{"id":4624,"date":"2018-04-06T14:34:09","date_gmt":"2018-04-06T14:34:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2018\/04\/06\/machiavelli-arendt-and-the-important-difference-between-private-and-public-morality\/"},"modified":"2018-04-06T14:34:09","modified_gmt":"2018-04-06T14:34:09","slug":"machiavelli-arendt-and-the-important-difference-between-private-and-public-morality","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2018\/04\/06\/machiavelli-arendt-and-the-important-difference-between-private-and-public-morality\/","title":{"rendered":"Machiavelli, Arendt, and the Important Difference between Private and Public Morality"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reader R. B. writes:<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
I have been enjoying your posts about immigration because they are insightful. I'm on the border (haha) about the issue for the most part. I work with illegals from Mexico (in a restaurant) so you can imagine how that plays into my thinking. The problem as I see it is this: it is extremely difficult to gain citizenship in America and extremely expensive; most immigrants do not have the money and are trying to escape their shitty situation in Mexico. They are left with a nasty choice of returning to Mexico or purchasing an illegal visa (which the majority of the time is a scam for a large amount of their money). I am a Christian so I think it's important to think about how God treats the other–the outcast, the poor, and the immigrant. <\/span><\/div>\n
 <\/span><\/div>\n
A professor friend has written an interesting paper on the subject, entitled "Love and Borders."  If you have time let me know what you think. <\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
My overall view is as follows.  Maybe later I'll discuss the details of the paper in question.<\/span><\/div>\n
\n

Christian precepts such as "Turn the other cheek" and "Welcome the stranger" make sense and are salutary only within communities of the like-minded and morally decent; they make no sense and are positively harmful in the public sphere, and, a fortiori<\/em>, in the international sphere.  The monastery is not the wide world.  What is conducive unto salvation in the former will get you killed in the latter.  And we know what totalitarians, whether Communists or Islamists, do when they get power: they destroy the churches, synagogues, monasteries, ashrams, and zendos. And with them are destroyed the means of transmitting the dharma, the kerygma, the law and the prophets.  <\/span><\/p>\n

An important but troubling thought is conveyed in a recent NYT<\/em> op-ed (emphasis added):<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Machiavelli teaches that in a world where so many are not good, you must learn to be able to not be good. The virtues taught in our secular and religious schools are incompatible with the virtues one must practice to safeguard those same institutions.<\/strong> The power of the lion and the cleverness of the fox: These are the qualities a leader must harness to preserve the republic.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The problem referenced in the bolded sentence is very serious but may have no solution.  That's the aporetician in me speaking. <\/span><\/p>\n

The problem as I see it is that (i) the pacific virtues the practice of which makes life worth living within families, between friends, and in such institutions of civil society as churches and fraternal organizations  are essentially private and cannot be extended outward as if we are all brothers and sisters belonging to a global community.  Talk of  global community is blather.  The institutions of civil society can survive and flourish only if protected by warriors and statesmen whose virtues are of the manly and martial, not of the womanish and pacific, sort. And yet (ii) if no  extension beyond the private of the pacific virtues is possible then humanity would seem to be doomed  in an age of terrorism and weapons of mass destruction.  Besides, it is unsatisfactory that there be two moralities, one private, the other public.<\/span><\/p>\n

Consider the Christian virtues preached by Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount<\/a>.  They include humility, meekness, love of righteousness, mercy, purity of heart, love of peace and of reconciliation.  Everyone who must live uncloistered in the world understands that these pacific and essentially womanish virtues have but limited application there.  Indeed, their practice can get you killed. (I am not using 'womanish' as a derogatory qualifier.)<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Si<\/a>You may love peace, but unless you are prepared to make war upon your enemies and show them no mercy, you may not be long for this world.  Turning the other cheek makes sense within a loving family, but no sense in the wider world.  (Would the Pope turn the other cheek if the Vatican came under attack by Muslim terrorists or would he call upon the armed might of the Italian state?)  My point is perfectly obvious in the case of states: they are in the state (condition) of nature with respect to each other. Each state secures by blood and iron a civilized space within which art and music and science and scholarship can flourish and wherein, ideally, blood does not flow; but these states and their civilizations battle each other in the state (condition) of nature red in tooth and claw.  Talk of world government or United Nations is globalist blather that hides the will to power of those who would seize control of the world government. United under which umbrella of values and principles and presuppositions?<\/span><\/p>\n

What values do we share with the Muslim world? <\/span><\/p>\n

The Allies would not have been long for this world had they not been merciless in their treatment of the Axis Powers.  <\/span><\/p>\n

Israel would have ceased to exist long ago had Israelis not been ruthless in their dealing with Muslim terrorists bent on her destruction.<\/span><\/p>\n

This is also true of individuals once they move beyond their families and friends and genuine communities and sally forth into the wider world. <\/span><\/p>\n

The problem is well understood by Hannah Arendt ("Truth and Politics" in Between Past and Future<\/em>, Penguin 1968, p. 245):<\/span><\/p>\n

     The disastrous consequences for any community that began in all<\/span>
     earnest to follow ethical precepts derived from man in the singular<\/span>
     — be they Socratic or Platonic or Christian — have been<\/span>
     frequently pointed out. Long before Machiavelli recommended<\/span>
     protecting the political realm against the undiluted principles of<\/span>
     the Christian faith (those who refuse to resist evil permit the<\/span>
     wicked "to do as much evil as they please"), Aristotle warned<\/span>
     against giving philosophers any say in political matters. (Men who<\/span>
     for professional reasons must be so unconcerned with "what is good<\/span>
     for themselves" cannot very well be trusted with what is good for<\/span>
     others, and least of all with the "common good," the down-to-earth<\/span>
     interests of the community.) [Arendt cites the Nicomachean Ethics<\/em>,<\/span>
     Book VI, and in particular 1140b9 and 1141b4.]<\/span><\/p>\n

There is a tension  between man qua philosopher\/Christian and man qua citizen.  As a philosopher raised in Christianity, I am concerned with my soul, with its integrity, purity, salvation. I take very seriously indeed the Socratic "Better to suffer wrong than to do it" and the Christian  "Resist not the evildoer." But as a citizen I must be concerned not only with my own well-being but also with the public welfare. This is true a fortiori<\/em> of public officials and people in a position to  influence public opinion, people like Catholic bishops many of whom are woefully ignorant of the simple points Arendt makes in the passage quoted. So, as Arendt points out, the Socratic and Christian admonitions are not applicable in the public sphere.<\/span><\/p>\n

What is applicable to me in the singular, as this existing individual concerned with the welfare of his immortal soul over that of his  perishable body, is not applicable to me as citizen. As a citizen, I   cannot "welcome the stranger" who violates the laws of my country, a stranger who may be a terrorist or a drug smuggler or a human trafficker or a carrier of a deadly disease or a person who has no respect for the traditions of the country he invades; I cannot aid and abet his law breaking. I must be concerned with public order.  This order is among  the very conditions that make the philosophical and Christian life possible in the first place. If I were to aid and abet the stranger's law breaking, I would not be "rendering unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's" as the New Testament enjoins us to do.<\/span><\/p>\n

Indeed, the Caesar verse provides a scriptural basis for Church-State separation and indirectly exposes the fallacy of the Catholic bishops  and others who confuse private and public morality.<\/span> <\/p>\n

The article referenced above is Thomas M. Crisp, Love and Borders.<\/a><\/span> <\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reader R. B. writes: I have been enjoying your posts about immigration because they are insightful. I'm on the border (haha) about the issue for the most part. I work with illegals from Mexico (in a restaurant) so you can imagine how that plays into my thinking. The problem as I see it is this: … Continue reading “Machiavelli, Arendt, and the Important Difference between Private and Public Morality”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,123],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4624","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aporetics","category-political-morality"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4624","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4624"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4624\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4624"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4624"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4624"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}