Edward Rothstein -- a different perspective on a dispute in rmd (and elsewhere) (very oblique Dylan content)
Judge Magney
By EDWARD ROTHSTEIN
Cataclysms not only cast shadows over
human victims but also shake the
foundations of intellectual life: wars
can shift the direction of scholarship;
genocide can upend the presumptions of
sociology. The destruction of the World
Trade Center and the attack on the Pentagon
may have similar effects, challenging the
intellectual and ethical perspectives of two
sets of ideas: postmodernism (affectionately
known as pomo) and postcolonialism (which
might be called poco). These ideas, which
have affected political debate and university
scholarship, are now being subject to a shock
that may lead in two directions: on one hand
to a more intense commitment, and on the
other — I hope — to a more intense
rejection.
In general postmodernists challenge assertions that
truth and ethical judgment
have any objective validity. Postcolonial theorists, who
focus on cultures that
have experienced Western imperialism, agree in part,
suggesting that the
seemingly universalist principles of the West are
ideological constructs. Many
have also implied that one culture, particularly the
West, cannot reliably
condemn another, that a form of relativism must rule.
But such assertions seem peculiar when trying to account
for the recent
attack. This destruction seems to cry out for a
transcendent ethical
perspective. And even mild relativism seems troubling in
contrast. It focuses
on the symmetries between violations. But differences,
say, between
democracies and absolutist societies or between types of
armed conflict are
essential now. Debate over these kinds of
interpretations are now heating up.
So it might be worth examining some hypotheses of poco
and pomo.
First of all there are some significant differences
between the two ideologies.
Pomo is partly an attempt to question the fundamental
philosophical and
political premises of the West. It argues that many of
the concepts we take for
granted — including truth, morality and objectivity —
are culturally
"constructed." And some scholars generally agree,
including the historian of
science Thomas S. Kuhn, who argued that science could
not lay claim to
universal truths, and the pragmatist philosopher Richard
Rorty, who has
challenged objective notions of truth.
Poco, though, has a more specific ambition, analyzing
the effects of colonialism
on what used to be called the third world, knottily
interpreting how postcolonial
societies absorb and contend with the West. But within
the poco ideology,
Western claims of objectivity are still put into
question. In "The Postcolonial
Studies Reader" (1995, Routledge), for example, the
governing perspective, the
editors explain, is opposition to the West's "myth of
universality," which is little
more than a "strategy of imperial control." One
contributor writes:
"Postcolonialism is regarded as the need, in nations or
groups which have been
victims of imperialism, to achieve an identity
uncontaminated by universalist or
Eurocentric concepts and images."
In the Sept. 17 issue of The Nation — published just
before the attack on the
World Trade Center — Edward Said, one of
postcolonialism's founding
theorists, also points out that unlike radical pomo
advocates, he accepts
universal principles like "human rights." Still, he
refers to "ideological
confections": ideas like "the clash of civilizations"
that, coincidentally, were
invoked by many European and American leaders in
condemning the terrorist
attack. Such "false universals," Mr. Said says, are used
to legitimize "corporate
profit-taking and political power." Similar arguments
have become
commonplace in worldwide protests against
"globalization."
Follow this logic to its most extreme conclusions, and
the rejections of
universal values and ideals leave little room for
unqualified condemnations of a
terrorist attack, particularly one against the West.
Such an attack, however
inexcusable, can be seen as a horrifying airing of a
legitimate cultural
grievance. Military responses can seem no different. And
so the conflict
becomes a series of symmetrical confrontations, as is
often asserted about
battles in Israel.
Poco, though, goes further. For while affirming most of
the pomo rejection of
ideals and universals, poco establishes its own
universal: Western imperialism
becomes a variety of Original Sin. The implication is
that any act against the
West by a postcolonial power can be seen as a reaction
to an act by the West.
These ideas simplify interpretation tremendously.
Western imperial behavior is
seen as the fundamental cause of terrorism, the evil of
the former leading to
the evil of the latter, thus creating a rough symmetry
in which differences are
minimized.
In last week's issue of The Nation, for example, one
writer, after condemning
the "indescribable evil" of the attack, says, "This is
not really the war of
democracy versus terror that the world will be asked to
believe." The terrorist
attacks, he suggests, were a result of injustices caused
by the West. Another
writer says that "our own government, through much of
the past 50 years, has
been the world's leading `rogue state,' " having been
responsible for killing
"literally hundreds of thousands if not millions, of
innocents."
A column from The Guardian, the British newspaper, calls
terror attacks
"counterproductive acts of outrage" against Western
injustice. Similar
sentiments have been expressed about Israel, which is
considered a proxy for
the United States. A commentator for the BBC said that
supposed Israeli
violation of international law was a cause, if not the
main cause, of terrorism.
These attitudes are not a traditional expression of
left-wing politics. The
anti-Western virulence is too strong, and the weakening
of judgment against
terrorism too prevalent. Symmetries are strained for;
one culture (the West) is
seen as no more virtuous — indeed far less so — than
another, leading to
comments that sound eerily similar to some extreme
justifications offered in
the Arab world.
Of course the errors and apparent venality of the West
must be considered in
examining radical Islamic terrorism. But the
intellectual focus on a single and
continuing Original Sin creates a skewed perspective.
As the historian Bernard Lewis has shown, the origins of
what he calls Islamic
hatred of the West are complicated: a history of
struggles going back almost
14 centuries, the fear of modernity felt by "right wing"
theocratic
fundamentalists, the countries' widespread poverty
conjoined with demagogic
clerics and wealthy rulers. Terrorist rage is also
directed against Arab regimes
in which secular life reigns over the religious realm
(as in Egypt and Jordan).
Christopher Hitchens, while attacking the West in the
current issue of The
Nation, writes: "Does anyone suppose that an Israeli
withdrawal from Gaza
would have forestalled the slaughter in Manhattan? It
would take a moral
cretin to suggest anything of the sort; the cadres of
the new jihad make it very
apparent that their quarrel is with Judaism and
secularism on principle, not with
(or not just with) Zionism."
For now though these considerations are subsumed by poco
ideology, spiced
by pomo sentiments. While condemning the recent attacks,
they establish near
symmetries between the outrage of both sides, and they
eliminate perspectives
that might reveal fundamental cultural differences (like
those affirmed,
unambiguously, by the attackers). The great ironic twist
is that the values
latent in pomo and poco — an insistence that differing
perspectives be
accounted for and that the other be comprehended — are
consequences of the
very ideas of the Western Enlightenment — reason and
universality — that
they work to undo.
One can only hope that finally, as the ramifications
sinks in, as it becomes
clear how close the attack came to undermining the
political, military and
financial authority of the United States, the Western
relativism of pomo and
the obsessive focus of poco will be widely seen as
ethically perverse. Rigidly
applied, they require a form of guilty passivity in the
face of ruthless and
unyielding opposition.
Greg Wallace
"Judge Magney" <judge_...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:908ab6ee.01092...@posting.google.com...
> From last Friday's New York Times.
>
> By EDWARD ROTHSTEIN
>
> Cataclysms not only cast shadows over
> human victims but also shake the
> foundations of intellectual life: wars
> can shift the direction of scholarship;
> genocide can upend the presumptions of
> sociology. The destruction of the World
> Trade Center and the attack on the Pentagon
> may have similar effects, challenging the
> intellectual and ethical perspectives of two
> sets of ideas: postmodernism (affectionately
> known as pomo) and postcolonialism (which
> might be called poco). These ideas, which
> have affected political debate and university
> scholarship, are now being subject to a shock
> that may lead in two directions: on one hand
> to a more intense commitment, and on the
> other - I hope - to a more intense
> granted - including truth, morality and objectivity -
> In the Sept. 17 issue of The Nation - published just
> before the attack on the
> World Trade Center - Edward Said, one of
> seen as no more virtuous - indeed far less so - than
> latent in pomo and poco - an insistence that differing
> perspectives be
> accounted for and that the other be comprehended - are
> consequences of the
> very ideas of the Western Enlightenment - reason and
> universality - that
Kenneth Wilson
Ken
O'B
more readable.
This version looks better on my CPU anyway:
WS Krispy
morality and sense of justice are not based on something anchored in
objective timelessness, they still constitute a very real consensus of
individual minds. Yes, it would be much nicer if there were stone tablets
upon which the finger of God had incised all correct responses to all
imaginable actions. But the fact that 300 million feeling, thinking,
breathing beings with outsized cerebrums share a conviction that the
slaughter of 6,000 people who were just going about their daily business
is wrong in a very basic sense imparts authority enough for their
considered actions in response.
"Modernism" was such a silly term in itself. Will people in the year 2150
look back at the intellectuals of the period 1920-1975 and say "oh yes,
they were Moderns"? Talk about chronological chauvanism-- as if these guys
were having the last say and so constituted The Modern for all time. Of
course, this makes the term "Post-Modern" doubly silly.
--
wsk
Maureen & Stephen Scobie
<wskr...@EXCISEhome.com> wrote:
> Post-modernism is *such* a crock. Even if our shared, "constructed"
> morality and sense of justice are not based on something anchored in
> objective timelessness, they still constitute a very real consensus of
> individual minds. Yes, it would be much nicer if there were stone tablets
> upon which the finger of God had incised all correct responses to all
> imaginable actions. But the fact that 300 million feeling, thinking,
> breathing beings with outsized cerebrums share a conviction that the
> slaughter of 6,000 people who were just going about their daily business
> is wrong in a very basic sense imparts authority enough for their
> considered actions in response.
This argument actually supports the pomo position rather than
undermines it.
>
> "Modernism" was such a silly term in itself. Will people in the year 2150
> look back at the intellectuals of the period 1920-1975 and say "oh yes,
> they were Moderns"? Talk about chronological chauvanism-- as if these guys
> were having the last say and so constituted The Modern for all time. Of
> course, this makes the term "Post-Modern" doubly silly.
On this point I fully agree. It derives from the fact that most of
these "period" categories for the study of literature were in fact
coined in the early 20th century. At that point, it was easy enough to
look back and use period terms based either on strict chronology ("18th
century") or (since most of this periodising was in relation to English
literature) major reigns of British monarchs ("Elizabethan,"
"Victorian"). Indeed, almost the only term which wasn't strictly
chronological was "Romantic," and that has posed its own problems. (I
still try to distinguish between "Romantic" with a capital R, referring
loosely to the period between 1780 and 1830, and "romantic" with a
small r, referring to stylistic and thematic tendencies which are by no
means confined to that period.) "Modernist" may have seemed quite
reasonable in 1920, but it's a term which has long outlived its
usefulness, and it invites, as you say, the silliness of
"post-Modernist," not to mention "post-post-Modernist," or even (a term
which I heard used quite seriously as long as 20 years ago)
"post-contemporary." All these terms should be scrapped, and replaced
with simple chronological designations, such as "early 20th century"
and "late 20th century."
Having said that, however, I admit that I am still intrigued by all the
implications of "post-." In terms like "post-modern,"
"post-structuralist," or "post-colonial," it does not (when it is being
used with the greatest care) *simply* designate chronological
succession. Rather, the implication is that the "post-" goes back into
the previous movement, reinterprets it, and seeks new solutions to the
questions the previous movement raised. This is a worthwhile
implication, and I would like to find some way of preserving it, even
while I agree that the strictly temporal implications of "modern" are
no longer relevant.
Stephen
Kenneth Wilson
> > Post-modernism is *such* a crock. Even if our shared, "constructed"
> > morality and sense of justice are not based on something anchored in
> > objective timelessness, they still constitute a very real consensus of
> > individual minds. Yes, it would be much nicer if there were stone
tablets
> > upon which the finger of God had incised all correct responses to all
> > imaginable actions. But the fact that 300 million feeling, thinking,
> > breathing beings with outsized cerebrums share a conviction that the
> > slaughter of 6,000 people who were just going about their daily business
> > is wrong in a very basic sense imparts authority enough for their
> > considered actions in response.
>
> This argument actually supports the pomo position rather than
> undermines it.
Yes it does. But there are millions who think bin Laden did no wrong. PoMo
would leave us no way to prove them wrong, and no way for us to even know
they're wrong. Which suggests that like today's "tolerance," which tolerates
no disagreement, it's a term nobody really believes in.
Ken
"Those who boast of their suspicion of metanarratives are merely offering a
meta-metanarrative -- worse yet, a meta-metanarrative in denial, an ideology
about ideologies which denies being an ideology." -- J. Budziszewski
WS Krispy
Kenneth Wilson wrote:
> Stephen Scobie wrote:
> > > Post-modernism is *such* a crock. Even if our shared, "constructed"
> > > morality and sense of justice are not based on something anchored in
> > > objective timelessness, they still constitute a very real consensus of
> > > individual minds. Yes, it would be much nicer if there were stone
> tablets
> > > upon which the finger of God had incised all correct responses to all
> > > imaginable actions. But the fact that 300 million feeling, thinking,
> > > breathing beings with outsized cerebrums share a conviction that the
> > > slaughter of 6,000 people who were just going about their daily business
> > > is wrong in a very basic sense imparts authority enough for their
> > > considered actions in response.
> >
> > This argument actually supports the pomo position rather than
> > undermines it.
>
> Yes it does.
I understand why you both think it actually supports pomo. In a strict sense,
nothing short of literalist theism is in true contradiction to pomo. But I think
in a practical sense what I'm talking about does bring you a few valid steps
away from pomo's valueless relativism. Without theism, the merely human
consensus of one group can never trump the merely human consensus of another
group in any rock-bottom moralistic way. But a given group still finds itself in
a certain reality-- call it a shared hallucination if you will -- and it can
legitimately base its actions on the majority's principles and gut feelings. To
act is not to necessarily claim you possess exclusive moral truth. It is to play
your honest part in this weirded out passageway called life, fervently hoping
your group really is closer to The Good (if it exists in itself anywhere) than
the group that has crossed you.
[snip]
--
wsk
"I never said I was a pacifist."- BD
"I was a fighter. They called me the world's greatest. If I could do something
about what happened, I would." - Muhammad Ali (speaking as a Muslim).
Lloyd Fonvielle
> Having said that, however, I admit that I am still intrigued by all the
> implications of "post-." In terms like "post-modern,"
> "post-structuralist," or "post-colonial," it does not (when it is being
> used with the greatest care) *simply* designate chronological
> succession. Rather, the implication is that the "post-" goes back into
> the previous movement, reinterprets it, and seeks new solutions to the
> questions the previous movement raised. This is a worthwhile
> implication, and I would like to find some way of preserving it, even
> while I agree that the strictly temporal implications of "modern" are
> no longer relevant.
But you would have to explain how this was different, in the 20th Century, from
art movements throughout history. Artists of every age, consciously or
unconsciously, go back into the previous movement, reinterpret it, seek new
solutions to the questions previous movements raised. The Renaissance would be
post-modern in this sense, minus perhaps the conscious intent, the attitude --
assuming Renaissance artists really believed they were returning to classical
models, and not just using them as the basis for a new synthesis. Harold
Bloom's concept of creative misreading would explain how even "emulation" led
unconsciously to the same process of reevaluation, reinterpretation -- i. e.
the same results.
Post-modernism, I fear, will only survive as an illustration of how
20th-Century artists clung desperately to the idea that they were somehow
different, somehow new -- yes, it says, we went back to old ideas and
reinterpreted them, but we knew we were doing it, while Michelangelo didn't, so
we're cooler.
Not.
Maureen & Stephen Scobie
<navi...@compuserve.com> wrote:
> But you would have to explain how this was different, in the 20th Century,
> from
> art movements throughout history. Artists of every age, consciously or
> unconsciously, go back into the previous movement, reinterpret it, seek new
> solutions to the questions previous movements raised.
Well, I think perhaps an explanation of how this gesture differs in the
20th century could be offered, but it would be a long and complex
argument, and not, perhaps, ultimately worth it. Umberto Eco did at
one point say that "post-modernism" was not a chronological category at
all, but rather a particular aesthetic stance which had surfaced at
many different eras of cultural history. E.g. the later 18th century:
as many people have commented, there is no more "post-modern" novel
than "Tristram Shandy."
The term exists, unavoidably, and it will be part of any history of
late 20th century culture. But it seems to me it no longer has any
practical use or relevance, and I would be glad to drop it.
Stephen
Maureen & Stephen Scobie
<wskr...@EXCISEhome.com> wrote:
> But a given group still finds itself in
> a certain reality-- call it a shared hallucination if you will -- and it can
> legitimately base its actions on the majority's principles and gut feelings.
But this is precisely the argument that Osama bin Laden would use to
show that his actions were "legitimate."
I'm not saying that I agree or disagree with the argument (I have many
problems myself with pomo arguments about moral relativity, and I don't
think they are simple either/or positions) -- I just find this a weird
argument for *you* to be using.
Stephen
robertandrews
>In general postmodernists challenge assertions that truth and ethical
judgment have any objective validity.
The only objective truth is that we're all going to die -- taxes are
negotiable; the afterlife, if it exists, is unknown. The idea that someone
claims to "objectively" know more than this is pure nonsense. Bible
interpretation is objective truth? That's a riot.
We as individuals, as society & as a world determine what is right & wrong.
Some values, like the repulsion to cruelty & torture, are common to nearly
all cultures. Even the Einsatzgruppen grew disgusted with their brutality &
slaughter. Mankind cannot continually revel in death without destroying
itself & the world, & nearly all people (& all creation) want to live. Our
shared judgments form the basis for morality.
Kenneth Wilson
> >In general postmodernists challenge assertions that truth and ethical
> > judgment have any objective validity
> The only objective truth is that we're all going to die .............
> We as individuals, as society & as a world determine what is right &
wrong.
You contradict yourself. How can we make a determination if there's no there
there? Any determination in those circumstances would be entirely arbitrary
and as such wouldn't have the force of moral authority. If we can't know
objectively, the categories of right and wrong are meaningless, and common
values are mere presumptions, no bar to anyone else's behavior. *Prove*
that murder is wrong. In your system it's impossible, so you have no right
to censure, much less pass punitive laws. Your laws are no more than
utilitarian social contracts. You slam religious conservatives for wanting
to make laws based on sincerely held convictions about the nature of the
universe, but then you say you can't even make judgments but you want to
make the laws yourself anyhow? The kind word for that is "illogical." You
have no right to make moral judgments, period.
> Some values, like the repulsion to cruelty & torture, are common to nearly
> all cultures.
This fact is usually denied by PoMo proponents because it hints at the
existence of objective moral knowledge. (Strange debate -- the offense makes
arguments for the defense and vice-versa).
Ken
robertandrews
>*Prove* that murder is wrong.
You prove it.
Lloyd Fonvielle
> If we can't know
> objectively, the categories of right and wrong are meaningless, and common
> values are mere presumptions, no bar to anyone else's behavior. *Prove*
> that murder is wrong. In your system it's impossible, so you have no right
> to censure, much less pass punitive laws. Your laws are no more than
> utilitarian social contracts.
You assume that utilitarian social contracts, based on reason, are not moral --
that there is no connection between morality and reason. The Founding Fathers
would have been astounded by this concept. They made a careful distinction
between the morality based on reason, which is the business of the state, and
the morality based on faith alone, which is a private matter. It's a wonderful
idea, and the essence of the genius of the American system -- which was hardly
original, by the way, but a synthesis of much social widom learned over
thousands of years. The genius of America is that there's nothing specifically
"American" about any of it. Americans are the children of love and theft.
Kenneth Wilson
> You assume that utilitarian social contracts, based on reason, are not
moral --
> that there is no connection between morality and reason. The Founding
Fathers
> would have been astounded by this concept.
No, I assume that unless there are moral first principles we have nothing
worth reasoning from. The Founders would certainly have agreed. If nothing
is true, everything is permited indeed, because reason can't say why it
shouldn't be. Also, utilitarianism falls far short of Christ's love, and of
the love of God. It's a sad falling off.
> They made a careful distinction
> between the morality based on reason, which is the business of the state,
and
> the morality based on faith alone, which is a private matter.
See my reply to Robert Andrews.
> Americans are the children of love and theft.
Very nice. Lacking your rhetorical skill, let me just quote, way out of
context, "if somethin's not right it's wrong"? :-)
Ken
Lloyd Fonvielle
> . . . let me just quote, way out of
> context, "if somethin's not right it's wrong"? :-)
Here we agree absolutely. If the Christian right's campaign to deny full
civil right to gays results in human suffering for an oppressed minority, the
example of Jesus exposes this as absolutely wrong . . . and doctrine be
damned.
Kenneth Wilson
What example exactly are you thinking of? Jesus never shrunk from calling
sin "sin," and as for doctrine, he said he came to fulfill the Old
Testament, not abolish it. Without opening the issue of gay rights, any
argument that begins from a "tolerant" Jesus is un-Scriptural.
Ken
Lloyd Fonvielle
> Without opening the issue of gay rights, any
> argument that begins from a "tolerant" Jesus is un-Scriptural.
Reopening the issue of gay rights, any argument that begins from an
"intolerant" Jesus is un-Christian.
Kenneth Wilson
> ..... any argument that begins from an "intolerant" Jesus is un-Christian.
I think the first problem here is a mistaken understanding of tolerance. If
we use Aristotle's Doctrine of the Mean, proper tolerance would be opposed
not simply by narrow-minded repressiveness but by such repressiveness on the
one side and soft-headed indulgence on the other (thank you, J.
Budziszewski). The question then becomes what the proper mean is, and rather
than always being mean-spirited, as the PC'ers insist, refusal to tolerate
is sometimes wise and necessary.
I'm sure I could easily name several things you wouldn't tolerate, were they
legal or not. (And I won't do so because then the first question that pops
to mind is "are A and B comparable to X and Y and thus reasonable things to
tolerate," which would miss the point that all decent people draw a line
somewhere. All decent people do not draw it in the same place, but to be
decent, or at least to have any real character, is to say you would draw the
line at some forms of evil). In fact you sometimes speak of being willing to
die for this or that. I assume you'd be willing to die for these goods even
if they were unpopular and illegal --and that's the only time you'd ever
likely have to. But by your logic of respect for the right of others to make
choices you disapprove of, and a political philosophy which says that state
compulsion must ultimately be subject to reason alone, not sectarian
religious belief, which also uses reason (sectarian is meaningless here, as
the Christian fundamentalist "sect" comprises millions and millions
worldwide), you would have been prohibited from fighting for black civil
rights, if not in the 1950's, certainly in the 1750's. "Reason" simply isn't
the clincher, for the simple reason that all reasoners don't reason alike.
As for Christ, did he tolerate the moneychangers? He didn't give us a
laundry list of sins -- he didn't need to. He spoke to a people steeped in
the Jewish scriptures that told them what was wrong. We have the same
documents, but we've stopped heeding them in many cases. Even among
Christians there is much room for debate over some Biblical laws and
prohibitions, and Christ clearly abolished some. But we can hardly say, as
some do, "if Christ didn't condemn it, we can't either."
Ken
Lloyd Fonvielle
> As for Christ, did he tolerate the moneychangers? He didn't give us a
> laundry list of sins -- he didn't need to. He spoke to a people steeped in
> the Jewish scriptures that told them what was wrong. We have the same
> documents, but we've stopped heeding them in many cases. Even among
> Christians there is much room for debate over some Biblical laws and
> prohibitions, and Christ clearly abolished some. But we can hardly say, as
> some do, "if Christ didn't condemn it, we can't either."
"Both read the Bible day and night
"But he reads black where I read white."
-- William Blake
In the Gospels, I don't see Jesus getting violently angry except in the
incident of the money-changers in the Temple -- a case where worldly concerns
entered the church of his times. My guess is that if he'd seen guys in there
raising money for "Christian" political candidates, he would have gone just as
ballistic. Something to think about.
I don't hear real bitterness in his tone except when talking about the
self-appointed religious authorities of his time, reciting their "rules of
behavior" extracted from scripture without the slightest comprehension of the
spirit behind those rules. Something to think about.
For the outcasts of the world, the suffering and the oppressed, I hear
nothing -- and I mean nothing -- but love and compassion, expressed in terms
that convey love and compassion TO THEM, not by theological implication (i. e.
I'm condemning you for your own good.) Something else to think about.
You can parse Jesus's words like a lawyer, looking for loopholes which
allow the self-righteousness and voice of condemnation congenial to the
Christian right, but any child can see that Jesus was about something else.
Everybody hates sin, because, let's face it, sin sucks. What Jesus taught was
a different way of dealing with it, a different path away from it than that
practiced by the "religious" authorities of his time and ours,
Kenneth Wilson
> In the Gospels, I don't see Jesus getting violently angry except in the
> incident of the money-changers in the Temple -- a case where worldly
concerns
> entered the church of his times. My guess is that if he'd seen guys in
there
> raising money for "Christian" political candidates, he would have gone
just as
> ballistic. Something to think about.
Nothing to ponder -- I completely agree. It was a temple.
> I don't hear real bitterness in his tone except when talking about
the
> self-appointed religious authorities of his time, reciting their "rules of
> behavior" extracted from scripture without the slightest comprehension of
the
> spirit behind those rules. Something to think about.
Yes, something to think about when anyone interprets Scripture. What do you
do with all the Old Testament proscriptions and evidences of a righteous God
whose patience does have an end?
> For the outcasts of the world, the suffering and the oppressed, I
hear
> nothing -- and I mean nothing -- but love and compassion, expressed in
terms
> that convey love and compassion TO THEM, not by theological implication
(i. e.
> I'm condemning you for your own good.) Something else to think about.
You seem to imply that to be oppressed is to be righteous. Ani deFranco, at
least, would seem to agree. Again, Christ stood in a tradition that was
quite explicit about what wrong was. He was understood in that tradition,
and to make himself understood otherwise he would have had to repudiate it
wholesale. The only way to get a PC-tolerant Jesus instead of a
hard-truth-but-merciful one is to cut him off from his tradition.
> You can parse Jesus's words like a lawyer, looking for loopholes
which
> allow the self-righteousness and voice of condemnation congenial to the
> Christian right, but any child can see that Jesus was about something
else.
> Everybody hates sin, because, let's face it, sin sucks. What Jesus taught
was
> a different way of dealing with it, a different path away from it than
that
> practiced by the "religious" authorities of his time and ours,
Jesus took sin so seriously he was willing to die for ours. He told us to
"repent," to turn away from it.
Ken
Lloyd Fonvielle
> What do you do with all the Old Testament proscriptions and evidences of a
> righteous God
> whose patience does have an end?
Well, I don't pick and choose among the ancient Hebrew tribal laws, depending
on the social agenda I want to promote.
Kenneth Wilson
Another all too easy, ungrounded charge. I might just as well throw the same
picking-and-choosing charge at liberals. On any given issue there will
always be some on both sides guilty of self-serving hypocrisy. In the life
of the mind and spirit there's no guilt by association.
Have you studied those laws and the theologians you criticize, so you can
make even an educated guess at who's choosing conveniently and who isn't? I
don't mean does your understanding of Jesus rule out their interpretation, I
mean, have you studied the Old Testament material itself so that if you then
reject their understanding you can judge who's intellectually honest and who
has no ground to stand on? I'm no scholar of that material either, which is
why I have a few up-in-the-air non-positions. But conservative
interpretations make sense on their own terms -- they have integrity --, and
I also know rank and file conservatives and one conservative scholar, and
I've seen their integrity too.
A lurker wrote me to object to my saying Christ was not "tolerant." Here's
what I meant: yes, he tolerated the wrongdoers themselves. He did far
more -- he loved them, he sought them out. But he also compared himself to a
doctor, who spends his time with the sick. Prostitutes, adulterers,
tax-collectors in service of the occupying Romans -- these people recognized
their sin, so they were open to his message to turn from it. He never shrunk
from calling wrongdoing, wrong.
I know we both feel the need to correct the other guy's take on these
things. The anti-NDC contingent has been extraordinarily patient this time.
Or maybe they've just given up. Either way, if we're just discussing
theology, I quit. So, Lloyd, if you reply, try, really, really hard --
Scout's honor -- not to say anything pithy and provocative that just demands
a response!
Ken
Lloyd Fonvielle
> I know we both feel the need to correct the other guy's take on these
> things. The anti-NDC contingent has been extraordinarily patient this time.
> Or maybe they've just given up. Either way, if we're just discussing
> theology, I quit. So, Lloyd, if you reply, try, really, really hard --
> Scout's honor -- not to say anything pithy and provocative that just demands
> a response!
You're just plain wrong! I think that pretty much settles the whole thing.
Kenneth Wilson
Darn it, Lloyd, you just couldn't resist, could you?!
Lengthy, point by point rebuttal to follow,
Ken
Lloyd Fonvielle
> Lengthy, point by point rebuttal to follow . . .
And I tried so hard to end things on a gracious note.
