From: Matt Kundert (pirsigaffliction@hotmail.com)
Date: Thu Apr 28 2005 - 18:02:11 BST
Arlo said:
Platt's just upset because no one is rushing in to defend his distortions
and deliberately manipulated "skews" of history. So, let's be fair and ask
outright... is there anyone else on this list that believes (1) "brutality"
emerged only with the advent of "secular" power, (2) "freedom" is a
"christian concept" given to us by "christian theology" and not reason (or,
for that matter, any "other" theology), (3) the benevolent years during
which the "church" wielded power were the freest, most democratic, wonderful
years of utopic peace known in history??
Matt:
Realize, I rarely agree with Platt on anything. And this isn't one of the
those rare times. But, what I want to know is what "freedom is given to us
by reason" means. Personally, and I know Sam agrees with me, and not for
any specific religious reasons mind you, I think saying that "freedom" is
given to us by "reason" as opposed to "Christian theology," which is just a
substitute for God, plays into people like Platt's hands. The reason is
that the Enlightenment reaction to religious fanaticism was something like
"Reason fanaticism." Now, I'm not saying that we need to, say, "dial down
the rhetoric" because it gives the religious fanatic endless fuel for asking
awkward questions like, "Don't you have faith in Reason? In science?"
Rather, people like Sam and I think its philosophically wrong (partly
because of those awkward questions), or rather, it doesn't get enough juice
to move it sufficiently past religious fanaticism. I think Sam and I agree
that the Enlightenment was a step forward for busting the bubbles of some of
our Authoritative Idols, but it did so by erecting another, though smaller
and weaker, idol (smaller and weaker if only because, by that point, it is
that much more obvious how the idol deconstructs itself).
And I'll also say this. While I don't think Christianity invented freedom
(that would seem to be horribly anachronistic given the fact that I'm sure
the word was around a while before Paul), it does embody the flag of freedom
and equality in its tradition, just as any other tradition does that's made
it this far in the cultural evolution game. And it embodies it quite well
overall, though the fat is still being strained from the meat. If it
didn't, I think Christianity would have died out quicker in the West.
Matt
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