 |
Date: Mon, 1 Apr 1996 18:57:12 -0600 (CST) From: JA Good <gem@owlnet.rice.edu>
In response to Jacqueline Cartier's response to my response: Amen: Abrams hits the Kierkegaardian nail on the head. Surely you don't have to be desperately ill to become a Christian. Could Christianity possibly be the healthy response of a healthy individual -- at least some of the time?
Jim Good
Rice University
Date: Mon, 1 Apr 1996 18:43:13 -0600 (CST) From: JA Good <gem@owlnet.rice.edu>
> >> On Sun, 25 Feb 1996 Jeff Irvin <jirvin@UOFT02.UTOLEDO.EDU
wrote:
> >>
> >> > In fact, I would
> >> > say that "staring into the abyss" is a prerequisite to
becoming an
> >> > existentialist, or a Christian for that matter. I believe Kierkegaard
said
> >> > the same thing in his writings. Paraphrased, I believe
Kierkegaard would
> >> > have written something like, "It is the realization
that life has no
> >> > meaning or purpose that leads us to despair, and it is
this despair which
> >> > leads us to belief in God.">
> >> >
> >To which Jim Good responded:
> >> Is Kierkegaard right about this? Must one experience
profound despair in
> >> order to be a "true" Christian? I've always thought
Keirkegaard
> >> overstated his case on this point. He seems to assume his
experience is
> >> the "true" experience.
> >>
> Jeff Irvin responded:
>
> I would respond to this point by saying that it is my personal belief
that
> most people who call themselves Christian never experience this
"deep, dark
> depression, excessive misery." Therefore, Kierkegaard has only
touched upon
> one of the many ways in which people come to the Christian faith.
>
> I do believe though that the mystic, of necessity, must pass through
this
> flame of doubt. Unfortunately, not all of us are of the same stuff
as
> mystics.
>
Here, Here. I'm not even a Christian, but some of the finest Christians I've known (and I have no doubts about their sincerity or depth of conviction) never experienced the kind of despair Kierkegaard seems to think is essential to being a "true" Christian. If Kierkegaard is right about Christianity, I'd say he lends credence to the critiques of Nietzsche, Marx, and Freud -- that Christianity is for weak individuals who can't cope with the harsh realities of life. Surely most Christians don't believe this about their faith.
I'm curious, however, why it is "unfortunate" that most of us are not made of the same stuff as mystics. I'm glad I'm not made of the same stuff as most of the mystics I've read.
Jim Good
Rice University
Date: Tue, 2 Apr 1996 06:15:07 -0600 (CST) From: Rosemary Grant <fhr010@mail.connect.more.net>
In regard to despair seems like I remember C. S. Lewis wrote about the significance of experiencing pain and despair from a Christian perspective. It's my understanding (correct me if I'm wrong) that it helps us appreciate the pain of others and develop empathy for them. Pain also can strengthen our faith. It can be a blessing as well as a curse.
How would this relates to Kierkegaard's position would be interesting to know. Lewis was suprised by joy and went through a stage as an atheist before he found this joy.
Respectfully,
Rosemary Bradford Grant
Monett High School History/Humanities Instructor UMKC adjunct professor fhr010@mail.connect.more.net Monett, MO 65708 1-417-235-5445 & fax 1-417-235-7884
Date: Wed, 03 Apr 1996 12:44:59 +0000
From: Jeff Irvin <jirvin@UOFT02.UTOLEDO.EDU>
Jim Good wrote, in part:
>. I'm not even a Christian, but some of the finest Christians
>I've known (and I have no doubts about their sincerity or depth of
>conviction) never experienced the kind of despair Kierkegaard seems to
think
>is essential to being a "true" Christian. If Kierkegaard is right
about
>Christianity, I'd say he lends credence to the critiques of
Nietzsche,
>Marx, and Freud -- that Christianity is for weak individuals who
can't
>cope with the harsh realities of life. Surely most Christians
don't
>believe this about their faith.
>
>I'm curious, however, why it is "unfortunate" that most of us are
not
>made of the same stuff as mystics. I'm glad I'm not made of the
same
>stuff as most of the mystics I've read.
>
>Jim Good
>Rice University
>
Jim,
I would say that everyone is weak. Therefore, the argument that weak people become Christians is valid, but also redundant. This means that people come to Christianity for diverse psychological reasons. They are the same reasons people turn to Socialism, Nazism, or any other -ism.
The reason I respect the mystic is because they are usually self-reflective and question what appears to be real. I believe it is this type of individual who ultimately gives us a greater understanding of our world. It is even possible that the intellectual, as defined by Richard Hofstadter, could be classed as a mystic.
Jeff Irvin
Date: Wed, 3 Apr 1996 09:36:15 -0500 (EST) From: Eric Goodfield <labia@yorku.ca>
On Monday, April 1, Jim Good wrote:
> In response to Jacqueline Cartier's response to my response:
> Amen: Abrams hits the Kierkegaardian nail on the head. Surely you
don't
> have to be desperately ill to become a Christian. Could
Christianity
> possibly be the healthy response of a healthy individual -- at least
some
> of the time?
Sorry Jim,
There is no such thing as a "Christian Individual" in any theological sense approximating Christ's humanity(except, of course, as a result of the 17th C. liberal/capitalist paradigm merger in England). Perhaps, then, you don't actually intend "healthy", but rather "a wealthy individual".
much love,
labia
Date: Wed, 3 Apr 1996 09:09:19 -0600 (CST) From: JA Good <gem@owlnet.rice.edu>
On Tue, 2 Apr 1996, Rosemary Grant wrote:
> In regard to despair seems like I remember C. S. Lewis wrote
about
> the significance of experiencing pain and despair from a
Christian
> perspective. It's my understanding (correct me if I'm wrong) that it
helps
> us appreciate the pain of others and develop empathy for them. Pain
also
> can strengthen our faith. It can be a blessing as well as a
curse.
> How would this relates to Kierkegaard's position would be
> interesting to know. Lewis was suprised by joy and went through a
stage as
> an atheist before he found this joy.
Why couldn't Lewis be a joyful atheist? Your statement makes joy and atheism sound mutually exclusive.
It's been too long since I've read Lewis to respond precisely to your questions, but I'm sure Kierkegaard would agree that we are incapable of empathy unless we've suffered. This gets back to the point I'm really curious about. Is it possible for a person (a rare individual I will concede) to be capable of being genuinely empathetic without having first suffered? Is pain an essential prerequsite to enlightenment? Can a person have a strong faith without having first experienced terrible pain?
Surely others out there have known people who grew up going to church everyday the doors were open, and who have not sufferred terribly, but have very strong faith. My point is that such a person can be a genuine, sincere Christian, although I'm willing to concede this may be rare. Obviously, many of us have also known the preacher's kid who turned into a shallow rebel.
Jim Good
Rice University
Date: Wed, 03 Apr 1996 17:49:43 -0500
From: Wilbur Streett <wstreett@monmouth.com>
OK, my two cents on this topic..
Emotion is the motor of thought. You don't think very much if you don't have strong feelings, because if you don't have strong feelings, why bother to figure things out?
The definition of Christian used to be the one that believed that God was something that each individual could access directly, with the permission of the clergy or the King. (After all, that's what made Jesus so popular, the peasant's didn't have to let the clergy define what God was for them, Jesus told them that they could speak directly to God themselves) In short, the Christians were a bunch of trouble makers with their own minds. Given the herd mentality of the time, you had to be pretty motivated to become a Christian. Of course, Christianity is no longer the "rebel" religion, it's as mainstream as any other, so you don't have to suffer to come to christianity anymore.
On the other hand, my understanding of the existential pain of life causing depression and suffering is because you can't make a substantial life altering decision by just "going along" with the crowd. If you don't spend the time to actually come to terms with the meaning in life, then you are simply going along for the ride. But there has long been a noted correlation between Genius and Insanity (depression). I think that it takes a bit of an obsessive/compulsive nature to come to understand any concept in great depth. Modern Psychology would have us believe that is an illness, and has pointed out that obsessive/compulsive people are often "victims" of depression. In my case, I wouldn't have traded my depressions for anything in the world, since without ever feeling sad, how would I know when I'm happy?
So on to emphathy, if you can't or won't or don't allow your feelings to travel into sadness or depression, how are you going to have the depth of feeling necessary to understand another's sadness? Empathy is feeling where another human is, and if you don't have the emotional strength to feel your own feelings, (both the good ones and the bad), then how can you possibly feel the feelings of others?
As to pain strengthing faith, you have to have faith in order to survive pain, and surviving pain builds faith. Belief in God aside.
The "Joy" of the "God" of men is something that quite different from belief in God. On our United States currency we have "In God We Trust", which is a basic statement of optimism in life. Not a statement that we are all christian and that we all believe in God, but a statement that life supports us and we trust in it. Now some will claim that the statement is just an outdated religious statement there for historical reasons, but from my perspective it is a statement that we believe in the world and that things will work out. Indeed, our belief in the device of currency speaks volumes about our beliefs.
Wilbur
>
>Why couldn't Lewis be a joyful atheist? Your statement makes joy
and
>atheism sound mutually exclusive.
>
>It's been too long since I've read Lewis to respond precisely to
your
>questions, but I'm sure Kierkegaard would agree that we are incapable
of
>empathy unless we've suffered. This gets back to the point I'm
really
>curious about. Is it possible for a person (a rare individual I
will
>concede) to be capable of being genuinely empathetic without having
first
>suffered? Is pain an essential prerequsite to enlightenment? Can
a
>person have a strong faith without having first experienced terrible
pain?
>
>Surely others out there have known people who grew up going to
church
>everyday the doors were open, and who have not sufferred terribly,
but
>have very strong faith. My point is that such a person can be a
genuine,
>sincere Christian, although I'm willing to concede this may be
rare.
>Obviously, many of us have also known the preacher's kid who turned
into
>a shallow rebel.
>
>Jim Good
>Rice University
>
>
Date: Wed, 3 Apr 1996 15:28:29 -0600 From: Rosemary Grant <fhr010@mail.connect.more.net>
Jim,
Certainly that is possible. I was just telling what happened to Lewis.
>but I'm sure Kierkegaard would agree that we are incapable
of
>empathy unless we've suffered. This gets back to the point I'm really
curious about. Is it possible for a person (a rare individual I
will
>concede) to be capable of being genuinely empathetic without having
first
suffered? Is pain an essential prerequsite to enlightenment? Can a
person have a strong faith without having first experienced terrible pain?<
I have a similar question that I have heard along these lines. Do we have to get down in the gutter to know what it's like in the gutter? Usually people answer in the negative. On the other hand I've heard counselors and those who teach counseling say that it is best to never say to a person in their despair that you know how they feel. No one really knows how another person feels who is suffering. Just because your father died when you were a grown person doesn't mean you would understand how a child in elementary would feel losing a father. (This is one example I know that happened during this school year)
You wrote: >Surely others out there have known people who grew up going to church>everyday the doors were open, and who have not sufferred terribly, but>have very strong faith.<
Yes, for some people faith grows as life endures. Their perspective of Christianity is not that you have to go down in drink and sin in order to experience conversion. I suppose my faith is somewhat like this except I certainly realize that I need the redemption of Christ's death on the cross for my sins. I became a believer,however, when I was 8 years old.
How can we measure our faith? I've certainly had doubts; my daughter's an atheist. Nevertheless, I have never turned my back on Christ. I don't think I could ever do that. Nor would I want to.
My point is that such a person can be a genuine,>sincere Christian, although I'm willing to concede this may be rare.
I've had my share of suffering because I have an incurable chronic disease, but I don't see what that has to do with my faith. It hasn't changed my faith one way or the other. I faced the realization of death as a young person. Perhaps that's why this disease makes no difference. When I found out I had it I was angry, but not with God. It had no effect on my faith.
On the other hand, if I had not been a Christian I suppose I would
have felt wiped out.
Respectfully,
Rosemary Bradford Grant
Monett High School, history & humanities instructor 1-417-235-5445 UMKC adjunct, fax 417-235-7884
Monett, MO 65708
Date: Thu, 4 Apr 1996 10:23:03 -0800 (PST) From: Leonard Charles Porrello <lporrell@harp.aix.calpoly.edu>
Jeff:
While agree with your idea that we are all weak (although, I would say in need of love and (self)discipline), and I respect your valuable insight about the mystics, I think that your are a little too general in lumping "-isms" together, and then lumping "Christianity" in with them.
At the great risk of being too general myself, I see two basic types of people (who are attracted to institutionalized forms of belief); first, there is the "true believer", and second, their is one who seeks the best explanation for one's multifaceted and often incongruous experiences, many of which can not be subsumed under the stale category of "the rational". We all (even the mass movement minded (or mindless) true believer) seem to seek answers to three basic questions: Who am I?; Why am I here?; Where am I going? While we can say that these concerns are "psychological," I would not want to reduce them to "merely" psychological (for I believe that humans are more than mere products of mindless evolution). The questions evoke speculation, as you imply, about the true nature of reality (ontology); they invoke speculation about humanity's ultimate meaning(s). At stake then, regarding the various "-isms" and Christianity, is the issue of which system best accounts for objective reality. And to bring this back to Kierkegaard, even though he is not concerned with "objective" reality, since, as another contributor on this thread mentioned, we need not assume that his experience was the "true" experience, we CAN concern ourselves with objective reality--and along these lines, the "-isms" and Christianity are very much dissimilar, and should hardly be lumped together merely as interchangeable systems of belief which meet psychological needs.
Leonard Porrello
English Department
Cal Poly State University, San Luis Obispo
Date: Thu, 4 Apr 1996 17:24:45 +0100
From: Perry Tapper <TAPPER@zlin.vutbr.cz>
It seems to me that a regular church-goer with "strong faith" is not
truly solid Christian until that faith has been tested by terrible
suffering. After all, without the trial of His crucifixion and His
successful maintainance of faith, would Christ's message have
had such an influence?
Perry Tapper
Palacky University
Olomouc
Czech Republic
Date: Thu, 4 Apr 1996 11:29:02 -0600 (CST) From: JA Good <gem@owlnet.rice.edu>
Rosemary Grant wrote:
> I have a similar question that I have heard along these
lines. Do
> we have to get down in the gutter to know what it's like in the
gutter?
> Usually people answer in the negative. On the other hand I've
heard
> counselors and those who teach counseling say that it is best to
never say
> to a person in their despair that you know how they feel. No one
really
> knows how another person feels who is suffering. Just because your
father
> died when you were a grown person doesn't mean you would understand
how a
> child in elementary would feel losing a father. (This is one example
I know
> that happened during this school year)
>
> Yes, for some people faith grows as life endures. Their
> perspective of Christianity is not that you have to go down in drink
and
> sin in order to experience conversion. I suppose my faith is somewhat
like
> this except I certainly realize that I need the redemption of
Christ's
> death on the cross for my sins. I became a believer,however, when I
was 8
> years old.
> How can we measure our faith? I've certainly had doubts;
my
> daughter's an atheist. Nevertheless, I have never turned my back
on
> Christ. I don't think I could ever do that. Nor would I want to.
>
> I've had my share of suffering because I have an incurable
chronic
> disease, but I don't see what that has to do with my faith. It
hasn't
> changed my faith one way or the other. I faced the realization of
death as
> a young person. Perhaps that's why this disease makes no difference.
When
> I found out I had it I was angry, but not with God. It had no effect
on my
> faith.
> On the other hand, if I had not been a Christian I suppose I
would
> have felt wiped out.
>
Rosemary,
I commend you on your faith. I've often thought that the best critique of Kierkegaard's portrayal of Christianity is the testimony of persons who have had different types of experiences in their life. Kierkegaard, I think, did what many of us have a tendency to do, and that is assume his particular experience was somehow universal. I don't condemn Kierkegaard for doing this; I just think it's worthwhile to consider that this might have been part of what was going on in his thought.
And, I'm willing to commend Kierkegaard for trying to point out to the people in his native Denmark that many of them (he thought all of them it seems) had become complacent, and "everyday" about their convictions. I am also willing to consider the possiblity that, in the interest of rhetorical force, he intentionally overstated his case. What concerns me at times is that it seems many religious Kierkegaardians read him rather literally. His melodramatic way of stating his points can be quite seductive.
I hope others find this discussion as fruitful as I do. I think the discussion is important because it speaks to our human tendency to overgeneralize. Moreover, from many pulpits today, you can hear Kierkegaardian sounding analyses of the Christian life. Again it has rhetorical force, but I think it should be heard critically.
Moreover, (perhaps to open another can of worms) remember that Kierkegaard's fideism would make it difficult, if not impossible, for him to demarcate what we would today think of as radical, dangerous cults from "true" Christianity. A pure Kierkegaardian, in my opinion, could not consistently condemn Jim Jones and the mass suicide in Guiana. I think he painted himself into this corner by his emphasis on the radically alienated individual who stands before God completely alone. Only this type of person could be a "true" Christain, according to Kierkegaard. Only the desperately ill (psychologically speaking) person could be a "true" Christian.
For Kierkegaard, our society could not condemn those who murder abortion doctors. For all we know those people were doing precisely what God told them to do. This is the problem of the "teleological suspension of the ethical." And that doctrine, I would submit, followed quite naturally from his portrayal of the Christian life as pervaded by suffering, of the Christian as always a stranger in a strange land.
This sort of "crisis" thinking (a la Allan Megill, "The Prophets of Extremity*) can lead to the conclusion that desperate measures are necessary.
Sincerely,
Jim Good
Date: Thu, 11 Apr 1996 08:47:57 -0500 (CDT)
From: Rosemary Grant <fhr010@mail.connect.more.net>
Perry's post reminds me of Dante's _Inferno_ and the levels of hell. Wasn't one of the levels for people who were neither really for Christianity or against it. Neither on the side of Satan, but not necessarily against his influence.
It seems that there's a lot of folks who would fit into this mind set, and I wonder how they influence other believers. Such people don't appear to have much faith and whether or not a tragedy in their lives would shake them out of their indifference is doubtful. In society today it appears to be rather acceptable to be _ho-hum_ about faith in God, but there's always been people like this. Dante's work tried to address this problem and IMHO he was saying that these people need a stronger commitment to be included in with the category of believers. On the other hand, some people think a little faith is better than none at all. This might be true if a person is open to the possibility of rethinking some of their disbeliefs.
I certainly don't know the answer to this question, but my students
don't like the people that Dante describes in his class work. Maybe it's
like the adage, _A little learning is a dangerous thing_. Maybe it goes
like this,..._A little faith is a dangerous thing_
Respectfully,
Rosemary Bradford Grant
Monett High School History/Humanities Instructor UMKC adjunct professor fhr010@mail.connect.more.net Monett, MO 65708 1-417-235-5445 & fax 1-417-235-7884
Date: Wed, 10 Apr 1996 17:45:59 -0500 (CDT)
From: 5SH6FREEBURG@vms.csd.mu.edu
Jim,
I'm not sure I would agree with you on Kierkegaard's thought logically leading to atrocities such as the Jim Jones and the killing of abortion doctors. To try and solve one's own personal existential crisis by reacting in some real-world way is antithetical to Kierkegaard. These are worldly solutions and the expression of anger and rage in a physical manner. His thought was oriented differently. To Kierkegaard the ideal was the man who lived complacently with his fellow citizens but internally was the lone individual before God. "Most men are subjective towards themselves and objective towards others--terribly objective sometimes, but the real task is to be subjective toward others and objective towards oneself." (I need to check the citation).
Date: Thu, 11 Apr 1996 19:29:29 -0600 (MDT) From: Helen Liebel-weckowicz <hliebelw@gpu.srv.ualberta.ca>
The idea of faith is not Western alone. There exists (in Japan) the so called Amida Buddhist sect. Their adherents have dispensed with the study of the voluminous scriptures of the religion and believe in called on the name of Buddha in an act of faith, for succour. HLW
Date: Thu, 11 Apr 1996 21:09:32 -0700 (PDT) From: Leonard Charles Porrello <lporrell@harp.aix.calpoly.edu>
Perry Tapper had referred last week to "Christ's message": Which message do you mean: that He is God's son (and God himself), and that our only chance at relationship with God lies in faith in him?; or, that we really should all love one another?; or, that institutionalized religion need not get between one and God?; or, what?
L. Porrello
Date: Fri, 12 Apr 96 14:21:00 PDT
From: "Brown, Alex" <BROWNA@tp.ac.sg>
Perry Tapper writes:
It seems to me that a regular church-goer with "strong faith" is not truly solid Christian until that faith has been tested by terrible suffering. After all, without the trial of His crucifixion and His successful maintainance of faith, would Christ's message have had such an influence?
Curious comment this. What gives Buddha, Mohamed, Lao Tsu and other major religious figures their 'influence'?
As far as I know, none of them were crucified or died tragic deaths. Could it be simply their message itself. I think we could also say that it was not their assassination that gave Ghandi and Martin Luther King significance as great humanitarians, but their moral example and articulate leadership.
According to the logic of Perry's argument the ultimate proof of one's Christianity would be to get oneself staked up on a cross, just like Christ. (So much for the rainforests of the world when Christians decide to do this).
Although not a Christian, I would suggest that we don't need the spectacle of pain and suffering to justify the Christian theology. We would only need the Sermon and the Mount.
Regards
Alex Brown
Singapore
Date: Fri, 12 Apr 1996 09:42:15 -0500 (CDT) From: JA Good <gem@owlnet.rice.edu>
On 10 Apr 1996 17:45:59 -0500 (CDT) a message said:
>
> I'm not sure I would agree with you on Kierkegaard's thought
logically
> leading to atrocities such as the Jim Jones and the killing of
abortion
> doctors. To try and solve one's own personal existential crisis by
reacting
> in some real-world way is antithetical to Kierkegaard. These are
worldly
> solutions and the expression of anger and rage in a physical manner.
His
> thought was oriented differently. To Kierkegaard the ideal was the
man who
> lived complacently with his fellow citizens but internally was the
lone
> individual before God. "Most men are subjective towards themselves
and
> objective towards others--terribly objective sometimes, but the real task
is to
> be subjective toward others and objective towards oneself." (I need
to check
> the citation).
>
I didn't mean to imply a strict logical connection between Jones, etc. and Kierkegaard. Perhaps I overstated my case. What I would suggest is that the emphasis on extreme individualism one finds in Kierkegaard and others is dangerous. Moreover, more directly related to the initial impetus for this discussion, I worry about the notion that one must be sick before one can be well. I think this is an overgeneralization and can be a self-fulfilling prophecy.
I just finished reading Ian Hacking's _Rewriting the Soul: Multiple Personality and the Sciences of Memory_, in which he discusses the "looping effect of human kinds." I take Hacking's notion to be quite similar to what I am concerned about with the view expressed by many in the present discussion that we are "all weak," or "all sick," "most of us are just to shallow to realize it," etc. Hacking believes that when authority figures (in the book therapists) tell people that they have repressed memories because of sexual abuse when they were children, or that they have multiple personalities, etc., many of these people will begin to conform to the diagnosis of the authority figure. And then, of course, the authority's diagnosis is confirmed, and so on. In the same way I wonder if Kierkegaard didn't assume that because he came from a "dysfunctional" family everybody must have a dysfunctional background (because after all we are all sinful), and everybody must be miserable before they can be "saved." This then, I would suggest, may have had a looping effect, especially in evangelical circles which seem to emphasize Kierkegaardian-like analyses.
Further, my understanding of Kierkegaard is that the "true Christian" would not live "complacently with his fellow citizens," but in fact would be like Abraham who was always a stranger in a strange land. The story of Abraham and Issaac (which Kierkegaard uses masterfully) does not make Abraham sound like a particularly normal guy who blended into the woodwork of society. Rather, a Christian, for Kierkegaard, has to be willing to sacrifice his or her own son if God commands it. The problem with this, which I believe Martin Buber pointed out well, is that when you emphasize alienation (and individualism) as much as Kierkegaard did, you lose social checks on what believers believe God's will is. This, I think, makes Jones, etc. possible, although I would not say it makes such wackos necessary.
Finally, if Kierkegaard believed in getting along complacently with society, he certainly had a hard time practicing it in his own life. Did he not lose his journalism job because he was ruthlessly attacking respected ministers in his column? I think these actions were quite consistent with Kierkegaard's thought. Should we say that Kierkegaard was using a "real-world way" to express rage and anger rather than focussing on his relationship to God. And, do those who murder abortion doctors think they are being worldy? Of course not. They could use Kierkegaard's notion of the teleological suspension of the ethical to justify their actions (in their own minds at least). If society condemns them they merely assert that they stand alone before God and have no duty to follow societal conceptions of morality. Why would they listen to society if everyone in society is weak or sick, but too shallow to realize it?
Jim Good
Date: Sat, 13 Apr 1996 06:10:19 -0400
From: Allan Mayberry Greenberg <amayberg@curry.edu>
If we were to examine the issue currently under consideration (Kierk. and faith), what would we find as the underlying values/concerns? That is, what are the elements that make this particular focus more generalizable? Among the things to be separated out, as I see them, are faith as opposed to fanaticism, inner-directedness as opposed to other-directedness, personal decision-making in defining oneself as opposed to "social" decision-making and defining the group/society/world. There certainly are others. m I think that in order to expand this discussion, we do need to go beyond what currently seems to be a rather monolithic consideration of faith--which clearly does not require a traditional religious basis of any sort, but rather one or more values that are crucial in some way to one's decision-making, or to how one lives one's life. And it is, as I see it, in times of crisis thast one may begin to assess what those decisive or determining values are.
In order to begin to try to understand how people acted in the past and how they might act in the future in matters that affect their world, on whatever level (personal, local, national, etc.), it is essential to determine the bases for the decisions affecting actions. Or, if determined that certain actions are not amenable to a rational analysis, to be as clear as possible about that. The most difficult task I have with students is helping them to assess their values, in order--at least in part--to enable them to evaluate past, present, and (hypothetically) future both in light of and in spite of those values.
(On a personal note, I too have endured crises--and there is no traditional faith in the mix, nor is there a severe stoicism. There are values and beliefs [small "v," small "b"].
Allan C. Mayberry Greenberg
amayberg@curry.edu
(617) 333-2374
Date: Wed, 17 Apr 1996 20:50:17 -0500 (EST) From: Jeff Irvin <jirvin@UOFT02.UTOLEDO.EDU>
Mr. Mayberry has hit upon another generalization in addition to the one I was trying to make when I first suggested that Christianity, Nihilism, and Existentialism might have a common referent.
What is that referent? Mr. Berry says that it is "underlying values and concerns." This an even broader generalization than I recommended. I believe it is the development of worldviews based on the belief that life on this planet is ultimately meaningless.
Christianity says there is no meaning, except God and living our lives for him; there is no intrinsic meaning in human existence itself.
Nihilism says there is no meaning and you had better just get used to it.
Existentialism states that yes life is ultimately meaningless, but we are
free to create meaning for our lives. In fact, we are slaves to this
freedom. The only way to get rid of our freedom is suicide.
Jeff Irvin
Department of History
University of Toledo
2801 W. Bancroft St.
Toledo, Ohio 43606
e-mail: jirvin@uoft02.utoledo.edu
It is not enough that I succeed, others must fail.
--Gore Vidal
Date: Sat, 20 Apr 1996 00:58:58 -0400
From: Cartiermin@aol.com
Jeff Irvin states:
"This an even broader generalization than I recommended. I believe it is the development of worldviews based on the belief that life on this planet is ultimately meaningless.
Christianity says there is no meaning, except God and living our lives for him; there is no intrinsic meaning in human existence itself."
The exception you refer to regarding Christianity includes the belief that human life does have intrinsic meaning because human beings are 1) created as persons, in the image of the trinity of persons, and are intended by the creator to participate in that shared personal life; 2) as persons, participate in the human life of Jesus, fully human and the second person of the trinity, restored by his redemption to full participation in the trinitarian life they had distanced themselves from by sin. The Catholic church and all but the most rigid right-wing christian churches (drawing their principles more from Romanticism than from the New Testament) has claimed directly and continually that human life has value in itself, as created and intended by the Creator. That is a primary difference between the closed-system concept of existence that forms the basis of the Greek philosophic system (nothing is ever truly given, always retained by the first principle) and the open-system concept represented by a creator capable of genuine, eternal interaction and actual giving.
Jacqueline Cartier
Date: Mon, 22 Apr 1996 18:58:05 -0500 (CDT) From: Rosemary Grant <fhr010@mail.connect.more.net>
I don't know exactly how this fits in to the conversation begun on Keikegaard, or even if it does, but it helped me understand the perspective of the ancient world. The Greek citizen had the opposite conception of public and private from what we do today. Their private lives were restricted, and what they did in their homes was highly regulated by the father. Therefore, as they left their homes and entered into public space in the polis, the large amount of freedom they had was much appreciated. In contrast, people today have large amounts of freedom within their private space and increasingly less within the public. Practice of religion is another area with noticeable differences. With the Greek temple worshippers could come in and out; their gods were accessible to all. The structures of churches today are closed with people usually entering by a front entrance. Another factor to consider is that the ancient world did not have the same concept of the individual self as we do today. Although they knew about the spirit within a person, they didn't have today's concept of a soul.
Although God seems accessible to most Christian individuals, for some there may be some difficulty in becoming well-acquainted with the Divine. Certainly propriety seems to have placed certain restrictions on how to communicate with Him and in the form of worship we pursue. Nevertheless, in the confines of one's home we have a great deal of lattitude in how we conduct our worship and live our daily lives. Some people have stretched their lattitude to the ultimate, and either have rejected God or decided to use God as a rabbit's foot when we roll the dice. Some have lost an appreciation for the concept of the soul.
IMHO it is not good to trivialize one's worship or practice devil-may-care conduct within one's Christian life. The situation may be similar to the one that the ancient world eventually reached. Their public practice of religion became mundane, routine, meaningless, and lackluster. The people lost their zest for religion as well as their appreciation for the traditions of their ancestors. They set sail on a stormy sea never to return.
I'm certainly short of knowledge about these questions, but I am
most interested in learning more about what other people know.
Respectfully,
Rosemary Bradford Grant
Monett High School History/Humanities Instructor UMKC adjunct professor fhr010@mail.connect.more.net Monett, MO 65708 1-417-235-5445 & fax 1-417-235-7884
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