Mere Stoicism

Yes, the title to this post borrows from the title of C.S. Lewis' collection of broadcasts made by him in his capacity as chief Christian apologist after the death of G.K. Chesterton (or so I think).  Unlike Chesterton, Lewis was more smug than clever, a characteristic of apologists throughout history, but one which Chesterton managed to control.  Chesterton also managed to defend Christianity without creating an elaborate fantasy world, which strikes me as a more effective approach if one is inclined to defend a religion or belief system which clearly must be defended, or else there would be no apologists.  A religion which produces apologists must be questionable by nature, but appears especially questionable if its apologists must defend it by resort to fantasies.

I don't think Stoicism requires apologists, and don't intend to be one.  That's not what this post is about.  It's meant to explore the limits of Stoicism or what it must be to have no limits, if that's possible.

The limits I refer to relate to its effectiveness in achieving tranquility, and in avoiding sadness or despair.  I sometimes am inclined to think there are limits and that they're unavoidable, particularly with respect to what has taken place.  In other words, I wonder whether the maxims of Stoicism, which are so sensible and seemingly effective in relating to the here and now and anticipating the future, suffice to provide solace regarding the unending, irrevocable past.

The past would seem to be necessarily a matter beyond our control, and therefore nothing to be disturbed by according to Stoicism, and particularly according to Epictetus.  To the extent what took place in the past has consequences now, Stoicism serves to address those consequences, and thought and conduct may serve to diminish their effects.  One might remedy what took place in the past in that manner and in that sense, and one may, with effort, not allow the effects of past actions in the present to be unduly disturbing.  

That's to consider past actions.  What, though, about past omissions, and specifically those omissions which result in one having missed an opportunity, being unable to do what one desperately wants to do or have a life which one longs for now?  The disturbance and despair one feels in that case, especially in highly personal and subjective human matters such as love and happiness, can be painful in the extreme.  It can find expression in our dreams or in sudden encounters with things or persons we know from the past and are unavoidable.  You don't see them coming.

Regret is futile, of course.  There's nothing more futile.  As a result, it should be avoidable.  But how do we avoid what cannot be avoided because it can't be altered, and when what could have been cannot be?  There's nothing to fix.  Nothing can be made better.  Mistakes can't be "made good."

Perhaps the power of regret lies in the fact that nobody else is responsible for what took place, and what didn't take place.  It's easier to ignore or discount things beyond your control when you didn't cause them to be.  It's difficult to be indifferent to yourself, to your own acts, failure to act, or your own thoughts and feelings.

Chess Play and Obsession

The success and popularity of the Netflix "limited series" The Queen's Gambit reminds me of the surge in interest in the game which took place when Bobby Fischer won the world championship in 1972.  I was a high school team player at that time, and the interest of others in the game was a subject of some fascination to me.  The match between Fischer and Spassky was, incredibly, broadcast live courtesy of public television, with commentary by Shelby Lyman.  I watched that broadcast and, more significantly, others did as well.  The popularity of the match and the game which resulted astonished me.

Chess players--serious chess players, in any case--have been and always are fascinated by the game; one might almost say addicted to it or obsessed with it.  It's necessary to devote a significant amount of time to it to play well, and the amount of time it's necessary to devote to it increases the more one plays and the better one gets, as does the quality of your opponent.  At the highest level, chess is life, as Fischer once said--for him it was in particular, it seems.  It's unclear he had any life apart from it.

Fortunately or unfortunately, I've never reached the highest or indeed the higher levels of play.  I played a great deal in high school, studied the game, and was successful particularly in the last year I participated in scholastic play.  Then I stopped playing, only to begin playing once more much later in life.  I'm now a club player, but haven't been in a tournament in many years.

The star of the Netflix series is addicted to drugs and alcohol, and the implication is her remarkable talent as a chess player is in some manner associated with those addictions and may itself be a kind of addiction.  I think there's something to that.  Chess has long been associated with intelligence.  One derives pleasure from being thought intelligent, and being thought more intelligent than those one defeats at chess.  Pleasure is also felt when winning, and winning at chess is thought to be the result of the fact the winner's intelligence is greater than that of the defeated.  The winner of a chess match is perceived as intellectually superior to his/her opponent.  Fischer used to say that he felt joy in crushing the will of his opponents, or something to that effect.  Such a feeling may well be sought eagerly and would be intense enough to give rise to something like addiction.  

Chess has also been associated with insanity.  Fischer, unfortunately, is a case in point.  The great 19th century player Paul Morphy apparently went mad.  G.K. Chesterton noted that reason, or excessive reasoning, can cause insanity, and pointed to chess players in support of this claim.   Chess has also been associated with evil geniuses.  Intellectual villains are sometime portrayed as being avid players of the game. There seems to be something of the game that attracts and repels us.  It's attractive as an exercise in skill, but we seem troubled by the display of great skill when it is confined to chess play.  We're moralists to an extent.  We think great ability of this kind should be applied to something more wholesome, and of greater benefit to people and the world.  There's something strange and dubious about great chess players.

I have no idea what it is about me that attracts me to the game.  But I think that to be a serious player one must at least have a fairly sizable ego, an ability to focus intensely and an ability to perceive combinations available in a position.  I have those characteristics, to a certain extent.  But a great player must have them to an extraordinary degree.  The ability to focus on the game alone, and nothing else, strikes me as especially important to success over the board.  Fischer, as I noted, said that chess is life, and the lead in the Netflix series says something similar.  I think it was that the chess board is itself a world, and most importantly one that she could control.  Being an orphan and subject to the whims of so many others, it's understandable she would seek out and master a world less cluttered and subject to strict rules. For a great chess player, chess is all-consuming.  Like an addiction to drugs and alcohol, I would think.

"A beautiful game, except for the players"  So says one of the characters in The Bishop Murder Case, one of the works of S.S. Van Dine involving the "detective" Philo Vance, when referring to chess.  The suspects in that book are a chess master and theoretical physicists, one of whom is disabled and fond of children's games.  Strange, unnatural, dangerous people, capable of atrocities. 

A beautiful game nonetheless, though. 

The Pathos of the Apologist

I read yesterday a book, apparently a classic of Christian Apologetics, entitled Your God is too Small:  A Guide for Believers and Skeptics, by J.B. Phillips.  It is an easy read.  It leads me to ponder the pathos of the apologist.  It seems to me that apologists, especially those who defend religion or, more generally, the belief in God, always disappoint when sincere.

It's better to disappoint than induce contempt or, at best, amusement.  Dr. Strangelove was delightfully amusing in his defense of his plan to use mines to protect the rich and powerful from the Doomsday Machine and repopulate the world, or at least the American part of it.  The religious apologist in defense of religion is never, never amusing.  In my experience, though, the religious apologist is sad.

A lawyer is familiar enough with special pleading.  In a sense, it is what lawyers do.  So, I think I know it when I see it.  I see it in Phillips' book, alas, and have seen it in the books of others like C.S. Lewis and Chesterton.  I moves me to wonder why such books are written.

Phillips, in what I think is a fairly perfunctory fashion, first describes and criticizes views of God which he feels are "too small" and therefore out of place in the modern world (the book was written in 1952).  He does so by the way of acknowledging, also I think in a perfunctory fashion, the problems with views held by certain, and it seems too many, Christians.   God viewed as "resident policeman" for example.  God as a revered, but very old and therefore old fashioned, gentleman.  These and other views he claims very naturally lead modern men and women to think Christianity to be out of touch with modern reality, and especially the discoveries of modern science.

He also maintains, however, that those who think of the God of the immense universe as necessarily detached from we humans and our concerns also view God as "too small."   According to Phillips, that's because we think God incapable of having a personal interest in us, something we shouldn't do of the Supreme Being.  He claims those who think God impersonal think of God merely as a great and powerful human, a kind of "managing director" too busy with other matters to pay attention to us as he naturally does by virtue of what he really is, a Father.

Well, I don't think that works.  I think it fairly evident that those who think God impersonal, at least in comparison with the exceedingly personal God of Christianity don't feel God is incapable of loving us in the manner we humans understand love because God is too busy.  Instead, I think that they do so because such a God isn't human.
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Be that as it may, having decried various views of God, even some Christian views, as "too small" Phillips then proceeds to tell us why only Christianity provides the means by which we escape the view of God as "too small."

He does so in a way I find interesting.  To a certain extent, he uses C.S. Lewis' idea that Jesus must have been God because he said he was God.  The argument is something like this:  Jesus was not a lunatic; only a lunatic would say he was God if he wasn't God; Jesus said he was God; therefore, Jesus was God.

The logic of it aside, a problem with this view is that the only evidence Jesus said he was God appears in a Gospel written decades after his death, while the other Gospel's do not claim he said he was God.  It's extremely likely that if he said he was God, this would be mentioned in the other Gospels.  The fact it isn't makes one wonder if he ever said what the Gospel of John claims.  In any case, one can't simply assume he ever said such a thing.  It's not a very solid foundation for an argument.

In writing this Phillips is merely repeating the argument of Lewis, though.  Most striking is his argument that (and now I paraphrase) if you really believe Jesus is God, you'll accept that he is God; you'll even know he's God in the sense that it will make perfect sense to you that he's God, and, well, that's as good as it gets when it comes to showing God exists.

There's other stuff in the book as well.  That the God of the universe had to become human in order to show us the way, etc., and this reconciles the impersonal God with the personal God.  Where do we get our conceptions of Beauty, Truth, Goodness than from God (well, I would say more than likely from interacting with the rest of the world and others than from somewhere or some being existing outside of time and space--whatever than means).  I confess I grew impatient.

Again, why bother?  I can understand that a believer would grow frustrated and angry at the assaults of the angry non-believers.  I suppose it's natural to defend what you believe in.  But I very much doubt that apologists convince anyone, and think that apologetics is simply "preaching to the choir."  If the arguments I've seen are representative, they aren't persuasive.  So, to believers and non-believers I say--believe, or don't believe, and be content, but most of all be silent.  That's my guide to believers and skeptics.

Great Pan Is Not Dead



According to Plutarch "Great Pan is Dead!" are the words uttered in a loud voice (sometimes called a "divine voice") heard by the sailor Thamus on his way--by boat one would assume--to Italy while travelling there during the reign of the Emperor Tiberius.  The extremely fat and inordinately glib Christian apologist G.K. Chesterton, who could be a witty fellow though over-fond of quips, thought Pan to be the only pagan god said to have died, and thought his death somehow connected with the death, or perhaps the birth, of Jesus.

I'm not sure if it mattered all that much for Chesterton's purposes, but I suspect the birth of Jesus somehow precipitated the death of Pan.  I think a case can be made that it did, though it took quite some time to do Pan in.  This had something to do with the birth of theology, according to Chesterton.

Others, such as Robert Graves, thought the story the result of some confusion, and believed the great shout had been mistranslated over time or mistold.  He believed there was no Thamus, but there was a Tammuz, another pagan god who died and whose death was remembered through a ritual which was being performed and was overheard by...someone.

It does seem jolly old Chesterton was mistaken about pagan gods and their birth or death, for various of them did die or their consorts did, and it was their death and resurrection which became the subject of the mystery religions such as that of Mithras, and Isis, and the Great Mother.

Pan was the god of nature, of wild nature that is; but also of shepherds and flocks, and music through the rustic flute.  He's often confused with satyrs, due to the fact that he had the horns, hoofs and hindquarters of a goat.  And it must be said he was inclined to physical pleasures as well, which of course rendered him abhorrent to many Christians.  As a nature god he wasn't worshipped in temples but in caves or wooded groves.  He was born in Arcadia.  His Roman counterpart was Faunus.

But if he died so long ago, he seems to keep coming back, Chesterton and, perhaps, Jesus notwithstanding.  He came back during the Renaissance, as did so much else pagan in spirit.  He was a favorite of the 19th century Romantics, and is even now worshipped by neo-pagans.  He is part of the great inheritance of Western culture that is pagan antiquity, and like it will not die much as some wish it would, who are blithely ignorant of the debt owed to it even, and perhaps especially, by Christianity. 

I know little of Wiccan or neo-paganism generally.  I'm not inclined to engage in rituals or ceremonies which are meant to revive or mimic ancient religious worship.  Nor am I inclined to worship any of the old gods.  But I am pleased that there seems to be a revival in respect for and reverence towards nature--by which I mean the physical world, the universe.  We've believed ourselves to be nature's master for far too long, and are paying the price of the monstrous credo we've accepted here in the West; that we like the God of the Abrahamic religions are apart from nature rather than a part of it.  We will pay more for our self-regard. 

Stoicism also keeps coming back, as the modern resurgence of that philosophy makes clear.  But it's always been around in one sense or another, and it's injunction to "live according to nature" is one that will be accepted it's to be hoped.  It may have to be accepted if we're to survive.

But if I were to worship any of the old gods, I think Pan would be one of them, along with Apollo and Hermes, the one the god of reason, the other the bright intelligence of the universe.  And Pan the god of the physical nature of all living things.

The Mind of an Apologist

Now and then I take up and read, without the urging of a divine voice as far as I know, a work devoted to a defense of religion or belief in God.  I think I do so in the hope that I will find one which is convincing or at least worthy of respect.  I have not yet encountered such a work, alas. 

Dorothy Sayers, known for her detective fiction and the character she created, Lord Peter Wimsey, wrote such a work or two regarding Christianity, though it's not clear that she felt she did.  One of them is called The Mind of the Maker, which I'm currently reading.

When I say it's not clear she felt she was writing as an apologist I refer to the somewhat irritated preface of that book, in which she complains that another work she wrote was taken to be in the apologetic line when it was not; it was, she maintains, simply an effort to explicate Christian doctrine, and so could not be taken as a defense of it let alone as an expression of personal beliefs.  One might infer, then, that The Mind of the Maker was similarly written as an explanation, not justification, but thus far that's an inference I find difficult to make.  I can't help but wonder if she was hedging her bets, in the hope that she could respond to any criticism of her claims by stating that they're not hers, but that of the Christian faith.

She was a friend of another apologist, C.S. Lewis.  I've read him as well, and also G.K. Chesterton.  I've been disappointed by both Lewis and Chesterton, but perhaps they didn't think they were apologists either.  Lewis struck me as illogical and gullible (in his acceptance of Christian assertions), and Chesterton struck me as someone who did not think or argue so much as relentlessly manufacture mots.

Sayers' book addresses the doctrine of the Trinity, and naturally enough references St. Augustine's De Trinitate.  It seems she feels as he felt that the concept of the Trinity is something which we can understand by analogy with similar aspects of nature, i.e. the universe, and our interaction with it.  She evidently thinks that God as creator can be understood through contemplation of the creative process engaged in by artists, including writers of fiction like herself, because artists in creation engage in a process which itself involves a trinity--Energy, Idea and Power, which come into play not necessarily in that order.  And, since this creative process involves a trinity....etc.  It's perhaps unsurprising that she associates herself with God in this fashion (although I for the life of me cannot think of God as a lawyer).

I'm not that far into the book, but already I feel myself anticipating another disappointment.  St. Augustine indulged in this sort of thing as well, finding triads of all kind in all sorts of things (for example the act of seeing) which are in or take place in nature.  Indeed, C.S. Peirce was big on triads.  The number 3 has long been considered by some to be magical or mystical.  Perhaps this means something.

However, it seems to me this imposition of categories of three on the universe is facile and artificial.  Why not categories of four or five, or more?  We can do that sort of thing with relative ease.  Impulse, Energy, Idea and Power--how's that?  Interaction, Impulse, Energy, Idea and Power.  Why not?

She responds to critics who maintain that God should not be compared to humans and ascribed human characterises by claiming that we're always anthropomorphizing.  I suppose we do, or at least do so quite often.  It doesn't follow from this, though, that God should be ascribed human characteristics, nor does it follow from this that God shouldn't be thought of as having certain human characteristics in particular.

She maintains that biblical claims that God punishes not only sinners but their innocent descendants doesn't really mean that God does anything of the sort.  It is rather a metaphor reflecting the fact that certain conduct results in adverse consequences which continue over time.  Metaphor and analogy abound in Christianity, of necessity as we cannot truly understand the divine.

Well, at this time I sigh and go on reading.  But it seems to me that the efforts of these apologists consist in ignoring that which they purport to defend, or interpreting it in manner which requires they disregard it "as is."  That's been going on for some time.  In my reading so far, apologists for established religions have invariably expounded on claims and constructed arguments which, if they are valid, don't require the acceptance of aspects of those religions which render them unique and which are seemingly essential to them in the sense they make them different from other religions.

Thomas Aquinas repeated arguments for the existence of God made long before by pagan philosophers and claimed they established the existence of the Christian God, which one would think would of necessity have been different from the god of the pagan philosophers.  If the Christian God was not different, well and good, but Thomas presumably would have been loathe to make that claim.  If the Christian God is different, has the existence of a different god been proved by the philosophers? 

An apologist for a religion whose apology does not address that which distinguishes the religion does not defend or justify that religion.  Instead, the apologist establishes that he/she is unable to defend or justify its distinctive features.  The apologist unwittingly thereby puts the veracity of the religion in doubt. 

For which, no doubt, the apologist should apologize.

Things in our Control

The Stoic dictum that we should concern ourselves with things in our control, and not with those outside of our control is wise, but demanding.  Perhaps too demanding.  Initially, it seems, all that is beyond our control was to be considered indifferent.  Wisely as well, I think, the absolute nature of this directive was qualified.  Certain of the Stoics began to note distinctions in the vast multitude of things seemingly beyond our control.  Some of them therefore came to be considered worthy subjects of concern, or at least of more concern than others.

These included matters related to health of the body, for example.  The tendency of ancient philosophers (and some not so ancient, unfortunately) to distinguish between mind and body, which was carried over into Christianity and beyond, made concern with the body seem unimportant.  However, the rather intimate relation between what was considered mind and what was considered body eventually compelled Stoics and others to recognize that problems with the one could result in problems with the other, and so a concern with health became, however grudgingly, considered as more than a matter of complete indifference.

Human nature has always presented problems for systems of thought which seek to establish finality, certainty, single causes, single goals, single truths.  The same may be said of all of nature.  This is because we humans, and the rest of the universe we inhabit, are far more complex than we like to think.  It's odd that the "quest for certainty" is often associated with religions or the religious.  One would think that the belief in a great, all-powerful and all-knowing creator would instill in us a recognition of our own limitations, including limits on our knowledge and ability to know.  In certain instances it does, but those instances seem to involve only the recognition by some of us of the glaring limitations of others.  Such is the extent of our self-conceit that we assume God has created the universe and formulated a purpose for it and us obvious enough for us to discern, and indeed made it in such a fashion peculiar enough that we humans are destined to rule over it.

This view can make even the supposedly humble seem breathtakingly arrogant.  Someone decided to make audio books of some of Chesterton's Father Brown stories, and I've heard them now and then through the good offices of satellite radio as I drive about.  It may be that it is the manner of the actor portraying the good priest, but I'm struck by the smugness of the character far more than I was when I read the stories.  Chesterton himself shared this smugness, of course.  Smugness is not a characteristic of the humble or of those who acknowledge their own limitations.

Which brings us back to things in our control, and things out of our control.  Even when qualified, this is a consideration which requires a recognition of our limitations; of what we can and cannot do, and the futility and indeed destructive nature of an excessive concern with people and things which we can't shape to our desires.  It may be said to be the first step towards practical wisdom.  Stoicism is in many senses a therapeutic philosophy, as it seems has become known to psychologists who have noted similarities between it and cognitive behavioral therapy.  Ultimately, to the extent we can control things that control is limited.  But this control implies responsibility as well as the acknowledgement of our limits.  Because we can control ourselves we are responsible for ourselves and our conduct; we should not blame our conduct on what we cannot control just as we should not base our conduct on what we cannot control.

The Best Government Money Can Buy

We had it, according to Mark Twain, quite some time ago, and will have it again.  He could be amusing at times, could old Sam, and perceptive as well when he was not pandering to his readers by commenting buffoonishly on noisy, dirty, smelly foreigners in such works as Innocents Abroad (I was reminded of this sad characteristic while reading Mencken's fine essay on Puritanism in American literature).

That Twain felt we had in his time such a government reminds us that things are not all that different, our Supreme Court's decision in Citizens United notwithstanding.  I can't but feel that there lurks in liberal criticism of that decision a petulance born of the belief that there are simply not enough liberally-minded corporations readily available to foot Democratic bills as there are conservative ones to pay for Republican campaigns.  Regardless, though, it is always a concern when money figures so prominently in the election of officials of any kind.  It's not clear to me, however, that the view of the majority of the Supremes that corporations are people for purposes of free speech as well as for other purposes adds that much to the corruption of our politics.

Of greater concern I think is the rejection of limitations on financial contributions to the efforts of our leaders and those who wish to lead us to induce us to vote for them or those things they hold dear.  Corporations have been treated as persons in the law for so many years for so many reasons that maintaining they are not for other, particular purposes is somewhat awkward.  Limiting financial contributions is relatively clear and simple, would likely reduce the opportunity for corruption and would seem to have no clear adverse impact of any significant kind.  It may make it more difficult for our politicians and their minions to bombard us with increasingly trite, simplistic and hyperbolic propaganda, but this would not be a bad thing.


This brings us to the rather perplexing view which is translated into the phrase that "money is speech."  It clearly is not in itself.  It can, though, facilitate the ability of some not only to speak, but to speak very loudly and frequently in many different locations to many people.  Is this facilitation itself free speech, to be accorded constitutional protection?


Consider the law applicable to restrictions on the constitutional right to free speech.  Consider, in other words, those circumstances in which it has been held that government has wrongfully limited that right.  I think it would be accurate to state that money is not often a factor, except to the extent that it somehow figures in action which results in the prohibition or limitation of speech itself.  That unconstitutional limitation rightfully relates to the content of speech or the act of speaking, however, not to the quantity of speech.

If one is prohibited from saying something by government, or speaking at all, that is or should be significant in the law.  If one is prohibited not from saying something, but from having access to unlimited amounts of money from particular donors which will allow you to say it again and again, at all times and in all places through media of all kinds, and hiring professionals to say that something in the most persuasive manner, that is or should be something quite different as far as the law is concerned.

Of course, we can only truly avoid being led by the nose by our politicians and their lackeys by thinking analytically.  But that would mean spending money on educating people to do so.  That wouldn't make money thought, but it would be a thoughtful use of money (I should never have read Chesterton; I can't avoid these cloying little gibes at times, and blame it all on him).  Unfortunately, thinking is often something those who have the money would rather we not do.

O tempora! O mores! Part IV

As I've noted before, more and more there are those among the politicians, pundits and preachers who delight in instructing us some who indulge in pronouncements regarding our depraved state.  I received an email recently from a friend referencing declamations from a few of them which note, rather surprisingly I think, the expensive silliness engaged in by members of the GSA, and the fact that members of the Secret Service recently consorted with prostitutes in Columbia, as examples of that depravity.  I find this surprising as I find neither activity particularly shocking.  It may be that I am simply too depraved myself to be shocked, but I suspect that the shock evidenced by the commentators in question is more a function of the fact that they are Republicans than of the nature of the activities themselves. 

There are some disturbing things takings place, however, and some very disturbing things as well.  I question whether this has not been the case in the past, though, and so am not personally inclined to think we have reached new lows (those who think in that fashion seem unable to to avoid mentioning the Roman Empire when they beat their breasts in horror at our immorality; I suspect because Hollywood has taught them that empire fell due to lack of morals, and they are eagerly awaiting our downfall which they hope to be at least as much of a spectacle).

But it won't do, really.  We are no better and no worse than what we have always been (for example at the time Cicero uttered those famous words which appear in the title of this post) and likely will always be.  We are, though, much better informed than we were in the past.  We can now know everything, and even see everything, immediately.  Our cruelty and stupidity have never been so much on display, so accessible.  In the past, not even the Shadow could know with such completeness and detail the evil that lurks in the hearts of men.  Now each of us can transmit it around the globe when we see it by use of smart phones.  And there are more of us, much more.  More people, more cruelty and stupidity.  That is the way of it; of us.

One can't disagree with the claims being made that we must do better, even when made by those ponderous, self-righteous souls whose business it is, or who have made it their business, to tell us so.  One can maintain that they should practice what they preach, of course, but preachers seldom do so, and this doesn't stop them from preaching.  But one should also give consideration to what can be done.  It may be our curse and our doom that when we do so we always seem to come to the same conclusions.

Those conclusions seem typically to be religious in nature, or rather that we become more religious in nature (the spirit of Chesterton seems to have taken hold of me).  There are problems in this approach, though, not the least of which is that religion no longer provides a detriment to evil behavior, if indeed it ever did.  The fear of hell is no longer prevalent.  It won't be coming back.  Even when we believed in hell, we managed to be immoral.

As a practical matter, it may be that the best we can do as individuals is control ourselves, and refrain from controlling others, or seeking and being governed by things which the Stoics taught us are beyond our control.  I think this may have been their primary contribution to theories of the manner in which we should conduct our lives.  It's a time for quietism.

On Reason and Religious Belief

Well, Maimonides, whom I mentioned in the prior post, thus far seems content to guide the perplexed by such devices as noting that, based on his translation of the Hebrew, statements appearing in the Old Testament to the effect that various individuals saw God don't really mean that they saw him as a corporeal being.  God, after all, is not a corporeal being, and so cannot be seen.  Therefore, such statements mean that they discerned him in whatever fashion a non-corporeal being may be discerned.  I hope his Guide gets better, but will reluctantly put it aside for a time.

Yesterday while driving I heard courtesy of Book Radio (no, the pictures are not in your head, no matter what they say) one of Chesterton's Father Brown stories.  I've enjoyed reading some of them, but this particular one served only to remind me of his unsatisfyingly breezy, dismissive way of handling criticism of religion.  Father Brown's ministry, apparently, has exposed him to all the artifices of thieves and so he catches a notorious one in the story in question; such was its rather dubious point.  What caught my attention, though, was the good Father's statement that he knew someone pretending to be a priest was not one because he (the fake priest) spoke badly of reason and that is not good theology according to Father Brown.

I'm not sure I agree.  Ultimately reason, I think, is not good theology; instead, it shows us theology is not good (yes, I'm imitating Chesterton's relentlessly playful style).  Certainly reason may be employed in theology as it may be employed in any form of argument, but I know of no basis on which reason demonstrates the existence of God, let alone the God of Christianity.  I think Chesterton himself said as much, in fact.

Assuming this to be the case, what does that tell us about belief in God?  Reason is very useful in assisting us in various ways, in learning about things, in solving problems, in noting error and avoiding error.  It would seem that at the least it can be maintained that reason is not useful in ascertaining the existence of a God.  More specifically, the existence of God is not something amenable to reason; it can't be demonstrated or verified in the way things amenable to reason can be.  I think it's foolish to maintain it can be, even if one accepts such arguments as those of Aristotle.  Even if we assume that reason tells us there was a First Mover, what reason do we have to believe that First Mover is God as most believe God to be?

The religious should abandon any claim that reason establishes the existence of God, I think, together with the claim that religion has a rational basis.  The quest to provide a basis for religious belief of the same kind as that which supports scientific conclusions, or even those of logic, is foolish.  As well try to do so with our appreciation of poetry, or music, or beauty, or any feeling of transcendence.  Our feelings regarding such things are arational, as it were.  The existence of such feelings can be verified, but the bases for them can't--unless it can be established that we have them because we are "hardwired" to have them, which I think is the same as to say we've evolved in such a fashion as to experience them in certain circumstances.

If that's the case, however, we have them because it is our nature to have them.  If it's our nature to have them, though, why deny them, or why claim that they are improper or misguided?

More on Chesterton and Disappointment

Having read Orthodoxy, and being most of the way through Heretics, I find myself more and more puzzled why Chesterton is believed by some at least to be a profound thinker.  He was certainly clever and could be witty, but if these particular books are any indication his was not a rigorous mind, and his treatment of positions he opposed seems breezy and even careless. 

His sentences are almost all declarative.  He states; he neither argues nor explains.  Rhetorically, he seems to have been something of a one-trick-pony.  He sets forth an idea or makes a statement, and then, thoughtfully, repeats it--at least three times, in my experience--for our benefit but in different ways.  This becomes grating.  Reading him is somewhat like listening to a speech by the Reverend Jesse Jackson.

I find myself sympathizing with his view that ancient paganism was misunderstood and romaticized by many.  I think he is correct in maintaining that the pagans of the west were not the joyous, care-free exponents of life they were made out to be by some, and that they were in certain respects more sensible than we are today.  His belief that we are unable to be as sensible as they were, though, stikes me as odd, and his claim that we cannot be because of Christianity seems even odder.  He appears to maintain that there was no real joy in life until Christianity arrived on the scene, and that since its arrival and because of it we can now, finally, be joyous; in fact, we are or at least should be so joyous that we cannot be sensible.  As usual, he doesn't bother to explain this view in anything resembling detail.  An example or two would be useful.  In all honesty, the Church I grew up in was not particularly fun-loving.  And, Christ as portrayed in the Gospels can be described in many different ways, but "jolly" isn't one of them.  When the Church began to preach Happy Jesus, as it were, in the 1960s instead of fiendishly-tortured-and-killed-because-of-our-sins Jesus, it was hard not to think that it was engaged in some kind of involved practical joke. 

I know monks and priests were often described by some authors in the past as being roguish and delighting in drink and women, but I suspect this isn't the sort of thing Chesteron intends to reference in his claim that Christians are a much happier group generally than non-Christians.  Just what he intends is unclear.  He contrasts what he claims are pagan virtues, such as justice, with what he claims are Christian virtues which turn out to be, unsurprisingly, faith, hope and charity.  His description of these Christian virtues, however, is rather extreme.  Christian hope is a hope which exists only when things are hopeless; Christian charity is foregiveness of that which cannot be foregiven.  Pagans, apparently, were too sensible to go to such extremes.  I think I must be as well.

Reading him, I can't help but get the feeling that he felt he was writing only for other Chestertons, or at least for those he believed would know already what he sought to convey.  It's difficult to otherwise understand such a cavalier approach to disputation.  This doesn't make much sense, though, in one who felt he was engaged in a contest with the increasing popularity of materialistic modernism, and one expects more from him--at least, I do.

On First Looking into Chesterton's "Orthodoxy"

It's an interesting book, though I cannot say I felt like "stout Cortes" gazing with great amazement at the ocean the poet thought he saw, first among europeans.  Chesteron was a clever fellow, and was far too intelligent to maintain that he was attempting to demonstrate why one should be a Christian.  Instead he purports only to tell us why he is one, in an apparent effort to avoid being characterized as an apologist for the faith.  He is careful to note of all his arguments, such as they are, that they address matters which can't be adequately expressed in words.  In other words, he takes pains to cover his (reputedly enormous) ass as he goes about explaining his eventual acceptance of a truth which he seemingly believes cannot be verified, but which he claims was always there, awaiting discovery, much like the Pacific Ocean.

He writes that fairy tales (told to him by his nanny) played their part in his eventual acknowledgement of Christianity.  He seems to have felt that they contain some truth beyond common sense.  Perhaps this delight in fairy tales was typical among english gentlemen of his time.  Not being one, however, and having merely read some of them as I had no nanny to tell me of them, I don't find them as impressive.  One he doesn't mention is that of Goldilocks and the Three Bears, but I think that fairy tale in particular tells us much about why he became orthodox eventually, or at least how he explains he did so.  After some time and having tried other ways of comprehending the world, he simply came to believe in Christianity because it feels "just right."

He seems to prefer proclaiming to explaining.  There is not much in the way of reasoning to be found in this work.  I'm not familiar with most of those he finds wanting in various respects, except Bernard Shaw and Nietzsche (he also mentions H.G. Wells as being lacking), and so can't say with any certainty whether his charcterizations of them and their opinions are fair.  What he calls materialism, though, seems to be of a very simple-minded variety, and his criticisms of eastern religions, primarily Buddhism, may have their bases in what those religions appeared to be to the theosophists and other european mystics of that time.  In other words, his criticisms, like his arguments, are cursory and conclusory.  Being fond of the stoics, I thought his treatment of Marcus Aurelius was rather shabby.  He seems to have believed Marcus to be less than manly in his approach to life.  It seems inappropriate for an obese english gentleman of very comfortable means to take this view of a Roman Emperor who spent the bulk of his reign in military camps and campaigns against tribes such as the Quadi.  As I recall, the dreadful C.S. Lewis felt that Christianity was the only truly "manly" religion as well.  Perhaps Lewis had a nanny also.

His defense of the Trinity seems merely weird.  If I understand him correctly, it somehow prevents us from viewing the Supreme Being as a kind of dictator, or from it being one.  It is instead, through the mystery of the Trinity, a kind of unusual committee; Jesus the human humanizing the Father, and the Holy Ghost doing whatever it is supposed to be doing, in a kind of harmony.  But, having heard the Trinity explained by a priest as analogous to a ham sandwhich, I can accept that Chesterton's view may be as good as it gets.

Regardless, I feel the same disappointment reading Chesterton on Christianity as I have felt reading the apologies, or explanations, of others concerning it.  No real effort is made to explain the divinity of Christ, which would seem to me a fairly important aspect of the religion.  Christ said remarkable things, says Chesterton, and if we can trust what others wrote regarding what he said that may well be true.  It doesn't follow, though, that he was God.  Regarding the fact that there were admirable humans long before Christ lived, this means, says Chesterton, that they were really Christian, but Christians who evidently were not required to know of Christ or believe him to be God in order to be Christian.

One wonders why the more sophisticated and intelligent defenders of Christianity spend so little time and effort on establishing why Christ is divine, or whether it is necessary to believe him divine in order to be Christian.