to merely reacting to our environment. Our self-transcendence makes us unique and reflects (as an image) the self-transcendence of God. No two people are alike not only because no two have shared the same heredity and environment but because each possess a unique character out of which we think, feel, judge – in short, choose to act. We can summarize this conception of man made in God’s image by saying that, like God, we have personality (we are self-conscious), self-transcendence (we possess self-determination), intelligence (the capacity for reason and knowledge), morality (the capacity for recognizing and understanding good and evil), gregariousness or social capacity (our characteristic and fundamental desire and need for human companionship/community, especially represented by the male and female aspect), and creativity (the capacity to imagine new things or to endow old things with new significance). significance). In Christian theism human beings are indeed dignified. As human beings we are dignified, but people do not possess it, even if as a gift so we are not to be proud of it, for it is a dignity derived from a reflection of the Ultimately Dignified. Yet it is a reflection. So people who are theists see themselves as a sort of midpoint – above the rest of creation creation (for God has given them dominion over it – Gen. 1:28 and Ps. 8:6-8) and and below God. Helmut Thielicke says it well: “His [man’s] greatness rests solely on the fact that God in His incomprehensible goodness has bestowed His love upon him. God does not love us because we are so valuable; we are valuable because God loves us.” This is then the ideal balanced human status. It is failing to remain in that balance that our troubles arose. b) Human beings were created good, but through the fall, the nature of man, as created in the image of God, became defaced, though not so ruined as to be incapable of restoration; through the work of Christ, God redeemed humanity and began the process of restoring people to goodness, though any given person may choose to reject that redemption. Human “history” can be summed up in our words: creation, fall, redemption, and glorification. To the essential human characteristics, as noted above, we now add that all of humanity, indeed all of creation was created “very good” (Gen. 1:31). Because God by His character sets the standards of righteousness, human goodness consisted in being what God wanted people to be – beings made in he image of God and acting out that nature in their daily life. The tragedy is that we did not stay as we were created. As noted, God gave humans the capacity for self-determination and therefore, therefore, God gave the original pair, Adam and Eve the freedom to remain or not remain in the close relationship of image to original. As Genesis 3 reports, they chose to disobey God at the only point where God put down limitations, and hence violated the personal relationship they had with their Creator. The result of this act of rebellion was death for Adam and Eve. And their death has involved for subsequent generations long centuries of personal, social, and natural struggle, turmoil, and decay. The image of God in man was defaced in all its aspects. In personality we lost the capacity to know ourselves accurately and to determine our own course of action freely in response to our intelligence. Our self-transcendence was impaired by the alienation we experienced in relation to God, for as Adam and Eve turned from God, God let them go. And as we, humanity, slip from the close fellowship with the ultimately transcendent one, so we loose our ability to stand over against the external universe, understand it, judge it accurately and thus make truly “free” decisions. Rather, humanity has and is becoming more of a servant to nature than to God. And so our status as viceregent over nature (an aspect of the image of God) was reversed. Human intelligence also became impaired and so now we can no longer gain a fully accurate knowledge of the world around us, nor are we able to reason without constantly falling into error. Morally, we became less able to discern good and evil. Socially, Socially, we began to exploit and subjugate other people. Creatively, Creatively, our imagination became separated from reality; imagination became an illusion, and the artists that created gods in their own image led humanity further and further from its origin, its purpose, its Creator. As in the manner of the first humans, people of all eras have attempted to set themselves up as autonomous beings, arbiters of their own way of life, choosing to act as if they had an existence independent from God. But that
is precisely what they we do not have, for we owe everything – our origin, our salvation, and our continued existence – to God. In brief summary, at the fall humanity became alienated from God, from others, from nature, and even from ourselves. This is the essence of fallen humanity. But humanity is redeemable and has been redeemed. The story of the creation and fall is told within the first three chapters of Genesis. The rest of the bible is devoted to the story of redemption, or, the story of God’s love in redeeming us by the sacrifice of His Son, Jesus Christ, and thereby granting us the possibility of a new life. It is important to note that Christians disagree on precisely what role God takes and what He leaves us (i.e. predestination vs. free will), but most would agree that God is the primary agent in salvation. But this does not mean that we play no role. Adam and Eve were not forced to fall and we are not forced to return. Our role is to respond by repentance for our wrong attitudes and acts, to accept God’s provisions and to follow Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour. Redeemed humanity is humanity on the way to substantial healing of our alienations, primarily fellowship with God, and restoration of the defaced image of God (i.e. our personality, self-transcendence, and reasoning, moral, social and creative capacities). Glorified humanity is humanity totally healed and at peace with God, and individuals at peace with others and themselves. But glorification happens only on the other side of death. 4) For each person death is either the gate to life with God and His people or the gate to eternal separation from the only thing that will ultimately fulfill human aspirations. At death a person is transformed and either enters an existence with God and His people – a glorified existence. Or a person enters an existence forever separated from God, holding their uniqueness in awful loneliness apart from precisely that which would fulfill them. G.K. Chesterton once remarked that hell is a monument to human freedom, and, we might add, human dignity. Hell is God’s tribute to the freedom He gave each of us to choose whom we would serve. From this we recognize that our decisions have a significance that echoes into eternity. Those, however, who respond to God’s offer of salvation by accepting Jesus Christ as their Lord an Saviour, live forever as glorious creatures of God – completed, fulfilled, but not sated, engaged in the ever-enjoyable communion of the saints. The scriptures give little detail about this existence (ex. Rev. 4-5, 21), but of what is known creates a longing Christians can expect to be fulfilled beyond their fondest desires. 5) Human beings can know both the world around them and God Himself because God has built into them the capacity to do so and because He takes an active role in communicating with them. The foundation of human knowledge is the character of God as creator. As He is the all-knowing knower of all things, so we can be the sometimes-knowing knowers of some things. The Word (in Greek logos, logos, from which the world logic is derived) is eternal, an aspect of God Himself (see Jn. 1:1-4). That is logicality, intelligence, rationality, and meaning are all inherent in God. It is out of this intelligence that the universe came to be. And therefore, because of this source the universe has structure, order and meaning. Moreover, in the Word (see Jn. 1:1-4), this inherent intelligence, is the “light of men,” light being in the book of John a symbol for both moral capacity and intelligence. Verse 9 adds that the Word, “the true light … enlightens every man.” God’s own intelligence is thus the basis of human intelligence. Knowledge is, therefore, possible because there is someone to know (the omniscient God and humans made in His image) something to be known (all else of God’s creation). Of course, God is forever so far beyond us that we cannot have anything approaching total comprehension of Him. In fact, if God desired, he could remain forever hidden. But God wants us to know Him, and He takes the initiative in this transfer of knowledge. This initiative is called revelation and God reveals, or discloses, Himself to us in two basic ways. Through general revelation God speaks through the created order of the universe (see Rom. 1:19-20 and Ps. 19:1-2). God’s existence and His nature as Creator and Sustainer is revealed in God’s “handiwork,” the universe. As we contemplate the magnitude of this – its orderliness and its beauty – we can learn much about God. When we look at humanity, we see something more, for humans add the dimension of personality. God, therefore, must be at least as personal as we are. Thus far can general revelation go, but little further. As Aquinas said, we can know that God exists through general revelation, but we could never know that God is triune except for special revelation. Special revelation is God’s self-disclosure in extra-natural ways. Not only did He reveal Himself by appearing in spectacular forms such as to Moses as a burning bush that was not consumed (Ex. 3:1-17). In fact, in this passage God carried on a dialogue with Moses in which genuine two-way communication occurred. Later, God gave Moses the Ten Commandments and revealed a long code of laws by which the Hebrews were to be ruled. God revealed Himself to the patriarchs before Moses and the prophets after him, who recorded His Word. The cumulative writings grew to become the Old Testament, which was affirmed by Jesus Himself as an accurate and authoritative revelation of God. And because Jesus Christ was very God of very God but still completely man, he showed us what God is like more fully and more clearly than can any other form of revelation. Jesus Christ is God’s ultimate special revelation. “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth”, says John 1:14, and “we have beheld His glory”.
The main point is that is that theism declares that God can and has clearly communicated with us. Because of this we can know much about who God is and what He desires for us. 6) Ethics is transcendent transcendent and is based on the character of God as good (holy (holy and loving). Made in God’s image we are essentially moral beings, and thus cannot refuse to bring moral categories to bear on our actions. Our sense of morality has been flawed by the fall but even in our moral relativity we cannot get rid of the sense that some things are ‘right’ or ‘natural’ and others not. Differing in our moral judgements does nothing to alter the fact that we continue to make, to live by and violate moral judgements. We live in a moral universe and virtually everyone – at least if they reflected upon it – recognizes this and would have it no other way. However, theism teaches that not only is there a moral universe but that there is an absolute standard – God’s character of goodness - by which all moral judgements are measured. Furthermore, Christians (and Jews) hold that God has revealed His standard in the various laws and principles expressed in the bible – the ten commandments, the sermon on the mount, the apostle Paul’s teaching, etc. Thus there is a standard of right and wrong and people who want to know it can know it. Jesus Christ is the fullest embodiment of the good. He is the complete man, the second Adam (I Cor.15:45-49), humanity as God would have it be. In Jesus we see the good life incarnate but Jesus’ good life was supremely revealed in His death – an act of infinite love (see Rm. 5:7-8, 1 Jn. 4:10). Inevitably, while ethics is very much a human domain, it is ultimately the business of God. We are not the measure of morality. God is. 7) History is a linear, meaningful meaningful sequence of events leading to to the fulfillment of God’s God’s purposes for humanity. History is not reversible, not repeatable, not cyclic, nor is it meaningless. Rather it is teleological, linear meaning that the actions of people – as confusing and chaotic as they may appear – are nonetheless part of a meaningful sequence that has a beginning, middle and is being directed toward a known end. God, in His infinitely transcendent omniscience, knows the beginning from the end and is aware of and sovereign over all human action. Several basic turning points in the course of history form the background for the theistic understanding of human beings in time. These turning points include the creation, the fall, the flood, God’s revelation to the Hebrews (which includes calling of Abraham from Ur to Canaan, the exodus from Egypt, the giving of the law, and the witness of the prophets) the incarnation, Jesus’ life, the crucifixion and resurrection, Pentecost, the spread of the good news via the church, the second coming of Christ, and the judgment. This is a slightly more detailed list of events paralleling the pattern of man’s life: creation, fall, redemption, and glorification. Looked at in this way, history itself is a form of revelation. That is, not only does God reveal Himself in history, but also the very sequence of events is revelation. One can say, therefore, that history (especially as localized in the Jewish people) is the record of the involvement and concern of God in human events. Theists look forward, then, to history being closed by judgement and a new age inaugurated beyond time. But prior to that new age, time is irreversible and history is localized in space. In Christian theism, “it is appointed for men to die once, and after that comes judgement” (Heb. 9:27). As such, an individual’s choices have meaning to that person, to others, and to God. History is the result of those choices, which under the sovereignty of God, bring about God’s purposes for His creation. In short, the most important aspect of the theistic concept of history is that history has meaning because God – the Logos (meaning itself) – is behind all events, not only by “upholding the universe by His word of power” (Heb. 1:3) but also “in everything…[working] for good with those who love Him, who are called according to His purpose” (Rm. 8:28). Behind the sometimes seemingly chaotic events stands the loving God sufficient for all. 8) Christians live to seek first the kingdom of God, that is, glorify God and enjoy Him forever. The Christian worldview is unique because it serves as the focus for the ultimate meaning of human existence, human history, and the life of each Christian. To glorify God is not just to do so in religious worship and praise. It also includes revealing God’s character character by being who we were meant to be – the embodiment of the image of God in human form. To be like Jesus is to be like God. We are to imitate him, seek first his kingdom and righteousness (Mk. 6:33). All the happiness and joy we receive when we substitute our desires for God’s glory comes to us as a result of yeilding our will to his. Human flourishing, while not being a primary goal, is a result of turning one’s attention toward God and his glory. There are other ways to personalize our committment to the Lord. Some Christians say it is to obey God, or to love Him with all our hearts, minds, soul, and strength and their neighbours as themselves. Others sacrifice for the sake of the gospel.
4.2 The Grandeur of God It should now be obvious that Christian theism is primarily dependent on its concept of God, for theists’ hold that everything stems from Him. Nothing is prior to God or equal to Him. He is He Who Is, Is, the I the I Am. Thus theism has a basis for metaphysics. Since He Who Is also is He is He Who Knows, Knows, theism has a basis for epistemology. And since He Who Is also is The Worthy One, One, for He has a worthy character, theism has a basis for ethics. Therefore, theism is a complete worldview.
The world, as Gerard Manley Hopkins once wrote, is “charged with the grandeur of God”. The greatness of God is the central tenet of Christian theism. Fully cognizant Christian theists, therefore, do not just believe and proclaim this view as true. Their first act is toward God – a response of love, obedience and praise to the Lord of the Universe – our maker and sustainer, and through Jesus Christ, redeemer and friend.
5. Deism: The Clockwork Universe A man said to the universe: “Sir, I exist.” “”However,” replied the universe, “The fact has not created in me a sense of obligation.” From Stephen Crane, War Is Kind and Other Lines (1899), frequently anthologized. Although theism lasted for so long, many forces operated to shatter the basic intellectual unity of the West. Deism held sway over the intellectual world of France and England briefly from the late seventeenth into the first half of the eighteenth century. Deism developed, some say, as an attempt to bring unity out of a chaos of theological and philosophical discussion. The period became bogged down in interminable quarrels over what began to seem, even to the disputants, as trivial questions. Deism, to some extent, is a response to this, though the direction such agreement took put deism rather beyond the limits of traditional Christianity. Another factor in the development of deism is a change in the location of the authority of knowledge about the divine; it shifted from the special revelation found in Scripture to the presence of reason, “the candle of God,” or to intuition, “the inner light”. The reason for this shift is somewhat ironic. Through the middle ages, due in part to the rather Platonic theory of knowledge that was held, the attention of theistic scholars and intellectuals was directed towards God; the idea was that knowers in some sense “become” what they know. And since one should become “good” and “holy” one should study God. Theology was thus considered the queen of the sciences (which at that time simply meant knowledge), for theology was the science of God. This hierarchical view of reality is more Platonic than theistic because it picks up from Plato the notion that matter is somehow, if not evil, than at least irrational and certainly not good or worthy of study. But more biblical minds began to recognize that this is God’s universe and even though it is fallen, it still has value. Furthermore, God is rational and thus His universe is rational, orderly, and knowable. Scientists operating on this basis began to study the form of the universe. A picture of God’s world emerged as a huge, well-ordered mechanism, a giant clockwork. Due to the success of the method of obtaining knowledge about the universe, the same method was used to obtain knowledge about God. Having cast out Aristotle as an authority in matters of science, deism now casts out scripture as an authority in theology and allows only the application of “human” reason. Deism thus sees God only in “nature” by which was meant the system of the universe. And since the system of the universe is seen as a giant clockwork, God is seen as the clock maker. Christian theism, of course says that the depth of the content revealed about God in nature, general revelation, is limited. For Christians, much is left to learn from the study of special revelation. However, deism denies that God can be known by revelation, by special acts of God’s self-expression in, for example, Scripture or the Incarnation. As Peter Medawar says, “The seventeenth century doctrine of the necessity of reason was slowing giving way to the sufficiency of reason.”
5.1 Basic Deism Historically, deism is not really a school of thought because although a number of people held related views, not all held every doctrine in common. Still, it is helpful to think of deism as a system and to state that system in a relatively extreme form. For in that way, we will be better able to grasp the implications the various “reductions” of theism were having on eighteenth century society. 1) A transcendent God, as a First Cause, created the universe but then left it to run on its own, God is thus not immanent, not fully personal, not sovereign over human affairs, not providential. As with theism, the most important proposition regards the existence and character of God. Essentially, deism “reduces” the number of features God is said to display. He is a transcendent force or energy, a Prime Mover or First Cause, a beginning to the otherwise infinite regress of past causes. But he is really not a he. Certainly he does not care about his creation; he does not love it. He has no “personal” relation to it at all. To deists, God is distant, foreign, alien. Such a god is not one to be worshipped, but merely an intellect or force to be recognized. The lonely state this leaves humanity in was, however, not seemingly felt by early deists. Almost two centuries past before this implication was played out on the field of human emotions.
2) The cosmos God created is determined because it is created as a uniformity of cause and effect in a closed system; thus, no miracle is possible. The universe is closed in two senses. First, it is closed to God’s reordering because he is not interested in it and because any tampering would suggest an error in the original plan, which would be below an all-competent deity. Therefore, no miracles or events which reveal any special interests of God are possible. Second, the universe is closed to human reordering because for any human to be able to reorder the system, he or she would have to be able to transcend it, get out of the chain of cause and effect. But this we cannot do. It should be noted that this second implication is not often emphasised by deists. Most continue to assume, as we all do apart from reflection, that we can act to change our environment. 3) Human beings, though personal, are part of the the clockwork of the universe. universe. To be sure, deists do not deny that humans are personal. Each of us has self-consciousness and, at least at first glance, self-determination. Bishop Francois Fenelon (1651-1715), criticizing the deists of his day, wrote, “They credit themselves with acknowledging God as the creator whose wisdom is evident in his works; but according to them, God would be neither good nor wise if he had given man free will – that is, the power to sin, to turn away from his final goal, to reverse the order and be forever lost.” If we cannot “reverse the order” then we cannot be significant. If an individual has personality, it must then be a type which does not include the element of selfdetermination. Deists, of course, recognize that human beings have intelligence, a sense of morality, a capacity for community and creativity. But all these, while built into us as created beings, have a sort of autonomous nature just like the rest of the stuff of the universe. They are not grounded in God’s character and thus have to be seen in the light of human dimensions only. That is, as human beings we have no essential relation to God and thus we have no way to transcend the system in which we find ourselves. Human beings are what they are; and according to deism, we have little hope of becoming anything different or anything more. 4) Human beings may or may not have a life beyond their physical physical existence. Were the history of worldviews a matter of the immediate working out of rational implications of a change in the idea of the really real, a belief in the afterlife would have immediately disappeared. But it didn’t. Nor did a belief in morality; that took another century. So warm deists, like Ben Franklin who believed in a creator-god worthy of worship and John Locke who was not hostile to Christianity, are those closet to Christian theism and persisted in the notion of an afterlife. Cold deists, like Voltaire, who was hostile to Christianity, however, did not. 5) Through our innate and autonomous human reason and the methods of science, we can not only know the universe but we can infer at least something of what God is like. The cosmos, this world, is understood to be in its normal state; it is not fallen or abnormal. To deists, God is to be known through nature and not through history, since no special revelation is necessary or possible, and none has occurred. God had simply created and maintains the universe, but otherwise has left it alone and man in charge of his own destiny. But humanity, while in one sense the maker of its own destiny, is yet locked into the closed system. Human freedom from God is not a freedom to anything; in fact, it is not a freedom at all. Deism maintains the primacy of empiricism and reason, since nothing is revealed to us, they say, outside that which we experience. However, some deists, like Alexander Pope in his Essay on Man, assume knowledge of God and of nature that is not capable of being known by experience. But then how is it known that the universe is a vast all-ordered clockwork? One can’t have it both ways. Either (1) all knowledge comes from experience and we, not being infinite, cannot know the system in its entirety, or (2) some knowledge comes from another source – for example, from innate ideas built into us or from revelation from the outside. Since revelation is rejected and innate ideas are often discounted, tension thus arises in deism’s epistemology. 6) Ethics is intuitive intuitive or limited to general revelation; revelation; because the universe universe is normal, it reveals what is right. right. Another implication of seeing God only in a natural world which one views as unfallen is that God, being the omnipotent Creator, becomes responsible for everything as it is. This world must then reflect either what God wants or what he is like. Ethically, this leads to the position expressed by Alexander Pope that, “whatever is, is right”, which effectively destroys the notion of ethical decisions. Good becomes indistinguishable from evil, and therefore, neither good nor evil exists. As Baudelaire said, “If God exists, he must be the devil.” Also, the notion of sin takes on a new colour in such a context or even disappears if whatever is, is right. For a sin would be not against a personal God, but against the “Eternal Cause”, against a philosophic abstraction. This also would remove any thought of eternal spiritual accountability further promoting an anything goes attitude. Yet, we continue to make ethical distinctions. distinctions. Somewhere, every one of us distinguishes distinguishes between good and evil, right and wrong, moral and immoral. Deistic ethics do not fit us in our actual human dimensions, making deism an impractic impractical al worldview worldview to live by. However, However, not all deists saw (or now see) that their assumptions assumptions lead to Pope’s Pope’s conclusions. Some believe that Jesus’ ethical teachings were really natural law expressed in words. As interested as the deists were in preserving the ethical content of Christianity, or in claiming that humans have an innate capacity to discern right and wrong, they were unable to find a suitable basis for it.
7) History is linear; for the course of the cosmos was determined at creation. Written histories are based solely on the autonomy of human reason and as a result display a wide variety in the interpretation of the meaning and significance of human events. Deists themselves see little interest in history because they sought knowledge of God primarily in nature. The Bible is most useful not as a record of God’s acts in history but as illustrations of divine law from which ethical princi principal palss can be derive derived. d. Since Since the stress stress is on genera generall rules, rules, the specif specific ic acts acts of histor history y are unimporta unimportant. nt. Furthermore, God is quite uninterested in men and women and even whole peoples. Besides, the universe is closed to his reordering anyways. 8) Cold deists use their own autonomous reason to determine their goal in life; warm deists may reflect on their commitment to a somewhat personal God and determine their goal in accordance with what they believe their god would be pleased with. Unlike with Christian theism, there is no orthodox deism and so deists are able to choose from amongst their reason, intuition, tradition, or whatever else to decide aspect of life is most important to them. But as a deist becomes more divorced from an allegiance to a personal God and His eternal standards of right and wrong, the more societies become pluralistic and less socially cohesive.
5.2 An Unstable Compound For its inconsistencies, impracticality, and dependence on Christian theism, deism did not prove to be a stable worldview. These tensions soon became apparent, and include (1) humans could not maintain significance and personality in the face of a universe closed to reordering. Once reason replaced revelation, the concept of God was up for graps and the slide from Christian theism to belief in gods with lesser and lesser personality was inevitable. However, the human personality is a “fact” of the universe. If God made that, must he not be personal? (2) Iductive reasoning proved inadequate, for it would take an infinite mind to hold the details necessary for an accurate generalization. Since no human mind is infinite, certain knowledge of universals was impossible, and thoughtful people were left with a relativity of knowledge they found hard to accept. Today we could find even more aspects of deism to question. Scientists have largely abandoned thinking of the universe as a giant clock. Subatomic particles do not behave like minute pieces of machinery. If the universe is a mechanism, it is far more complex than we thought, and God must be quite different from a mere “architect” or “clock maker”. (3) The assumpt assumption ion of an unfall unfallen, en, normal normal univer universe se tended tended to imply imply that that whatev whatever er is, is right right,, thereb thereby y eliminating ethics. But deists were very interested in ethics, that being the one division of Christian teaching that was most acceptable. And at first autonomous reason and traditional morality tracked well together as the the surrounding culture assumed the reasonableness of these values. In the early years, deists had confidence in the universality of human reason; people who used their reason would agree on what is right and wrong. This eventually turned out to be a false hope. However universal human nature may be, in practice people do not agree on matters of good and evil or what constitutes “good” behaviour as much as the early deists thought. So historically deism is a transitional worldview, and yet it is not dead in either popular or sophisticated forms. Some describe God as superflous with words like Energy, Force, or First Cause, or, as astrophysicist Stephen Hawking, use “the term God as the embodiment of the laws of physics.” Others of a more philosophical deism describe God as mystery of being, order of existnece, the hidden sphere, absolutue horizon, and while this being manifests theistic characteristics, some like Vaclav Havel (former Czech Republic president) aviod this conclusion by shifting the attention to themselves as reflector of their conscious experience. They take this being to have a moral moral dimen dimensio sion n and the ontolo ontologic gical al founda foundatio tion n for human human moral moral respon responsib sibil ility ity.. Some Some more more youthf youthful ul and therapeutic versions of deism consider the creator to watch us as we live good, happy, but secular lives and going to heaven when we die. These views are not uncommon because a full blooded naturalism is not so ambivalent.
6. Naturalism: The Silence of Finite Space Deism is the isthmus between two great continents – theism and naturalism. Then, if deism is just a passing phase, almost an intellectual curiosity, naturalism, on the other hand, is serious business. The intellectual route is this: in theism God is the infinite-personal Creator and sustainer of the cosmos. In deism God is “reduced”; he begins to lose his personality, though he remains the Creator and (by implication) the sustainer of the cosmos. In naturalism God is further “reduced”; he loses his very existence. Rene Descartes (1596-1650), a theist by conscious confession, set the stage by conceiving of the universe as a giant mechanism of “matter” which people comprehended by “mind.” He thus split reality into two kinds of being in such that ever since the Western world has found it hard to see itself as an integrated whole. The naturalists, taking one route to unification, made mind a subcategory of mechanistic matter.
John Locke (1632-1714), a theist for the most part, believed in a personal God who revealed himself to us but thought that our God-given reason was the judge of what was to be taken as true from the “revelation” in the Bible. The naturalists removed the “God-given” from this conception and made “reason” the sole criterion for truth. Julien Offray de La Mettrie (1709-1751), a theoretical deist but a practical naturalist, has said, “Not that I call in question the existence of a supreme being; on the contrary it seems to me that the greatest degree of probability is in favour of this belief.” Nonetheless, he continues, “it is a theoretic truth with little practical value.” The reason he can conclude that God’s existence is of so little importance is because the God who exists is only the maker of the universe. He is not personally interested in it nor being worshipped by anyone. It is precisely this conclusion, this feeling, which marks the transition to naturalism.
6.1 Basic Naturalism
1) Prime reality is matter. matter. Matter exists eternally eternally and is all there is. God does not exist. exist. In naturalism, the nature of the cosmos is primary and with an eternal creator-God out of the picture, the cosmos becomes eternal – always there though not necessarily in its present form. Nothing comes from nothing. Something is. Therefore, something always was. But that something is not a transcendent creator but the matter of the cosmos itself. However the definition of matter changes. In the eighteenth century scientists had yet to discover the complexity of matter nor its close relationship with energy. They conceived of reality as made up of irreducible “units” existing in mechanical, spatial relationship with each other. A relationship that was being investigated and expressible in exorable “laws”. Later scientists were to discover that nature is not so neat or at least not so simple. There seem to be no irreducible “units” and physical physical laws have only mathematical expression. Now, scientists search for a complete description of the universe but some have lost confidence in ever discovering nature’s true form. 2) The cosmos exist as a uniformity of cause and effect in a closed system. Modern scientists have found the relations between the various elements of reality to be far more complex, if not more mysterious than the deistic clockwork image can account for. Nonetheless, the universe is a closed system. It is not open to reordering from the outside – either by a transcendent being (for there is none) or by selftranscedent or autonomous humans (for we are part of the uniformity). Most naturalists are determinists, though they say that this does not remove our (sense of) free will or our responsibility. 3) Human beings are complex “machines”; personality is an interrelation of chemical and physical properties we do not yet fully understand. There is only one substance in the cosmos: matter, and we are it and only it. Humans are unique among animals because we alone are capable of conceptual thought, employ speech, possess a cumulative tradition (culture), a moral capacity, and have had a unique method of evolution. However, any mystery that surrounds us is a result of our mechanical complexity and not because of an extramaterial basis or transcendent power. Through stressing humanity’s distinctiveness naturalism finds a basis for value. 4) Death is the extinction extinction of personality and individuality. individuality. The only immortality that is possible is to continue to exist in our progeny and in the way that our lives have influenced others in our culture. This is perhaps the hardest proposition of naturalism to accept, yet it is demanded by their conception of the universe. It is clear and unambiguous and may trigger immense psychological problems. 5) Through our innate and autonomous human reason, including the methods of science, we can know the universe. The cosmos, including the world, is understood to be in its normal state. Both deists and naturalists accept the internal faculty of reason and the thoughts humans have as givens. From a cosmic standpoint, reason developed under the contingincies of evolution over a long period of time. From a human standpoint, a child is born with innate faculties which merely have to be developed. These faculties work on their own within the framework of the languages and cultures to which they are exposed. At no time is there any information or interpretation or mental machinery added from outside the ordinary material world. As children grow, they learn which of their thoughts are helpful to deal with the world around them. The methods of science are especially useful in producing more profound knowledge. Human knowledge, then, is the product of natural human reason grounded in its perceived ability to reach the truth about human beings and the world. Many early naturalists, and some some modern modern scientis scientists ts and other other lay educated educated people people may think think in this this way but moder modern n philos philosoph ophica icall naturalists claim that no one can know what something truly is. They are content to say that we can learn to describe what we take to be reality in language that allows us to live successfully in the world. There is a rift between words and things that cannot be bridged, which is fully played out in post-modernism. 6) Ethics is related only to human beings. Ethical considerations did not play an early role in the rise of naturalism as it was an outworking of notions of the external world. Most early naturalists continued to hold ethical views similar to those in the surrounding culture, that is, theism and deism. And though these three worldviews could adopt similar ethical norms, their basis is radically different. If there was no consciousness prior to the existence of humans then there was no prior sense of right and wrong.
And if there was no ability to do other than what one does, any sense of right and wrong would have no practical value. So for ethics to be possible there must be both self-consciousness and self-determination (ie personality). Naturalists say that personality came with the appearance of human beings and so too came ethics. No ethical system was derived solely from the nature of “things” outside of human consciousness meaning that no ethical system or natural law is inscribed in the cosmos. How exactly value and morals are brought about in the human situation, in other words, how to transition from the realm of what is (personality) to what ought to be without a transcedent standard or guide is very difficult and debateble. Some hold that humans have a sense of morality from intuition, authority, and convention. And while a person may reject these and live in ostracisim and martyrdom, rarely does anyone succeed in inventing values totally divorced from culture. Of course values differ from culture to culture and none seems absolutely universal. So some argue for an ethic based on objective inquiry and find it in a harmonious adjustment of people to each other and their environment. Whatever promotes harmony is good. This may tend to define good action as group-approved, survival promoting action. The persistence of naturalism lies in its appearance as objective and coherent. Naturalists conceive of morality in a totally mechanistic fashion, with nothing transcedent about it. People simply follow a pattern embedded in them as creatures. Recently many naturalists give permission to sex outside of marriage, marriage, euthanasia, euthanasia, and abortion. Naturalism Naturalism holds values values are constructed constructed by human experience, experience, need, and interest. An ethic of behaviourism would define happiness as having short run reinforcers congruent with long-term ones. Humanism is the overall attitude attitude that human beings, beings, especial especially ly individua individuals ls are of special special value. value. Christian Christian humanists (Calvin, Erasmus, Spenser, Shakespeare, Milton) emphasized human dignity deriving from the image of God. Secular humanism is completely framed within naturalism, but not all naturalists are secular humanists. Some take the good to be something that has so far only been recognized by the elite, “a voluntary aristocracy of the spirit.” The good consists of disinterestedness as a now mandatory way of alleviating the disorders and frustrations of the modern world. Marxism can vary from humanistic democracy to Stalinistic totalitarianism. In theory, Marxism is supposed to benefit working people and enable them to gain economic control over their own lives. In reality, the bureaucratic rigidities of life under communism led to economic stagnation as well as loss of personal freedom. 7) History is a linear system system of events linked by cause and effect effect but without an overriding purpose. purpose. Naturalism views natural and human history as a continuity. Natural history self-activated and began in the recesses of the universe an incredibly long time ago. The theory of evolution, which is held responsible for human origns, was given a “mechanism” by Darwin. However, evolution is nonteleological and so aks as many questions as it answers. answers. Thus while evolution evolution considered considered strictly on the biological biological level continues continues to be unconsciou unconsciouss and accidental, human actions are not: they are human history. In other words, when humans appeared, meaningful history began also. But like evolution, which has no inherent goal, history has no inherent goal. Human events have only the meaning people give them when they choose them or reflect back on them. 8) Naturalism itself implies no particular core commitment on the part of any given naturalist. Rather core commitments are adopted unwittingly or chosen by individuals. Each individual is unconstrained in their choice of direction in life. Most naturalists are an integral part of a particular cultural community and orient their personal lives within its norms. However, social rebels cannot be reasonably critized from within naturalism. And while naturalism has no justification to act selflessly, some choose to serve a purely secular human flourishing.
7. Nihilism: Zero Point Nihilism is more a feeling than a philosophy. Strictly speaking, nihilism is not a philosophy at all. It is a denial of philosophy, a denial of the possibility of knowledge, a denial that anything is valuable. If it proceeds to the absolute denial of everything, it even denies the reality of existence itself. In other words, nihilism is the negation of everythin everything g - reality, reality, knowledge, knowledge, ethics, ethics, beauty. beauty. In nihilism nihilism no statement statement has validity; validity; nothing has meaning. meaning. Everything is gratuitous, de trop, that is, just there. Those who have been untouched by the feelings of despair, anxiety, and ennui associated with nihilism may find it hard to imagine that it could be a seriously held worldview. But it is, and it is well for those who want to understand the twentieth century to experience, if only vicariously, something of nihilism as a stance toward human existence. To read nihilistic art is to begin to feel the pangs of human emptiness, of life without value, purpose, meaning: Marcel Duchamp's ordinary urinal, signed with a fictional name; Samuel Beckett's End Game, Waiting for Godot, Breath; Douglas Adam's The Hitchhicker's Guide to the Galaxy; Franz Kafka, Eugene Ionesco, Joseph Heller, Kurt Vonnegut Jr.,
7.1 The First Bridge: Necessity and Chance A moderate form of nihilism holds to the first two propositions of naturalism, that (1) matter is all there is and it is eternal, and (2) the cosmos operates with a uniformity and continuity of cause and effect in a close system, but recognize that these propositions imply a loss of human dignity and freedom. If the universe is closed then its activity can only be governed from within. Any force that acts to change the cosmos, on any level (microcosmic, human, macrocosmic), is part of the cosmos. There would thus seem to be only one explanation for change: the present state of affairs must govern the future state. In a closed universe the possibility that some things need not be, that others are possible, is not possible. In a closed universe, freedom must be a determinacy unrecognized which precludes self-determinacy and moral responsibility. Self-consciousness, as it is only an epiphenomenon, can be affected by changing the agent's environment. According to behavioural pyschologist B.F. Skinner, "a person does not act on the world, the world acts on him." In sum, human beings are without the ability to choose on the basis of an innate self-conscious character to affect their own destiny or do anything significant. Nihilism holds that some events are more predictable than others, but none is uncertain. uncertain. However, naturalism offers chance and necessity as the cause for humanity’s emergence and freedom. But chance is either the inexorable proclivity of reality to happen as it does, appearing to be chance due to an ignorance of the forces of determinism, or it is absolutely irrational. In the second sense, chance is not an explanation but the absence of one. An event occurs. No cause can be assigned. So while chance produces the appearance of freedom, it actually introduces absurdity since it is causeless, purposeless, directionless. Chance, then, does not allow for self-consciousness self-consciousness and freedom, but a subjection to capriciousness.
7.2 The Second Bridge: The Great Cloud of Unknowing The presupposition of a closed universe also has epistemological consequences: if a person is the result of impersonal forces – either haphazard or inexorable – then that person has no way of knowing whether what is seemed to be known is truth or illusion. Naturalism holds that perception and knowledge are either identical with or byproducts of the brain; they arise from the functioning of matter. But matter functions by a nature of its own. There is no reason to believe that matter has any interest in leading a conscious being to true perception or to logical conclusions. The only beings in the universe who care about such matters are humans. But people are bound to their bodies. Their consciousness arises from a complex interrelation of highly ordered matter. Why should whatever that matter is conscious of be in any way related to what actually is the case. Any tests for distinguishing illusion from reality utilize the brain they are testing. Each test could well be a futile exercise in spinning out the consistency of an illusion. Therefore if naturalism is true there is no way of establishing its credibility, let alone proving it. Any argument constructed implies the classical laws of identity, noncontradiction, and the excluded middle but this does not guarantee the truthfullness of these laws in the sense that any claim obeying them necessarily relates to the objective, external universe. Moreover, any argument to check the validity of an argument is an argument that might be mistaken. Virtually Virtually no one is a pure epistemolog epistemological ical nihilist. nihilist. Yet naturalism naturalism does not allow a person person to have any solid reason for confidence in human reason. One of the worst consequences of epistemological nihilism is the very denial of the facticity of the universe. But while we think of such situations primarily in pyschological terms committing such “cases” to institutions, this is the proper state, the logical result of any perception or dream becoming equally real or unreal. We thus end in an ironic paradox. Naturalism, born in the Age of Enlightenment, was launched on a firm acceptance of the human ability to know. Now naturalists find that they can place no confidence in their knowing.
7.3 The Third Bridge: Is and Ought For naturalism, the universe is merely there, not providing humanity with a sense of oughtness. It only is. is. Ethics, however, is about what ought to be, whether it is or not. If every person has moral values and many values conflict with each other then which are the true or higher values. That moral values are relative to one’s culture is only another way of saying that is (the fact of a specific value) equals ought (what should be so). Moreover, the cultural rebel’s is is not considered ought if they upset social social cohesiven cohesiveness ess and jeopardiz jeopardizee cultural cultural survival. survival. Therefore the cultural relativist has affirmed a value – the preservation of a cultural in its current state – as more valuable than its destruction or transformation from one or m ore elements within it. The situation is not so critical if there is sufficient separation of peoples of radically differing values. Ethical nihilism holds that there is no nonrelative standard by which to judge the values in conflict exitence and thereby determine which are ultimately true or give m eaning to specific variations.
7.4 Inner Tensions in Nihilism Most naturalists are not nihilists because they do not take their naturalism seriously. No naturalist can live an examined life, if examination leads to nihilism, for there are at least five reasons no one can live a life consistent with nihilism. 1) From meaningle meaninglessnes ssnesss nothing nothing at all follows, follows, or rather rather anything anything follows. follows. No act is more or less less appropriat appropriate. e. Furthermore, goal oriented behaviour is creating value by choice, which is not living by nihilism. 2) Every moment moment nihilists nihilists think think and think think their thinking thinking has has substance substance they cheat cheat their philosop philosophy, hy, for they have denied that thinking is of value or that it can lead to knowledge. Nihilism’s one affirmation, that the universe has no meaning, is meaningless since otherwise it would be false. They merely are; they merely think. And none of this has any significance whatsoever. 3) While While a limited sort sort of pratical pratical nihilism nihilism is possible possible for a while, eventual eventually ly a limit is reached. reached. In order to be a practicing nihilist, there must be something to oppose and deny. A practicing nihilist is a parasite on meaning. 4) Nihilism Nihilism spells spells the death death of art although although much of modern modern art has nihili nihilism sm as its core core ideology. ideology. To the extent extent that these artworks display the human implications of a nihilistic worldview, they are not nihilistic; to the extent that they themselves are meaningless, they are not artworks. Art is nothing if not formal, that is, endowed with structure by the artist. But structure implies meaning. So to the extent that an artwork has structure, it has meaning and thus is not nihilistic. Even if the art is random, attempting to be anti-art and suggesting meaningless it still participates in one of the above paradoxes, and is thus nonnihilistic. 5) Nihilism poses severe psychological psychological problems problems for those who hold to it. People cannot live live with it because it denies what every fiber of their waking being calls for – meaning, truth, value, beauty, dignity, freedom, significance, worth.
8. Existentialism: Beyond Nihilism Existentialism, and every other important worldview that has emerged since the beginning of the twentieth century, has as its major goal to transcend nihilism. Atheistic existentialism was a major theme of Nietzche (the “will to power” of the “overman”) that quickly became distorted. Theistic existentialism was born in the mid 19 th century as Kierkegaard reflected on the death of Danish orthodoxy. Either form did not appear in any fullness or cultural significance until after the WW1-WW2 era in the 1950s, for it was only during that period that nihilism finally gripped the intellectual world and began affecting the lives of ordinary people.
8.1 Basic Atheistic Existentialis Existentialism m Atheistic existentialism affirms most propositions of naturalism (worldview questions 1,& 4-7) except those relating human nature and our relationship with the cosmos. Indeed, existentialism’s major interest is in our humanity and how we can be significant in an otherwise insignificant world. In short: Matter exists eternally; God does not exist. Death is extinction of personality and individuality. Through our innate and autonomous human reason, including the methods of science, we can know the universe. The cosmos, including this world is understood to be in its normal state. Ethics is related only to human beings. History is a linear stream of events linked by cause and effect but without an overarching purpose. 2) The cosmos is composed soley of matter, but to human beings reality appears in two forms – subjective and objective. The universe is structured or chaotic. Whichever it makes no difference. The world merely is. The world is assumed to have existed long before humans. For unknown reasons there are two different kinds of beings, one coming from the other and into a separate existence. The first is the objective unconscious world which people know through reason, sensation and science. The second kind of being is the subjective realm – that of the mind, of consciousness, awareness – which science cannot penetrate. The objective world is orderly whereas the subjective knows no order. The inner awareness of the mind is a conscious present, a constant now. Time has no meaning, for the subject is always present to itself, never past, never future. Subjectivity is the self’s apprehension of the non-self; subjectivity is making that non-self par of itself. The subject takes in knowledge not as a bottle takes in liquid but as an organism takes in food. Knowledge turns into the knower. Naturalism holds to the unity of the two worlds by seeing the objective world as real and the subjective as its shadow. As this path leads to nihilism, existentialism emphasizes the two world’s disunity. Since there are no extraterrestial extraterrestial beings, humans are the only beings who are self-conscious and self-determinate. There is no longer an attempt to understand why this is so.We perceive self-conscious and self-determinate and so we work from these
givens. Our significance is not related to the facts of the objective world, over which we have no control, but up to the consciousness of the subjective world over which we have complete control. 3) a) Human beings are complex “machnines”; personality is an interrelation of chemical and physical properties we do not yet fully understand. F or human beings alone existence precedes essence; people make themselves who they are. The objective world is one of essences as everything comes into being bearing its nature. Only human beings are not humans before they make themselves so. Each person becomes human through using self-consciousness and self-determination. In Satre’s words, “If God does not exist, there is at least one being in whom existence precedes essence, a being who exists before he can be defined by any concept, and … this being is man…. First of all, man exists, turns up, appears on the scence, and, only afterwards, defines himself.” b) Each person is totally free free as regards their nature and destiny. destiny. From proposition 2 it follows that each person is totally free. Each is uncoerced, radically capable of doing anything imaginable with our subjectivity. There is freedom within. 4) The highly wrought and tightly organized objective world stands over against human beings and appears absurd. The hard, cold facticity and thereness of the objective world appears alien and absurd. It does not fit us. It is impervious to our wishes. We are strangers in a foreign land and the sooner we learn to accept this the sooner we transcend our alienation and pass through the despair. The authentic existentialist is unimpressed by the objective world’s ultimate absurdity and weapon, the toughest fact to transcend – death. We are free so long as we remain subjects. Death places us as objects once again. We must not forget our bent toward nonexistence, but live out the tension between the love of life and the certainty of death. 5) In full recognition of and against the absurdity of the objective world, the authentic person must revolt and create value. Here is how existentialism moves beyond nihilism. Nothing is of value in the objective world but while we are conscious we create value. The authentic person is one who keeps ever aware of the absurdity of the cosmos but who rebels against that absurdity and creates meaning. Fyodor Dostoevsky’s “underground man” is a paradigm of the rebel without a seemingly reasonable cause. Dostoevsky says that, “the meaning of a man’s life consists of proving to himself every minute that he is a man and not a piano key.” Ethics is simple for existentialists for the good action is the consciously choosen action. The good is part of the subjective; it is not measured by a standard outside the individual human dimension. However, subjectivity leads to solipsism but we are all in this absurd world together, making meaning for ourselves, and our actions affect each other in a manner that nothing can be good for us without being good for all. Moreover, as we think and act and effect our subjectivity, we are engaged in a social activity by choosing a certain image of a man. People living authentic lives create value for themselves and others too. However, if we create value simply by choosing it and thus can never choose evil, does good have any meaning? Evil is seen as not choosing, as passivity, as living at the direction of others and not recognizing the absurdity of the universe. To counter these objections some claim that although death does indeed end it all, human life is more than itself, for it stems from a past humanity and it affects humanity’s future. Albert Camus’ The Plague depicts the possibility of living a good life in a universe where God is dead. It is attractive to those whose moral values are traditional, not because Camus offers a base for those values but because he continues to affirm them even though they have no base. Unfortunately, affirmation is not enough since it can be countered by an opposite affirmation. 8) The core commitment of every full-blown atheistic existentialist existentialist is to himself or herself. The Sartrean notion of human selves making themselves whom they will come to be, they are the emperors and bishops of their own pointland. Since they themselves make themselves who they are, they are responsible only to themse themselve lves. s. They They admit admit they they are are finite finite beings beings in an absurd absurd world, world, subjec subjectt to death death withou withoutt except exception ion.. The authenticity of their value comes solely by their virtue of their own conscious choices.
8.2 How far Beyond Nihilism? Atheistic Atheistic existienti existientialism alism fails to provide provide a referent referent for a morality morality that goes beyond each individaul. individaul. By grounding human significance in subjectivity, it places it in a realm divorced from reality. The objective world keeps intruding intruding causing causing the subject to continual continually ly affirm and affirm. But when affirmation affirmation ceases, so does authenic authenic existence. Atheistic existientialism goes beyond nihilism only to reach solipsism. Many would say that this is not beyond nihilism at all; it is only donning a mask called value that is stripped clean at death.
8.3 Basic Theistic Existentialism Existentialism A watered-down liberal theology of morality and good works that reduced God to simply a pure man and that Kierkegaard responded to produced not despair but optimism. Late in the second decade of the twentieth century
Karl Barth and subsequent theologians such as Emil Brunner and Reinhild Neibuhr reburbished Christianity along existentialist existentialist lines as what came to be called neo-orthodoxy, since it put God very much back into the picture. Theistic existentialism begins by accepting the following presuppositions of theism (worldview questions 1-4, 6, & 8): God is infinite and personal (triune), transcendent and immanent, omniscient, sovereign and good. God created the cosmos ex nihilo to operate with a uniformity of cause and effect in an open system. Human beings are created in the image of God, can know something of God and the cosmos and can act significantly. God can and does communicate with us. We were created good but now are fallen and need to be restored by God through Christ. For human beings death is either the gate to life with God and His people or life forever separated from God. Ethics is transcendent and based on God’s character. However, theistic existentialism has special variations and emphases. 3 & 5) Human beings are personal beings who, when they come to full consciousness, find themselves in an alien universe; whether or not God exists is a tough question to be solved not by reason but by faith. The most important variation from theism is that theistic existentialism does not start with God. With theism God is assumed to be there and of a given character. Theistic existentialism emphasizes the place in which humans find themselves when they first come to self-awareness. We find our selves conscious but the objective world impervious, without answers, and a not immediate perception of God. The human situation is ambivalent since we have evidence for cosmic order, love and therefore a benevolent deity but also evidence to the contrary. Rather than accounting for the absurdity of the universe on the basis of the Fall, as theism does, theistic existentialism assumes God is immediately responsible and therefore that he must believe in God in spite of the absurdity. The point is that while reason may lead us to atheism, we can always take a leap of faith and refuse to accept reason’s conclusions. To be sure, if the Judeo-Christian God exists, we had better acknowledge it because in that case our eternal destiny depends on it. But, say the existentialists, the data is not all in and never will be, and so every person who would be a theist must step forth and choose to believe. God will never reveal himself unambiguously. Consequently each person, in the loneliness of his or her own subjectivity, surrounded by a great deal more darkness than light, must choose. And that choice must be a radical act of faith. When a person does choose to believe, a whole panorama panorama opens to the traditional traditional propositions propositions of theism. theism. Yet the subjectiv subjective, e, choice-ce choice-centere ntered d basis basis for this worldview colours the style of each Christian existentialist’s existentialist’s stance within theism. 3 & 6) The personal is the valuable. Both forms of existentialism emphasize the disjunction between the objective and subjective worlds. Theistic existentialism emphasizes personal relationships as of primary value. The impersonal is there; it is important; but it is to be lifted up to God. To do so serves to eradicate the alienation so strongly felt by people when they concentrate on objective relationships with nature and, sadly, with other people as well. The following basic elements of Christianity are described by a dead orthodoxy on the left contrasted with a live theitic existentialism on the right: Depersonalized Personalized Sin Breaking a rule Betraying a relationship Repentance Admitting guilt Sorrowing over personal betrayal Forgiveness Canceling a penalty Renewing fellowship Faith Bel Believi ieving ng a set of prop propos osit itiions ons Comm Commit ittting ing one oneself self to a per person son Christian life Obeying rules Pleasing the Lord, a Person When put this way the existentialist version is obviously more attractive. Of course, traditional theists respond by saying the second column demands or implies the existence of the first column and, theism has always included the second column in its system. 5) Knowledge is subjective; subjective; the whole truth is often paradoxical. paradoxical. Knowledge about objects is necessary but not sufficient. Full knowledge is intimate interrelatedness interrelatedness an is linked firmly to the authentic life of the knower. Some existentialists have so disjoined the objective and subjective world, that one has no relation to the other, and have thereby abandoned the concept of objective truth. It is not that facts are unimportant but that they must be facts for someone and that changes their character making knowledge become the knower. 7) History as a record of events is uncertain and unimportant, but history as a model or type or myth to be made present and lived is of supreme supreme importance. Theistic Theistic existentiali existentialism sm distrusts distrusts the accuracy accuracy of recorded recorded history and loses interest interest in its facticity facticity and to emphasize its religious implication or meaning. The former is associated with the high criticism of the mid 19 th century. Rather than taking the biblical accounts at face value the higher critics, such as D.F. Strauss, Ernest Renan, and Julius Wellhausen denied a Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch made the naturalistic assumption that miracles cannot happen. These accounts must therefore be false, not necessarily fabricated by writers who wished to decieve but propounded by credulous people of primitive mindset. Rather than change their assumptions they concluded that the Bible was historically untrustworthy. But instead of an abandonment of the Christian faith entirely, a radical shift in emphasis took place. The facts of the Bible were not important; what was were its examples of the good life and
its timeless moral truths. The Fall was not an event but is existential as a mythological description of the universal experience of man rebelling against God. Other supernatural events are similarly demythologized. Either they are not taken literaly, or if they are, their meaning is not in their facticity but in what they indicate about human nature and our relationship to God. However, theists charge, their must be an event for there is to be meaning. Meaning is created in the subjective world, but it has no objective referent. Such abandonment should lead to doubt and a loss of faith. Instead it has led to a leap of faith.
9. Islamic Theism: The Revelations of Another Prophet During the middle ages, Islamic scholars had contributed to western thought by preserving, commenting on and advancing the philosophy of the ancient Greeks. But the intellectual influence on Europe and subsequently the New World largely disappeared by the 17 th century. Politically, the middle east has posed a continued challenge to the west, even if in the background of the cold war, from the Ottoman Empire, to the 1979 Iran embassy bombing, to 9/11 and the ensuing conflicts. The word Allah word Allah is the Arabic word for God, or a contraction of al-ilah, the God. It is not a proper name but used as “God” is English. This chapter will limit limit itself to the teachings teachings of the Qur’an and the Hadith. Where there are differences among various Islamic groups, the most widely held interpretation will be used. And if that’s not possible, priority will be given to the more literal reading of the Qur’an.
9.1 Basic Islamic Theism
1) The fundamental reality of Islam is God (Allah), described as monotheistic, infinite, personal, transcendent, immanent, omniscient, sovereign, and good. Of these attributes Islam emphasizes his oneness, transcendence and sovereignty. There has been debate as to what extent the Qur’an should be included in the category of fundamental reality. Islam arose in the context of rivalry and a great amount of content in the Qur’an consists of demonstrating that Islam Islam is better better than any other other religi religion, on, and that that God, God, as portr portraye ayed d in Islam, Islam, is better better than than any other deity. deity. Muhammad proclaimed monotheism, as he understood it, against the polytheism that dominated Mecca of his day, the monotheism of Judaism, which he considered hypocritical, and the trinitarian monotheism of Christianity, which he censured as both idolatrous and absurd. Islam did not so much define itself internally as externally against the other existing options. The constantly proclaimed unequaled greatness of Allah is the founding convinction upon which hinges all other attributes. Anything that could conceivably be construed as detracting from his greatness must be considered to be false, or even offensive. The worst sin in Islam is shirk , which is commonly translated as “idolatry,” but literally means “association.” Shirk means to conjoin Allah with any of his creatures, to ascribe a partner to him, or to understand him to possess limitations that are characteristic of his creatures but not him. Not only does this prohibition rule out such notions as an incarnation or direct revelation in any humanly apprehensible form, but it also means that whatever attributes God has revealed about himself cannot be measured by human standards. Allah is not unknowable, but it would be presumptuous for us to infer from his attributes specifically how he would manifest them in any particular cases. An integral part of any theism is that God is both transcendent and immanent but in Islam Allah’s transcendence far outweighs his immanence. Any notion of a possible relationship with Allah must respect this boundary. In Islam, we can know that Allah is merciful, but we should in no way pretend that we comprehend what this means sufficiently to draw implications from it. While Christian theism allows for a personal relationship with God, and notions of God’s incarnation in the world and the indwelling of his spirit within us, Islamic theism holds that this would bring God too far down to the level of his creatures. When the Qur’an notes of Allah’s presence, his guidance, and availability of his kindness, it does so in the context of exhortation to obedience and even threats. Some verses (50:16-18) seem to imply a personal relationship but Allah’s presence is not apparent and is actually mediated by angels. Sufism, the mystical side of Islam, teaches that after many years of labours beyond the normal rules of Islam, one must reach a state of absolute purity before attaining a moment of being in the direct presence of God. Sufism does not supply an exception to the emphasis on God’s transcendence because its goal is not for God to move downward in order to be closer to the human being, but for the Sufi monk to rise up in his spiritual state until he finally attains the height sufficient to experience God. General revelation by God in the universe is understood by those who are wise, in other words those who already believe in Allah. It is generally accepted that the Qur’an is eternal. In its true form it exists in heaven as the Mother of the Book (Umm-al-kitab). When Gabriel first commissioned Muhammad, the angel presented him with excerpts out of the Umm -al-kitab and commanded him to read and subsequently recite these portions (sura 96). This order seriously perplexed Muhammad at first because he was illiterate. The angel reassured him that the same God who creates people out a mere clot of blood (ie the fertilized ovum), would also give him the ability to read the book
and to repeat its content with complete precision. This is one of the reasons why Muslims refer to the Qur’an as a miracle (the other being its perceived perfection in form and content). The nature of the book-behind-the-book, the true Qur’an, has caused a lot of discussion among Muslims. The debate concerns the fact that if the Qur’an is eternal then there would be two fundamental realities, Allah and the Qur’an, which would detract from Allah’s greatness. To deal with this some say that the Qur’an is temporal but this reduces the authority of the book which is so engrained within most Muslims. Therefore, a common alternative is to indeed hold that the Qur’an is eternal, though not as an independent reality, but as the thoughts of Allah. Consequently, one has to think of the Qur’an on two levels, distinguishing it as the content of the mind of God (which is never accessible to us) and as divine revelation (which is the only way to have accurate knowledge about God). 2) Allah created the universe ex nihilo, and all creatures are resposnsible to him. However, the world is a closed system insofar as nothing happens in the world outside his divine decrees. The magnificence of God’s greatness is brought out clearly in the miracle of his creation. God’s creation is not limited to material things but includes the realms of angels and jinn (malicious spirits) that were brought into existence prior to humans.Allah’s method of creation is to speak a thing into existence. Thus we read concerning the creation of Adam, “He created him from dust, then said to him: ‘Be.’ And he was.” (3:59). Since Allah created the universe, he has absolute discretion over it. Insofar as he does care for it, it is purely a matter matter of his good good nature nature,, which which he is not obliga obligated ted to maint maintain ain.. Nothin Nothing g happen happenss outsi outside de of Allah’ Allah’ss plan. plan. Knowledge for Allah is never just his taking cognizance of certain states of affairs or holding all correct propositions to be true. With him, to know a thing or an event is to control it. Whatever creativity creatures creatures may possess, they can exercise it nly insofar as Allah permits it according to his inscrutable will. 3) Human beings are the pinnacle of God’s creation. They have been given abilities of which other creatures, such as angels and jinn, are not capable. However, their high standing also brings with it the responsibility to live up to God’s standards. According to the Qur’an, when Allah set out to create Adam, he called a general meeting of all of the spiritual beings he had created heretofore and announced what he was about to do.When the angels learned of his intention, they were offended and actually questioned Allah’s wisdom. After all, they claimed, they had been praising God faithfully all along. Why would he now put another creature above them, particularly one who would be prone to mischief? (2:30). Allah personally educated Adam in how to identify the many creatures on earth. He then called another meeting in which he challenged the angels to give the proper labels to various items in creation, but they failed miserably at this task. Then God brought out Adam, and to their amazement, he was able to do the very thing that they could not. The angels took back their criticism and acknowledged that Allah had not made a mistake in creating such a wonderful being. Allah then commanded all of the angels to bow down before Adam (3:34). Iblis refused to do so and became Satan or Shaytan. God then placed Adam and his wife in a garden and gave the command not to eat of a certain tree. In a manner that is not specified, Satan was able to persuade them into disobedience, and they were expelled from the garden and deprived of their happiness. Even while Adam was out of favour with God, he received instructions from Allah, and upon proper penitence, God restored him to fellowship. Thus there was no permanent curse, Adam did not remain a fallen creature, and humanity was not beset with heritable original sin. We have then the following preliminary description of what Islam teaches regarding mankind: we are God’s representatives on earth, higher than any other living creature (in contrast to Christian teaching) with a nature that was not corrupted by Adam’s fall. Consequently, we are born in a state of purity and innocence, a fact that implies that any newborn that comes into the world as a Muslim. We have now an obligation to live up to our standing as being born pure is no guarantee that we will remain pure. Privilege requires responsibility, and the stakes are immeasurably high. It is one thing to acknowledge God as the greatest with mere words, even if they are meant sincerely, it is quite another to live one’s entire life in submission to him, and the latter requirement is the test for whether a person will qualify for salvation. 4) Death is a time of transition transition between this life and our eternal eternal state, which will consist of either paradise or hell,. Proper observance of burial customs contributes to the fate of the soul after death. Some time in the future, the deceased will face an interrogation by the two angels Munkar and Nakir, and anything that the survivors can do in order to help the deceased give the proper answers will increase their chances of entering paradise. Therefore it is a good thing to encourage a person right before he dies to say the confession one last time: “There is no God but God, and Muhammad is the prophet of God.” If this is no longer possible, those who are gathered at the funeral will repeat it on behalf of the deceased. The corpse must be washed and transformed into a state of ritual purity. Finally, he or she must be buried lying on the right side, facing in the direction of Mecca. These outward physical measures have their purpose in guiding the soul into being fully prepared for the upcoming judgment at the end of time. Everyone agrees that eventually there will be the last day on which all the dead will be raised in order to face judgment. In the meantime, what happens in the interval immediately after death
and before the resurrection and the judgment is a matter of debate. Some Muslims hold that the soul will sleep peacefully until that time; others believe that between death and resurrection there will be a period of spiritual purgation in which postmortem suffering will purify the soul so as to become fit for heaven. Regardless of these speculations, there is no question of what will happen when the resurrection takes place. All human beings will be called to stand before the divine tribunal, and all of their beliefs and attitudes as well as the record of every last little action that they have performed during their lifetime will become a basis for judgment. Every human being will have accumulated a book of their deeds, both good and evil, during their mortal lives. No one can be fully sure that they have enough good to outweigh any bad, and so be assured of going to paradise (my emphasis). The three notable exceptions to this are martyrs, children before puberty and those who are mentally impaired, the later two because they are not fully accountable for their actions. To claim assurance for salvation implies that one can dictate to Allah what he must do. The Qur’anic description of hell is first of all a place of hot, odiferous, poisonous water in which the unbeliever will have to endure numerous tortures. Heaven is depicted as a beautiful oasis with fresh water, luscious green plants, handsome boys serving all the best to eat and drink, and the beautiful huri, the enticing, dark-eyed virgins, whose services are perennially available. Now, there is no question that the description of heaven is utterly geared toward men. Nonetheless, one should not infer that women will not be eligible for heaven. 5) Allah has endowed human beings with the capacity of knowledge by means of reason and the senses. Thereby, they can also know God’s revelation. However, God’s sovereign decrees limit human knowledge. Allah has created humans in a way that their senses will be a reliable sources of information and their reasoning skills are trustworthy. Human reason is sufficient to determine truth from falsehood. Of course, our reasoning ability, no matter how sharp, would be useless if we did not have the necessary information to apply it, but this is where divine revelation helps us out. Around the globe, every group of people has had one or more messengers from God who taught them the same precepts as Muhammad. Thus whatever should be known could be known easily by simply listening to the prophets. The prophets were a clear source of knowledge and the fact that the people did not submit to Allah is due to their evil, not to a lack of sufficient information. Furthermore, among the prophets were a few who were even more distinguished. These were the “messengers,” who also left books of their teachings for posterit: Moses brought the Law, David brought the Psalms, and Jesus brought the Gospel. But the same unbelieving people who did not accept them in person corrupted their writings in order to suit their idolatrous preferences. As a result, the clear messages from God, which might have survived in writing even if their original bearers had been rejected, became distorted in their written forms as well. All of that should have changed with the coming of Muhammad. He was considered to be the “seal of the prophets,” and what distinguishes him is the belief that his message, as recorded in the Qur’an, was perceived free from error or human interference. There is thus no need for any further prophets, and however much the message may have been obscured previously, it should now be clear and accessible to everyone. Nevertheless, clear revelation does not imply automatic acceptance of the revelation. Those who are committed to unbelief will not change their minds, no matter how strong the evidence may be. Those who do not recognize the truth will be kept from doing so by God. Although humans have a choice whether to obey Allah or not, the choice is not open-ended. It appears that God classifies each person into one of two groups: those who are believers and those who are his enemies. Allah refuses aid to his enemies and will make sure they remain deluded in their unbelief. It is important to draw a distinction with Christianity on this point, and that while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through Christ (Rom. 5:10). 6) Right and wrong are based on the teachings of the Qur’an, as amplified by the Hadith and interpreted by the schools of law, the shari’a. There is nothing left for us to do than to try our best to follow all of God’s commandments. There is no point in speculating on God’s will. Rather than search for God’s purposes, we should accept whatever he sends our way bila kayf, which means “without asking why.” Any statement of intent on our part should be accompanied by the phrase “inshallah” – “if – “if God wills.” In case there is ambiguity concerning how a particular Qur’anic command is interpreted, one can consult the hadiths, which are several collections of sayings and actions by Muhammad, as allegedly remembered by those who knew him well. Even though it is accepted practice the use the expression Hadith in the singular, there is no single authoritative collection, and the various components are of uneven authority. Consequently, there developed among Sunni Muslims four schools of Islamic Law that advocated different degrees of strictness in applying the rules of the Qur’an and their relationship to the Hadith. The obligations of a Muslim begin with the five pillars: to recite the confession, to pray five times a day, to fast during the month of Ramadan, to give the annual contribution for the poor, and to make the pilgrimage to Mecca at leaast once in a lifetime. But this is only the beginning as Muslim life is strictly regulated. There are three fundamental categories of actions: those that are directly commanded ( farad), farad), those that are permitted ( halal), halal), and those that are prohibited ( haram). haram). It is important to note that any violation of halal is haram and not to carry out the obligations of farad is also haram. When everything is riding on one’s actions, and when there is no assurance of
God’s indulgence, let alone any grace, avoiding the potentially negative consequences of any sin is bound to become the primary incentive for one’s actions rather than the positive motivation of keeping the rules out of gratitude. 7) History has significance in demonstrating the absolute sovereignty of God but, even more so, as the opportunity for people to demonstrate their submission to him. Human history is the world’s longest final exam, and the test starts right along with the lectures. On a less ultimate level, the goal of history is to subsume the entire world under the umma, the Islamic community, which is as much a political entity as a congregation of believers. Islam commands to set up Islamic governments, and it is never fully implemented unless there is an Islamic state. In this state no idolatry will be allowed but Jews and Christians will be tolerated so long as they pay the jizya, jizya, a compensation for living in a Muslim community without contributing to it. Many Muslims believe that prior to the last judgment, the Mahdi will appear. Some hold this person to be Christ, others do not. How history ends is not all that crucial considering that the all-important all-important last judgment follows immediately. 8) A devout Muslim is grateful to Allah for providing the opportunity to serve him and will strive to follow the divine instructions in even the smallest part of life. Such a devout believer will frequently express gratitude that Allah has provided the chance to enter Paradise. Muslims tend to find the idea of salvation by grace irresponsible, and even without a notion of original sin, they are sufficiently convinced of human sinfullness that they consider any chance at salvation at all to be a true act of mercy on God’s part. Still, Islam demands of the person nothing less than everything. The stardards for a truly acceptable life are high and become extremely detailed the more one seeks to implement them according to the Hadith. Nevertheless, gratitude and hope are not the same things as joy and grace. The weight of obligations and their consequences are too profound to induce automatic rejoicing. But what really makes the picture so poignant is that, all the compliance by a human notwithstanding, the will of Allah can always override all the good works a person may have accumulated. It is easy to believe that God has it in his power to forgive a person’s sins without the need for any atonement. This understanding of forgiveness, however, leaves open a frightening uncertainty, since we can never have any assurance about God’s verdict for each individual on the day of judgment. For example, the first two caliphs (who are considered exemplary in their lives) expressed feelings of terror on their deathbeds.
9.2 Folk Islam For virtually any religion, in addition to its various schools, denominations, and sects, it is possible to encounter a wide gulf between the “standard” version of the religion, which is the way it is being taught in the books and by its leaders, and the folk version of the religion, which is the way the religion is actually lived out on a day-to-day basis by the common people. Since Islam so heavily stresses the transcendence of God it stands out as a religion in which the gulf between the standard form and the folk version has become particularly wide. If a Muslim population is living in an area with another dominant religion, and it appears that this other religion meets needs the Islam does not, the result is often a syncretism in which the elements of the other religion are incorporated into Islamic practice. Sufism developed as a way of addressing the “hunger for the heart” for those who “longed for a faith that has reality for the individual.” Wahhabite Islam, the version practiced by the Taliban, was founded precisely to eliminate the practices of folk Islam. Folk Mulsims carry out the basic duties of the five pillars and observe other Islamic obligations, but their goal is not the worship of Allah for its own sake but rather to tap into the sources of power and blessing that Islam provides. Life is too large and complicated for individual humans to manage by themselves, and people always look for solutions that will provide immediate aid. For example, a common phenomenon is that people who have manifested a great amount of devotion during their lives may be venerated as saints, and those who admire them visit their tombs in order to say prays and receive special blessings. Additionally, practices of folk Islam are frequently geared toward spiritual protection from the malicious spirits (jinn), curses, or the “evil eye.” In fact, in some areas, this second aspect is so overwhelming that one could conclude that folk Islam is more animism than theism.
10. Pantheistic Monism: A Journey to the Far East We have discovered that our reason leads us from naturalism to nihilism, which is hard to transcend. Is it possible that we need not abandon naturalism but say that our reason cannot be trusted? Existentialism went part way down this route. Also, since the West has a history of quarrelling over “doctrines” then let us call a moratorium on quarelling and even distinguishing intellectually at all. Perhaps any usefull doctrine will do. Third, if all our activism to produce positive change and social betterment go unrewarded, or are even detrimental then lets stop doing and raise our quality of life by simply being.
The beginning of the modern western world’s interest in Eastern philosophy is the 1893 Parliament of World Religions and the rejection of middle class life and values in the 1960s. With its antirationalism, syncretism, quetism, lack of technology simple living, and its radically different religious framework, the East is attractive to some. Pantheistic monism underlies the Hindu Advaita Vedanta system of Shankara, the Transcendental Meditation of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, much of the Upanishads, and Hermann Hesse’s Siddhartha, which is a popular 1970s novel. Buddhism shares many key points but differs on ultimate reality. The description of Zen is that part of Buddhism most popular in the West. Hare Knishna also differs in the respect that it holds reality not to be monistic (that only one impersonal element constitutes reality) but rather ultimately personal.
10.1 Basic Eastern Pantheistic Monism each and every human being is the soul of the cosmos. cosmos. 1, 2, 3a) Atman is Brahman; that is, the soul of each Atman Atman (the (the essenc essence, e, the soul, of any person) person) is Brahma Brahman n (the (the essenc essence, e, the Soul of the whole cosmos). cosmos). Effectively, each person is God. But God must be defined in pantheistic terms: God is the one, infinite-impersonal, ultimate reality. That is, God is the cosmos. God is all that exists; nothing exists that is not God. If anything that is not God appears to exist, it is maya, illusion, and does not truly exist. It is not our separateness that gives us reality, it is our oneness, the fact that we are Brahman and Brahman is (the) One. Ultimate reality is beyond description; it just is. In fact, we cannot express in language the nature of this oneness. We can only “realize” it by becoming it, by seizing our unity, our “godhead,” and resting there beyond any distinction whatsoever. whatsoever. But the West is not used to this as the laws of thought deman distinction: A is A, but A is not non-A. To know reality is to distinguish one thing from another, label it, catalog it, recognize its subtle relation to other objects in the cosmos. In the East to “know” reality is to pass beyond distiction, to “realize” the oneness of all by being one with all. Not realizing our oneness leads to the second proposition. 1, 2, 3b) Some things are more one than others. This proposition is a way of saying that reality is a hierarchy of appearances. Some “things” are closer than others to being one with the One. The ladder is common: inorganic and organic matter, animals, and humans who are also hierarchical with the Perfect Master, the Enlightened One, the guru nearest to pure being. “Realizing” oneness implies consciousness but when one is one with the One, consciousness completely disappears as it is discared as useless through meditative techniques along with everything else. lead to the One. 1, 2, 3c) Many (if not all) roads lead Since ideas are not formally important, orientation to oneness is not so much a matter of doctrine but technique. Some suggest chanting a mantra, a seemingly meaningless Sanskrit word sometimes selected by a guru and given in secret to an initiate. Others recommend meditation on a mandala, a highly structured, often fascinatingly ornate and beautiful circular image, symbol of the totality of reality. Others require endless repetition of prayers or acts of obeisance. All of these intellectually contentless methods of mediation require quietness and solitude. One attempts to get on the vibe level with reality, to turn one’s soul to the harmony of the cosmos and ultimately to the one solid, nonharmonic, nondual, Ultimate vibration – Brahman, the One. To achieve this is the Eastern monistic way of achieving salvation. 1, 2, 3d) To realize one’s oneness with the cosmos is to pass beyond personality. Since Atman is Brahman and Brahman is impersonal then human beings in their essence are impersonal. This is diametrically opposed to theism because the chief characteristic of God and people is His and our personality. Person Personali ality ty means means an indivi individua duall has comple complexit xity y at the core core of his his or her being. being. Person Personali ality ty demand demandss selfselfconsciousness and self-determinancy. In pantheism the chief characteristic about God is Oneness, a sheer abstract, undifferentiated, nondual unity. For any of us to “realize” our being is for us to abandon our complex personhood and enter the undifferentiated undifferentiated One. According to the Mandukya Upanishad, Atrman has “four conditions”: waking life, dreaming life, deep sleep, and “the awakened life of pure consciousness.” Notice that the highest state is the state most approaching total oblivion, for one goes from the activity of ordinary life in the external world to the activity of dreaming to the nonactivity, nonconsciousness, nonconsciousness, of deep sleep and ends in a reversal of the first three, “pure consciousness.” “Pure consciousness” has nothing to do with the consciousness the western society is familiar with. “Pure consciousness” is sheer union with the One, pure being, and not “consciousness” at all, for that demands duality – a subject to be conscious and an object to be conscious of. Even self-consciousness demands duality in the self. This explains why Eastern thought often leads to inaction and quietism. individual, personal existence, but it changes changes nothing essential in an individual’s individual’s nature. 4) Death is the end of individual, Human death signals the end of an individual embodiment of Atman; it signals as well the end of a person. But the soul, Atman, is indestructible. No human being in the sense of individual person survives death. Atman survives but Atman is impersonal. When Atman is reincarnated it becomes another person. Eastern thought teaches the immortality of the soul but not the personal and individual immortality. But the personal is illusory so nothing of
value perishes; everything of value is eternal. This explains why life is cheap in the East. Individual embodiements of life are of no value. But in essence they are of infinite value; for in essence they are infinite.
5) To realize one’s oneness with the cosmos is to pass beyond knowledge. The principle of non-contradiction does not apply where the ultimate reality is concerned. From From the statemen statementt Atman Atman is Brahma Brahman, n, it also also follow followss that that human human beings beings in their their essenc essencee are are beyond beyond knowledge. Knowledge and language, like personality, demands duality – a knower and a known, speaker and listener, subject and predicate. Ergo, language cannot convey the truth about reality. This is why Eastern thought is nondoctrinal since no doctrine can be true in the sense that it could give the full and complete description of reality. Perhaps some can be more useful at bringing a subject to unity with the One, but then even a lie or a myth could be useful. But if there can be not true statement there can also be no lie. 6) To realize one’s oneness with the cosmos is to pass beyond good and evil; the cosmos is perfect at every moment. Karma is the notion that one’s present fate is the result of past action, especially in a former existence. This ties it to reincarnation, which follows from the general principle that nothing that is real (that is, no soul) ever passes out of existence. On its way back to the One, however, it goes through whatever series of illusory forms its past action requires. Karma is the Eastern version of reaping what you sow but there is no God to give forgiveness and so confession is of no avail. A person can choose his future acts; thus karma does not imply determinism or fatalism. This suggests a moral universe in which people should do the good. However, the basis for doing good is not so that it will be done or for the benefit of others. Karma demands that every soul suffers for its past “sins”, so there is no value in alleviating suffering. The soul so helped will have to suffer later. So there is no agape love, giving love, nor would any love benefit the recipent. One does good deeds in order to attain unity with the One and therefore doing good is first and foremost a self-helping way of life. Second, all actions are merely part of the whole world of illusion. The only “real” reality is ultimate reality, and that is beyond differentiation, beyond good and evil. Like true and false, the distinction between good and evil fades away. Everything is good is identical to nothing is good or everything is evil. 7) To realize one’s oneness with the One is to pass beyond time. Time is unreal. History is cyclical. History has no meaning where reality is concerned.In fact, our task as people who would realize their godhead is to transcend history. This helps to explain why Christians, who place great emphasis on history, find their presentation of the historical basis of Christianity almost entirely ignored in the East. In the East, yesterday’s facts are not meaningful in themselves. They do not bear on us today unless they have a here-and-now meaning; and if they have a here-and-now meaning, then their facticity as history is of no concern. The Eastern scriptures are filled with epigrams, parables, fables, stories, myths, songs, haiku, hymns, epics, but almost no history in the sense of events recorded because they took place in an unrepeatable space-time context. To be concerned with history would be to invert the whole hierarchy. The unique is not the real; only the absolute and all-encompassing is real. If history is valuable, it will be so as myth and myth only, for myth takes us out of particularity and lifts us to essence. Despite notable attempts of some, like D.T. Suzuki, to insist that Buddhism is not nihilistic, it will usually seem so to Western readers. Core commit commitmen ments ts among among indivi individua duall Easter Eastern n panthe pantheist istic ic monist monistss may vary vary widely widely,, but one consis consisten tent t 8) Core commit commitmen mentt is, by the eliminat elimination ion of desire desire,, to achiev achievee salvat salvation ion,, that that is, to realiz realizee one’s one’s union union with with pure pure consciousness, the One (Hinduism) or the Void (Buddhism). Hinduism and Buddhism both locate the problem with human beings in their separateness from the really real, the One or the Void. H Human uman beings live an illusory material existence in an illusory material world, desiring illusory goals. The result is suffering. To avoid suffering, one should eliminate this desire. Hinduism focuses on a variety of meditation practices. Buddhism presents an eightfold path: right view, right intention, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right consciousness.
10.2 The Buddhist Difference Both Hinduism and Buddhism emphasize the singularity of prime reality but there is a key difference. Advaita vedanta (nondualist Hinduism) holds that final reality is Brahman, the One. The One has, or better, is Being itself. From Brahman (the One) emanates the cosmos (the many). Buddhist monism holds that final reality is the Void. Final reality is nothing that can be named or grasped. To say that it is nothing is incorrect, but to say that it is something is equally incorrect. That would degrade its essence by reducing it to a thing among things. The Hindu One is still a thing among things, though it is the chief among things. The Void is not a thing at all. It is instead the origin of every thing.
This leads to a different understanding of human beings as well. For a Hindu, an individual person is a soul (Atman) and thus has substantial (spiritual, not material) reality because it is an emanation of Brahman (reality itself). In death an individual soul loses its bodily residence but is reincarnated in another individual – a sort of transmigration of the soul. For a Buddhist, an individual person is a not-soul. There is no namable nature at the core of each person. In fact, each person is an aggregate of previous persons. There is not so much the transmigration of the soul as the disappearance of a person at death and the reconstitution of another person from the five aggregates or “existence factors”: body, feeling, perception, mental formations, and consciousness. Religious practice, techniques of meditation, differ too. Hindus will commonly repeat a mantra, like Om, and thus induce a trance or trance-like state that is taken to be an ascent toward godhood. Buddhists may likewise repeat a mantra, but their goal is to reach a state of realizing their root in nonbeing – the nonentity of their “face before they were born.” In any case, the attempt is made to empty the mind of all analytical thought, for ultimate reality is not only nonbeing, it is also “no-mind,” that is, a mind that does not analyze does not analyse what it is grasping but grasps what is only as what it is.
10.3 East and West: A Problem in Communication Communication Cyclical history, paths that cross, doctrines that disagree, evil that is good, knowledge that is ignorance, time that is eternal, reality that is unreal: all these are the shifting, paradoxical, even contradictory masks that veil the One. If we point to its irrationality, Easterners reject reason as a category. If we point to the disappearance of morality, the Easterner scorns the duality that is required for the distinction. An understanding that the East and West operate on two very different sets of assumptions seems to be the starting point for any dialogue.
11. Postmodernism: The Vanished Horizon Over a hundred years after Nietzsche, the acknowledgement of the death of God finally reached the ears of man, thus beginning the era of postmodernism. Postmodernism is actually not “post” anything; it is the last move of the modern, the result of the modern taking its own commitments seriously. Two major intellectual shifts have occurred over the past centuries. From a ‘premodern’ concern for a just society based on revelation from a just God to a ‘modern’ attempt to use universal reason as the guide to justice to a ‘postmodern’ despair of any universal standard for justice. Our society now finds itself in an age afloat in a pluralism of perspectives, a plethora of philosophical possibilities, but with no dominant notion of where to go or how to get there. A near future of cultural anarchy seems inevitable. How does one define the indefinite? Top scholars have long debated and disagreed on the core of the theory without a centre. However, some common elements can be noted, namely “fragments, hybridity, relativism, play, parody, and camp.” Academic postmodernism is more a loosely structured constellation of ephemeral disciplines like cultural studies, gay and lesbian studies, science studies and post-colonial theory making it long on attitude and short on argument. The term is usually thought to have first arisen in architechture, as architects moved from unadorned, impersonal boxes of concrete, glass, and steel to complex shapes and forms drawing motifs from the past without regard to their original purpose or function. But the term became a key word in cultural analysis when French sociologist Jean-Francois Lyotard defined postmodernism as “incredulity towards narratives” and used the term to signal a shift in cultural legitimation. No longer is there a single story, a mettanarative, or worldview that ties the Western world together. It is not just that there have long been many stories, each of which gives its binding power to the social group that takes it as its own. But with postmodernism no single story can have more credibility than any other.
11.1 From Being to Knowing 1) The first question postmodernism addresses is not what is there or how we know what is there but how language functions to construct meaning itself. In other words, there has been a shift in “first things” from being to knowing to constructing meaning. In reflecting on this report’s own set of presuppositions, some have challenged the order of the seven questions. In particular, premodernity and especially theism puts being before knowing whereas naturalism puts knowing before being. This shift came with Descartes who thought he could doubt everything except his own thoughts. From this he argues that God necessarily exists and that reality is dual – matter and mind. Descartes championed the autonomy of human reason, freeing society from the ancients and giving way to intellectual progress on the basis that the human mind itself can come to know the truth. Nietzsche completed what Descartes started, as Nietzsche took doubt beyond Descartes, rejecting his certitude about the existence of the self. In other words, what if it is the thinking that creates the ‘I’ instead of the ‘I’ that
creates the thoughts? What if the activity of thinking does not require an agent but produces only the illusion of one? What if there is only thinking – a fluid flow of language without discernible origin, determinate meaning or direction. After Nietzsche no thoughtful person could secure easy confidence in the objectivity of human reason. But as Nietzsche pointed out in the parable of the madman, it takes a long time for ideas to sink into culture.
11.2 The Death of Truth and the Power of Language 2) The truth about the reality itself is forever hidden from us. All w e can do is tell stories. If we begin with the seemingly knowing self and follow the implications , we are left with a solitary self (solipism) and then not even that. Postmodernism holds that those who hang onto their own stories as if they were the master story, encompassing or explaining all other stories, are under an illusion. We can have meaning, for all these stories are more or less meaningful, but we cannot have truth. Nothing we can know can be checked against reality. Language is a human construct that we cannot determine the ‘truthfullness’ of, only its usefulness. Truth is whatever we can get others to agree to. If we can get them to use our language, then – like the stong poets – Moses, Jesus, Plato, Freud – our story is as true as any story will ever get. In short, there is only pragmatic truth, not truth of correspondencce. So in postmodernism there is a movement from the Christian ‘premodern’ notion of a revealed deter determin minate ate metana metanarr rrati ative ve to the moder modern n notion notion of the autonomy autonomy of human human reaso reason n with with access access to truth truth of correspondence to the postmodern notion that we create truth as we construct languages that serve our purposes, though these very languages deconstruct upon analysis. power. Any one narrative used as a meta-narrative meta-narrative is oppressive. 3) All narratives mask a play for power. If there is no truth of correspondence then there are only stories, that when believed, give the storyteller power over others. Several major postmodern theorists have taken up this angle, notably Michel Foucault. Any story but one’s own is oppressive. Since there is no way of knowing who’s story really is then all we have is our definitions which benefit some and not others. To reject oppression is to reject the stories that society tells us. Hence we can trace the transition from the premodern acceptance of the inspired metanarrative written by holy men of God to the ‘modern’ universal belief in reason yeilding truth to a ‘postmodern’ reduction of all metanarratives as power plays. 11.3 The Death of the Substantial Self and Being Good without God languages they construct about themselves. themselves. 4) Human Beings make themselves who they are by the languages We make ourselves by what we choose to do. For Nietzsche the only self worth living is the Ubermensch, the one who has risen above the conventional herd and has fashioned himself as a ‘man beyond man’. However few can do this as most of us have ourselves constructed by the conventional language of our age and society. So again there is a shift from the ‘premodern’ theistic notion that human beings are dignified by being created in the image of God to the ‘modern’ notion that human beings are the product of their DNA template which is the result of unplanned evolution to the ‘postmodern’ notion of an insubstantial self constructed constructed by the language it uses to describe itself. linguistic construct. Social good good is whatever society takes takes it to be. 5) Ethics, like knowledge, is a linguistic This is a postmodern version of an older cultural relativism that takes truth to be what we decide it is. Individual freedom freedom remains remains if the person agrees with how society draws its ethical ethical lines. Postmodernis Postmodernism m can make no normat normative ive judgem judgement ent;; it can only only observ observee and commen comment. t. So much much the worse by those those who find find themse themselve lvess oppressed by the majority.
11.4 The Panoramic Sweep of Postmodernism The value in literature resides not strictly within a text, but in a complex interaction between what a text says and what the reader wants and needs. This view takes literature not as ‘literature’ but as linguistics, politics, or an instrument of social change. In history there is a trend away from modern historicism ( that the meaning of events is to be found in their historical context) to a denial of the fixity of the past, of the reality of the past apart from what the historian chooses to make of it, and thus any objective truth about the past. Postmodern history does not use imaginati imagination on to re-create re-create for readers a sense sense of the past itself itself but creates creates a past in the image of the present present and in accord with the judgment of the historian. The move away from academic footnotes only exacerbates this situation. The content and context of history should be a generous series of methodologically reflexisive studies of the makings makings of the histories histories of postmoder postmodernity nity itself. Furthermore, Furthermore, scholars will become become reluctant reluctant to attempt attempt any thoroughgoing critique of the existing social order. In other words, history becomes reflection on histories of reflection.
11.5 Postmodernism: A Critique Some aspects of postmodernism seem useful, if not true (as per theism). First, postmodernism’s critique of the optimism of naturalism is often on target. Second, the postmodern recognition that language is closely associated with power is also apt. However, if we accept the radicial form this suspicion takes then we end up in a contradiction or at least an anomaly. If all linguistic utterances are power plays, then that utterance itself is a power play and no
more likely to be proper than any other. Third, attention to the social conditions under which we understand the world can alert us to our limited perspective as finite human beings. But a radical sociology of knowledge is also self-refuting. If we are only the product of nature and society then so is our view that we are only the product of nature and society. More critically, postmodernism’s rejection of all metanarratives is itself a metanarrative. Second, the idea that we have no access to reality and that we can only tell stories about it is self-referentially self-referentially incoherent. Put crudely, this idea can’t account for itself, for it tells us something that, on its own account, we can’t know. Third, deconstructive post postmo mode dern rnis ism’ m’ss view view of the the inde indete term rmin inac acy y of lang langua uage ge rais raises es the the ques questi tion on abou aboutt how how to unde unders rsta tand nd deconstruction’s own propositions. There is an unresolvable paradox in using language to claim that language cannot make unambiguous claims. Fourth, postmodernism’s critique of the autonomy and sufficiency of human reason rests on the autonomy and sufficiency of human reason. In short, the postmodernist is boxed into subjective awareness consisting of an ongoing set of mere language games.
12. The New Age: A Separate Universe Eastern mysticism provides a way out for those caught in the West’s nihilistic bind. However, it is foreign and even watered down versions require a radical reorientation from the West’s normal mode of grasping reality. Numerous writers have sought to propagate New Age ideals and integrate them into mainstream North American culture, including, Marilyn Ferguson, Shirely MacLaine, Carlos Castaneda, Jean Houston, Fritjof Capra, Deepak Chopra, Eckhart Tolle, Ken Wilber, and journals Body & Soul and Yoga Journal. Many New Age thinkers are expecting a ‘quantum leap forward’ and the introduction of a new man and a new age. Basing their hope on a non-theistic origins theory (i.e., evolution), they see humankind as evolving in stages towards higher states of consciousness and societies evolving in stages towards greater comprehensiveness and sophistication. New Agers read ancient religious texts or biographical accounts of those who claim to have made a breakthrough and wait for it to become more widespread. The use of psychedelic mind altering drug in the 1970s has given way to hope in a ‘techno-shamanism’ or ‘trans-humanism’ which is humanity transcending bio-physical barriers by escaping into the digital world. Some have turned to a variety of ‘holistic’ and alternative medicine to achieve optimum physical and spiritual health. Critics of this hope want assurance that the prophesised euphoric bliss is more than an opium pipe dream.
11.2 The Basic Tenets of the New Consciousness 1) Whatever the nature of being (idea or matter; energy or particle), the self is the kingpin – the prime reality. As human beings grow in their awareness and grasp this fact, the human race is on the verge of a radical change in human nature; even now we see harbingers of transformed humanity and prototypes of the New Age. New Age proponents don’t agree on what exactly this self is, be it an idea, spirit, ‘psycho-magnetic ‘psycho-magnetic field’, or the unity that binds the diversity of cosmic energy. But they do agree that the self - the consciousness-center of the human - is indeed the centre of the universe. And more than that, as the self is said to create and recreate the universe, pulling energy from the ‘void’ and establishing reality. If one is absolute supreme, the “I AM,” then it is obvious that self-deception is the weakness of the new consciousness. 2) The cosmos, while unified in the self, is manifested in two more dimensions: the visible universe, accessible through ordinary consciousness, and the invisible universe (or Mind at Large), accessible through altered states of consciousness. In the basic picture of the cosmos, then, the self (in the center) is surrounded first by the visible universe to which it has direct access through the five senses and which obeys the “laws of nature” discovered by natural science. The second realm is the invisible universe to which the self has access through such ‘doors of perception’ such as drugs, meditation, trance, biofeedback, acupuncture, ritualized dance, certain kinds of music, etc. Human groups are viewed ‘societies of island universes’ and while distinct each universe (i.e. each self) is similar enough to other universes to be able to communicate. As each self is the universe, the self is not capable of perceiving or remembering all that has happened. Thus, comprehension of the universe is possible because the brain acts as a reducing valve by filtering out what is not important. New Agers hold to the uniformity of cause and effect but preach that the universe is open to reordering by the self, especially if one realizes its oneness with the One. However, the invisible, Mind at Large, cosmic God consciousness does not obey the laws as time becomes elastic, and energy and power become available. It takes time, we are told, for the self to realize that it has made up the rules of reality. But when one does, one can go on to generate whatever reality one desires.
Of those who have altered their state of consciousness and connected with the other reality, a change in luminosity is often reported. For some, Mind at Large is not a separate reality but ordinary reality as it really is. A second distinctive characteristic is that this realm is populated by many beings, be it persons in past lives, or ‘helper’, ‘guardian’, spirits of various sorts. 3) The core experience of the New Age is cosmic consciousness, in which ordinary categories of space, time and morality tend to disappear. Underlying this proposition is the notion that seeing is believing: that is, anything that the self sees, perceives, conceives, imagines, or believes exists. The New Age offers a radical and simple resolution to the problem of distinguishing between appearance and reality: by flatly denying the distinction. Perception takes two forms, first one for the ordinary universe which is known as waking consciousness or “straight thinking.” The second is actually composed of multiple states of consciousness, some say three, others six. Central to cosmic consciousness is the unitary experience: first, the experience of perceiving the wholeness of the cosmos; second, the experience of becoming one with the whole cosmos; and finally, the experience of going beyond even that oneness with the cosmos to recognize that the self is the generator of all reality and in that sense is both the cosmos and its maker. It is important to note that not every altered state of consciousness is an euphoric experience. Some report bouts with demons, feelings of the overbearing weight of the judgment seat, and visions of the lows of hell. When traversing in an unknown area, New Age proponents recommend a guide, at least during the early attempts. This highlights a contradiction since if one is capable of creating what it wishes then why the nightmarish visions? And why would God need a guide? Not all proponents of the new consciousness agree that the category of morality disappears but it must if there are no metaphysical distinctions. Nevertheless, they agree that it is better to ‘love’ than to ‘hate’ and better to help usher in the new age than to just watch the old collapse. 4) Physical death is not the end of the self; under the experience of cosmic consciousness, the fear of death is removed. New Age proponents claim that humans are a unity beyond the body. The reason for this is that if one ‘knows’ that one is the be all maker of the universe and that one’s consciousness is more than a physical manifestation, then there is no need to fear death. This is repeatedly confirmed by altered states of cosmic consciousness such as through near death or out of body experiences, past-life recall, which can be triggered by acupuncture and spiritism, or from LSD trips. Three distinct distinct attitudes attitudes are taken taken to the metaphysic metaphysical al question question of the nature of reality reality under the general 5) Three framework of the New Age: (1) the occult version, in which the beings and things perceived in states of altered consciousness exist apart from the self that is conscious, (2) the psychedelic version, in which these things and beings are projections of the conscious self, and (3) the conceptual relativist version, in which the cosmic consciousness is the conscious activity of a mind using one of many non-ordinary models of reality, none of which is any “truer” than any other. There is no use denying that some people have had strange experiences. If a person reports a strange experience, he or she could be lying, misremembering, or embellishing but we could not critique the account except on a priori basis, that is, if it is self-contradictory self-contradictory or doesn’t hold under cross examination. Each person with an altered state has unique experiences but they are analogous in some ways, for example, with light, timeless, beings, etc. The first answer, deriving from paganism, suggests that cosmic consciousness lets one see, react to, receive power from and perhaps begin to control the spiritual beings that reside in the other dimension. On the one hand this presents a contradiction because if the self is the sole maker of the universe then who are these beings? On the other hand, one may be the maker if one can wrest power from the beings for one’s own use. Either way, occult bondage is a frequent problem, even for those who dabble in this area with a level of expertise. The second answer points to the origin of reality in the psyche of the person who experiences it. This view is more consistent with the first proposition as one does not so much open doors of perception but creates a new reality to perceive. If one’s self is the creator of the vision, then heaven and hell are merely inner constructs. The third answer holds to a radical distinction between objective reality and perceived reality. It is as if our manner of perception is deeply influenced by our environment and symbol systems. Boring from postmodernism, the Benjamin Whorf hypothesis states that “the structure of the language one habitually uses influences the manner in which which one unders understa tands nds his his enviro environme nment. nt. The pictur picturee of the universe universe shifts shifts from from tongue tongue to tongue tongue.” .” The conceptual relativist version of the new consciousness worldview allows people to substitute one symbol system for another, that is, one vision of reality for another. The only category left to determine between symbol systems is by considering which one allows us what we want. 6) Human beings can understand reality because in a state of God-consciousness they directly perceive it. Nonetheless, when New Age teachers present present this view to others, they often often cite the authority of ancient ancient Scriptures and other religious teachers. The New Age knowledge of direct reality is not mediated by rational argument or any external authority. Rather, the experience is the source and authority for the knowledge. Most people, however, do not have a direct
knowledge of their own divinity but need to be convinced of it through various methods, such as meditation. But to think that one is God or can become a god is the primal sin of pride. 7) History as a record of events that actually occurred in the past is of little interest, but cosmic history w hich ends with the deification of humanity, especially the individual human self, is seen as a great vision and a great hope. New Age proponents do not hesitate to consider accounts of experience from throughout human history. But they are more interested in the ‘experience’ induced by these events than with the significance of these events themselves. The overall pattern of history is of considerable interest, as this impacts the human experience. First there was the general evolutionary development of the cosmos, the formation of the earth and first organic matter, leading to the development of higher life forms, including humanity, which now waits on the edge of a transition into a … new age: the arrival of a new man and a new women. 8) New Agers are committed to realizing their own individual unity with the cosmos, creating and recreating it in their own image. By no means would all who refer to themselves as a part of the New Age would imitate Shirley MacLaine as she runs up a California beach shouting, “I am God. I am God!” But behind the specific beliefs and practices of fully New Age individuals is the hope held by each of them that each one is in the center of reality even though they have not yet achieved a fully cosmic consciousness. Their commitment is to reach this goal.
12.5 Cracks in the New Consciousness The first major problem with the New Age worldview is shared with naturalism and pantheistic monism, that is, of a closed universe. The problems with the absence of a transcendent God are many, including the absence of ethical distinctions, as discussed previously. The second problem is the host of demigods from another reality or projections of the psyche. Either way, they must be placated with ritual incantations or meditation or drugs. But as the Bible attests, we have no power over the occult realm except through Jesus Christ. The third major difficulty with the new consciousness is its understanding of the nature of reality and of truth. The New Age is incredibly syncretistic as it accepting as equal the languages and systems of many descriptions of realit reality. y. Theref Therefore ore,, there there is no truth truth of corre correspo sponde ndence nce,, only only a patter pattern n of inner inner cohere coherence nce.. This This is actua actually lly epistemological nihilism because it says that one cannot know what actually is but only what one experiences. The flip side is that the self is god, maker of his own reality. But what meaning is there if one is all that exists?
Postscript First of all, I would like to thank J. Sire, and others, because I find thinking in worldviews helpful since by doing so we can compress every philosophy alternative to Christian theism into a finite number of categories that more or less fit together on a single spectrum. However, I am beginning to form my own ideas on how I would develop a system of worldviews. First, I suspect that certain very fundamental beliefs, like of a triune-creator-God, logically deduce to only one possible conclusion. If we were to fully understand just a few basic Scripture verses then we could develop the full Gospel, of course with its help. This idea is discussed below as how I would descibe all worldviews as an answer to one question, instead of eight. Also, this means that those religions or worldviews that claim to hold to some fundamental aspect but not its logical conclusion (ie salvation by faith) have an inconsistency. I suspect that in such cases the fundamental belief is held to so that it can be twisted solely to produce a different conclusion. Such worldviews would not be partially true but entirely false because some erroreous belief is most prefered and allowed to override (reinterpret) a correct and more fundamental belief. It seems that it is human nature to desire to know God before we do know Him. We follow, or attempt to follow, His commands before we know them personally because they are written on our hearts and on our conscience. However, some people do not prefer the ways of the Lord.... why...what does this mean? This is an important aspect of the ‘Christian worldview.’ There is something that we intrinsically prefer, that we choose or deny, value and give priority. It is possible that this fundamental orientation of the heart, mindset, committment, basic preferance, is what we are driven by to seek and accept the Lord or reject His offering. It is more than a misunderstanding of the Gospel and a hatred for ‘religion’ that keeps people from Christ. Either the Gospel is a sweet fragrance for those who seek Him or it is foolishness....why? Why do people react differently to the Gospel? Is it that prior seeds have been planted in them, or their upbringing and personal experiences, or socio-economic environment? No. I suspect it is because of a very natural willingness to be positive and to prefer good & truth over evil and subjectiveness. It has to do with the heart.... the heart. Sire states (Universe, 5 th ed., pg. 10) that Naugle has introduced a link between the concept of worldview and what many books of the Bible refer to as ‘heart.’ But what I am suggesting is that there is an orientation of the heart that preceedes our adoption of the Christian worldview, for those who do. Now I don’t want to begin to discuss predetermination and free will before I am capable of doing so. However I would like to point out that Romans 9 discusses God creating people for different purposes. But even so these verses, I think, do not refer to their salvation and so the question why people react differently to the Gospel may still remain. 14 What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid. 15 For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. 16 So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy. 17 For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth. 18 Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, mercy, and whom he will he 19 hardeneth. Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will? 20 Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it , Why hast thou made me thus? 21 Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour? 22 What if What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction: 23 And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory, 24 Even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles? (Romans 9:14-24 KJV) There is another related issue I’d like to discuss. That is if one does reject Christ as his or her saviour then they are doing so not by accepting, or keeping with any of the eight main alternative worldviews, say, naturalism or paganism, but rather they do so by acquiescing nothing less than worship of themself and Satan. Now many nonChristians don’t consider themselves to being doing this but ultimately it is so since at the end of life there is only heaven or hell and eternity with God or a lonely eternity with the devil. Obviously this is thoroughly Christian but I am making two agruments here: 1) that there is an additional worldview not mentioned in Sire’s books. 2) that there are ultimately only two worldviews. Currently, I can identify two varieties of this additional worldview, which is effectively satanism, that is extreme beyond the new age. First there is entry level satanism, or luciferianism, luciferianism, which considers the serpent to have
been wrongly cursed in the Garden as, they believe, the devil was only trying to free humanity from the suffocating grip of Yahweh. As a result such people have a very twisted, overly pragmatic, and indifferent ethical views. The other is hardcore black theistic satanism that recognizes the sovereign authority and personal character of the Creator but without worship of Him and instead worship and sacrifice is directed to Satan and his anti-christ. Filled with delusion and rage, such people refuse to serve the Lord and would rather take up war against Him and His people, possibly in spite of knowing they will loose. It is a good thing to be able to take all possible perspectives and condense them into a ten worldviews. But can we go further and categorize these worldviews into just two? I propose that all worldviews should be lined up on the question asked by Jesus to Peter “who do you say I am?” (Matt 16:15). If we say that Jesus, the Son of man, is “the Christ, the Son of the living God” then we essentially have the Gospel and more elements follow producing Christian theism. If we do not say that Jesus Christ is the 2 nd person of the God-head and the promised messiah, the only mediator between God and man, then there are numerous ways to answer this question. All of this questions’s negative answers can be divided and developed into worldviews, some being close and some far from what is traditionally, biblically, Christian. As such, if this could be possible (and dare I say useful) then we have effectively classified all thought as either that which conforms to the truth (Jn. 14:6) and which is built upon the only sure bedrock (Matt. 16:18) and that which does not, in all the myriad ways of man’s speculation that it could possibly do so. Moreover, and linking back to the above agrument, since denying Christ would essentially be worship of self and Satan, we are ultimately faced with only two alternatives: good and evil. Based around this one question with essentially only two answers is how I would develop a system of worldviews. And this is how I would interpret “seeing the world in a grain of sand” (W. Blake, Auguries of Innocence, 1805). This view, I think, is in concord with all of the Bible, but especially the ceation and fall. In Genesis 3 the “very good” work of God was corrupted, not by a plurality of religions, but by a slight ignorance of Word of God (as Eve added to what God had said) influenced by Satan himself and thereby resulting in human sin and separation from God. It is possible that by being created in the image of God we have an innate longing for Him, like an infant who’s face brightens up when his mother appears and saddens when she leaves momentarily. As discussed earlier, there seems to be a fundamenta fundamentall orientat orientation ion of the heart preceeding preceeding our recognition recognition of our worldview. worldview. An eternal eternal committment not towards a particular religion or set of beliefs but rather towards either God and goodness or evil. I wonder and hope it is possible to rightly divide all theology, philosophy, and comparative religion upon one significant question, as described, and thereby simplfy even further our systems of thought and making even more obvious the glory of God.
Annotated Bibliography On Worldviews Sire, J.W., The Universe Next Door: A Basic Worldview Catalog, Catalog , 5th ed. (InterVarsity Press, 2009). This book helped to convince me of Christianity. Sire, J. W., Naming W., Naming the Elephant: Worldview Worldview as a Concept (InterVarsity Concept (InterVarsity Press, 2004). This book unpacks each specific characteristic characteristic of Sire’s definition of the worldview. Sire, J.W., Why Should Anyone Believe Anything at All? (InterVarsity Press, 1994). In this book Sire talks at length about why one should choose one worldview over another. Naugle, D., Worldview: The History of a Concept (Eerdmans, 2002). Naugle gives an extended description of the biblical concept of the heart and his identification of it with the worldview concept spawned the 4 th edition of Sire’s Universe Next Door. Door . It also surveys the origin , development, and various versions of the concept from Immanuel Kant to Arthur Holmes and beyond, and presents his own definition of the Christian worldview. Marshall, Griffioen, and Mouw eds., Stained Glass: Worldviews and Social Science (Univ. Press of America, 1989). A helpful collection of essays, especially by J.H. Olthuis, “On Worldviews.” Every expression of a worldview, it is claimed, claimed, is deeply deeply imbedded imbedded in the flow of history and the varying characteri characteristics stics of language. language. Each expression of any general worldview bears the marks of the culture out of which it comes and is therefore not absolute or ahistorical. Therefore, each formulation of each worldview must be considered on its own merits, of course. But for each of the worldviews Sire weighed and found wanting he knows of no formulation that does not contain problems of inconsistency (p.282, 5 th.) Comparative Religion Smart, N., Worldviews: Crosscultural Explorations of Human Beliefs , 3rd ed. (Prentice Hall, 2000). For a phenomenological and comparative religion approach. Burnett, D., Clash of Worlds (Monarch Books, 2002). Has a focus on religious worldviews. Corduan, W., Neighboring W., Neighboring Faiths: A Christian Christian Introduction to World Religions Religions (InterVarsity Press, 1998). Neill, S., Christian Faith and Other Faiths (InterVarsity Press, 1984). The above two books survey and evaluate several world religions. Christianity The following recently published books offer decent expositions of the Christian worldview: Holmes, A.F., Contours of a Christian Worldview (Eerdmans, 1983); The Making of a Christian Mind (InterVarsity Press, 1985). Phillips, G.W. & Brown, W.E., Making W.E., Making Sense of Your World World from a Biblical Viewpoint (Moody Viewpoint (Moody Press, 1991). Walsh, B. & Middleton, R., The Transforming Vision: Shaping a Christian World View (InterVarsity (InterVarsity Press, 1984); The Truth is Stranger Than It Used to Be (InterVarsity (InterVarsity Press, 1995). Sire, J.W., Discipleship J.W., Discipleship of the Mind Mind (InterVarsity (InterVarsity Press, 1990). Pearcey, N., Total Truth: Liberating Christianity from Its Cultural Captivity (Crossway, 2004). Bertrand, M.J., (Re)thinking Worldview: Learning to Think, Live and Speak in This World (Crossway, 2007). Kraft, C.H., Worldview for Christian Witness (William Carey Library Publishers, 2008). Hiebert, P.G., Transforming Worldviews: An Anthropological Understanding of How People Change (Baker, 2008). The following books offer a consideration of the theistic concept of God from the standpoint of academic philosophy: Gilson, E., God and Philosophy (Yale University Press, 1941). Mascall, E.L., He E.L., He Who Is: A Study in Traditional Theism Theism (Libra, 1943). Owen, H.P., Concepts of Deity (Macmillan, 1971). The following books discuss a variety of metaphysical and philosophical theological issues: Hasker, W., Metaphysics W., Metaphysics (InterVarsity Press, 1983). Evans, S.C., Philosophy S.C., Philosophy of Religion Religion (InterVarsity Press, 1985). Morris, T.V., Our Idea of God (InterVarsity Press, 1991). Moreland, J.P. & Craig, W.L., Philosophical W.L., Philosophical Foundations Foundations for a Christian Worldview Worldview (InterVarsity (InterVarsity Press, 2003). For a more extended treatments of epistemology from a Christian perspective, see: Holmes, A.F., All A.F., All Truth is God’s Truth (InterVarsity Press, 1977). Wood, W.J., Epistemology: W.J., Epistemology: Becoming Intellectually Intellectually Virtuous (InterVarsity (InterVarsity Press, 1998).
For an extended analysis of the problem of evil, see: Kreeft, P., Making P., Making Sense out of Suffering Suffering (Servant, 1986). Blocher, H., Evil H., Evil and the Cross (InterVarsity (InterVarsity Press, 1994). Wenham, J. The Enigma of Evil (Zondervan, 1985). Schaeffer, F.A., Genesis in Space and Time (InterVarsity Press, 1972). Lewis, C.S., Mere C.S., Mere Christianity Christianity . The opening argument of Lewis’s book is on the universality of the notion of good and evil. Christianity and Science: Lewis, C.S., Miracles C.S., Miracles (Fontana, 1960). This book contains an excellent description of what an open universe involves. Ratzsch, D., Science and Its Limits (InterVarsity Press, 2000). Pearcey, N.R. & Thaxton, C., The Soul of Science: Christian Faith and Natural Philosophy (Crossway, 1994). These books are helpful to understand the Christian understanding of science. Bube, R., Putting R., Putting It All Together: Together: Seven Patterns for Relating Relating Science and the Christian Faith Faith (University Press of America, 1995). Jaki, S., Chance or Reality and Other Essays (University Press of America, 1986). Plantinga, A., Warrant and Proper Function (Oxford, 1993). This book rejects Darwin’s idea that the mind developed by chance and natural selection. Deism Hill, J., Faith J., Faith in the Age of Reason (InterVarsity (InterVarsity Press, 2004). Taylor, C., A C., A Secular Age (Belknap, 2007). These books detail the transition from theism to deism and beyond. Bloom, A., The Closing of the Am erican Mind (Simon & Schuster, 1987). This book argues for basing our values on more than commitment and decision. Islam Bavinck, J.H., The Church Between Temple and Mosque (Eerdmans, 1981). For an approach to worldview analysis with an even more individual and personal focus. Chapman, C., The Cross and the Crescent: Responding to the Challenge of Islam (InterVarsity Press, 2003). Haneef, S., What Everyone Should Know About Islam and Muslims (Kazi Publications, 1979). Moucarry, C., The Prophet and the Messiah: An Arab Christian’s Perspective on Islam and Christianity (InterVarsity Press, 2001). These books take up the challenge of dealing more intently with the spcific details of each worldview – where possible internal inconsistencies are, the differing conception of the nature and character of Allah and God, the historical evidence for the nature and character of Jesus and Mohammad, and the reasons for the authority afforded their two foundational scriptures (the Bible and the Qur’an). Eastern Religion Guinness, O., The Dust of Death (Crossway, 1994). Includes a Christian critique of the Western trend towards the East. Postmodernism The following are presentations and critiques of the postmodern worldview: Best, S. & Kellner, D., Postmodern D., Postmodern Theory (Guilford, 1991). Connor, S., Postmodernist S., Postmodernist Culture (Blackwell, 1989). Burnham, F.B., Postmodern F.B., Postmodern Theology: Christian Christian Faith in a Pluralist World World (Harper San Fransico, 1989). Borgmann, A., Crossing the Postmodern Divide (University of Chicago Press, 1992). Toulmin, S., Cosmopolis: The Hidden Agenda of Modernity (Free Press, 1990). The following are introductions to recent literary theory: Lundin, R., The Culture of Interpretation (Eerdmans, 1993). Stevens, B.K. & Stewart, L.L., A L.L., A Guide to Literary Criticism Criticism and Research, Research , 3rd ed. (Harcourt Brace College, 1996). Walhout, C. & Ryken, L., Contemporary Literary Theory: A Christian Appraisal (Eerdmans, 1991). Mitchell, W.J.T., Against W.J.T., Against Theory (University of Chicago Press, 1985). The journals The Christian Scholar’s Review and Christianity and Literature .
New Age Groothuis, D.R., Unmasking the New Age (InterVarsity Press, 1986); Confronting the New Age (InterVarsity Press, 1988); Jesus in an Age of Controversy (Harvest House, 1996). These books contribute to a clearer and more comphrensive definition of the New Age worldview. The later deals with the New Age concept of Jesus. Herrick, J.A., The Making of the New Spirituality (InterVarsity (InterVarsity Press, 2003). Raschke, Raschke, C.A., The Interr Interrupt uption ion of Eterni Eternity: ty: Modern Modern Gnosti Gnosticis cism m and the Origi Origins ns of the New Religi Religious ous Consciousness (Nelson-Hall, 1980). Herrick’s book argues that the roots of the New Age movement originate in ancient Gnosticism and can be seen in subsequent stages of Western civilization and emerging into a ‘new religious synthesis.’
God Loves You For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life (John 3:16).
All Are Sinners Sinners For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23). As it is written, “There is none righteous, not even one” (Romans 3:10).
Jesus Christ: God’s Remedy for Sin For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord (Romans 6:23).
But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name (John 1:12). For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures (1 Corinthians 15:34).
Our Response If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9). Whoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved (Romans 10:13).
Assurance As As a Believer That if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved (Romans 10:9). Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death and into life (John 5:24). But these have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing you may have life in His name (John 20:31).
Next Steps Straightening up, Jesus said to her, “Woman, where are they? Did no one condemn you?” She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said, I do not condemn you either. Go, and sin no more (John 8:10-11).
But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ (2 Pet. 3:18).
