The “classic” revelations of the Jewish/Christian tradition were repeated by Jesus in response to the question, “Teacher, which commandment is the greatest?” Jesus replied: “’You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and the first commandment. And, the second is like it, ‘You shall lover your neighbor as yourself.” Then, Jesus adds, “On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” (Matthew 22: 37-40) Last week I discussed how difficult these commandments are in that they have required the work of all the law and the prophets, as well as the work of more than two thousand years of theological reflection to try and ‘interpret’ or ‘explain’ what it means to ‘love God’ and ‘to love your neighbor as yourself.’
This week I review a wonderful little book by Hilary Putnam, “Jewish Philosophy as a Guide to Life” (Published by Indiana University Press in 2008) in which we discover that the need to ‘interpret’ and ‘explain’ how to ‘love of God’ and to ‘love of neighbor and self’ is alive and well in the twenty-first century (C. E.). Putnam, a well-know philosopher in his own right, examines the work of three Jewish religious philosophers, Franz Rosenzweig, Martin Buber, and Emmanuel Levinas, as well as the religious thought of Ludwig Wittgenstein. The thrust of all four philosophers, as argued by Putnam, is to express these two major commandments within the context of twentieth century philosophy.
These philosophers agree that we need to get away from metaphysics, for metaphysics is a search for the “essence” of things. In metaphysics, the philosopher “seeks an imaginary position, one outside the flow of time. He seeks to view everything, even himself, as if he were an ‘outsider’ and seeks to view the world as if he were not in it.” (p. 28) But this is not the philosophy we are involved in Rosenzweig argues, we need “another sort of philosophy.” (p. 19) Man needs “a proper relation to God” as well as “a proper relation to other human beings or to the world.” (p. 26) Putnam suggests that “our task is to acknowledge God” but, as Rosenzweig believes, “one can acknowledge any one of the three—God, Man, and World—as they demand to be acknowledged unless one acknowledges the other two.” (p. 26) This leads to the conclusion, also reached by Wittgenstein, that “religious belief…it’s really a way of living, or a way of assessing life. It’s passionately seizing hold of this interpretation.” (p. 27)
In terms of the existence of God, Putnam writes that “we construct our images of God in response to demands that we do not create” but that “for a religious person theorizing about God is beside the point.” (p. 6) He quotes Buber: “Man receives, and what he receives is not a ‘content’ but a presence, a presence of strength.” (p. 6): and he continues, with Wittgenstein, that “religion is a deep-going way of life.” (p. 11) One must maintain, Putnam argues, the ancient idea of transforming one’s way of life and one’s understanding of one’s place in the larger scheme of things and in the human community…” (p. 13) As with Pascal, one must see one’s religious continuity as a way of life, to be learned, studied, and lived.
In order to move into this community, Rosenzweig contends that we need to continually think as if we were with another person. We must ‘speak’ to some one and think for some one. This makes a person live philosophical or theological problems. We need ‘readiness’ rather than ‘plans.’ By being ‘ready’ we can respond to another person. If we have plans, we are not listening to another because we already have determined a pathway. (pgs. 31-33) Our existence within the community allows for this listening and learning.
We “are always in the presence of God” and, therefore, there is “essentially just one commandment, the commandment to love God.” (pgs. 35-36) Revelation is always ‘an event between the two.’ Thus, a ‘religious experience’ is known ‘again and again’—“For we know it only when—we do.” (pgs. 42-43) For God calls us to love him…and we respond “Here I am!” We do not always hear this voice saying “love me”, but it is there. (pgs. 46-7) The request is for us to step outside of ourselves, to enter into relationship.
However, this is the hardest thing to do. Rosenzweig continues that “the tragedy that threatens everyone, the tragedy of being completely enclosed in oneself” is “the greatest danger facing the soul.” (p. 47) “Once one becomes God’s lover, however, one can no longer be completely enclosed in oneself, but one cannot escape that fate simply by returning God’s love…To return God’s love properly involves imitation dei—‘Be thou holy, for I the lord thy God am holy’…love of God cannot have a, so to speak, ‘vertical dimension’ without a ‘horizontal dimension’; ‘love of God’ without a direction out to other fellow human beings is not really love of God at all.” (p. 48) “I have to be able to love each and every human being as a human being.” (p. 49) “To sum up: the whole purpose of human life is revelation, and the whole content of revelation is love.” (p. 54)
Buber sees these relationships as a dynamic interaction, between God and a person as well as between a person and the world. This is captured by the I—thou relation. But, the relationship between God and a person is one that can only be of short duration. The important thing is that once one has experienced this connection the “It—World” relationship is transformed. It transforms not only the individual’s interior life but it also transforms the person’s social life. The experience of the divine is not an end in itself…but the end is the transformation of life in the world. (p. 64) One cannot describe God or theorize about him. One can only enter into an “I—You” relation with God and become transformed. (p. 65) Buber argues that you can never answer the question, “How do you know that God exists?” The “I—You” relation is never a matter of knowledge. The “I—You” relation is a shared relation, a mode of being, that can transform one’s life even when one is back in the “It” world. (p. 67) So we believe in God and therefore act in the image of God which brings us into closer relationship with God. It is a cumulative thing!
But, Levinas argues that one cannot act according to a formula such as “Behave in such and such a way…” This is a disaster because it says “treat the other as an end and not as a means…” (p. 70) and this, basically, assumes that all people are “fundamentally the same.” (p. 71) Levinas attempts to describe the “fundamental obligation of one person to the other” (p. 73): he states that the fundamental obligation we have is the obligation to make ourselves available to the neediness of the other person. (p. 74) Levinas goes on to say that to be a human being in the normative sense involves recognizing that I am commanded to say ‘Here I am’ to the other. “If you have to ask, ‘Why should I put myself out for him/her?’ you are not yet human.” (p. 75) “A genuine ethical relation to another presupposes that you realize that the other person is an independent reality and not in any way your construction.” (p. 78) And, this fundamental obligation is not derivable from any metaphysical or epistemological picture.” (p. 80) The bottom line is: “every human being is responsible for every other.” (p. 81) This is an ideal, Levinas admits, but without an ideal everything becomes mediocre.
As mentioned above, by being in the community we can come to perceive a ‘trace’ of God’s presence in the tradition of the Commandment and the interpretative community that continues to work out what the Commandment means. But, the individual in the community must feel a profound experience of being Commanded by a God with whom she or he has not had a numinous experience. (p. 86) The ‘human truths’ of the Old Testament as interpreted by Levinas are (1) every human being should experience him/herself as commanded to be available to the neediness, the suffering, the vulnerability of the other person; (2) know that, philosophically, they cannot gain an account of how this is possible; and (3) know that the divine command lacks a metaphysical basis and is not based on a personal epiphany. (pgs. 86-7) This obligation of the individual exists without the feeling that the other has the same obligation. (p. 96)
Putnam does contend that in this argument Levinas leaves out one major point about love: Levinas does not consider the love that an individual should have for themselves. Putnam argues that one cannot love others if one does not love oneself. (p. 99) Putnam claims Aristotle as his teacher on this point.
Reading this book, one certainly feels that the effort to explain the ‘love of God’ and the ‘love of neighbor’ is alive and in good hands.
Friday, March 28, 2008
Friday, March 21, 2008
The "Classic" Christian Revelations
In the posting last week I discussed faith as warranted belief and related this to the revelations of the communities that we belong to. These revelations are divided into those that are ‘classic’ or ‘primordial’, that is the revelations that are associated with the founder or founders of the community in question and the revelations of later members of the community that are ‘repeated or re-enacted’ by individuals as a part of their present experience as members of the community.
It seems important, at this time, to present what I believe to be the ‘classic’ revelations of the community I belong to, the Christian community. Therefore, what follows is what I believe are the foundations.
The first revelation is that there is a god…that is, God exists. This revelation cannot be attributed to anyone one person or group of persons. But, it is the ‘primordial’ revelation. Also, there are no proofs or anything else to accompany the insight. The revelation is presented in the Torah, the Old Testament to the Christians, the foundational document of the Hebrew/Christian tradition and is there, right in the very first sentence of the book: “In the beginning, God…” (Genesis 1:1) In my opinion, we do not need anything more than this to serve as the foundational revelation of our belief. We need no proofs, no justifications. The existence of God is the most basic, deeply held assumption that we possess.
The next two revelations are tied very closely together. Since I am a Christian I will start out with Jesus, for he is my teacher. His public ministry is dated somewhere around 25 to 27 C. E. In the scriptures we can read the following story in three of the four Gospels: Matthew 22: 34-40; Mark 12: 28-34; and Luke 10:25-28. I will quote from the Gospel of Matthew. In chapter 22, verses 34-36, Jesus is asked by a lawyer: “Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?”
Jesus answers: “’You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And, the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” (Matthew 22: 37-40) That is, everything else is interpretation.
The quotation marks inside the quotation marks are because Jesus is quoting directly from the Torah. The first quotation, relating to God, comes from Deuteronomy 6: 5; the second, relating to the neighbor, is from Leviticus 19:18. That is, Jesus is just repeating the ‘classic’ or ‘primordial’ revelation that is referenced in the older scriptures.
But, this story is not the only one that exists about the repeating of this revelation. The Jewish religious leader, Hillel, who taught in the period 30 B. C. E. to 10 C. E., emphasized the love of one’s fellow human beings as the essence of the entire Jewish tradition. It is reported that he was asked to summarize the whole of Jewish teaching (while standing on one foot) and he replied:” What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow man: this is the whole Law; the rest is the explanation…” This, to Hillel was the summation of Leviticus 19:18, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Of course, to Hillel, as it was to all the religious Jews, it was understood that “The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.” (Deuteronomy, 6: 4-5)
The Christian teaching of the revelation is exactly the same as the Jewish teaching; Hillel, as did Jesus, just repeated the ‘classic’ or ‘primordial’ revelation that existed in the older tradition. But, this is not what I find to be remarkable in their statements. What I find remarkable is their claim that “the rest is just explanation” or “On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” What this tells me is that to ‘love God’ and ‘to love your neighbor as yourself’ is very, very difficult! It sounds so easy…’love God’…’love your neighbor’…but we have the Old Testament…we have the New Testament…we have all the law and the prophets…and we have two thousand years of additional writings…just to interpret and explain what it means to ‘love God’ and to ‘love your neighbor.’
Why is it so difficult to interpret or explain what love means? It is so difficult because the essence of the Jewish/Christian faith is relationship, not theory. That is, the law and the prophets help us to define and understand what it means to be in relationship with God and with ‘our neighbor’. The law and the prophets are not the basis of a dogmatic structure or a systematic theology. They are a way of living.
But, why do we need all the law and the prophets? Isn’t love…well…just love? The answer to this is that love is not just love. Love means a lot of things. Love is dependent upon the situation. Just look at the way Hillel expresses the second greatest commandment which is like the first: “What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow man…” What does this mean? The only appropriate answer to this is that it means that…it depends! It depends upon what the situation is. And, this is the essence of love. How do I love you when you are doing something despicable? How do I love you when you are kind and gentle? How do I love you when you are sick and not feeling well? How do I love you in the routine of life?
This is why we need the law and the prophets to interpret or explain what it means to love God…to explain what it means to love our neighbor. This is why we need the teachings of Jesus and Hillel. Think back to the story that Jesus tells about the Good Samaritan. What is this story in response to? It is in response to a question a lawyer poses to Jesus. The lawyer asks: “And, just who is my neighbor?” Not only is it difficult to define love…we even have trouble in understanding who our neighbor is!
Do we need interpretation? Do we need explanation? The answer is obvious. The essence of love, it seems to me, is that we need to know enough about the one that is loved to be able to provide the loved one with what they need, and not with what we want to give them. We have to be sufficiently self-less to learn enough so that we can respond to where the loved one is. This is very, very difficult. For example, we need to know as much as we can about God in order to truly love God and respond to him as he would want us to. Likewise, we need to know as much as we can about our neighbor so that we can respond to her/him in a way that is most meaningful to them. This is what strikes me so in the stories about how Jesus healed individuals. We note that first he physically heals them. Then, in almost every case, he gives them a verbal instruction: “Don’t tell anyone about your healing”; or “Go to the synagogue and praise God.” These instructions of Jesus are very personal and must be related to the spiritual healing of the individual. Jesus knows enough about these people so that he can not only physically heal them, but provide a way for them to be healed spiritually in order to become whole human beings. Love is knowing the loved one sufficiently so that you can be where they are and not just where you are! Jesus is a model to us of this kind of love and he wants us to be a model to others of this kind of love.
The final revelation of love given to us by Jesus is captured in the story of his death and of the events leading up to his death. According to the stories we have, Jesus was a threat to a segment of the organized religion of his time. (But, not, seemingly, to the part that Hillel represented.) The leaders of this segment emphasized ‘the Law and the prophets’ in their teachings. In fact, the information provided us in the Gospel teachings indicate that these leaders made ‘the Law and the prophets’ their ultimate concern. They, in this sense, turned the teachings of Jesus and Hillel up-side-down. Jesus told these leaders over and over again, “Think in the right way! Don’t make ‘the Law and the prophets’ your ultimate concern. Make God your ultimate concern!” But this was threatening. It challenged their teaching. And, Jesus, apparently, was sufficiently successful in drawing people to him and to his teaching that they had to do something about him. As the story goes, these threatened leaders conspired to have him killed. The final lesson that Jesus gives us is the example of how he died…he stayed true to his teaching about love to his last breath, even asking for those connected in any way to his death to be forgiven. The life of Jesus shows us how one could live…and how one could die…loving God and loving neighbor.
It seems important, at this time, to present what I believe to be the ‘classic’ revelations of the community I belong to, the Christian community. Therefore, what follows is what I believe are the foundations.
The first revelation is that there is a god…that is, God exists. This revelation cannot be attributed to anyone one person or group of persons. But, it is the ‘primordial’ revelation. Also, there are no proofs or anything else to accompany the insight. The revelation is presented in the Torah, the Old Testament to the Christians, the foundational document of the Hebrew/Christian tradition and is there, right in the very first sentence of the book: “In the beginning, God…” (Genesis 1:1) In my opinion, we do not need anything more than this to serve as the foundational revelation of our belief. We need no proofs, no justifications. The existence of God is the most basic, deeply held assumption that we possess.
The next two revelations are tied very closely together. Since I am a Christian I will start out with Jesus, for he is my teacher. His public ministry is dated somewhere around 25 to 27 C. E. In the scriptures we can read the following story in three of the four Gospels: Matthew 22: 34-40; Mark 12: 28-34; and Luke 10:25-28. I will quote from the Gospel of Matthew. In chapter 22, verses 34-36, Jesus is asked by a lawyer: “Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?”
Jesus answers: “’You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And, the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” (Matthew 22: 37-40) That is, everything else is interpretation.
The quotation marks inside the quotation marks are because Jesus is quoting directly from the Torah. The first quotation, relating to God, comes from Deuteronomy 6: 5; the second, relating to the neighbor, is from Leviticus 19:18. That is, Jesus is just repeating the ‘classic’ or ‘primordial’ revelation that is referenced in the older scriptures.
But, this story is not the only one that exists about the repeating of this revelation. The Jewish religious leader, Hillel, who taught in the period 30 B. C. E. to 10 C. E., emphasized the love of one’s fellow human beings as the essence of the entire Jewish tradition. It is reported that he was asked to summarize the whole of Jewish teaching (while standing on one foot) and he replied:” What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow man: this is the whole Law; the rest is the explanation…” This, to Hillel was the summation of Leviticus 19:18, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Of course, to Hillel, as it was to all the religious Jews, it was understood that “The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.” (Deuteronomy, 6: 4-5)
The Christian teaching of the revelation is exactly the same as the Jewish teaching; Hillel, as did Jesus, just repeated the ‘classic’ or ‘primordial’ revelation that existed in the older tradition. But, this is not what I find to be remarkable in their statements. What I find remarkable is their claim that “the rest is just explanation” or “On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” What this tells me is that to ‘love God’ and ‘to love your neighbor as yourself’ is very, very difficult! It sounds so easy…’love God’…’love your neighbor’…but we have the Old Testament…we have the New Testament…we have all the law and the prophets…and we have two thousand years of additional writings…just to interpret and explain what it means to ‘love God’ and to ‘love your neighbor.’
Why is it so difficult to interpret or explain what love means? It is so difficult because the essence of the Jewish/Christian faith is relationship, not theory. That is, the law and the prophets help us to define and understand what it means to be in relationship with God and with ‘our neighbor’. The law and the prophets are not the basis of a dogmatic structure or a systematic theology. They are a way of living.
But, why do we need all the law and the prophets? Isn’t love…well…just love? The answer to this is that love is not just love. Love means a lot of things. Love is dependent upon the situation. Just look at the way Hillel expresses the second greatest commandment which is like the first: “What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow man…” What does this mean? The only appropriate answer to this is that it means that…it depends! It depends upon what the situation is. And, this is the essence of love. How do I love you when you are doing something despicable? How do I love you when you are kind and gentle? How do I love you when you are sick and not feeling well? How do I love you in the routine of life?
This is why we need the law and the prophets to interpret or explain what it means to love God…to explain what it means to love our neighbor. This is why we need the teachings of Jesus and Hillel. Think back to the story that Jesus tells about the Good Samaritan. What is this story in response to? It is in response to a question a lawyer poses to Jesus. The lawyer asks: “And, just who is my neighbor?” Not only is it difficult to define love…we even have trouble in understanding who our neighbor is!
Do we need interpretation? Do we need explanation? The answer is obvious. The essence of love, it seems to me, is that we need to know enough about the one that is loved to be able to provide the loved one with what they need, and not with what we want to give them. We have to be sufficiently self-less to learn enough so that we can respond to where the loved one is. This is very, very difficult. For example, we need to know as much as we can about God in order to truly love God and respond to him as he would want us to. Likewise, we need to know as much as we can about our neighbor so that we can respond to her/him in a way that is most meaningful to them. This is what strikes me so in the stories about how Jesus healed individuals. We note that first he physically heals them. Then, in almost every case, he gives them a verbal instruction: “Don’t tell anyone about your healing”; or “Go to the synagogue and praise God.” These instructions of Jesus are very personal and must be related to the spiritual healing of the individual. Jesus knows enough about these people so that he can not only physically heal them, but provide a way for them to be healed spiritually in order to become whole human beings. Love is knowing the loved one sufficiently so that you can be where they are and not just where you are! Jesus is a model to us of this kind of love and he wants us to be a model to others of this kind of love.
The final revelation of love given to us by Jesus is captured in the story of his death and of the events leading up to his death. According to the stories we have, Jesus was a threat to a segment of the organized religion of his time. (But, not, seemingly, to the part that Hillel represented.) The leaders of this segment emphasized ‘the Law and the prophets’ in their teachings. In fact, the information provided us in the Gospel teachings indicate that these leaders made ‘the Law and the prophets’ their ultimate concern. They, in this sense, turned the teachings of Jesus and Hillel up-side-down. Jesus told these leaders over and over again, “Think in the right way! Don’t make ‘the Law and the prophets’ your ultimate concern. Make God your ultimate concern!” But this was threatening. It challenged their teaching. And, Jesus, apparently, was sufficiently successful in drawing people to him and to his teaching that they had to do something about him. As the story goes, these threatened leaders conspired to have him killed. The final lesson that Jesus gives us is the example of how he died…he stayed true to his teaching about love to his last breath, even asking for those connected in any way to his death to be forgiven. The life of Jesus shows us how one could live…and how one could die…loving God and loving neighbor.
Friday, March 14, 2008
Warranted Belief
“A community of faith usually traces its history back to what may be called a ‘classic’ or ‘primordial’ revelation. This classic revelation, a definite disclosive experience of the holy granted to the founder or founders of the community, becomes as it were the paradigm for experiences of the holy in that community. A revelation that has the power to found a community of faith becomes fruitful in that community, and is, so to speak, repeated or re-enacted in the experience of the community, thus becoming normative for the experience of the community. Yet only because the primordial revelation is continually renewed in present experience can it be revelation for us, and not just a fossilized revelation.” John Macquarrie, “Principles of Christian Theology,” Second Edition, (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons,1977), pages 8-9.
In the past two postings I have discussed the importance of community and the fact that we belong to communities that, in a sense, believe in the things that we believe in or believe in the things that we want to believe in. These communities represent how we would like to live, both within the community itself and in relationship with the world outside of the community. Today, the emphasis is not upon the founder or founders of the community, but in those that come later. Our emphasis is upon those that ‘repeat or re-enact‘ the community’s primordial revelation in their present activity so that the revelation is constantly renewed and alive.
The ‘classic’ or ‘primordial’ revelation of the community essentially creates a ‘possibility for life,’ a ‘worldview,’ a ‘hypothesis.’ The classic revelation presents something that must be and will be tested over time. Of course, it is not complete, in and of itself. It needs to be reflected on. Its meaning needs to be explored. Interpretation is required to place it into a context that can be understood. And, then people need time to see how it works, refine the message, and build a framework or structure around it. The process is one of going from the unknown to the known and this is not easy. At first, we don’t really know all the ramifications and consequences that surround the revelation. These must be worked out.
In words that we have used before, this primordial revelation results in the creation of a model. We are not always sure about what this model does or should be applied to. Yes, there are some immediate applications of the revelation because the revelation generally provides an explanation for something we did not understand before. The recipient of the revelation had asked a question, implicitly or explicitly, and the revelation is, in some way, an answer to that question. We assume that the revelation must be quite rich if a community of faith is founded upon it. By rich we mean that we find many more applications of the revelation when we live with it for an extended period of time and we use the model on a regular basis. That is, we must, over time, find that the model or models that are derived from the revelation fit with experience; the world and the revelation, we find, ultimately are consistent with one another.
In other words, the community finds that as it continually renews the revelation in present experience, the model or models related to the revelation work. They provide relatively adequate predictions that can be used by the members of the community, as well as the community itself, to solve problems and make decisions that lead to the life that those in the community would like to live. The model or models used by the community ‘work’ in the sense that they produce desirable and sustainable results. The community comes to have ‘faith’ in the revelation or revelations it subscribes to.
A ‘classic’ or a ‘primordial’ revelation that does not achieve success in this way over an extended period of time will not survive. And, we observe in history, that communities are founded that survive for a period of time as the models used by the community are satisfactory for a ‘local’ or ‘regional’ situation, but do not possess a more universal message and so tend to fade as they come into competition with other communities whose revelation is broader and more robust. Thus, part of the relevance of the revelation, and the survival and growth of the community, depend upon the ability of the community’s model or models to expand or adapt to more and more universal conditions. That is, the model or models must allow the community to solve more and more difficult problems that apply in more and more different situations. This is what the community does as it renews itself in the ‘present experience.’ The primordial revelation is alive and does not, as Macquarrie writes, become ‘fossilized.’
This is how faith is built and grows. It is because of our action, our decision making. Action is, ultimately, the source of our perceptions and our general belief. More generally, a belief is warranted if there is sufficient experience that the model or models believed in can be relatively successful, either as seen in others, such as other members of our community, or as actually experienced by ourselves.
This is an important point for a couple of reasons. First, humans tend to focus just on current or short term outcomes. This response has been built into them because of the need to respond to immediate danger in order to act in a way that optimizes their chance for survival. However, as human beings evolved and came to live more and more in civilized communities reliance on an immediate response did not always result in the best outcomes over time. In this respect, the community helps the individual member of the community by showing that its models do produce favorable results. This is one of the fundamental reasons we belong to the community. But, the community also helps the individual member persist in the use of the models, even though the results may not turn out to be, in the short run, the outcomes that are most desired.
This emphasis on process allows the individual member of the community to move away from the concentration on short term results. The only way a belief can become warranted is that it must lead to the ‘expected results’ over the longer run. But, how long is ‘long term’? It is subjective and there needs to be some consideration of ‘balance’ concerning the tradeoff between staying with the model or quickly dispensing of the model to get a new one. We must accept the fact that our models are tentative. Still, we must not be too willing to get rid of a model too quickly. Our communities help us to make a reasonable decision about staying with a model.
A belief that is warranted is a belief that is justified. But, one belief may not be as strong as another belief. That is, beliefs are subject to varying degrees of belief. In some instances, we have a very high degree of belief in a model and consequently we may feel very confident in using that model. In this sense, the degree of belief influences how far we should act using a particular model. The probabilistic models that we use really are just projections of our degrees of belief; in this our models are but predictive instruments.
We must accept the fact that we don’t know everything and we will never know everything. This was the point of my post on January 19, 2008 titled, “What is Missing?” As a consequence of this we will never know the ‘truth’ about anything. Especially if everything is connected in some way to everything else even our ‘reductive’ science cannot provide us with knowledge of the ‘truth’. Creation is just too sophisticated and complex and the minds of human beings don’t have the processing power to model all of the world in order to be able discern what the ‘truth’ is. We do construct models to help us make the predictions we need to solve problems and make decisions. But our models are limited, our knowledge is bounded. They are tentative because we can’t know everything. Since we can’t know everything, our predictions can only be probabilistic. Faith in our models, therefore, is a necessary condition of our life and we develop more and more trust in our models as our belief becomes more warranted. That is the best we can hope for.
In the past two postings I have discussed the importance of community and the fact that we belong to communities that, in a sense, believe in the things that we believe in or believe in the things that we want to believe in. These communities represent how we would like to live, both within the community itself and in relationship with the world outside of the community. Today, the emphasis is not upon the founder or founders of the community, but in those that come later. Our emphasis is upon those that ‘repeat or re-enact‘ the community’s primordial revelation in their present activity so that the revelation is constantly renewed and alive.
The ‘classic’ or ‘primordial’ revelation of the community essentially creates a ‘possibility for life,’ a ‘worldview,’ a ‘hypothesis.’ The classic revelation presents something that must be and will be tested over time. Of course, it is not complete, in and of itself. It needs to be reflected on. Its meaning needs to be explored. Interpretation is required to place it into a context that can be understood. And, then people need time to see how it works, refine the message, and build a framework or structure around it. The process is one of going from the unknown to the known and this is not easy. At first, we don’t really know all the ramifications and consequences that surround the revelation. These must be worked out.
In words that we have used before, this primordial revelation results in the creation of a model. We are not always sure about what this model does or should be applied to. Yes, there are some immediate applications of the revelation because the revelation generally provides an explanation for something we did not understand before. The recipient of the revelation had asked a question, implicitly or explicitly, and the revelation is, in some way, an answer to that question. We assume that the revelation must be quite rich if a community of faith is founded upon it. By rich we mean that we find many more applications of the revelation when we live with it for an extended period of time and we use the model on a regular basis. That is, we must, over time, find that the model or models that are derived from the revelation fit with experience; the world and the revelation, we find, ultimately are consistent with one another.
In other words, the community finds that as it continually renews the revelation in present experience, the model or models related to the revelation work. They provide relatively adequate predictions that can be used by the members of the community, as well as the community itself, to solve problems and make decisions that lead to the life that those in the community would like to live. The model or models used by the community ‘work’ in the sense that they produce desirable and sustainable results. The community comes to have ‘faith’ in the revelation or revelations it subscribes to.
A ‘classic’ or a ‘primordial’ revelation that does not achieve success in this way over an extended period of time will not survive. And, we observe in history, that communities are founded that survive for a period of time as the models used by the community are satisfactory for a ‘local’ or ‘regional’ situation, but do not possess a more universal message and so tend to fade as they come into competition with other communities whose revelation is broader and more robust. Thus, part of the relevance of the revelation, and the survival and growth of the community, depend upon the ability of the community’s model or models to expand or adapt to more and more universal conditions. That is, the model or models must allow the community to solve more and more difficult problems that apply in more and more different situations. This is what the community does as it renews itself in the ‘present experience.’ The primordial revelation is alive and does not, as Macquarrie writes, become ‘fossilized.’
This is how faith is built and grows. It is because of our action, our decision making. Action is, ultimately, the source of our perceptions and our general belief. More generally, a belief is warranted if there is sufficient experience that the model or models believed in can be relatively successful, either as seen in others, such as other members of our community, or as actually experienced by ourselves.
This is an important point for a couple of reasons. First, humans tend to focus just on current or short term outcomes. This response has been built into them because of the need to respond to immediate danger in order to act in a way that optimizes their chance for survival. However, as human beings evolved and came to live more and more in civilized communities reliance on an immediate response did not always result in the best outcomes over time. In this respect, the community helps the individual member of the community by showing that its models do produce favorable results. This is one of the fundamental reasons we belong to the community. But, the community also helps the individual member persist in the use of the models, even though the results may not turn out to be, in the short run, the outcomes that are most desired.
This emphasis on process allows the individual member of the community to move away from the concentration on short term results. The only way a belief can become warranted is that it must lead to the ‘expected results’ over the longer run. But, how long is ‘long term’? It is subjective and there needs to be some consideration of ‘balance’ concerning the tradeoff between staying with the model or quickly dispensing of the model to get a new one. We must accept the fact that our models are tentative. Still, we must not be too willing to get rid of a model too quickly. Our communities help us to make a reasonable decision about staying with a model.
A belief that is warranted is a belief that is justified. But, one belief may not be as strong as another belief. That is, beliefs are subject to varying degrees of belief. In some instances, we have a very high degree of belief in a model and consequently we may feel very confident in using that model. In this sense, the degree of belief influences how far we should act using a particular model. The probabilistic models that we use really are just projections of our degrees of belief; in this our models are but predictive instruments.
We must accept the fact that we don’t know everything and we will never know everything. This was the point of my post on January 19, 2008 titled, “What is Missing?” As a consequence of this we will never know the ‘truth’ about anything. Especially if everything is connected in some way to everything else even our ‘reductive’ science cannot provide us with knowledge of the ‘truth’. Creation is just too sophisticated and complex and the minds of human beings don’t have the processing power to model all of the world in order to be able discern what the ‘truth’ is. We do construct models to help us make the predictions we need to solve problems and make decisions. But our models are limited, our knowledge is bounded. They are tentative because we can’t know everything. Since we can’t know everything, our predictions can only be probabilistic. Faith in our models, therefore, is a necessary condition of our life and we develop more and more trust in our models as our belief becomes more warranted. That is the best we can hope for.
Friday, March 7, 2008
The Communities We Belong To
Pascal argued that the possibility for belief rested with the community or communities that we join. His discussion related especially to the possibility for one to believe in God and the community he referenced was the Christian community. However, his argument for belief can apply to any potential belief that we might want to consider and the ‘community’ that supports and promotes that belief. The community can be explicit or implicit; vague, ill-defined and loosely organized; or controlled, highly-delineated, and tightly organized; or any of a number of different ways of existing. It could be an economic class, say the bourgeoisie, middle-class, or capitalist, a philosophical community, say modern, post-modern, or existential, or a political movement, say liberal, conservative, or socialist, and so on.
The important thing about ‘community’ is that it helps you define yourself by displaying how the people within this community live, what they believe in, and how they relate to the world outside the community. In this world of uncertainty where we operate with only incomplete information, we grow up in communities and this helps us to grow and to develop our problem solving skills because the community has models of the world that we can use to solve problems and make decisions. The community exists because the models used by the community have apparently been relatively successful, at least up until this time. That is, the community is still there because it has been able to survive using the models of the world that the community is based upon.
Not all communities, however, are improving their chances of survival. All communities exist because, at one time or another, their models did provide a means for those within the community to survive and perform satisfactorily relative to other communities. But, communities are in competition with one another and the more successful communities seem to thrive and grow at the expense of those whose models do not seem to work as well. So, we have some communities that are ‘advancing’ and others that are ‘in decline’. Those that are in decline are either attempting to modify their models so as to create more successful models of the same tradition, or, the declining community becomes very defensive and sticks with its existing models and turns inward, thereby exacerbating the decline.
Regardless, one chooses the communities one belongs to and in so choosing commits, on various levels, to the things that the community stands for. Some of these commitments become what Paul Tillich has defined as “Ultimate Concerns.” An Ultimate Concern is something a person gives especial allegiance to, something that dominates and influences all a person does. For example, God can be the Ultimate Concern. But, a political party may also be a person’s Ultimate Concern. A book, like the Bible, may become a person’s Ultimate Concern. Wealth or social standing may become the Ultimate Concern of a person. Or, a way of thinking may become an Ultimate Concern.
In this sense, the choice of community is a spiritual decision and this is something we are very interested in. The obvious concern, therefore, becomes whether or not the Ultimate Concern that a person chooses is really “Ultimate”. If the commitment is to something that is really Ultimate, then the person making the commitment can achieve some kind of peace of mind by seeking the Ultimate. Problems occur, however, if the commitment is made to something that is not really Ultimate. In these instances, the one committing does not achieve peace of mind because he or she is giving their allegiance to something that cannot fully satisfy them. That is, a commitment to something that is not truly Ultimate leaves one incomplete in a number of different possible ways. A commitment to something that is not truly Ultimate does not provide “the peace which passes all understanding.” In biblical terms the commitment is to an idol and the pursuit of this idol is idolatry.
How can one distinguish between a commitment to something that is Ultimate and the commitment to something that is not? I would like to argue that one major difference is that when one commits to something that is not Ultimate, one is committing to an outcome or to a series of outcomes. That is, one is basing ones commitments on the possibility of receiving something. The problem with putting the emphasis upon receiving something is that one can fall short of what one wants to receive; or, a person, not being satisfied, continually revises their expectations of what they want to receive, setting the standard higher and higher. In focusing on outcomes, a person is never satisfied; that person is always discontented and restless. This is not the way to peace of mind.
It seems to me that if a person is to focus on something that is truly Ultimate then that person will focus on a process and not on a specific outcome or outcomes. That is, if God is the Ultimate Concern, then one wants to focus on God and on what God does. And how can this be done? One definition of truly being with God is to be in unity with God. Jesus speaks of the fact that he and the Father (God) are one. Expanding this definition somewhat to be consistent with the teaching of the Christian Church, one can argue that one wants to be “in unity with God, with self, with others, and with creation.” That is, one would like to be ‘with’ all components of life and move together with them. Thus, for something to be truly an Ultimate Concern, it must bring people into a relationship with all of these elements so that the individual can claim that they are one with God and God’s creation.
There is no specific ‘outcome’ here for all these elements are always changing. Being in unity with each of them, therefore, requires a process for gaining and, hopefully, maintaining unity over time. The important thing to note is that what gains unity and then maintains unity will not always be the same. That is why ‘process’ is important because ‘outcome’ will necessarily vary!
This means, that when one makes a commitment to a community of belief one is making a commitment to learn and grow so as to maintain a unity with the community and with all the things that the community stands for. If the choice of community is too narrow, then things are left out of the commitment and one can never become complete or whole. But, most importantly, the commitment must be one to change with the community and keep in unity with the community over time and not just at one time in history.
This is where the concept of love comes into the picture. To me, love is not something that exists, but a process of commitment between the one that loves and that which is loved. Love is something that allows for change and growth and is not something that is fixed and limited. It is a relationship and not a constant. Love allows for the one who loves to change and for that which is loved to change. Love is related to knowing and understanding, to learning and adjusting. Only by accepting this does one have any possibility of unity or wholeness when considering someone or something else that one loves.
Returning to the relationship between belief and community one can now understand that the relationship is a dynamic one and not static, something that is forever new. One does not come to ‘believe’ in something; one comes to a ‘belief in’ someone or something and that belief is continually renewed over and over again by actively working to understand the loved one and one’s self and living through the process of commitment and love. This, I believe, it is the model that Jesus displayed to us in his life and is the model that the Christian community lives by. It is the model that Christians, everywhere, attempt to exemplify in their own lives.
The apostle Paul writes in his first letter to the Corinthians 13: 4-8: “Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Lover never ends.” What does this specifically mean? I don’t know…it is a process and not an outcome.
The important thing about ‘community’ is that it helps you define yourself by displaying how the people within this community live, what they believe in, and how they relate to the world outside the community. In this world of uncertainty where we operate with only incomplete information, we grow up in communities and this helps us to grow and to develop our problem solving skills because the community has models of the world that we can use to solve problems and make decisions. The community exists because the models used by the community have apparently been relatively successful, at least up until this time. That is, the community is still there because it has been able to survive using the models of the world that the community is based upon.
Not all communities, however, are improving their chances of survival. All communities exist because, at one time or another, their models did provide a means for those within the community to survive and perform satisfactorily relative to other communities. But, communities are in competition with one another and the more successful communities seem to thrive and grow at the expense of those whose models do not seem to work as well. So, we have some communities that are ‘advancing’ and others that are ‘in decline’. Those that are in decline are either attempting to modify their models so as to create more successful models of the same tradition, or, the declining community becomes very defensive and sticks with its existing models and turns inward, thereby exacerbating the decline.
Regardless, one chooses the communities one belongs to and in so choosing commits, on various levels, to the things that the community stands for. Some of these commitments become what Paul Tillich has defined as “Ultimate Concerns.” An Ultimate Concern is something a person gives especial allegiance to, something that dominates and influences all a person does. For example, God can be the Ultimate Concern. But, a political party may also be a person’s Ultimate Concern. A book, like the Bible, may become a person’s Ultimate Concern. Wealth or social standing may become the Ultimate Concern of a person. Or, a way of thinking may become an Ultimate Concern.
In this sense, the choice of community is a spiritual decision and this is something we are very interested in. The obvious concern, therefore, becomes whether or not the Ultimate Concern that a person chooses is really “Ultimate”. If the commitment is to something that is really Ultimate, then the person making the commitment can achieve some kind of peace of mind by seeking the Ultimate. Problems occur, however, if the commitment is made to something that is not really Ultimate. In these instances, the one committing does not achieve peace of mind because he or she is giving their allegiance to something that cannot fully satisfy them. That is, a commitment to something that is not truly Ultimate leaves one incomplete in a number of different possible ways. A commitment to something that is not truly Ultimate does not provide “the peace which passes all understanding.” In biblical terms the commitment is to an idol and the pursuit of this idol is idolatry.
How can one distinguish between a commitment to something that is Ultimate and the commitment to something that is not? I would like to argue that one major difference is that when one commits to something that is not Ultimate, one is committing to an outcome or to a series of outcomes. That is, one is basing ones commitments on the possibility of receiving something. The problem with putting the emphasis upon receiving something is that one can fall short of what one wants to receive; or, a person, not being satisfied, continually revises their expectations of what they want to receive, setting the standard higher and higher. In focusing on outcomes, a person is never satisfied; that person is always discontented and restless. This is not the way to peace of mind.
It seems to me that if a person is to focus on something that is truly Ultimate then that person will focus on a process and not on a specific outcome or outcomes. That is, if God is the Ultimate Concern, then one wants to focus on God and on what God does. And how can this be done? One definition of truly being with God is to be in unity with God. Jesus speaks of the fact that he and the Father (God) are one. Expanding this definition somewhat to be consistent with the teaching of the Christian Church, one can argue that one wants to be “in unity with God, with self, with others, and with creation.” That is, one would like to be ‘with’ all components of life and move together with them. Thus, for something to be truly an Ultimate Concern, it must bring people into a relationship with all of these elements so that the individual can claim that they are one with God and God’s creation.
There is no specific ‘outcome’ here for all these elements are always changing. Being in unity with each of them, therefore, requires a process for gaining and, hopefully, maintaining unity over time. The important thing to note is that what gains unity and then maintains unity will not always be the same. That is why ‘process’ is important because ‘outcome’ will necessarily vary!
This means, that when one makes a commitment to a community of belief one is making a commitment to learn and grow so as to maintain a unity with the community and with all the things that the community stands for. If the choice of community is too narrow, then things are left out of the commitment and one can never become complete or whole. But, most importantly, the commitment must be one to change with the community and keep in unity with the community over time and not just at one time in history.
This is where the concept of love comes into the picture. To me, love is not something that exists, but a process of commitment between the one that loves and that which is loved. Love is something that allows for change and growth and is not something that is fixed and limited. It is a relationship and not a constant. Love allows for the one who loves to change and for that which is loved to change. Love is related to knowing and understanding, to learning and adjusting. Only by accepting this does one have any possibility of unity or wholeness when considering someone or something else that one loves.
Returning to the relationship between belief and community one can now understand that the relationship is a dynamic one and not static, something that is forever new. One does not come to ‘believe’ in something; one comes to a ‘belief in’ someone or something and that belief is continually renewed over and over again by actively working to understand the loved one and one’s self and living through the process of commitment and love. This, I believe, it is the model that Jesus displayed to us in his life and is the model that the Christian community lives by. It is the model that Christians, everywhere, attempt to exemplify in their own lives.
The apostle Paul writes in his first letter to the Corinthians 13: 4-8: “Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Lover never ends.” What does this specifically mean? I don’t know…it is a process and not an outcome.
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