In a Philosophical Discussion . . .

. . . three's a crowd and four's a cross-conversation. 

One-on-one, back-and-forth, defining and refining, pursuing the point, focusing like a laser, driven by eros for truth but free of polemos under the aegis of philia.  But also under the aegis of 

Amicus Plato, sed magis amica veritas.

And with no illusions about achieving agreement. An attainable goal here below is clarity about differences. "I will teach you differences." (Shakespeare, King Lear, Wittgenstein.)

Moving from Religion to Philosophy: A Typology of Motives

People come to philosophy from various 'places.'  Some come from religion, others from mathematics and the natural sciences, still others from literature and the arts.  There are other termini a quis as well.  In this post I am concerned only with the move from religion to philosophy.  What are the main types of reasons for those who are concerned with religion to take up the serious study of philosophy?  I count five main types of motive.

1. The Apologetic Motive.  Some look to philosophy for apologetic tools.  Their concern is to clarify and defend the tenets of their religious faith, tenets they do not question, or do not question in the main, against those who do question them, or even attack them.  For someone whose central motive is apologetic, the aim is not to seek a truth they do not possess, but to articulate and defend a truth, the "deposit of faith," that they already possess, if not in fullness, at least in outline.

2. The Critical Motive.  Someone who is animated by the Critical Motive seeks to understand religion and evaluate its claim to truth, while taking it seriously.  To criticize is not to oppose, but to sift, evaluate, assay, separate the true from the false, the reasonable from the unreasonable.  The critic is not out to defend or attack but to understand and evaluate.  Open to the claims of religion, his question is: But is it true?

3. The Debunking Motive.  If the apologist presupposes the truth of his religion, or some religion, the debunker presupposes the falsehood of a particular religion or of every religion.  He takes the doctrines and institutions of religion seriously as things worth attacking, exposing, debunking, unmasking, refuting.

The apologist, the critic, and the debunker all take religion seriously as something worth defending, worth evaluating, or worth attacking using the tools of philosophy.  For all three, philosophy is a tool, not an end in itself. 

The apologist moves to philosophy without leaving religion. If he succeeds in defending his faith with the weapons of philosophy, well and good; if he fails, it doesn't really matter.  He has all the essential truth he needs from his religion.  His inability to mount an intellectually respectable defense of it is a secondary matter.  He might take the following view. "My religion is true. So there must be an intellectually respectable defense of it, whether or not I or anyone can mount that defense."

The critic moves to philosophy with the live option of leaving religion behind.  Whether or not he leaves it behind depends on the outcome of his critique.  Neither staying nor leaving is a foregone conclusion.

The debunker either never had a living faith, or else he had one but lost it.  As a debunker, his decision has been made and his Rubicon crossed: religion is buncombe from start to finish, dangerous buncombe that needs to be unmasked and opposed. Strictly speaking, only the debunker who once had a living faith moves from it to philosophy.  You cannot move away from a place where you never were.

4. The Transcensive Motive.  The transcender aims to find in philosophy something that completes and transcends religion while preserving its truth.  One way to flesh this out would be in Hegelian terms: religion and philosophy both aim to express the Absolute, but only philosophy does so adequately.  Religion is an inadequate 'pictorial' (vortstellende) representation of the Absolute.  On this sort of approach all that is good in religion is aufgehoben in philosophy, simultaneously cancelled and preserved, roughly in the way the bud is both cancelled and preserved in the flower.

5. The Substitutional Motive.  The substitutionalist aims to find in philosophy a substitute for religion.  Religion, when taken seriously, makes a total claim on its adherents' higher energies.  A person who, for any reason, becomes disenchanted with religion, but is not prepared to allow himself to degenerate to the level of the worldling, may look to invest his energies elsewhere in some other lofty pursuit.  Some will turn to social or political activism.  And of course there are other termini ad quos on the road from religion. The substitutionalist abandons religion for philosophy.  In  a sense, philosophy becomes his religion.  It is in her precincts that he seeks his highest meaning and an outlet for his noblest impulses.

Some Questions

A. What is my motive?  (2).  Certainly not (1):  I seem to be constitutionally incapable of taking the religion of my upbringing, or any religion, as simply true without examination.  I can't suppress the questions that naturally arise.  We have it on high authority that "The unexamined life is not worth living."  That examination, of course, extends to everything, including religion, and indeed also to this very examining.  Note  that I am not appealing to the authority of Socrates/Plato since their authority can be validated rationally and autonomously.

Certainly not (3): I am not a debunker.  Not (4) or (5) either.  Hegel is right: both religion and philosophy treat of the Absolute.  Hegel is wrong, however, in thinking that religion is somehow completed by or culminates in philosophy.  I incline to the view that Athens and Jersualem are at odds with each other, that there is a tension between them, indeed a fruitful, productive tension, one that accounts in part for the vitality of the West as over against the inanition of the Islamic world.  To put it starkly, it it is the tension between the autonomy of reason and the heteronomy of obedient faith (cf. Leo Strauss).  Jerusalem is not a suburb of Athens.

Nor do I aim to substitute philosophy for religion.  Philosophy, with its "bloodless ballet of categories," is not my religion.  Man does not live by the discursive intellect alone.

My view is that there are four main paths to the Absolute, philosophy, religion, mysticism, and morality.  They are separate and somehow all must be trod.  No one of them has proprietary rights in the Absolute.  How integrate them?  Integration may not be possible here below.  The best we can do is tack back and forth among them.  So we think, we pray, we meditate and we live under the aegis of moral demands taken as absolute.

This theme is developed in Philosophy, Religion, Mysticism, and Wisdom. 

B. Have I left any types of motive out?   

The Art of Life: Among ‘Regular Guys’

Among regular guys it is best to play the regular guy — as tiring and boring as that can be. Need relief? Strictly limit your time among regular guys. But mix with them a little lest you be hated for being 'aloof,' or 'unfriendly.'

As long as one is in the world, one must be able to pass as being of the world.

Almost all socializing is levelling and dispiriting.  It drains one's spiritual sap. But a little socializing is good, like a little whisky. In both cases, however, more is not better.

In this fallen world, society is the enemy of solitude, and solitude is to be preferred if the good of the soul is a goal.

But I can imagine a form of sociality superior to solitude. This would be a society of spirits who had passed through the school of solitude and had achieved self-individuation.  But such a society is not to be had here below, if anywhere.

A qualification is needed. There are rare occasions in rare friendships in which one gets a glimpse of what that sodality of spirit would be like.

I'll end on a mundane note.  In my experience, a little socializing is often physically stimulating.  On an early morning ramble, I am doing alright.  I encounter an acquaintance. We chat for a few minutes. When I start up again I feel energized. There's a spring in my step and  glide to my stride. I exult, "I feel better than any old man should be allowed to feel."

RELATED:  Introverts and Inwardness

Time it took to compose this entry: 35 minutes from 4:00 to 4:35.

Today’s Facebook Shorts

The comment threads are healthy but you have to go the Land of Zuck to read them.
 
HOW MANY WHITE SUPREMACISTS DO YOU KNOW?
 
I don't know any. A white supremacist is someone who denies that whites and non-whites are equal in respect of rights (life, liberty, property, etc.) and are therefore legitimately enslaved or otherwise made subservient to whites for the benefit of whites. If you have a different definition of 'white supremacist,' please tell me what it is and how many of them you know.
 
CASHLESSNESS AND SOFT TOTALITARIANISM
 
Some restaurants no longer accept cash payments. Reason? Health concerns. A route to soft totalitarianism. Exaggerate some health threat. Inspire fear in a gullible populace of highly suggestible conformists. Ban cash in the name of public health. Result? Everyone making payments leaves a paper trail. People can be monitored as to where they go, where they shop, what they eat and drink., what they read. Too many visits to Joe's Real BBQ for paleolithic vittles and your social credit score goes down. You get the picture . Alarmist?
 
BV Comment 1:  Cede control of health care delivery to the gov't and they can tell you how to live, what to eat, drink, ride. Ride a motorcycle? Dangerous activity! Gov't has a reason to ban them if they are picking up the tab for health care.
 
BV Comment 2: Are we a gullible populace of highly suggestible conformists? Well, look at all the people walking around in the open air wearing masks. Or people driving alone in their cars wearing masks. Etc. Where is the independence of mind? Are we Americans or obedient Germans?
 
JOEY B.: OUT OF TOUCH AND BEING USED
 
Joe Biden has been spending too much time with his record player if he thinks that Critical Race Theory is merely a plea that we be sensitive to the feelings of people of other races. I am being charitable, perhaps excessively so. I am suggesting that he is an old man out of touch with current events.
 

Rebel with a Cause

"The eighty-year-old mystery of the murder of Sheldon Robert Harte, Leon Trotsky’s most controversial bodyguard."

Jean van Heijenoort was another of the Old Man's bodyguards.  I met van Heijenoort in the mid-70s when he came to Boston College on the invitation of my quondam girlfriend, Charaine H., a student at Brandeis University where van Heijenoort taught.  I had arranged for Robert Sokolowski to come and read a paper on Husserl. Comrade Van attended the talk. By then, however, the political enthusiasms of his youth were a thing of the distant past.  He had given up politics for logic and love. My entry tells the tale of his murder by a crazed lover in Mexico City where Lev Davidovich Bronstein  met his grisly end.

Moral?  Stick to logic if you want to play it safe. But there is more of life (and death) in politics and love.

A comment from Joseph:

I regularly read your blog, but I never comment because I do not know how. Anyway, I wanted to send a note about the Monsignor — what an incredible man. He is one of my personal models for how an academic should be. He is not only brilliant but also patient with students not so gifted (99.99% of them) — and he has quite a knack for teaching to several levels simultaneously. He is also funny (and not just for a priest). I'm glad that you have had the chance to meet him.

Harte Sheldon R.

Former Students

Did I help them or harm them? Probably not much of either.  They've forgotten me, and I have forgotten most of them.

The few excellent students I had made teaching somewhat worthwhile, but the unreality of the classroom bothered me and the unseriousness of teaching those with no desire to learn.  It was like trying to feed the sated or seduce the sexless.  Philosophy, like youth itself, is wasted on the young.

There were a few older students. They were eager and motivated but their brains had been ossified by the boring repetitiveness of mundane  existence. They wanted to learn, but they were old dogs unreceptive to new tricks. The picture I paint is in dark tones and your experience may differ. I am well aware of that.

What do I mean by the unreality of the classroom? Compare the dentist's office. You don't want to be there and he'd rather be playing golf. But you want his services, and he is intent on providing them in a professional manner.  It is a serious setting in which money, that universal measure of seriousness and reputation, are on the line. Most students in a required course don't want to be there, and getting them to participate is like pulling teeth. 

How did We get to be so Proud?

Recalling our miserably indigent origin in the wombs of our mothers and the subsequent helplessness of infancy, how did we get to be so arrogant and self-important?

In a line often (mis)attributed to St. Augustine, but apparently from Bernard of Clairvaux, Inter faeces et urinam nascimur: "We are born between feces and urine." 

So inauspicious a beginning for so proud a strut upon life's stage.

Pride, result of the Fall, comes before a fall — into the grave.

Saturday NIght at the Oldies: The Forgotten and the Underplayed

Betty Everett, You're No Good, 1963.  More soulful than the 1975 Linda Ronstadt version.

The Ikettes, I'm Blue, 1962. 

Lee Dorsey, Ya Ya, 1961.  Simplicity itself. Three chords. I-IV-V progression. No bridge.

Paul Anka, A Steel Guitar and a Glass of Wine, 1962.

Carole King, Crying in the Rain, 1963.  The earnest girl-feeling of young Carole makes it better than the Everly Bros.' more polished and better executed version.  

Don Gibson, Sea of a Heartbreak.  A crossover hit from 1961.  It's a crime for the oldies stations to ignore this great song. Joe Brown's cover is also good.

Ketty Lester, Love Letters, 1961.  Gets some play, but not enough.

Eric Clapton, Good Night Irene. This one goes out to Ed Buckner.