I had not intended on writing on today's topic until a few minutes ago. Instead, I had planned to discuss something that had come up while reading The Brothers Karamazov - a discussion in the novel about he role of the state and religion in issues of morality. It was a nuanced discussion: the non-clerics claimed that the use of the church to punish wrongdoers would hurt the central mission of the church, which is to love and accept wrongdoers and in so doing, to change their ways by moral persuasion via conduct. The clerics countered that they agreed with that to a point, but that beyond that point, the church would naturally reclaim the role of the state as people became more perfect through its actions. Oddly, the latter argument dovetails with Marxist philosophy - that as the consciousness of the proletariat improves through the ownership and so on of production, that the need to have the state manage affairs would wither away (and we would all be free!). Yes, nuanced, difficult and at times inscrutable in its tautologies.
Then I read a political article by Bill Murchison, decrying the loss of morals in the current generations. No, he was not talking about gay marriage or libidinous youth, but rather the ease with which people now decide what is right or wrong based on their personal assumptions of such. He was pointing to the latest scandal in politics, this one involving the NSA's general surveillance of phone calls and e-mails, and how the scandal arose from one young "whistle blower" named Edward Snowden, comparing him to another famous leaker, Julian Assange (released records regarding military matters in the middle east). It then struck me that the two conversations were somewhat entwined, and that both pertained to central question in this blog: that is, where does moral authority come from?
Murchison does not directly say - he only decries the personalization of such authority. But we have to ask: where does this individual sense of morality come from? Is it from religion or the state, or from the rumblings of the unwritten volkheist, the spirit of the people?
On this, the traditionalists are unswerving: moral authority can only come from divine inspiration which is then canonized in inspired religion. But mustn't this "inspiration" first be recognized by the people? If Jesus, to take an example, had simply been forgotten as another Jewish zealot, would his message be less true?
Of course, that did not happen, and the traditionalists would say that it could not happen - but why, then, the rise of the "debased" religions of the pagans during that era? Were they not, too, destined to influence the people for the hundreds of years that they were practiced and believed in?
Again, nuance; to find that a religion is true, it must meet with something in the human that makes it ring true; wouldn't that mean that true morality, and truth itself, was at least partially present in the average person? And if this is so, would Snowden or Assange necessarily be incorrect when they stated that they were doing the moral thing, even though it was against the laws of the state? Assange's information led to the deaths of US service men - a wrong, clearly; but he felt that US servicemen were obeying orders that were causing the death of innocents in Iraq and Afghanistan. Is the truth in the numbers, or is there a moral absolute to be found beneath it all? Certainly,we cannot rely on a state to be the source of morality - but in our country, we have, in effect, a separation of church and state. Our morality, then, is based in large on the government; and the government, at least in principle, is based on the will of the people. Thus we go round the circle - and are no closer to the truth, at least as far as I can see. For instance, If our government were a theocracy, basing their judgments on a religion that the majority of the people had accepted as True, would their decisions be any more correct? Are those of the mullahs of Iran? Are those of the ideas of Pat Robertson?
So: does Bill Murchison have a point, or is his disgust no less based on his own personal opinion than that of Edward Snowden? And, casting aside personal differences and the volkheist of the moment, how effective would, say, the Catholic Church now be as the temporal ruler of the USA?
It might be Jesus Christ himself who has the answer: render unto Caesar what is Caesar's. That is, work on the 'right' from within, basing it on values consistent with the Golden Rule (treat others as you would have them treat yourself) as well as the knowledge, buried in us all, that what we are capable of living is vastly greater than what is Caesar's. No, it is not ironclad; for instance, should you go to war for a cause that you consider unjust? Should you support a government that you consider unjust? The Hindus would clearly state "yes" - do you your duty as well as and with as much moral responsibility as you can, no matter the duty. The Quakers would clearly state "NO" as they have in our various wars, allowing themselves to work for "our side" only in non-lethal capacities. In this country, the individual may decide for himself what religion he might have, thus making a case that the individual is deciding just what his reaction to the outside world will morally be.
I suppose in the end the morality of one's decisions can be decided by the degree to which the individual has committed himself to the ideal - as long as the nature of this ideal is not egoistic, but determined by a higher collective conscious in the form of a morally secure religion or body. And here is where Bill Murchison's article makes the most sense. He compares the leakers to black people in the civil - rights era south. These people would, say, refuse to sit in the back of the bus, thus violating state law. The differences were: for one, they were on solid ground from their religion's viewpoint (we are all equally human) and from the "just" government's (similarly, all men are created equal); they hurt no one in their defiance (vs. Assange and perhaps Snowden); and they were willing to accept the consequences; unlike Assange and Snowden, they did not run for political asylum, but held out their wrists for the cuffs.
Jesus did not come specifically for this world, but his teachings were meant to have practical applications. One did not fight a government over profit or raw power; rather, one did do so (as did Paul and the martyrs) to uphold the right to live the inner truth - which in the case of the civil rights activists noted above, were writ in their material life as well, uniting both. The quandary, then, is not as messy as it at first seems. We recognize what is moral through others, and others through a recognized canon of morality; then we apply this to the outside world after seriously considering our motives - are they for a desire to express, in life, the timeless truths? Or are they for our own aggrandizement or to revenge our own hurts and humiliations? Certainly not cut and dried, but certainly a good start. FK
Then I read a political article by Bill Murchison, decrying the loss of morals in the current generations. No, he was not talking about gay marriage or libidinous youth, but rather the ease with which people now decide what is right or wrong based on their personal assumptions of such. He was pointing to the latest scandal in politics, this one involving the NSA's general surveillance of phone calls and e-mails, and how the scandal arose from one young "whistle blower" named Edward Snowden, comparing him to another famous leaker, Julian Assange (released records regarding military matters in the middle east). It then struck me that the two conversations were somewhat entwined, and that both pertained to central question in this blog: that is, where does moral authority come from?
Murchison does not directly say - he only decries the personalization of such authority. But we have to ask: where does this individual sense of morality come from? Is it from religion or the state, or from the rumblings of the unwritten volkheist, the spirit of the people?
On this, the traditionalists are unswerving: moral authority can only come from divine inspiration which is then canonized in inspired religion. But mustn't this "inspiration" first be recognized by the people? If Jesus, to take an example, had simply been forgotten as another Jewish zealot, would his message be less true?
Of course, that did not happen, and the traditionalists would say that it could not happen - but why, then, the rise of the "debased" religions of the pagans during that era? Were they not, too, destined to influence the people for the hundreds of years that they were practiced and believed in?
Again, nuance; to find that a religion is true, it must meet with something in the human that makes it ring true; wouldn't that mean that true morality, and truth itself, was at least partially present in the average person? And if this is so, would Snowden or Assange necessarily be incorrect when they stated that they were doing the moral thing, even though it was against the laws of the state? Assange's information led to the deaths of US service men - a wrong, clearly; but he felt that US servicemen were obeying orders that were causing the death of innocents in Iraq and Afghanistan. Is the truth in the numbers, or is there a moral absolute to be found beneath it all? Certainly,we cannot rely on a state to be the source of morality - but in our country, we have, in effect, a separation of church and state. Our morality, then, is based in large on the government; and the government, at least in principle, is based on the will of the people. Thus we go round the circle - and are no closer to the truth, at least as far as I can see. For instance, If our government were a theocracy, basing their judgments on a religion that the majority of the people had accepted as True, would their decisions be any more correct? Are those of the mullahs of Iran? Are those of the ideas of Pat Robertson?
So: does Bill Murchison have a point, or is his disgust no less based on his own personal opinion than that of Edward Snowden? And, casting aside personal differences and the volkheist of the moment, how effective would, say, the Catholic Church now be as the temporal ruler of the USA?
It might be Jesus Christ himself who has the answer: render unto Caesar what is Caesar's. That is, work on the 'right' from within, basing it on values consistent with the Golden Rule (treat others as you would have them treat yourself) as well as the knowledge, buried in us all, that what we are capable of living is vastly greater than what is Caesar's. No, it is not ironclad; for instance, should you go to war for a cause that you consider unjust? Should you support a government that you consider unjust? The Hindus would clearly state "yes" - do you your duty as well as and with as much moral responsibility as you can, no matter the duty. The Quakers would clearly state "NO" as they have in our various wars, allowing themselves to work for "our side" only in non-lethal capacities. In this country, the individual may decide for himself what religion he might have, thus making a case that the individual is deciding just what his reaction to the outside world will morally be.
I suppose in the end the morality of one's decisions can be decided by the degree to which the individual has committed himself to the ideal - as long as the nature of this ideal is not egoistic, but determined by a higher collective conscious in the form of a morally secure religion or body. And here is where Bill Murchison's article makes the most sense. He compares the leakers to black people in the civil - rights era south. These people would, say, refuse to sit in the back of the bus, thus violating state law. The differences were: for one, they were on solid ground from their religion's viewpoint (we are all equally human) and from the "just" government's (similarly, all men are created equal); they hurt no one in their defiance (vs. Assange and perhaps Snowden); and they were willing to accept the consequences; unlike Assange and Snowden, they did not run for political asylum, but held out their wrists for the cuffs.
Jesus did not come specifically for this world, but his teachings were meant to have practical applications. One did not fight a government over profit or raw power; rather, one did do so (as did Paul and the martyrs) to uphold the right to live the inner truth - which in the case of the civil rights activists noted above, were writ in their material life as well, uniting both. The quandary, then, is not as messy as it at first seems. We recognize what is moral through others, and others through a recognized canon of morality; then we apply this to the outside world after seriously considering our motives - are they for a desire to express, in life, the timeless truths? Or are they for our own aggrandizement or to revenge our own hurts and humiliations? Certainly not cut and dried, but certainly a good start. FK
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