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Viable Scenarios and Rationality

13 Thursday Feb 2020

Posted by in apologetics, atheism, Athesism Christianity, Catholic, christianity, epistemology, metaethics, philosophy, religion, Uncategorized

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A common view is that we are rational when we weigh the evidence for and against any belief we hold, and if the weight of the evidence says it is more likely than not true we can/should continue to believe it.   If not, then we shouldn’t continue to believe it.   Another approach is to say we should “apportion our beliefs to the evidence.”   These approaches are different from each other, but as far as they go they seem ok and I am not trying to parse them out here.  Instead I want to suggest there is more to having rational beliefs than simply following either of those approaches.

Consider the various Cartesian skeptical scenarios.  These scenarios force us to ask how we know anything about the external world. ( BTW throughout this  blog I am using “know” as imprecise short hand for “reasonably  believe.”  I think “knowing” something does require more certainty that what we “reasonably  believe”  but my sentences are awkward enough so I am sticking with the term “know”)     We might be dreaming.  Some god or evil genius may be manipulating a brain in a vat somewhere causing us to have these experiences etc.  If that was the case it would seem there is still something (a thinking thing) having an experience and so in some sense “I” (this thinking thing) would still exist,  but nothing external to my mind would need to exist as I perceive it.  This is where we get the famous “I think therefore I am.”

Perhaps the easiest way to start getting the idea of these scenarios is the dreaming argument.  Everything I know about the external world is due to my experiences.   However, since I have had dreams where the experiences were such that I couldn’t tell I was dreaming it seems at least possible that I could be dreaming now.   Do I have “evidence” I am not in a very detailed dream?   We can’t step outside of our experience to see what is causing our experiences, so no I do not.  Yet I believe I am not in a detailed dream.  So that would seem to violate the notion that rationality involves “apportioning belief to the evidence.”

 

Moreover, my rejection of the dreaming argument seems to violate a notion of parsimony.   Every time I have the experience of oncoming headlights traveling opposite my direction on a highway, not only do I have that experience, but I also believe there are physical people with minds and lives of their own in those vehicles. And not only that I think those people will pass headlights and behind those headlights will be real people with real lives and concerns etc.

 

We do not think there actually are physical things (that may have their own minds) that correspond to the imagery we experience when we dream.  We just think there is the experience of seeing people in our dreams, but those people don’t really exist with minds of their own.   It is possible there are material things existing somewhere that somehow correspond to the dream experiences we have, but our experience does not require that these material things actually exist.   It seems absurd to think any material things exist somewhere corresponding with our experiences – at least when we are talking about “dream experiences.”

But when we talk about experiences we have when we believe we are awake, we somehow think the opposite.   Belief in all those extra material things and minds suddenly seems justified – even though we know from dreams – we could be having the experience without the extra material things or minds existing.

 

My point is not to try to convince people we should believe we are in a dream or other skeptical scenario – I generally don’t try to convince people of things I do not believe myself.   But rather I want to point out that it is not the “evidence” that is apportioning our beliefs here.  The various skeptical scenarios take up a very small percentage of real estate in my mind.  Most of my beliefs are formed around the notion that I am a real person moving around with other real people with minds of their own.   I do this even though I have no evidence against one of the skeptical scenarios being true.     So in doing that I am certainly not “apportioning my belief to the evidence.”   So if it is rational to believe I am not in a skeptical scenario then there must be more to rationality than “apportioning  belief to the evidence.”

 

I think there is at least one other reason we do not orient our  beliefs towards a  Cartesian Skeptical scenario.  That is because it is hard or impossible to know what we should do in such a scenario.  The converse is also true.  If we did know exactly what we should do if we were in one of these Skeptical scenarios then it would be a much more rational to orient our beliefs to account for this scenario.  It would be a possibility we could better account for because we would have an understanding of how we should deal with it.   Thus whether we could have some idea what we should do in a scenario is important to whether we should consider it a viable scenario.   But without any understanding of how we should deal with or act in such a scenario, that scenario seems a dead end.   It is only rational to orient our beliefs to viable scenarios not dead end scenarios.

 

Now let’s get back to reality as we believe it exists.  We see things and believe many of them exist in a material form independent of our experience of them.   But does having this “materiality” actually answer how we should deal with this scenario?   Some would say it does, but I don’t think knowing about how things are tells us how they should be.  So I think just adding materiality to the scenario accomplishes very little if anything.

 

But regardless of where you stand on that question, you still may agree with me that the viability of a scenario does depend on whether we have any hope of knowing what to do if we are in that scenario.   If we don’t know what scenario we are in then, any scenarios where we would have no clue how to act anyway should be discarded from consideration in orienting our beliefs/actions.   This is because by definition whatever beliefs or actions we orient to would not  be  better or worse than any other in those scenarios.  So a rational person focuses on the possible scenarios where we could know what to do and form their beliefs based on the possibility of those scenarios being true.   Those are the “live options” or what I call the “viable scenarios”.

 

But do we have to “really” know what to do or can we make up what to do?  That is, do we have to be a “moral realist” or can we be an anti-realist and just admit we are making things up  based on our experiences.    It seems to me that if we can just make up morality through a form of constructivism it wouldn’t matter that we are in a real world as opposed to a skeptical world.   It would seem we could make up morality if we are dreaming or a brain in a vat.   So if the real world we think we live in does not offer anything better than a form of anti-realist morality, then it is no more viable than a Cartesian skeptical scenario.

 

It seems to me a “viable scenario” requires that 1) moral realism is true and 2) we have a way to know what morality requires.    A scenario where we can’t possibly know what to do in it, is not a viable scenario.  Whether viability is an on off switch, or more of a sliding scale may not be all that clear.  But let’s just say any scenario where 1 and 2 are not met is not a very “lively scenario.”  They would share the same trait that makes the Cartesian doubt scenarios non-viable.

 

Now consider the possibility that naturalism is true.  We can look at the possibility that naturalism is true without any preconditions and we might say the probability is X.  But then let’s consider the probability that naturalism is true if we are in a scenario where moral realism is true.  Some, myself included, would say that if they knew Moral realism was true then they would think the probability naturalism goes down.  So on moral realism the probability of naturalism becomes X minus Y.    Others might not agree.    But one thing I am fairly certain of, is that if the scenario we are in, includes 1 and 2 then the probability of naturalism being true is very low indeed.

 

The logic of the arguments made by Sharon Street, Mark Linville and Richard Joyce demonstrate this.   They persuasively argue that if naturalism and evolution is true, even if moral realism is also true, we have no way to reliably know what morality requires.  Street and Joyce believe in naturalism so they reject the idea we can reliably know what moral realism requires even if it is true.   Linnville, and I, think that in light of this sort of argument we should reject naturalism.

 

For the reasons I stated above I think rejection of naturalism is the more rational option.  That is because holding on to naturalism leads to believing in a non-viable scenario, and rational people orient their beliefs around viable scenarios, naturalism should  be rejected.    If naturalism is a scenario where the probability of 1 and 2 is extremely low, then naturalism implies a scenario that shares the same trait that makes the Cartesian skeptical scenarios non-viable.

 

Of course, people can dispute whether 1 and 2 are necessary for a viable scenario.  They can also disagree whether 1 and 2 make the probability of naturalism low and vice versa.  But I think this is the best way to understand the structure of my moral argument for God.

Love of the Gospels and Mark in Particular

04 Wednesday Dec 2019

Posted by in apologetics, atheism, Catholic, christianity, philosophy, religion, scripture, Uncategorized

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I started to question my faith at least by junior high.  I still vaguely remember arguing with a friend who was a year older – he was in a Catholic high school and I was in a public junior high.   We were basically arguing the free will issue and whether it could exist if God knew everything .  It came up because that was something they were discussing in his freshman high school religion class.   It wasn’t something we did often – and in fact it may have just been that one time with that particular friend.  But I do recall feeling, that I set my friend straight that the Christian perspective couldn’t work and excited to attend the same Catholic High School and take this up with the teacher.

 

And it all came to pass splendidly.  I did discuss/argue this with the teacher at that Catholic High School. And the thing is I think the teacher enjoyed the argument and discussions as much as I did.  Of course, he was probably very happy to have a student engage the material.  And I was happy to find some school material I wanted to engage.

 

But I certainly never thought any questions were out of bounds for any of my Catholic teachers.   And I have to say my experience with adults in the Catholic Church tended to be that way.  It could be that I would pick out adults with a interest in the philosophical.  I guess if just blindly picked people my experience wouldn’t be so good.  But as it was, I never had the experiences many seem to have had where the adults in their Church just want to avoid the tough questions.

 

In my experience Catholics tend to fall in two camps when it comes to these philosophical questions. Camp one:  I will give them a big analysis of how God couldn’t exist and they will shrug and say “yeah maybe.”  Camp two: I give the analysis and they will share their own arguments pro and/or con.  But I don’t recall every getting the Aretha Franklin “Don’t you blaspheme in here, don’t you BLAAAASPHEME in here!”

 

In my opinion this is good.  But of course it does mean it was easy for me to fall away from the faith.  And I did.  I never decided to declare I was an atheist, but I certainly didn’t go to church on Sunday or particularly care about what the church thought was sin.  But my love of philosophy never faded.   So I majored in it and took classes in epistemology and philosophy of religion, reasoning and logic etc.  I spent quite a bit of time reading, learning and thinking about philosophical issues.

 

About the time of College I started hearing all sorts of odd views from protestants on Christianity (“Faith alone” “actions don’t matter” etc etc.) and atheists.  And all of them would have bits and pieces of scripture that would seem to support their views.  So I really started to question if I knew what Christianity even was.  Whatever they were talking about seemed foreign.   I knew quite a bit of scripture from the times I went to mass but did the church leave big parts out?

 

So what to do?  I wasn’t interested enough to read all 73 books of bible.  And I knew Paul’s letters were there to address specific concerns of churches.  I decided to read a Gospel.  After all it is through the gospels that we learn about Jesus and spread the faith.  It is through the Gospels that we learn the most about Jesus.    But which Gospel?

 

Mark doesn’t have the wonderful “Sermon on the Mount” like Matthew, nor the “Prodigal Son” or “Good Samaritan” like Luke.  And it doesn’t have the adulteress or any of the wonderfully poetic and touching narratives in John.  But it did have one thing that was the most important at the time.  It was short enough to easily be read it in one sitting.   I had no excuse.

I still remember some trepidation at the time not knowing what this gospel would say.  Would it have what I considered some pretty nutty doctrines atheists and protestants were espousing?  Was I really that ignorant?    I had to find out.  So I read it, with the intention of learning about Jesus’s life and what he wanted us to learn according to Christian Scripture.

 

What did I think?  First, it is beautiful.  The narrative is fantastic for any time but especially when compared to other ancient writings.  Second, it depicted the Jesus I grew up learning about in Catholic Churches and Schools.   I followed up with the other Gospels.  There were no surprises and I definitely felt my Catholic upbringing accurately represented Jesus and his teachings.  I found many protestant and atheist views were very hard to square with what Jesus taught in the Gospels.  I now understand why protestants often appeal to other parts of the new testament (such as Paul’s letters) and atheists appeal to the old testament.

 

As a Catholic we have scriptural readings that we rotate through every three years.  You can know what scripture Catholics read every day around the world at church by picking up a missal or looking here online.   I believe Catholics read from a Gospel every Sunday, if not every day.  So we tend to cover the Gospels and therefore Jesus pretty thoroughly.

 

Although I can’t quote chapter and verse by heart, I can often tell what the story is by the name of the gospel general chapter number which is announced, and the first sentence or two as well as the prior readings.  Catholics who try to attend mass on Sundays and pay attention will learn the Gospels and therefore what Jesus taught.

 

Now that I go to mass every Sunday  I am often amazed how the priest will have a new insight into the same text.  Often it is how passage might relate to our lives, but it also could be based on how the Greek is translated, or its connection with Old Testament scripture, or history, or just a small detail in the text.

 

Lately I have been introduced to some podcasts from Travis They take a more secular approach to the Scripture and I know at least one is an atheist.  But they all seem to also have a great appreciation for the Gospels and an interest in what deeper meanings the writers may be trying to convey.   I have been blasting through them and really enjoying them.

 

Of course, I am familiar with the historical Jesus research and especially Dr. Ehrman’s popular work which I recommend to people as well.  But with all due respect to Dr. Ehrman I think he often misses the forest for the trees.  Why are the gospels so important?  I suggest it is not because we can find inconsistencies between the gospels or from copies of the gospels.   All of that is interesting and worth being taught.   But I think if you had a teacher teach you Shakespeare and the majority of his focus was on picking nits of plot inconsistencies and whether the copies accurately reflect what Shakespeare wrote, you would be missing out.   Of course, Dr. Ehrman was a Moody Bible institute graduate and so his background does suggest his approach.  Nevertheless, when I listened to his classes he starts out saying these texts are hugely important to human history.  And I agree they are.  But I don’t think his class really conveyed how that came to be.

 

What is my point?  Read a Gospel.  But don’t read it with the intent of trying to nit-pick flaws or justify doctrine or politics.  Just read what happened to Jesus and try to understand what Jesus is trying to teach us.  And then, regardless of your religion or lack of religion, you will begin to understand why Jesus has had such an impact in human history.

 

Anti-theists and Pharisees can Interpret the Old Testament the Way they Want, I will Interpret it the Way God Wants

12 Tuesday Nov 2019

Posted by in apologetics, atheism, Athesism Christianity, Catholic, christianity, history, law, logic, metaethics, Morality, philosophy, rationality, scripture, Uncategorized

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This a second post about how Christians should deal with the objections to Christianity based on Old Testament verses.  Often opponents of Christianity will try to tell Christians about the parts of the bible that were not “cherry picked” by their Church or Sunday school teachers.  They will often talk about how they read “the whole bible.” And then start spewing out all these obscure bits and pieces of the Old Testament – and then accusingly ask “do you believe that!?”  If you try to interpret the scripture in a way that complies with the basic gist of your faith, (as opposed to their hyper-literalist reading) they will say you are just making up that interpretation.  If you simply say, well I don’t know what to make of that scripture they will say aha! You don’t even know your own scripture.   If this is troubling you then this blog is for you – and hopefully those opponents of Christianity who engage in this line of argument.

I think the best response to this is to test out how much they actually know about the bible.  Simply ask them: What did Jesus say about the old testament scriptures?  The Gospels are full of Jesus being tested on interpretations of the old testament!  We will get to these in a bit.

Don’t be surprised if the only thing the Christian opponent will remember is the “one jot”passage from Matthew  that I blogged about here. I get that as a response so often that I chose to just blog about it first.  When get this passage  (and you inevitably will if you do this apologetics schtick long enough)  Ask them if they know when Jesus said that and how he elaborated on what he meant.  The above blog deals with that quote and the context much more extensively, but in sum, the quote was part of his famous the Sermon on the Mount.    He clearly elaborates what he means and likely contradicts the anti-theist’s approach to the old testament – which are usually literalistic and amazingly similar to the pharisees of Jesus time that often wanted to “test” him.

Ask them if Jesus ever summarizes the old testament.   Does he give us guidance as to how we should understand the old testament as a whole so that we live the lives he calls us to?  People who have actually read the Gospels will know he does, repeatedly.  The Gospels record numerous situations where Jesus repeatedly teaches by his actions and words how we should understand the Old Testament.   It would be good to see if the remember any.   I have gathered up several passages where Jesus himself addresses the Old Testament Scriptures.

But before I begin why just quote Jesus?  Why not Popes or other Scripture?   I certainly could, but, Jesus is the lens through which we should read all Christian writings, not the other way around.    When we interpret scripture we of course should make sure we are interpreting it in a way that God directly tells us we should!     Jesus himself informs us that scripture is not just the word of God – it has dual authorship.  See e.g., Mark 10:1-12.

Regardless of how one might understand scripture the vast majority of Christians will agree that when Jesus says something it is God speaking very directly.  Jesus is the head of the church (Colossians 1:18) not the pope, not the bible, but Jesus.  Christians can disagree with each other about scripture.  Martin Luther even said James contradicted Paul.  But if Jesus himself is telling us how to interpret the old testament, a Christian should listen up.

What did Jesus say?   The most important point is that Jesus repeatedly summed up the old testament.  He did not dive in and give us rules for each and every verse of all forty-six books of the old testament.  That would be a continuation of the rules model that he superseded.  Instead he repeatedly tells us we should understand a general bottom line from the old testament and repeatedly rejects precisely the literalist interpretations offered today by certain anti-theists.  (Although, it was religious leaders taking the literalistic view of the old testament in Jesus’s day.)    So what is the bottom line God explicitly tells us we should take from those 46 books?  Let us quote God directly from the Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John:

Matthew:

 “So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.” Matthew 7:12

This is then repeated:

“Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”

Jesus replied: “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.””

Matthew 22:34-40

Mark:

One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?”

 

“The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.[e] Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’[f] The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[g] There is no commandment greater than these.” Mark 12:28-31

Luke:

“ On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

“What is written in the Law?” he replied. “How do you read it?”

He answered, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’[a]; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[b]”

“You have answered correctly,” Jesus replied. “Do this and you will live.”

But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”

[Jesus responds with the Parable of the Good Samaritan]

Luke 10:25-37

 

And John:

“As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.  My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command.  I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. This is my command: Love each other.”

John 15:9-17

It isn’t a pope who is saying these things.  It isn’t a protestant reformer or a Sunday School teacher.   It is God himself telling us what the bottom line is.    If you are interpreting any of the old testament in a way that goes against this then are you going against God’s interpretation.  I am not interpreting God, I am quoting him.   Accordingly, churches are not “cherry picking” passages but rather being mindful of what God explicitly told them they should take away from the scripture.   Sure they will focus on the passages that they feel deliver the message God told us we should get from the Old Testament and not dwell on passages where it is hard to see the connection.  But that is not cherry picking that is being obedient to God.

Scripture is God revealing himself to us at very different times and environments.  But God is infinite and our understanding is finite.   It should not be surprising that God will use different tools that work better for some times and places than they do for others.  And it should not be surprising that scripture will never entirely reveal everything about God so we can completely understand God as a whole.  So the fact that we look at some verses of the 73 books and have to shrug our shoulders should not be surprising!  An infinite being revealing himself is not the same as telling the story of Harry Potter.     Does God give us enough direction to live a moral life.  I think any honest reader of the gospels would agree he does.

God took the time to give us a summary of the old testament.   I do think Christians should at least understand this often repeated summary.  Love God and love each other.  So if we read a passage and we don’t see how it yields what God told us it should, then it is fine to say we are not sure what we should make of that passage.    Perhaps the story is conveying a message to people based on understandings we have lost.   Perhaps what seemed loving and forgiving to the ancients no longer seems so.   Jews and Christians have made quite a bit of moral progress over the last several centuries.  An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth may seem extreme to us but it may have been a very moderate statement if the culture typically asked for the heads a culprit’s whole family in exchange for a tooth.  As we might expect God’s guidance has helped us make moral progress!

Jesus said as much himself.  At times scripture was written as a practical tool to guide people in the state they were in at the time.  See e.g., Matthew 19:1-9 and Mark 10:1-12.  Where Jesus says although the old testament allowed divorce that was not really how we should live.   (I would note Paul points out Jesus said this and that would be very hard to square with the view that Paul did not think Jesus was alive on earth as some Mythicists would claim.  “And unto the married I command, yet not I, but the Lord, Let not the wife depart from her husband” 1 Corinthians 7:10.)

Let’s look at how Jesus himself applies his bottom line summary in response to the Pharisees who often would raise almost the identical issues that Christian opponents raise today.

Stoning People

John 8:2-11 is an obvious and direct answer from Jesus on how we should deal with old testament laws:

“At dawn he appeared again in the temple courts, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them.  The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group  and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery.  In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?”  They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him.

But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger.  When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.”  Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.

At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. Jesus straightened up and asked her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?”

“No one, sir,” she said.

“Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin.”

These ancient codes like Lev. 20:10; Deut 22:22 have been so often quoted by Christian opponents you would think Jesus never addressed any of them, let alone addressed them directly and explicitly.

Many atheists will talk about how this passage from John does not appear in existing early texts.  But that is a red herring.  All Christian Churches I am aware of include this passage in their scripture.   Whether it was in early transcripts and taken out of some – or was a story about Jesus that was passed on and later included into John is unimportant.  It is part of our scipture and it tells us what God said.

In any case this is just one of many examples where Jesus’s bottom line that old testament laws must be understood in terms of treating others as you would like to be treated.  That would of course include judging others as we would like to be judged.    See e.g., Matthew 7:1-5, Luke 6:37-42 and Luke 6:31-36.  Where Jesus tells us to focus on our own shortcomings instead of trying to judge others for theirs.    These teaching not to judge others guts the penal aspects of the old testament across the board.  But let’s move to some other specific examples.

 

Healing on the sabbath, another rule broken! 

 

“Another time Jesus went into the synagogue, and a man with a shriveled hand was there.  Some of them were looking for a reason to accuse Jesus, so they watched him closely to see if he would heal him on the Sabbath.  Jesus said to the man with the shriveled hand, “Stand up in front of everyone.”

Then Jesus asked them, “Which is lawful on the Sabbath: to do good or to do evil, to save life or to kill?” But they remained silent.

He looked around at them in anger and, deeply distressed at their stubborn hearts, said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out, and his hand was completely restored.  Then the Pharisees went out and began to plot with the Herodians how they might kill Jesus.”

Mark 3:1-6.  See also Matthew 12:10-13, Luke 13:10-17

 

Harvesting Grain on the Sabbath was explicitly forbidden in Exodus 16:23–29 even gathering sticks was not permitted Numbers 15:32–36.  So we should not be surprised by the Pharisees who are so similar to many of today’s literalist rule obsessed Christian opponents.

“At that time Jesus went through the grain fields on the Sabbath. His disciples were hungry and began to pick some heads of grain and eat them.  When the Pharisees saw this, they said to him, “Look! Your disciples are doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath.”

He answered, “Haven’t you read what David did when he and his companions were hungry?  He entered the house of God, and he and his companions ate the consecrated bread—which was not lawful for them to do, but only for the priests.  Or haven’t you read in the Law that the priests on Sabbath duty in the temple desecrate the Sabbath and yet are innocent?  I tell you that something greater than the temple is here.  If you had known what these words mean, ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the innocent.  For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.”

Matthew 12:1-8

“Unclean” woman and Jesus.

Leviticus 15 talks about how women who are menstruating are unclean.  It is not just that an unclean person should not touch be touched by anyone, but you become unclean even if you touch things they touch! They are not supposed to touch anyone, and they are supposed to yell they are unclean so that others won’t contact them.   Yet she touches Jesus and Jesus does not condemn her for violating the Rules.   Indeed, he even praises her for her faith and heals her!  Matthew 9:18-23 Luke 8:43-48  and Mark 5:21-34.

According to Leviticus 13:45-46 and Numbers 5:2 lepers are also unclean.  So people are not supposed to touch them.   But what does Jesus do?  Yep he “reached out his hand…. but quickly pulled back saying ‘the rules say I can’t touch a leper, sorry dude!’ and walked on by” Anti-theist bible page 752:42.

For those interested in Christianity here is what the Christian Gospels say:

“When Jesus came down from the mountainside, large crowds followed him. A man with leprosy came and knelt before him and said, “Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.”

Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. “I am willing,” he said. “Be clean!” Immediately he was cleansed of his leprosy. Then Jesus said to him, “See that you don’t tell anyone. But go, show yourself to the priest and offer the gift Moses commanded, as a testimony to them.”

Matthew 8:1-4

See also Luke 5:13 “Then He put out His hand and touched him…”

 

Rules says we are not supposed to touch corpses Numbers 19:11-22 and number 5:2. But he seems to do just that when he takes a dead girl’s hand in Matthew 9:23-25.  Now Jesus said she was just “sleeping” but I do think the author intends us to think she had died in the sense we would mean by it.

Jesus also cuts against the teachings that one might read in the OT that misfortunes are the results of our sin or those of our ancestors.  Exodus 20:5 Deuteronomy 5:9 and Second Samuel 3:29.  No doubt passages like these lead the disciples to ask whether a man blind from birth was suffering due to his own sins or those of his parents.  Jesus said “Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” John 9:3. See also Luke 13:4-5

“Or those eighteen who were killed when the tower of Siloam fell on them—do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others living in Jerusalem?  No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did.”

 

In my last blog I talked about the rule based systems Jesus is here repeatedly and emphatically moving away from and rather pointing us in a moral direction.  That direction can best be expressed by loving God and treating others as you would want to be treated.   That is the basic rule Jesus aplied above and it can serve us to address all these “tests”.

Imagine this from the perspective of the woman caught in adultery and the rule Jesus is asked to address.    Imagine being a person suffering from paralysis or blindness and believing Jesus can heal you, but unfortunately the time Jesus comes near just happens to be the Sabbath so he follows the rule and says he will not work that day so you are out of luck.   What if you were the woman who suffered from hemorrhaging for years (thus preventing you from going to temple and forcing you to be considered unclean causing you to be outcast from society) knowing that if only you touched him you would be cured.  But when you did touch him instead of healing you he reprimanded you for breaking the rule!  Lepers obviously suffered.  They also had to announce to others they were unclean.  Jesus could heal you with a touch but sadly touching was against a rule so he walked by.  Putting ourselves in the shoes of others is the key that now makes all these “tests” seem easy.   If you were a pharisee listening to the Gospels at Jesus time I am not sure you would always anticipate how he answers these tests.  Jesus directly and radically changed the rule based system.   That is one of many reasons why the Gospels are so amazing.

Am I saying that God Changed what is Moral?

People often misunderstand what relativism is or at least when it is objectionable to the moral realist.  The moral realist does not say that a certain action – say killing someone is always immoral.  Rather they say that it is not dependent on the mind of the person judging.   So there may not be anything wrong with someone making an “eeeeee” sound.  But if you know that action is aggravating/effecting those around you then it may be immoral.  The moral realist is fine with that view.  The moral realist agrees the surrounding facts can effect the morality of a specific action.  However the objective moral realists says the rightness or wrongness of a given set of facts is not relative to the mind of the person doing the judging.  So if Jesus not stoning the adulteress (assuming all the facts and circumstances of her case) then it is not evil then it doesn’t matter if some pharisee thought it was evil.    The relativist would say his not stoning her could be morally good for Jesus but not morally good for the pharisee.  I address this common misconception of relativism here.

The passage from Mark 3:1-6 is especially illuminating on this point.   Jesus states “ Which is lawful on the Sabbath: to do good or to do evil….”  Of course, if it were objectively evil to break a rule (do any work on the sabbath) his statement would not make sense.  But they know what Jesus did was good and not evil despite the rule!  And Jesus knew he did not need to explain.  How did he know?  Because God is a loving relational being and he made us in his image.  Yet we are so attached to rules that even today people will still ask is ok to work (in a hospital healing people no less) on the sabbath?  Following Jesus does not require a high IQ and an understanding of a complicated rule system.  That is not why it is hard to follow him and do good.

Hopefully anyone can see one of the main messages that Jesus repeatedly taught was that specific rules are often twisted so that they work against their intended goal.   He repeatedly tells us what the moral goal is and shows us how to apply that goal to our thinking.   This is why I am somewhat baffled by people asking why didn’t Jesus just simply announce another rules against [insert whatever specific rule you want].    “’Are you still so dull?’ Jesus asked them.” Matthew 15:16

 

It is likely just that people haven’t read the Gospels, or if they did, they read them with a motivation other than trying to understand what Jesus was trying to communicate.      The anti-theists of today are so much like the Pharisees thinking they could teach morality better than Jesus by using the rule based system.   It is almost miraculously prophetic how Jesus addresses this same issue so directly and repeatedly.  It is also amazing that just as in Jesus day those who want to harden their hearts to his message will succeed and not understand even the basics of what he taught.

So when Christian opponents say we are “cherry picking” passages or reading the passages in ways that allow us to be loving, we should admit it is true.  That is what God told us to do.   Don’t let their ignorance of even the basic, repeated, and explicit teachings of Jesus lead us off the path God told us to take.

Slavery and Christianity: The First Known Abolitionist Speech.

01 Monday Jul 2019

Posted by in apologetics, atheism, Catholic, christianity, history, law, metaethics, Morality, politics, rationality, religion, Uncategorized

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Understanding the ancient world is often difficult for those who were raised in a Christian Culture.  It is very hard to believe that slavery was ubiquitous in the ancient world.  Why did they tolerate it?  It seems like they just treated it as we treat different roles.  Some people will own the restaurant some will bus the tables and some will cook etc.  People can own animals, and people are animals, so why not?   Aristotle expressed this view:

“And indeed the use made of slaves and of tame animals is not very different; for both with their bodies minister to the needs of life.”

Aristotle, Politics

 

At first blush Paul’s exhortation to seems take the view that being a slave is just another role people have:

 “Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. “Honor your father and mother”—which is the first commandment with a promise— “so that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth.”  Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.

 

Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, and with sincerity of heart, just as you would obey Christ. Obey them not only to win their favor when their eye is on you, but as slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from your heart. Serve wholeheartedly, as if you were serving the Lord, not people, because you know that the Lord will reward each one for whatever good they do, whether they are slave or free.

And masters, treat your slaves in the same way. Do not threaten them, since you know that he who is both their Master and yours is in heaven, and there is no favoritism with him.”

Ephesians 6.

At one level this passage seems to accept these roles.  At that level this passage reminds me of my father telling me he didn’t care what I did just whatever I did I should, do it well.     Of course, today we don’t see slavery as just another role.

 

But, he says “And masters treat your slaves in the same way” right after he describes how a slave should treat their master.  What?!?     This is often overlooked by people when they are trying to be critical of Paul and Christianity.  So how should a master treat his slave “the same way” Paul wants a slave to treat his master?  Well let’s fill that in:

 “Obey your earthly [slaves] with respect and fear, and with sincerity of heart, just as you would obey Christ.  Obey them not only to win their favor when their eye is on you, but as slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from your heart. Serve wholeheartedly, as if you were serving the Lord, not people, because you know that the Lord will reward each one for whatever good they do, whether they are slave or free.”

 

Whoa, that’s pretty crazy stuff for his time.  But, of course, it naturally follows from the view that “the first will be last and the last will be first” Mathew 20:16 and “I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.” Mathew 25:40.  I mean if this is really what that God wanted us to believe you would expect him who has power over us to come and do something like wash the feet of his own creation. John 13.

 

Paul and Christ are doing much more than arguing for a change of legal codes.  They want our heart, mind, and soul to point in the direction of love for another as opposed to us seeing others as tools.  They want us to view our relationships with other people in an entirely different way that cannot be captured in law and works regardless of the laws we live under.

Clearly this passage like so many others in Christianity turns what was the common view on its head.  We are all to be servants of Christ and by that we do what he wants which is to be servants of each other.  Not because we are forced but because of the love he wants us to build for each other.

 

But slavery was accepted everywhere for so long, why did people change their view and start thinking peopled should not own other people?  We see Paul is starting to really upset the apple cart but he still seems to accept the institutional roles themselves at least superficially.    How did we start to see this differently, and start to see the institution of slavery as immoral?  Of course If morality is defined as whatever we want then it seems the change would just be arbitrary like the wind.

 

One way to at least approach an answer to this question, is to examine the reasons given by the first person we know of to argue against Slavery as flat out being immoral.     This will give us an idea of the original grounds to break from that long established but immoral tradition.

 

There were certain Stoics who took a view somewhat similar to Paul’s, in that we are meant to be free in a spiritual sense and this can be extended to the physical sense.  And indeed the Stoic Dr. Piggliucci quotes, Seneca the younger, was so loved by early Christians that he was often referred to as a proto-christian Saint by them!

 

I would liken some of these statements from Stoics to some of Paul’s.    E.g., Paul asks Philemon that he free his slave out of love rather than have him order to do what he ought to do, and there is no such thing as slave or free in Christ,  and that it is good that slaves become free and that they stay free First Corinthians 7:21-24.    Paul like these stoics stopped short of giving a giving lengthy attack on slavery itself.

 

Dr. Piggliucci says  “That said, it is certainly the case that no Stoic questioned the very institution of slavery. But it is rather unfair to criticize Stoicism in particular for this failure. Every single ancient philosophy and religion, including Christianity, has incurred in the same failure.”  He may be right about other ancient philosphys and religions but based on what I say below I think Christianity is indeed different.  Even if we don’t count the teachings of Jesus and Paul as making slavery obsolete we have at least one Ancient Christian attacking slavery.

 

I would also question Dr. Piggliucci suggesting racism had nothing to do with ancient justification for slavery.  He says:

“The Colonial idea of slavery was intrinsically racist, founded on the conceit that some people are literally sub-human, not worthy of the same consideration as the rest of us. That was not the case in Ancient Greece and Rome, where one could become a slave by losing a battle.”

 

Consider this quote from Plato:

“…nature herself intimates that it is just for the better to have more than the worse, the more powerful than the weaker; and in many ways she shows, among men as well as among animals, and indeed among whole cities and races, that justice consists in the superior ruling over and having more than the inferior.”

 

Plato, Gorgias

 

Moreover, Aristotle specifically addressed this case and said that if a person who was not naturally a slave was made a slave after being captured in battle (a legal slave) it would be wrong for them not to be freed.  And if a person who was a natural slave was freed by law that would also be wrong not to re-enslave him.  See politics book 1 part 6.

 

What made someone naturally a slave and another naturally a ruler?  That is somewhat unclear but he seems fairly sympathetic to the view that “Helenes” (Greeks) are fit to rule.  Whereas non-Greeks “barbarians”  have no one fit to rule as they are all natural slaves. “But among barbarians no distinction is made between women and slaves, because there is no natural ruler among them: they are a community of slaves, male and female.” Politics book one part 2.

 

Aristotle also talks about the inability to understand certain things would make someone more fit to be a slave.    But whatever the details it is fairly clear he sees the natural slaves as inferior to the natural masters.  Here is a quote that also gives us some insight as to some other moral views Christianity inherited from the ancient world:

“And it is clear that the rule of the soul over the body, and of the mind and the rational element over the passionate, is natural and expedient; whereas the equality of the two or the rule of the inferior is always hurtful. The same holds good of animals in relation to men; for tame animals have a better nature than wild, and all tame animals are better off when they are ruled by man; for then they are preserved. Again, the male is by nature superior, and the female inferior; and the one rules, and the other is ruled; this principle, of necessity, extends to all mankind.”

Aristotle politics book 1 part 5.

 

It is for these reasons I would question Dr. Piggliucci’s statement suggesting the bigotry of the later centuries was not around in ancient times.

 

In any case the first known assault on the very notion of slavery comes from Saint Gregory, the Bishop of Nyssa.  He lived from @335- @395 AD.  I quote a translation of his attack on slavery from a homily on ecclesiastics where the person boasts of owning slaves.  I will offer a rather lengthy quote because it is important to get the reasoning.   The reasoning of the first people to take a different view is evidence of what caused the gradual change to our current views.  Moreover, the first known argument against slavery is in my opinion a text worth reading in its own right.

 

…..as for a human being to think himself the master of his own kind? “I got me slaves and slave-girls”, he says, and homebred slaves were born for me.

 

Do you notice the enormity of the boast? This kind of language is raised up as a challenge to God. For we hear from prophecy that all things are the slaves of the power that transcends all (Ps 119/118,91). So, when someone turns the property of God into his own property and arrogates dominion to his own kind, so as to think himself the owner of men and women, what is he doing but overstepping his own nature through pride, regarding himself as something different from his subordinates?

 

I got me slaves and slave-girls. What do you mean? You condemn man to slavery, when his nature is free and possesses free will, and you legislate in competition with God, overturning his law for the human species. The one made on the specific terms that he should be the owner of the earth, and appointed to government by the Creator – him you bring under the yoke of slavery, as though defying and fighting against the divine decree.

 

You have forgotten the limits of your authority, and that your rule is confined to control over things without reason. For it says Let them rule over winged creatures and fishes and four-footed things and creeping things (Gen, 1,26). Why do you go beyond what is subject to you and raise yourself up against the very species which is free, counting your own kind on a level with four-footed things and even footless things? You have subjected all things to man, declares the word through the prophecy, and in the text it lists the things subject, cattle and oxen and sheep (Ps 8,7- 8). Surely human beings have not been produced from your cattle? Surely cows have not conceived human stock? Irrational beasts are the only slaves of mankind. But to you these things are of small account. Raising fodder for the cattle, and green plants for the slaves of men, it says (Ps 1041 103,14). But by dividing the human species in two with ‘slavery’ and ‘ownership’ you have caused it to be enslaved to itself, and to be the owner of itself.

 

I got me slaves and slave-girls. For what price, tell me? What did you find in existence worth as much as this human nature? What price did you put on rationality? How many obols did you reckon the equivalent of the likeness of God? How many staters did you get for selling the being shaped by God? God said, Let us make man in our own image and likeness (Gen 1,26). If he is in the likeness of God, and rules the whole earth, and has been granted authority over everything on earth from God, who is his buyer, tell me? who is his seller? To God alone belongs this power; or rather, not even to God himself. For his gracious gifts, it says, are irrevocable (Rom 11,29). God would not therefore reduce the human race to slavery, since he himself, when we had been enslaved to sin, spontaneously recalled us to freedom. But if God does not enslave what is free, who is he that sets his own power above God’s?

 

How too shall the ruler of the whole earth and all earthly things be put up for sale?  For the property of the person sold is bound to be sold with him, too. So how much do we think the whole earth is worth? And how much all the things on the earth (Gen 1,26)? If they are priceless, what price is the one above them worth, tell me? Though you were to say the whole world, even so you have not found the price he is worth (Mat 16,26; Mk 8,36). He who knew the nature of mankind rightly said that the whole world was not worth giving in exchange for a human soul. Whenever a human being is for sale, therefore, nothing less than the owner of the earth is led into the sale-room. Presumably, then, the property belonging to him is up for auction too.  That means the earth, the islands, the sea, and all that is in them. What will the buyer pay, and what will the vendor accept, considering how much property is entailed in the deal?

 

But has the scrap of paper, and the written contract, and the counting out of obols deceived you into thinking yourself the master of the image of God? What folly! …

 

The Bishop’s indignation is palpable.   So while many of the ancients seemed to see people as an animal that would have value often based on traits they had no control over, such as intelligence or race etc.  Christianity and Judaism introduced a different way to understand who we are separated by God from the other animals and things of creation.

  1. Humans are priceless. God gave us everything in the world and that is priceless and so as owners clearly we are priceless.
  2. God gave us authority over animals and plants but not other people. Our God given authority does not go that far.
  3. The least shall be first and first shall be last, and how we treat the least is how we treat God himself. (This one was not in the Bishop’s text but permeates the Christian message.)
  4. And yes we are made in the image of God! Jesus built on this idea in saying we should refer to God as our Father.  Hence, we are all children of God.   We don’t try to analyze the worth of human being based on traits like race, ethnicity, intelligence or ability/disability.  We are all Children of God made in his image.    We all know we would not want our own children to be used and thought of as tools for someone else, we can rest assured God does not want that for his children made in his image either.

 

These are the seeds that lead inevitably to the assured destruction of slavery.  So long as we hold to these principles it seems impossible that people would ever treat other people as property again.   But we can also see how the reasoning of the pre-christians (that can indeed lead to our value being reduced based on certain traits) is slipping back into the ethical discourse.   As people, for whatever reason, want to distance their views from Christianity they seem to be saying personhood and our worth is based on certain traits we have rather than affirming the four principles I list above that reveal the sanctity of all human life regardless of the traits that person has.

It took far too long because our views were so different from God’s.  The Christian (or Jewish view when you consider the arguments from Genesis) view was not the view held by any other ancient people.  We believe all humans are connected to God in important ways.  For others mastery of everything was good.  So what could be better than mastery over other humans? “And there are many kinds both of rulers and subjects and that rule is the better which is exercised over better subjects- for example, to rule over men is better than to rule over wild beasts;”  Aristotle Politics Book 1.   To the ancients, people were fungible and their value was assessed by their traits, like the value of any other animal or thing.

 

But once we started to understand our role and that of God’s it was inevitable slavery would go.  So long as we hold onto that understanding it can never return.   Genesis was a huge part of this understanding.  Those who read Genesis as nothing but a scientific text miss so much. (or even primarily a scientific text)  It portrays us differently than other myths in important ways.  But when people just read it like any other creation myth they miss out on the most important parts.

 

Saint Gregory, the Bishop of Nyssa, offered his congregation good reasons to reject slavery when he wrote that Homily.   Many of the views would be repeated today and throughout history to provide the truest and best foundation for humanism generally.

 

If I said I am in favor of banning slavery based on the arguments presented by Saint Gregory would I be charged with “forcing my religious views on others?”

 

Scientific Knowledge is Overrated

14 Tuesday May 2019

Posted by in apologetics, atheism, Catholic, metaethics, Morality, philosophy, religion, Uncategorized

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In our culture saying the title is almost like saying “I hate children.”  How dare anyone suggest that scientific knowledge is overrated?  Clearly the only acceptable view is that science could never be over-rated and it could only possibly be under-rated.   But if we would allow that it is at least possible, then I suggest we consider how highly we rate both the scope of science as well as the value of scientific knowledge.

The claim that religion was there as a “stand in” until science could take it’s place is likely the oddest claim I have heard more than once.   It reveals what I think is a bizarre bias of our time.  Some people think that science and how nature works is so important to know, that they naturally think that was what religion was there for.   God revealed himself in the bible to explain lightening and how the mountains were made.

Our current culture values these sorts of “what is” or “how does this thing work” beliefs way out of proportion so we shouldn’t be surprised that people in our culture come to such an odd view.  The assumption seems to be, of course, the most important parts of any scripture are the ones that might overlap with science.  The fact that such a small fraction of scripture even deals with anything even arguably scientific is just more proof religion is misguided.

My life didn’t really change much after finding out how mountains were made.   Getting a scientific understanding of tectonic plates changed very little in my life and to that extent is not really important to me.   The very notion that Christianity or any religion existed to help us explain the natural world reveals how off kilter the importance we place on this knowledge of the natural world.  Christianity is a religion that helps us address the more important question – “how should we live?”.  The answers science can provide are interesting and sometimes they can help us address that important question.  But science does not address that question directly.     The major religions that exist deals with that directly.    That is the point of these religions – and really it is quite obvious to anyone who knows them.

It seems some people see the question “how should I live?” as a sort of afterthought.  They are so full of reasons to believe this or that is the case and so concerned about having evidence for this or that view of the state of things that when the question comes up it’s almost like would like to wave it away.  Like oh yeah if you want to talk about that silliness then here is my view…. And what follows is often some sort of poorly thought through mantra that demonstrates how little time they spend on it compared to the scientific “what is” questions they want really to get back to.

People now seem to think the most important thing is to fill our heads with beliefs that are more likely true than not and expunge those beliefs that do not pass that evidential muster.  There seems no concern with what seems obviously just as an important question.  How should I live?   Science has taught us many things but that does not mean it is the source of the most important information.

Overrating science is also done in that people try to claim science can answer questions it clearly can not answer.  We saw some of this scientific morality with the Nazis and communists.   But even today we see scientists taking the stage to talk about morality or other philosophical issues.  I am not interested in celebrity views on politics or science or philosophy, but I can see some people are curious about the views of their favorite celebrity.  But scientists are not celebrities, yet we see them selling books or lecturing on philosophy.  Why?   Is it good philosophy?  No, it’s because the scope of that field is overrated.

Science can help us live longer.  However, it does not teach us what to do with the extra time.  Religion does.   There is such a thing as useless knowledge.  And all knowledge is on this spectrum.

I feel like a conversation with certain atheists goes like this:  Why do you collect these acorns?  So I can plant more oak trees.  Why do you want to plant more oak trees?  Because they produce more acorns.  So why do we care they produce acorns?  Well we can then collect the acorns.  Why do you …. Oh wait.  Or why do you learn science?  Science will help us survive longer.  Why should we want to survive longer?  So we can learn more science.  I want to survive longer and I like oak trees, but I hope you can see my point.  It’s fine if you want to argue King Sisyphus is happy.   But, many of these same atheists saying we should live longer for the sake of living longer, also want to convince me that there is so much evil and misery in the world, God should be indicted.

Even studying in philosophy the focus was so much on Does God exist?   And we also focus on how and what it means to “know” a proposition concerning the external world. (See Cartesian Skepticism, and the Gettier problems)  After thoroughly trying to answer those question I ultimately decided it doesn’t really matter how we define “knowledge” as the fundamental problems presented by Descartes and similar arguments still have weight.  I think this time spent in philosophy was well spent because it dealt with a my understanding of a huge amount of beliefs.  It helped me learn that life does indeed have uncertainty and we need to deal with it.   Trying to define the problems away is not helpful.    It also helped me see the obsession our culture has with knowing “what is”.

I hope that is changing.  At the time I was in college majoring in philosophy there were no classes offered in what is now called meta-ethics were we could even start to ask “How should I live?” and what do we even mean to live rightly?  I had to pursue those questions on my own.  I think and hope this is changing.  Answering the question how we should live should not be an afterthought.

Problem of Evil Answered with Logic and Scripture

01 Wednesday May 2019

Posted by in apologetics, atheism, Catholic, christianity, logic, metaethics, Morality, philosophy, religion, scripture, Uncategorized

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The problem of evil is a common objection to Christianity and with some good reason.  I would even admit that certain evils in the world seem to me to amount to some evidence against the Christian God.   But I think the evidence can be shown to be fairly weak when looked at logically and with the aid of scripture.

 

When explaining my view on this problem I always start with this question:  Does God’s omnipotence mean he can violate the rules of logic?  If we answer yes then a the problem of evil is not a problem for God because it is a logical problem – and he is not bound by logic.  So let’s say that “omnipotence” of God means something short of breaking the laws of logic.  Once we understand God is so constrained then we see cracks form in the problem of evil.

Knowledge can’t be good and not good.

Ignorance can’t be bad and not bad.

God can’t have us know what evil is and not know what evil is.

God can’t let us be ignorant of evil and not be ignorant of evil.

We can’t know what the consequences of evil are, if there is no evil to be found.

If suffering is the result of evil then can we really know what evil is unless we know the experience of suffering?

So can we know the experience of suffering without experiencing suffering?

 

And what about the results of good which often are the opposites of suffering – peace, joy etc.?  (there seems no clear cut antonym for all the different aspects of suffering)  Can we know what they are when we don’t understand the opposite?  Can we know what it means to be taller or as tall as without also having an idea of shorter (or not as tall as)?  It seems to me we can’t know these states without knowing something of the opposites.  I can’t understand heat unless I have some concept of lack of heat, i.e., cold.

So if we think Knowledge is good then we might agree that even knowledge of evil is good.  Even if this good is logically linked to our experience of evil.   Now we may think well the good of knowing evil does not outweigh all the suffering evil brings.  God seems to agree.   But nevertheless we would still have to say knowledge is itself a good.  And if we think it is good to allow us to experience all goods then we can’t exclude some goods.  So it does seem there are logical restraints that means some goods entail evil.

So what does this have to do with scripture?

What was that tree God forbade Adam and Eve the fruit of?  Was it an apple tree or a pear tree?  No, it was the fruit of the “Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil”.   In Genesis God commands  “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.” Genesis 2:16-17.  I mean at first that seems a very odd sort of tree, and not one I remember seeing at the arboretum.   I think this should be a sign that the author of the story is not just telling us some literal event from history but is trying to make a different sort of statement about God.    What does it even mean to taste the fruit that comes from the knowledge of evil?  The fruit/result of knowing evil is, as we have said, suffering.   Can we have knowledge of evil unless we know what it produces?  I don’t think so because such knowledge would be warped.  Some things that may be evil might sound pretty good if it weren’t for the suffering it caused.  Knowing evil without knowing suffering is not really knowing evil.  (“When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it.” Genisis 3:6.)

 

Someone can’t know suffering without knowing suffering.   If someone says I know what it is like to be burned over 80% of my body – well the only way he could know that is if he was so burned or at least had that experience.  If he didn’t we would say no you actually don’t “know” that kind of suffering.

 

But this was our decision – not God’s.  He wanted to save us from this fruit.  Are we to think the author just randomly chose the name for that tree or is the author inviting the reader to explore a very deep philosophical issue?  What is “the fruit” of knowing good and evil that we wanted to taste?  When people are so caught up in literal readings that they argue whether the fruit was a pear or an apple my stomach sinks.  They are missing so much.

 

The text invites us to explore deep ideas about our experiences here in this life and our situation existing in this world as we do.    How can we know good and evil without knowing evil?  And how can we know evil if we can’t experience it?  And how can we experience something that is nowhere to be seen?    So the fruit of knowledge of good and evil implies the experience of evil.  But the Bible expresses that God did not want this for us.  But he also wanted us to be free.

 

God is portrayed as our parent who loves us.   Every parent understands this tension between wanting our children to avoid pain but also allow them to choose their own path.  Don’t go down that path, but recognizing there is value in letting us learn so giving us autonomy.

 

We can’t have freedom and not have freedom.

Freedom can’t be good and not be good at the same time.

God can’t have us overcome adversity without us overcoming adversity.

We can’t over come adversity if there is no adversity

Overcoming  adversity can’t be good and not good.

We cannot experience all that is good if we can never experience certain goods.

I can go on and on with logical constraints that imply evil is required for some goods.

 

But isn’t God overdoing it with all the evil in the world?  In other words we might agree we have to experience some evil and suffering to have certain goods but why so much suffering?   Couldn’t God have done it better?  So how should it have been done?  Well we should expect the suffering should be a finite time.  And of course all our lives are indeed finite – that is we die.    And indeed scripture explains that our life is finite –  because we chose to taste the fruit of the tree.

 

“22 And the Lord God said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.” 23 So the Lord God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken. 24 After he drove the man out, he placed on the east side[e] of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life.”  Genesis 3:22-24

 

 

Beautiful language expressing that God knew it was best we not live forever in this state that the fruits of this knowledge would bring to us.  God knew that knowledge of good and evil would entail suffering.  Is it a coincidence that death was brought into the world at that time?  Some would say God having death enter the world at that time is really a punishment.  I think the opposite.  He is helping us with the mess we got ourselves in.   Making our suffering here finite is the most loving thing to do.  It is only after the time that we chose to know good and evil that God prevents them from living forever.

 

Isn’t that what we would do for those we love.  We would say ok I don’t want you to go down that path because it will cause pain.  But if you choose that path of pain, then you will learn, but we would try to limit the pain.   And then we would make our own sacrifices to help those we love get out of the rut and back on the path where evil and its fruit (suffering) is avoided.  Moreover we would want the benefits of our knowledge to be used.  Good and loving relationships can be better appreciated thanks to this knowledge.   That is the story of God and humanity in a nutshell.

 

I am reminded of a friend in college who said to get a good grade just read the first and last chapters of the book to get the overall point and then memorize a few facts in the middle that you can throw in your test or paper to impress the teacher.  This is close.  Jumping from the first 3 chapters of Genesis and then reading a Gospel will give you a decent idea of Christianity.

 

Two final notes:

Scripture is not saying knowledge is to be avoided.  Remember the metaphor of a tree of the knowledge of good and evil was the *only* tree we were forbidden to eat from.  “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.” Genisis 2.  So only the tree that allows us to know these particular opposites was off limits.  This suggests that any other sort of knowledge (science history etc.) would be good and not have a negative trade off.  It is only this particular tree of knowledge that is off limits.  That fruit logically had to be packed in a can of worms.   Not necessarily the fruits of other knowledge.

 

Also, notice that God warns of the actions he will take – that they will die.   However, he does not go into detail about why he will take that action or why knowledge of Good and evil will cause so many problems.  Of course, for any such considerations to be appropriately understood by them he would need to give them knowledge of good and evil – exactly that which he was trying to avoid.

“Love” Versus Selfish “Emotional Empathy”

09 Tuesday Apr 2019

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When I speak with atheists about morality they tend to want to talk about Empathy rather than Love.  Maybe empathy seems more “scientific” or exact and, of course, it is less Christian sounding.    It is true that “Love” has many different meanings and the Christian view of Love, agape, is only one sense of the term.  Here I will again offer the Aquinas definition as being good enough for our purposes:

“To love is to will the good of another.”

 

Empathy also has a few different meanings.  Generally, it seems that there are about 3 general types taking shape in the literature:  Emotional (aka, affective), Cognitive, and Compassionate.

 

“Cognitive empathy” is the ability to figure out what someone else will feel.

 

“Emotional empathy” is the one found especially lacking in sociopaths.   Emotional empathy is actually feeling the feelings of others.  With this empathy our brains actually fire in the areas as though we are directly feeling a pain when see someone else being hurt.

 

“Compassionate empathy” is mostly marked off by including a desire to help when someone is suffering.  It may start out from the emotional empathy but it then brings about a will to act.    In short Compassionate empathy basically adds Christian love to the equation.  And indeed, we can do exercises called, unsurprisingly “loving-kindness” meditation that may improve our compassionate empathy.

 

So what should we make of these three types of empathy from a moral perspective?

 

As Christians we are called to love each other and compassionate empathy in the literature is what is most closely associated with that term as understood by Aquinas.  Compassionate empathy adds willing the good of another into the mental state, which as we know is basically Christian love.    Love is a root, if not the root, of Christian Morality, so yes, I am all for that.

 

Cognitive empathy seems fine enough just like any sort of knowledge.  It might have practical benefits in helping us serve others.  However, it is also the type of empathy that allows sociopaths to manipulate others as they seem more adept at this type of empathy than they are at the other two.  But, on the whole, I would say simply having knowledge is not itself morally meritorious.   Like all knowledge I think it is good to have this knowledge but not necessarily morally good.

 

But what about the emotional empathy?  That is the form of empathy where you feel what someone else feels.    It is the form of empathy I think most scientists would refer to, unless they specify otherwise.  (And from this point forward I will just refer to emotional empathy as empathy.)   This is the empathy that most clearly separates the sociopath (who is lacking in this form of empathy) from the normal person.  Sociopaths are, of course, traditionally seen as morally deficient people.    But our new scientific understandings of emotional empathy makes it tricky from a moral perspective.     Let’s dig deeper into what science tells us about this type of empathy.

 

 

Emotional Empathy is a feeling we get.  And as such it is not necessarily meritorious or culpable in itself.  It can help us to love, and to that extent it can be beneficial.   But there are some important points to make.

Empathy Mitigates our Good Deeds by Making them Self Centered

First it seems that emotional empathy makes many moral actions, well, less “selfless.”

 

“As kids, we are told not to hurt others, and we are told not to speak with our mouth full. Kids quickly come to feel very different about violating these two types of rules. Empathy is what makes the difference. Each time you hurt someone, that person’s distress becomes your pain, and you start to associate your vicarious pain with harming others. Violence then starts to feel intrinsically bad. Helping others, on the other hand, makes you feel their happiness, and will start to feel good.”

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-empathic-brain/201307/inside-the-mind-psychopath-empathic-not-always

 

When we avoid hurting others due to empathy, in a real sense, we are actually avoiding hurting ourselves.  When we bring others joy we are bringing ourselves joy.  To the extent we have more empathy we are acting in our own interest when we avoid hurting others.  Sociopaths do not have this pain when they hurt others so they are not restrained by their own self centered desires.

 

The very same parts of the brain can be triggered by emotional empathy that are triggered when we are directly hurt.  As explained by Bloom in his book “Against Empathy”:

 

“I feel your pain” isn’t just a gooey metaphor; it can be made neurologically literal: Other people’s pain really does activate the same brain area as your own pain, and more generally, there is neural evidence for a correspondence between self and other.”

https://fs.blog/2017/12/against-empathy/

 

“For example, meta-analyses on empathy for pain studies have revealed that a portion of the anterior insula and a specific part of the anterior cingulate cortex were consistently activated, both during the experience of pain as well as when vicariously feeling with the suffering of others.”

https://reader.elsevier.com/reader/sd/pii/S0960982214007702?token=471C4CEBC686EAE67A44C1DE5EC5F3248787E2DCA1A19E4841999B652AFDE1D37FBBA59721230AF2ED203630842E9246

 

So in effect Empathy is like God giving us a shock every time we hurt others.  But some people – sociopaths do not receive this corrective or it is much duller.  To the extent this is why we act morally better than sociopaths I dare say we are not more moral at all.  When our actions are simply driven by our own desire to avoid pain or discomfort we should not claim the moral high ground.  Can this empathy transition into love?  It seems it can but until we get full blown love and remain in simple emotional empathy – avoiding our own emotional pain or guilt seems to cut against what we should consider meritorious intentions.

 

Now to be clear I am not saying there is something wrong with acting in our self interest.   We should act in our own interest all things being equal.  But to the extent we are acting in self interest we shouldn’t think we can properly claim all the merit of acting selflessly for someone else.    And it is that concern for others that we traditionally find most meritorious from a moral perspective.

Empathy Spreads Suffering

The other problem for some is that empathy would seem something we want to avoid if we adopt a morality that focuses on avoiding suffering.   Empathy seems much more poignant when I see someone suffer than when I see someone celebrate.   I share some joy but I think on the whole I would rather not have any empathy experiences as opposed to several empathetic experiences where I share extreme pain or agony coupled with experiences where someone undergoes great joys.    Is it perhaps that envy is cutting into my joy of seeing others experience joy in a way that the empathy relating to pain seems undiluted?   Research supports the conclusion that negative empathy is stronger than positive empathy:

“Empathy is the ability to perceive and react to another person’s emotions. Much attention has been paid to empathy regarding negative emotions, but little is known about how (or if) we respond to positive emotions in the same way. Now, a new study reports that joy may be harder to share than distress.”

http://www.brainblogger.com/2013/01/26/joy-to-the-world-empathy-and-positive-emotions/

 

But even if, contrary to current research, positive and negative empathy were to balance out or even if empathy of positive emotions was stronger we would still need to ask if empathy of suffering was good.  That seems problematic if you want to say empathy and reducing suffering are both important.  Empathy with someone’s suffering increases the suffering in the world.  If we all see a horrible event where someone suffers pain and we have strong empathy we just magnified the amount of suffering in the world.    You have the person who is actually suffering directly and then the suffering all of us empathic people feel!  Whereas if we were all sociopaths well the person suffering would still suffer but that would be the extent of it.

 

As a Christian I certainly don’t view morality as mostly about avoiding pain/suffering so I do view empathy as a good springboard to love.  But I think those who want to view morality in more simplistic terms – as systems to avoid suffering they have a real problem.   The notions that suffering is a brain state and morality should be geared to avoid those brain states has a very hard case to say empathy with others suffering is morally good.

 

I imagine their argument will be along these lines:  Empathy makes people not want to hurt others so less people will be directly hurt by others if we all have empathy.  I would concede that may be true.  I think it would still be mitigated by laws that even selfish sociopaths would want because they protect them as well as others.  Laws would reduce the harm of sociopaths just like they do now.

 

The real problem for a morality that wants to be based on reducing suffering and yet wants to keep empathy is natural and unintentional suffering caused by natural disasters and diseases etc.  If you are all about reducing suffering it seems difficult to argue that multiplying all that suffering to everyone else with empathy is worth the slight decrease in direct harm caused by others.   It just seems that a morality based on reducing suffering would want to root out empathy.  This is one reason why we can easily think of counterfactuals to moral systems that claim to be all about reducing suffering as I presented here:

https://trueandreasonable.co/2014/12/19/a-moral-hypothetical/

 

Again, empathy is contrary to moral systems like Sam Harris’s that seem to want to claim morality is all about suffering and brain states of suffering.  I of course do not believe morality works that way.  I am not thrilled with suffering either – but the goal is love not just the ending of suffering.  So to the extent suffering (through empathy) leads to love then it is ok and even desirable.

I go more into the problems with Harris’s view here:

https://trueandreasonable.co/2019/02/11/sam-harris-worst-possible-misery-for-everyone/

 

In sum, to the extent emotional empathy removes the selfless intentions of our actions and increases suffering it can be problematic for some moral systems.  Love on the other hand seems morally desirable all the time in just about every moral system.

Love Versus Envy

02 Tuesday Apr 2019

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Love is the basis of Christianity and so it is only fitting that a Christian should consider what it is and what it is not.  In this blog I will compare love and what I think is the opposite of love – envy.  In the next blog I will talk about how love has important differences with empathy.

As Christians we know that craving anything before God is sin.  Wealth is one of those things that can lead to sin.   It, however, is not always intrinsically wrong to have property.  Christ wants us to give to the poor.  If giving them items caused them to be in sin, he would not ask us to do that.  Moreover, the fact that we are commanded not to steal suggests that owning property is part of God’s plan and can be healthy.

If I tell you that country A has a wider wealth gap then country B many people would say that, in itself, is reason to think country B is better.    I’m not one of them.  If people in A are all wealthier then all of those in Country B I would rather live in A, even if I was at the low end of that gap.   I would rather have more in absolute terms in country A even if relative to others in my own country I had less.

I know lots of people who have much more money than I do and I am glad they are in a situation where they can have that.  Envy has actually been one sin that has not usually been a problem for me.  But I do notice that my view is not shared by all.  Some people do think inequality of wealth is itself a problem.   Some people would rather have less themselves in absolute terms if it meant those around them had less as well.   This seems to be a lose/lose option based on envy.

Envy is specially targeted in the tenth commandment.   Envy is also a sin that is especially useful in fueling political and social movements.  Envy of the Jews has lead to antisemitism.  Socialism in particular uses envy to fuel it’s movements.  See for example the Kulaks, and the Ukrainian Holodomor.  Most politicians today do not talk about “the 1%” because they want to express how happy they are for the advantages they have.

Certainly I am not saying that all advantaged people “earned” their advantages.  That is obviously not true.  Some people are born smart or wealthy and this was obviously not “earned.”   However, being born smart or wealthy is not itself an immoral action either.   Don’t we wish we were born smart and wealthy – and good looks would have been nice too while we are at it.   Is it not due to our love that we want our children to have advantages such as good friends, wisdom, family, and yes, at least, some material possessions?

 

Christ commanded us to love our neighbor as ourselves.

One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”

Jesus replied: “’Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’[c] This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[d] All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.’

Matthew 22:36-40.

 

The Catechism quotes Saint Thomas Aquina’s short but effective definition of love:

To love is to will the good of another.

Now let’s look at Merriam Webster’s definition of Envy:

painful or resentful awareness of an advantage enjoyed by another joined with a desire to possess the same advantage

 

I think this helps us understand the direct opposition between the envious heart and what Jesus commands.  Instead of rejoicing that others have the advantages we also want, instead we react negatively toward others receiving the goods we want.

Again I am not saying we need to claim every advantage was earned.  And indeed we should agree that some advantages are not only unearned but are unjust.  If someone cheats someone else out of their property justice dictates they should not keep it.   But we need to make sure we are not rationalizing and fueling our resentment of others having more when they did nothing immoral to get what they have.  That would be envy, the opposite of love.

We can be envious even when someone did earn their advantage.  And as for the unearned, if some people were born lucky, like we wish we were born, do we rejoice for them, or are we resentful?  If we are resentful, obviously, we are not loving them as we love ourselves.

It seems to me that envy has as much claim to be the antithesis of love as hatred does.  I may hate many things about someone as they are now but still hope good for them.  Just as I can hate many things about myself and still hope good for myself.  But envy directly fights against willing the goods for others that we will for ourselves.

Faith defined

23 Monday Jul 2018

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What does Faith mean?   Of course many people say “faith” is the same thing as what I would call “blind faith.”  Believing something with no evidence or even despite of the evidence to the contrary.  As a Christian we want to know what God wants us to do when he says we should “have faith” or “believe”.  So I have investigated what the New Testament authors/Holy Spirit would have meant by “faith” when they enjoin us to believe and/or have faith.   The conclusion I have reached is a fairly straightforward definition.  Faith is belief and trust in God.   It might be blind faith but that is not the expected variety of faith.  In acts we see Paul would normally reason with people to try to help them become Christian.

“As was his custom, Paul went into the synagogue, and on three Sabbath days he reasoned with them from the Scriptures, explaining and proving that the Messiah had to suffer and rise from the dead. “This Jesus I am proclaiming to you is the Messiah,” he said. Some of the Jews were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, as did a large number of God-fearing Greeks and quite a few prominent women.” (emphasis added)

Acts 17, 2-4

Of course, there are places where it appears Paul worked miracles and people gained faith through witness of those miracles.  Which, of course, seems a perfectly rational way to gain faith and would likely be more convincing.  But as the above passage states his “custom” was to spread the faith through reason.

 

Why is there this misunderstanding of faith?   Well there are various reasons.  Obviously Christian detractors would like to label everyone of faith as being irrational so their motivation can be obvious.  But that clearly is not even close to the whole story.  Although most early church fathers and apostles were in favor or reason, some early church fathers emphasized a sort of rejection of reason such as Tertullian.  During the protestant reformation protestant churches seemed to take a hard turn against faith and reason coexisting.  Eg.,  Martin Luther “Faith must trample underfoot all reason, sense, and understanding,…”  Calvin seemed to have them operating as two completely different types of belief.  The Catholic Church has clearly emphasized that they work together and are never in conflict.  Pope John Paul II even described them as two wings for the human spirit.  It is obvious that certain evangelical faiths also want to embrace reason.

 

But lets get to scripture and what was meant.  The word that was translated as “faith” in Paul’s writing is the Greek word “Pistis”.   The word “believe” in John’s Gospel is the word Greek word  pisteuō.” I don’t intend to dive into that too much here but it is worth noting that these words had meanings and were not completely made up when the new testament was written.

 

Now I would like to look at scripture and address one interpretation that of a verse that I think is the most often cited by those who would claim Faith is irrational.  It comes from Hebrews 11:

“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” King James version.

 

No doubt this is a rather odd wording.  And if we just examine this phrase without the context it may lead people to think the author is saying our belief itself is the evidence for our belief in God.  But in context I think it is pretty clear (albeit still admitting the passage could be more clear) that the author is saying that the faith of the people who came before, and Gods treatment of them, is evidence for us.   To understand my point ask yourself “whose faith?” is the author referring to?  If you read the entire chapter you will see he is referring to the faith of the ancient Jews and describing how they were rewarded by God.  The fact that God was trustworthy to them is evidence that he will be trustworthy for us.

 

The overall tenure of the Hebrews seems to be one of a spiritual pep talk.    In Chapter 11 the author explains how many of the earlier Jews were rewarded by God by taking his word.  Moses, Abraham, Elijah etc.  These people all had faith in God and were rewarded.  Accordingly their faith is evidence for us that God is and God can be trusted.  This is actually quite reasonable.  If someone has proven to be trustworthy time and again and several people trust (have faith in) that person, well their trust is evidence for us.  The author makes this explicit when he says:

“Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us,  fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.  Consider him who endured such opposition from sinners, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.”  Hebrews 12.

 

Relying on the witnesses that God is trustworthy is not unreasonable and relying on witnesses is not believing with no evidence.

 

But what about my definition.  Well that definition is actually in Hebrews as well.  We see the two elements (belief and trust in God) spelled out in Hebrews 11 verse 6.

“But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.”

 

So the author identifies two beliefs both of which must be held in order to have faith.  1. “that he (God) is” and 2. “that he (God) is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.”    If you believe in God and diligently seek him,  I think this is tantamount to saying you believe he exists and trust him.

Willi Graf

02 Monday Jan 2017

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Today 99 years ago Willi Graf was born.  Willi was a member of the White Rose Society.  This society was a Nazi resistance group.  The core members were students Hans and Sophie Scholl, Alex Schmorrel, Christof Probst, and Willi Graf.

 

All of these core members had very interesting – if short – lives.   Hans and Sophie were Lutheran, Schmorrel was Orthodox, (He is officially an Orthodox Saint) Willi was Catholic and Christof Probst became Catholic just before he died.  I found all of these members to be inspirational.    They got together through a connection to the University of Munich.   Alex Hans and Willi were Medics and served together on the eastern front.

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Left to right: Hubert Furtwangler, Hans Scholl, Willie Graf and Alexander Schmorell on the Eastern Front (1942)

 

00scholls3

Left to right: Hans Scholl, Sophie Scholl and Christoph Probst.

They published leaflets trying to change germans’ minds about the Nazis.  They would also spray paint “Down with Hitler”  And “Freedom!” throughout the city.  They would write and print out the leaflets and then they would mail them to people who they thought would be influential, or just leave them throughout different cities.  Willi was not the author of the leaflets but instead he would form contacts in other cities.  They would distribute the leaflets at the same time in different cities so it appeared to be larger than it was.

 

Before the white rose was even formed, Sophie and Hans Scholl were influenced by Bishop Clemens August Graf von Galen.  There was a transcript of one of his sermons condemning the Nazis pogrom against disabled people.  They actually distributed his sermon just as they would later distribute their own work as the White Rose.

Here are some excerpts from the leaflets:

The first leaflet Said: “…Therefore every individual, conscious of his responsibility as a member of Christian and Western civilization, must defend himself against the scourges of mankind, against fascism and any similar system of totalitarianism. Offer passive resistance – resistance – wherever you may be, forestall the spread of this atheistic war machine before it is too late,..”

 

The Second leaflet said “…Why tell you these things, since you are fully aware of them – or if not of these, then of other equally grave crimes committed by this frightful sub-humanity? Because here we touch on a problem which involves us deeply and forces us all to take thought. Why do the German people behave so apathetically in the face of all these abominable crimes, crimes so unworthy of the human race? Hardly anyone thinks about that. It is accepted as fact and put out of mind. The German people slumber on in their dull, stupid sleep and encourage these fascist criminals; they give them the opportunity to carry on their depredations; and of course they do so. Is this a sign that the Germans are brutalized in their simplest human feelings, that no chord within them cries out at the sight of such deeds, that they have sunk into a fatal consciencelessness from which they will never, never awake? It seems to be so, and will certainly be so, if the German does not at last start up out of his stupor, if he does not protest wherever and whenever he can against this clique of criminals, if he shows no sympathy for these hundreds of thousands of victims. He must evidence not only sympathy; no, much more: a sense of complicity in guilt. For through his apathetic behavior he gives these evil men the opportunity to act as they do; he tolerates this government which has taken upon itself such an infinitely great burden of guilt; indeed, he himself is to blame for the fact that it came about at all! Each man wants to be exonerated of a guilt of this kind, each one continues on his way with the most placid, the calmest conscience. But he cannot be exonerated; he is guilty, guilty, guilty!”

 

The third leaflet again tried to trigger the conscience of their fellow Germans ending with  “We will not be silent. We are your bad conscience. The White Rose will not leave you in peace!”

 

The Fourth Leaflet said:

“…Every word that comes from Hitler’s mouth is a lie. When he says peace, he means war, and when he blasphemously uses the name of the Almighty, he means the power of evil, the fallen angel, Satan. His mouth is the foul-smelling maw of Hell, and his might is at bottom accursed. True, we must conduct a struggle against the National Socialist terrorist state with rational means; but whoever today still doubts the reality, the existence of demonic powers, has failed by a wide margin to understand the metaphysical background of this war. Behind the concrete, the visible events, behind all objective, logical considerations, we find the irrational element: The struggle against the demon, against the servants of the Antichrist. Everywhere and at all times demons have been lurking in the dark, waiting for the moment when man is weak; when of his own volition he leaves his place in the order of Creation as founded for him by God in freedom; when he yields to the force of evil, separates himself from the powers of a higher order; and after voluntarily taking the first step, he is driven on to the next and the next at a furiously accelerating rate. Everywhere and at all times of greatest trial men have appeared, prophets and saints who cherished their freedom, who preached the One God and who His help brought the people to a reversal of their downward course. Man is free, to be sure, but without the true God he is defenceless against the principle of evil. He is a like rudderless ship, at the mercy of the storm, an infant without his mother, a cloud dissolving into thin air….”

 

 

Here is a bit from the 6th Leaflet:

“…The Hitler Youth, the SA, the SS have tried to drug us, to revolutionise us, to regiment us in the most promising young years of our lives. “Philosophical training” is the name given to the despicable method by which our budding intellectual development is muffled in a fog of empty phrases. A system of selection of leaders at once unimaginably devilish and narrow-minded trains up its future party bigwigs in the “Castles of the Knightly Order” to become Godless, impudent, and conscienceless exploiters and executioners – blind, stupid hangers-on of the Fuhrer…”

Willi Graf in Particular:

One thing I found interesting about Willi Graf, is that he did not seem to have any authority figure or other adult to lead him to his courageous life.

 

Hans and Sophie had their father who was a conscientious objector to fighting in WWI.  He did not want them participate in anything Nazi.   Hans however was initially beguiled by the Nazis and became a leader in the Hitler Youth.    Sophie, also initially joined a nazi girl’s group.  However their father seemed to have a clear head and did push them in the other direction.  Their sister Inge Scholl wrote of this later:

 

“But there was something else that drew us with mysterious power and swept us along: the closed ranks of marching youth with banners waving, eyes fixed straight ahead, keeping time to drumbeat and song. Was not this sense of fellowship overpowering? It is not surprising that all of us, Hans and Sophie and the others, joined the Hitler Youth? We entered into it with body and soul, and we could not understand why our father did not approve, why he was not happy and proud. On the contrary, he was quite displeased with us.”

— Inge Scholl, The White Rose

 

Alexander Shmorrel was half Russian and so it is no surprise he came to find Nazis revolting – considering he spent time on the Eastern front.     And Probst’s stepmother was Jewish so he presumably would have a strong counterinfluence at home as well.

 

But Willi’s youth seemed a bit different.  It appeared that his anti-nazi views came solely from his belief that it was inconsistent with his faith.  He joined catholic youth organizations and remained with them even when they were illegal.  He also refused to join Hitler youth when it was mandatory.  Not only that but he would cross his acquaintances names out of his personal address book if they joined the Hitler Youth.   In some of my reading it seemed as though his actions went against his parents wishes.  Not that his parents were  Nazis but that they just wanted the best for him and wanted him to get along.  I should point out that one source says his father was a Nazi leader but I was not able to verify this or get the fuller story.

 

When Willi was seventeen he marched in a Mayday parade.  But whereas there was a sea of brown marching in step giving “heil Hitler’s” and carrying Swastika flags, he and his friends marched purposely out of step, did not wear brown, and carried their tattered school flag.

 

A friend commented: “Willie Graf… was one of those young people who have always found it impossible to remain indifferent in the face of injustice.”  This obstinate refusal to comply would lead to fights where it was said Willi would give as good as he would get.

And all of this was before he witnessed the horrors on the eastern front.

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To his sister he wrote from the Eastern front “The war here in the East leads to things so terrible I would never have thought them possible… Some things have occurred… that have disturbed me deeply… I can’t begin to give you the details… It is simply unthinkable that such things exist… I wish I hadn’t had to see what I have seen…. I could tell you much more but do not want to trust it to a letter.”

 

Even though I live at a time where it is much easier to live a good Christian life I still can relate to him when he wrote in his journal: “To be a Christian, is perhaps the hardest thing to ever become in life.” He was devoutly Catholic and it was said he would attend mass every Sunday even as a college student.  He was interested in the liturgy and composed some alternate liturgies that could be used at mass.   He was also chess player and philosopher.

 

But perhaps what I admire most about him is that despite harboring doubts he made a decision as to how to live and stuck to it even when it meant death.  He wrote in his journal: “Sometimes, I am certain of the rightness of my course. Sometimes I doubt it. But I take it upon myself nevertheless, no matter how burdensome it may be.”, and  “Sometimes you can’t just go where favoring winds send you. Sometimes one must take a direction which isn’t that easy. You can’t allow yourself to be continually blown about.”

 

He was not as eloquent at his trial as Sophie or Hans Scholl.   However, despite being interrogated the longest he never gave additional names of any his contacts.   All of the members of the white rose remained loyal to each other throughout their interrogations.  This reminds me of John 15:13  “ There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”

In the movie Sophie Scholl last days they make it appear that Willi was very vocal against the actions Sophie and Hans took, which lead to all the arrests.  But even, if this is true, nothing I have read suggests he ever held it against them.   I think they all decided it was just a matter of time before they were caught and killed.

We must remember that Willi and his friends were still quite young during this time.  They died at ages ranging from 21 to 25.  I think as I am older and wiser, not only from an age perspective but a historical one,  I can see how what they did was necessary.  But when I consider the inevitable doubts of the moment to go against all of society, at such a young age, and with full knowledge of the dire consequences, I can only marvel at the dedication of these young men and women.

 

I have been pondering their lives for a few months now and I am still looking for more information – especially on Willi Graf.  I know there has been a book written on him but it is in German.  I would love to get a translation.

 

My thoughts here were based on a 2 books,  “A Noble treason” by Richard Hasner and “At the Heart of the White Rose: Letters and Diaries of Hans and Sophie Scholl”  Hardcover – August, 1987 by Hans Scholl  (Author), Sophie Scholl (Author), as well as the movie The last days of Sophie Scholl and the White Rose.

 

There are also numerouse webpages that I read as well including the following:

 

http://spartacus-educational.com/GERprobst.htm

http://spartacus-educational.com/GERschmorell.htm

http://spartacus-educational.com/GERschollH.htm

http://spartacus-educational.com/GERgraf.htm

https://libcom.org/library/white-rose-documents

http://www.bls.org/downloads/MFL/White%20Rose.pdf