Some Questions About the Problem of Evil
November 23, 2010
Okay, fellow humans, help me out with my quandry. Here is a brief overview of the problem of evil, and then some questions.
First, it is an old question. It constitutes one of those objections to our experiences as human beings that require an answer form every generation of Christians. In other words, there is more than one conceptual image at work. Simultaneously, the “problem of evil” demonstrates what seems like inconsistencies in the truth claims inherent in Christianity (specifically) and theism (generally). However, there is some evidence to suggest that the problem is unduly complicated by misunderstanding the nature of those truth claims. For example, in its classic formulation the problem of evil reads like this, “If God exists, then God is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect. If God is omnipotent, then God has the power to eliminate all evil. If God is omniscient, then God knows when evil exists. If God is morally perfect, then God has the desire to eliminate all evil. Evil exists. If evil exists and God exists, then either God doesn’t have the power to eliminate all evil, or doesn’t know when evil exists, or doesn’t have the desire to eliminate all evil. Therefore, God doesn’t exist.” Perhaps a less technical, but sufficiently succinct way to put it is, “If God (who is completely good and powerful) exists, then how can evil also exist?” Clearly, this creates a neat little problem for Christians and theists. If you deny that evil exists, you seem foolish. If you deny that God is ultimately good or utterly powerful, you seem to be denying the concept of God. Consequently, the argument is set up as an “either/or” – either evil is real or God (as conceptualized by theism, especially Christianity) is real, because they cannot co-exist. This is a decidedly deductive construction of the problem. There are also inductive forms of the problem. In terms of theism, though, the ontological defense of God’s existence is valid and true (and convincing) – therefore, for a theist, inductive forms of the problem of evil and facts about evil “cannot constitute even prima facie arguments against the existence of God,” and are a moot point.
So, briefly, what are the ways in which theists have sought to unravel the apparent contradiction between these two facts?
First, some authors have suggested that suffering and evil are part of God’s plan in “building the soul” of a person. In other words, suffering and evil build endurance, patience, and faith. If you suffer, you are better for it. This, of course, is only as satisfying as the extent to which your imagination allows you to be comfortable. Surely, the suffering that an athlete in training endures is beneficial. The suffering a mother in child-birth endures is beneficial. However, do you think that a small child that suffers through Leukemia receives a benefit commensurate to her suffering? Do you believe that innocent Jews that suffered through the Holocaust and died were benefited from their suffering? So, the extent of the argument may only be appealing to the extent you see a benefit. What if, then, the benefit were eternal?
Second, some theists have tried to posit that “evil” is not a thing or being. It is a result of free will, and so the existence of evil is the consequence of God allowing humanity to have free will. Consequently, God created humanity in his image, and the result as a free agent that may and does choose to act in morally evil ways. Thus, the real conflict exists between God’s desire for humanity to reflect his glory, and for his plan for creation to be executed as conceived. God could force humanity to behave, but he would be violating his own will in providing humanity with a will. In other words, “good” is only good because evil is an option.
Third, and finally, the “Need for Natural Laws” is summarized by Michael Tooley:
“first, it is important that events in the world take place in a regular way, since otherwise effective action would be impossible; secondly, events will exhibit regular patters only if they are governed by natural laws; thirdly, if events are governed by natural laws, the operation of those laws will give rise to events that harm individuals; so, fourthly, God’s allowing natural evils is justified because the existence of natural evils is entailed by natural laws, and a world without natural laws would be a much worse world.”
This touches on Christian notions of Original Sin. When humanity exercised its free will against God’s will, it brought about certain changes in God’s creation that resulted in natural laws and states of affair that created patterns of destruction, violence, and suffering. Consequently, evil is only a problem in the temporal sense. Once Christ returns and sets everything to rights, there will be no “problem of evil” of which to speak. There is an infinitely good, knowledgeable, and powerful God that will have dealt justly with all the suffering and evil caused by humanity’s exertion of free will.
There are others, but I find something interesting in this whole debate. It is the designation of things and events as either “good” or “evil.” The reason I find it interesting is because the very notion of a “problem of evil” is designed to express the contradiction between the existence of a Christian God and the events we experience in life. However, the very language used to conceptualize the problem are dependent on the existence of said “morally good God.” If God did not exist, then neither would the moral designation of the good over and against that of evil. If there is no good God, can there even be evil? Of course, we wonder about the issue of suffering. What is our justification for giving moral designation to suffering? Am I suffering when I experience pain? If God does not exist, how would I have a standard of good by which I could compare the wrongness of suffering or the evilness of violence? How would an atheist that actually framed the question without presupposing that God exists maintain the tension of the original contradiction? Assume the atheist position is correct. There is no God. We have evolved socially, emotionally, morally, etc. If the notions of good and evil are both innate to the evolutionary process of humanity, how do we distinguish between them? Perhaps, I have unfairly changed the topic of the discussion, but I fail to see how the problem of evil exists without the existence of God. Doesn’t that mean that God has to exist?
Well, I was waiting to throw this out until I worked up a polished essay on it, but the deeper I go the more I realize that that is going to take about 2 years (at least) of me reading continental philosophy(a task which I’ve only begun, which means I haven’t found a “bottom” ; I haven’t figured out just how deep I have to go), so, instead, I’m going to just list some of my ideas thus far, and see what you think.
Oh, and if you’re planning on seeing District 9, but haven’t, you may not want to read some or all of this post.
I few weeks ago I watched District 9, by the white South African director, Neill Blomkamp. It is a powerful movie, and has dominated my thoughts ever since. Below is a quick synopsis of the pertinent parts, but be warned that my description hardly does the movie justice.
Spoiler begins
An alien ship mysteriously parked itself above Johannesburg, SA. Millions of aliens were found on the ship aimlessly living in their own filth. A camp, called District 9 was created for them below the ship and all of the aliens were moved to it. Over the course of 20 years, the camp became a slum, and numerous violent incidents gave rise to serious hatred on the part of Johannesburg residents toward the aliens whom they refer to as ”prawns.” As one character notes, the aliens do have undeniable shrimp-like characteristics. A super-corporation called Multi-National United is tasked with managing the prawns and the action of the movie begins with the MNU’s decision to move the entire prawn population to a new camp outside of Johannesburg. A geeky beaurocrat, who happens to be the CEO’s son-in-law, is put in charge of handing out eviction notices to the entire alien population of Disctrict 9. While carrying out the task our protagonist beaurocrat comes into contact with an alien substance which begins changing him into an alien. When the transformation starts, he is promptly kidnapped by his own corporation, where he is forced to participate in disturbing experiments. It turns out, MNU’s real interest in the “prawns” is their weapons technology which the company seeks to duplicate and market. Their only setback is that the alien technology can only be utilized by the aliens. MCU’s evil scientists soon discover, however, that the protagonist can use the weapons because his DNA is in the process of becoming alien. Just before they begin harvesting his organs in the interest of harnessing his weapon-operating power, he escapes and seeks refuge in District 9. For most of the movie the protagonist has the same bigoted attitude toward the aliens that everyone else both within MNU and without have. But, as he becomes a prawn, and develops a friendship of sorts with one of them, his attitude slowly changes, until, in the climax of the movie, he is defends his alien friend against extermination at the hands of his father-in-law’s heartless company.
Spoiler Ends
Here are some of the ideas that this movie has inspired:
1. For the purposes of ethical conversation, all aliens in Science Fiction and specifically in District 9=the Other.
2. In order for the protagonist of the movie to “love” the Other, he had to become the Other. He was incapable of understanding or loving the Other as himSelf.
3. The movie can obviously be “read” as commentary on the South African struggle with apartheid. However, the alien ship could have been parked over 1939-era Germany, or over present-day Gaza Strip and the same symbolic power would have been achieved.
4. In a way, the protagonist’s transformation could represent the Incarnation. Christ put himSelf aside to become the Other (humanity), in order to redeem the Other. Redemption could not have taken place outside of the act of “becoming the Other” on Christ’s part.
5. In terms of Christian morality, the concept of the Other is equivalent to the Neighbor, especially in a globalized world in which one is forced (blessed?) to rub up against, to pay attention to people and cultures radically different than one’s Self so that everyone is one’s Neighbor. How can we truly understand and love our Neighbor, then, without becoming her/him? Globalism brings us together but we are still so far apart. I expect Zizek’s book on the Neighbor to be particularly enlightening/challenging on this point, hopefully it will be mine next week.
6. Following Cavanaugh, in the Eucharist I consume Christ, but in turn, I am consumed; I become more and more a part of Christ’s body. Through Christ’s act of becoming us (the Incarnation), He installed the way for us to become more like Him (the Eucharist). Since we share the Eucharist with the Universal Church which spans nations, continents and cultures, the Eucharist is the way in which each individual Self becomes the Other. If you’ll allow a little analogical liberty, the alien substance which changes the human protagonist of District 9 into an alien can represent the Eucharist which changes each of us into body of Christ, thus uniting us (whether we like it or not) with each Other.
What do you think? I’ve got about 30,000 pages of Levinas, Lacan, Bidiou, Zizek, Derrida, Critchley, Foucault and maybe some Milbank (and many more who I haven’t yet thought about or discovered) to read before I can bring this all together into some sort of cogency. Any suggestions?
A Word from George
February 24, 2010
Islamic Mysticism: Sufism as Reconciliatory Movement
October 22, 2009
Frankly, I’m a little skeptical of posting this last entry on Islam. I’m not even sure why, really. It’s long, it’s probably out of the range of interests for a lot of our readers, and some of our readers seem to be annoyed at my recent foray into Islamic studies. Nonetheless, I think Christians must strive to better understand Islam (I am, at this point, at least echoing the feelings of other theophilicas: see this post, #4).
So, here is the discussion I want to have about this piece of research: Do you think mysticism is a common enough thread to open dialogue between religions? I am under the impression that most (all?) religions have their own mystics, so what about the human condition and pursuit for experiential knowledge of the divine drives mystics? I, again, cannot get over how many similarities exist between the development of Islamic orthodoxy and Christianity (no matter how loudly critics shout about the differences that do exist, and I do acknowledge that those differences exist).
Introduction
Mysticism, as a philosophy, contends that knowledge about reality exists beyond sense perception. Within the context of religious experience, the object of that knowledge finds its locus in the personal experience of the divine and its execution of the prescribed ritual behavior of the sect in question.[1] Mysticism within monotheistic traditions like Christianity and Islam incorporate various disciplines in order to achieve an experiential knowledge of God so intimate that it may be referred to as a union with God.[2] Ultimately, mysticism seeks to use this union to bridge the gap that exists between the believers’ temporal expression of faith and the metaphysical reality of God’s direct presence. As such, mystical traditions initially give the impression of correcting the inclination to focus exclusively on the manual, orthodox expressions of faith exhibited by those religious sects that adhere to monotheistic creeds.
The creed, then, is irrevocably central to the faith of Islam, and Islam’s understanding of the creed is ubiquitous in its assertion that Allah is, by ontological necessity, a distant God. The resulting religious institution demonstrates a long history of stringent adherence to protocol. George W. Braswell affirms that, “Islam is a religion of law, ritual, and duty.”[3] It should come as no surprise, then, that Islam has often been assailed by the tyranny of orthodox legalism and ritualism. Sufism emerged naturally as an internal response to the emotional and spiritual disconnect bred by such developments. It attempted to surmount the distance felt by Muslims by accentuating the nearness of God as a concept taught in both the Qur’ān and Ḥadith through the demonstration of the love, closeness, and presence of God.[4]
Like many ascetic movements, though, nearness to God in Sufism is best accomplished and then demonstrated through denial of worldly excess and personal discipline in matters of piety. The term Sufism, which has become the nomenclature associated with Islamic mysticism, is etymologically derived from an Arabic verbal noun which means “the habit of wearing woolen garments.”[5] Muslims commonly hold that the term “Sufism” harkens back to those original mystic believers whose only common element was a renouncement of the superficial outward observance of religious law endemic to the corrupt rulers in favor of a spiritual piety that clothed itself modestly in “wool.” Accordingly, theological rigidity was also traded for supernatural experience and esoteric knowledge.
However, the orthodox Islamic understanding of God’s transcendence, something of which Sufism has learned to stay well within, limits the mysticism of Sufis to a kind of gnostic experience. Thus, early Sufism was also influenced by Christian Gnosticism. Within that influence, a preference for allegory, symbolism and metaphor feeds the Sufi experience of esoteric knowledge. Nevertheless, interestingly, elements of Islamic mysticism have existed within most Muslim sects, and in many cases create an avenue for divisive groups to reintegrate with orthodoxy. The interplay that occurs between the theological knowledge of orthodoxy and the gnosis of mysticism creates a system of accountability between the legal and practical communities within Islam. Sufism seems to vacillate between reconciling both strict legalistic movements and radical secessionist groups to orthodox readings of the Qur’ān, especially those readings whose content share important motifs (e.g. using “light” as a metaphor for God) with other mystic traditions. This paper attempts to enumerate those ways in which Sufism has proven to be a reconciliatory movement within the greater Islamic community.
Development and Historical Theology of Sufism
The earliest attempts at mysticism within Islam likely occurred during the last decades of the eighth century C.E. Like the eastern Christian monasticism and asceticism that informed it, Islamic mysticism, in its seminal stages, was a reaction of the pious against those who held positions of power and influence within the ruling classes.[6] They remain incomprehensible to scholars, though, because of poor documentation and an utter lack of homogeneity among the respective groups.[7] However, the common thread that surfaced in each of the early mystical groups was a pious renunciation of the excessive living and shallow spirituality of the rulers. Some renunciants were prominent figures, scholars, and famous preachers like Ibrāhīm ibn Adham al-Balkhī (778 CE), Ḥasan al-Baṣrī (728 CE), ‘Abd al-Wāḥid ibn Zayd (767 CE), Fuḍayl ibn ‘Iyāḍ (803 CE), and Bishr ibn al-Ḥārith al-Ḥāfī (841 CE). All of them, though, were known to have worn wool.[8] Ultimately, their heart of renunciation, their penchant for ascetic accoutrement, and their tendency to gather under the leadership of spiritual masters would earn them their sobriquet. The resulting development of Sufism as a movement seems to owe itself to the impetus of at least two factors: political corruption and theological dogmatism.[9]
In the early centuries of Islam, Muslim armies bent on conquest enjoyed immense success; and a rift spread between rulers that grew drunk on power and wealth and pious scholars that proved impotent in the wake. This disparity left Muslims struggling with how to respond to the abuse of power perpetrated by their rulers. They had opportunity to go along with the interpretation of Islam offered by their rulers and build wealth or to follow the lead of those ascetics who would reject the spoils of the world in favor of spiritual wealth.[10] Such passive attempts to subvert the oppressive Umayyad regime went largely unnoticed, because of the more activist antics of groups like the Khārijīs and Shī ᷾īs.[11] Ironically, the regime that drove its conscientious objectors to asceticism because of abuse of power allowed the same to flourish under its own watch as it fought to subjugate the other, more vocal insurrectionists. As the Umayyad rulers sought to control the threat of insurgents, the Sufi quietly worked to disrupt that rule by demonstrating the benefits of a life dedicated toward the experience of God through personal piety.
All of the political clashes and internal unrest inevitably lead to a standoff between Islamic scholars over which faction had the right to impose correct interpretation and practice on the general population. A bitter conflict over orthodoxy that further divided Muslims also arose. These conflicts lead to an atrophied spirituality and cold dogmatism within Islam. As a result, Muslims that were weary with the quibbling of their leaders began to pursue experiences with God, not disputes about him. Sufism was subsequently energized by this pursuit and the belief that if Muhammad could have revelations from Allah, so could others.[12] According to Ahmet Karamustafa this transition resulted in, “new discourses on spiritual states, stages of spiritual development, closeness to God, and love; it also led to a clear emphasis on ‘knowledge of the interior’ (‘ilm al-bāṭin) acquired through ardent examination and training of the human soul.”[13] In their own perception, this exaltation of a longing for closeness to and love for God, “justified the austerities to which they subjected themselves in order to demonstrate their faithfulness.”[14] Thus, the Sufi were also able to rationalize driving the wedge between themselves and the legalists even deeper by rejecting the pedantic proclamations regarding righteous living within the intent of the State handed down by warring caliphs and imams.
While the origin of the Sufi movement proves to be rooted in reaction against negative forces within Islam, its proliferation appears to be the consequence of a renewed understanding of the spirit of orthodoxy. The renewed emphasis and nurture of the inner life was, “concomitant with a similar inward reorientation among the same circles of renunciants in the attempt to achieve a true understanding of the divine revelation.”[15] Sufism had infused its adherents, not only with a desire to know God and the self truly, but also to know them through accurate, energetic study of the Qur’ān. As such, the return to the inner self and the desire for esoteric knowledge necessitated a reciprocal return to Islamic orthodoxy within the Sufi communities. Therefore, the emergence of a Sufi theology served to further galvanize the mystics, to expand the scope and diversity of Sufi influence, and eventually to provide a philosophical counterbalance for Muslim faith and practice that extended to every stratum of society.[16]
Perhaps most important to the study of Sufi theology, and subsequently to the notion of Sufism as a reconciliatory force, is the understanding that “Sufism did not isolate itself from the wider Muslim society and discourse.”[17] Instead, Sufism proved to be a plausible branch of Islamic learning, demonstrating that it is a legitimate ‘ilm (knowledge/discipline) within the orthodox community.[18] However, Sufi theorists strive to establish an important distinction between the ‘ilm within Islam and the ma‘rifa (gnosis or cognitio experimentalis) of Sufism.[19] Renard cites that several Islamic scholars, like Kalābādhī, Makkī, Qushayrī, Anṣari, and Ibn al-‘Arīf, “locate experiential knowledge within their treatments of spiritual development, but do not make knowledge function as a structural basis for their overall approaches to the spiritual life.”[20] Sufi theology, then, clearly includes the didactic, cognitive elements which place it firmly within the testable arena of orthodoxy as well as the experiential, esoteric knowing of self and God affiliated with mystic experience. What emerges from such a construct within Islamic theology is a group of mystic scholars hailed as exemplary figures within both traditional and Sufi camps.
Abū Ḥāmid Muḥammad al-Ghazālī is one important figure of such towering respect from the eleventh century C.E. Ghazālī is a Sufi scholar whose prestigious career was dedicated almost singularly to the pursuit of knowledge (ma‘rifa). According to Renard, “From the start Ghazālī makes it very clear that becoming a person of knowledge is a foundational religious calling, one that outranks even devotion and martyrdom.”[21] Interestingly, one of the primary theological notions put forth by Ghazālī, the “divinely instilled human pre-disposition (isti‘dād) to ma‘rifa of God,” constitutes a theology of the heart wherein knowledge of God comes only from knowledge of self.[22] A believer must, then, be able to recognize and submit to God’s grace, which enables a person to know God, before they are even able to understand themselves which itself is a prerequisite to experiencing the divine presence.
Abrahamov explains that while this metaphysical claim asserts orthodox requirements regarding God’s transcendence and sovereignty, “it is not one of passivity,” in fact, “Man should not wait for God’s assistance, but work and be active for the purpose of knowing the world and its phenomena which is the requisite for knowing God and hence loving Him.”[23] Indeed, Ghazālī teaches that the experiential knowledge of God comes only through the thorough analysis of all the conditions of the heart, and that knowledge only comes by strict adherence not only to the disciplines of Sufism, but also adherence to the Pillars of Faith expressed in Islam.[24] Abrahamov agrees that while Ghazālī’s postulations certainly fall to the philosophical, they are clearly Islamic as well.[25] This clear observance of orthodoxy allows Sufism to direct Muslims in the pursuit of God’s presence without violating the sanctity of His transcendence, and readily allows the movement to adapt to the demands of the sectarian and cultural manifestations of Islam. Sufism provides for mystical, experiential knowledge of God to be a natural extension of Islamic piety, and provides the necessary impetus for many groups to align themselves with orthodoxy.
Sufism as Reconciliatory Sect
Perhaps the greatest testimony to the reconciliatory nature of Sufism is the response that kalām thinkers have had to it. Winter observes that while kalām should not be seen as coterminous with “theology” within Islamic studies, import should be rendered to those Muslim scholars from the kalām tradition that show “increasing respect for Sufi approaches to knowledge,” a group that has even come to recognize the “centrality of Sufism in constructions of Muslim ‘orthodoxy.’”[26] Toby Mayer explains why Sufism was able to integrate itself into orthodox thinking thusly:
But Sufism did not isolate itself from wider Muslim society and discourse. On the contrary, it underwent an extremely productive tension which was arguably the central dynamic of Islamic intellectual history: though Sufism constituted an esoterism of the highest order, with all the exclusiveness which that implies, it also had to reckon with the Islamic genius. The salient quality of that genius is integrality. In this there is a subtle but definite link between the unity of God and that of man, theological tawhīd (“making one” – monotheism) implying societal tawhīd.[27]
Thus, tawhīd is not only the theological impetus behind Sufism, but it remains one of the foundational theological elements by which Muslims demonstrate harmony under the revelation of God’s will[28] and successfully submit to the will of God in matters of personal piety. Consequently, Sufi scholars, like al-Ghazālī, have been able to demonstrate successfully that Sufism exists at the core of Islam, and that it “could not divorce itself from Islamic society, despite constituting at times a radically esoteric movement.”[29]
The tension mentioned by Mayer bears repeating, because the development of Sufism demonstrates that a simple devotional adherence to experiencing God, even in an esoteric sense, drove the amalgamation that occurred early in the movement’s history. This reconciliatory nature, then, is not some modern derivation of the Sufi tradition, it is the Sufi tradition. The Sufi practice of systematic self-examination as spiritual devotion, in particular, seems to be just as ubiquitous in the history of Islam as its theological ties to the tawhīd, especially within the classical theological schools. Proto-Sufism exhibited within the doctrine of the Muʹtazilite movement was evidenced by the presence of Sufi followers at the school of Abū Sahl Bishr ibn al-Muʹtamir, and seemed to be an early verification of orthodoxy in spite of the school’s speculative nature.[30] Ironically, Sufism’s influence is also seen in the schools of Bakriyya and Sālimiyya (kalām), institutions set at odds with the rationalism of Muʹtazila and still able to integrate with Sufism.[31] Mayer also points out that one other major school, the Karrāmiyya, was “counter-Muʹtazilite,” but constructed a defense of orthodoxy and revised contemporary theological jargon based on the methods of mystic introspection.[32]
Finally, though not exhaustively, the influence of al-Ghazālī by the eleventh century is of paramount importance in the eventual synthesis of Ashʹarism and Sufism. Sufism has in Ghazālī the perfect esoteric argument from a renowned exoteric scholar. In fact, Mayer points out that even Ghazālī’s conversion to Sufism was in effect a “bold attempt” to revive exoteric sciences through Sufism.[33] Ashʹari’s school was a major kalām force that succeeded under Ghazālī’s patrons, and eventually produced the official theology (which emphasized the tawhīd) of the Seljuk domains.[34] Subsequently, Sufism enjoyed greater synthesis into the Islamic ethos, and eventually became one of the elements of Islamic theology and philosophy that tied most Muslims together. According to Mayer, “Philosophy and Sufism thus influenced each other theologically. Sufism’s impact on philosophy is yet more obvious later in its history, in the Safavid period. Its influence pervades the thoughts of the most eminent Safavid Shīʹite philosopher Mullā Ṣadrā.”[35] Thus, Sufism and its emphasis on the internal state of humanity not only informed, but reconciled dissenting factions through Islamic history.
Conclusion
There are numerous ways in which Sufism has proven to be a reconciliatory movement within the greater Islamic community throughout history. Primarily, though, Sufism has proven to be a logical component of the greater orthodox canon in Islamic theology. Initially, proto-Sufi groups inspired the introspective discipline that would later become a natural extension of the doctrine of tawhīd with their ascetic commitment to Islamic ideals. The philosophical understanding of how the Qur’ān intends the unity of God and his creation to be understood and demonstrated allows for exegetical flexibility. Once Sufism was able to establish such a strong philosophical connection to such an important doctrinal element of Islam, the Sufi path to knowledge was embraced by many sects throughout Muslim history. Consequently, the esoteric goal of Sufism blended well with the Islamic commission to demonstrate and propagate the unity of God with his creation. As such, Sufism continues to prove an able reconciliatory force among orthodox Islamic factions that cannot deny the call of the Qur’ān to proclaim the message of Allah through the prophet Muhammad to all of mankind.
[1] Robert Audi, ed., The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy, 2nd ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 593.
[2] Walter A. Elwell, ed., Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2001), 806.
[3] George W. Braswell, Islam: Its Prophet, Peoples, Politics and Power, (Nashville: Broadman & Holman, 1996), 97.
[4] Ibid., 75.
[5] Alexander Knysh, Islamic Mysticism: A Short History, Themes in Islamic Studies 1, (Leiden: Brill, 2000), 5.
[6] Keith E. Swartley, ed., Encountering the World of Islam, (Atlanta: Authentic Media, 2005), 216.
[7] Ahmet T. Karamustafa, Sufism: The Formative Period, (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2007), 1.
[8] Ibid., 2.
[9] See Knysh, Islamic Mysticism, 9; Swartley, ed., Encountering, 216.
[10] Swartley, ed., Encountering the World, 216.
[11] Knysh, Islamic Mysticism, 9.
[12] Swartley, ed., Encountering the World, 216.
[13] Karamustafa, Sufism: The Formative Period, 2.
[14] Knysh, Islamic Mysticism, 9.
[15] Karamustafa, Sufism: The Formative Period, 2; A point corroborated by Ernst on multiple occasions. Carl W. Ernst, The Shambhala Guide to Sufism, (Boston: Shambhala, 1997), 25-26; 81.
[16] Ernst, The Shambhala guide, 31, 120; Karamustafa, Sufism: The Formative Period, 134; Knysh, Islamic Mysticism, 170.
[17] Tim Winter, ed., The Cambridge Companion to Classical Islamic Theology, Cambridge Companions to Religion, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008), 259.
[18] John Renard, trans., Knowledge of God in Classical Sufism: Foundations of Islamic Mystical Theology, The Classics of Western Spirituality, (New York: Paulist Press, 2004), 19.
[19] Renard classifies ‘ilm as “ordinary, traditional, discursive, acquired or ‘scientific’ knowledge” and ma‘rifa as “more intimate, infused, experiential or ‘mystical’ knowing.” See Renard, Knowledge of God in Classical Sufism, 19.
[20] Ibid.
[21] Ibid., 46.
[22] Ibid., 48.
[23] Binyamin Abrahamov, Divine Love in Islamic Mysticism: The Teachings of al-Ghazâlî and al-Dabbâgh, (London: RoutledgeCurzon, 2003), 84.
[24] Renard, Knowledge of God in Classical Sufism, 49-50.
[25] Abrahamov, Divine Love, 85-86.
[26] Winter, ed., The Cambridge Companion, 2.
[27] Ibid., 259.
[28] Swartley, ed., Encountering the World, 135.
[29] Winter, ed., The Cambridge Companion, 259.
[30] See Braswell, Islam, 96; Michael A. Sells, ed., trans., Early Islamic Mysticism: Sufi, Qur’an, Mi’raj, Poetic and Theological Writings, The Classics of Western Spirituality, (New York: Paulist Press, 1996), 308-310; Winter, ed., The Cambridge Companion, 260.
[31] Sells, ed., trans., Early Islamic Mysticism, 226; Winter, ed., The Cambridge Companion, 262-263.
[32] Winter, ed., The Cambridge Companion, 264.
[33] Ibid., 270.
[34] Sells, ed., trans., Early Islamic Mysticism, 318-320; Winter, ed., The Cambridge Companion, 270-271.
[35] Winter, ed., The Cambridge Companion, 280.
Augustine, Luther, And The Development Of Predestinarianism In Reformation Thought: Part II
September 16, 2009
Luther and Predestinarianism in the Reformation
The similarities between Augustine and Luther extend beyond Luther’s experience as a monk of the Augustinian order, which seems a forgone conclusion at first. Clearly, Augustine heavily influences Luther regarding presuppositions that underpin their predestinarianism. Bayer contends that Luther’s interpretation of Scripture leads him to the same conclusions about human nature as Augustine: the nature of sin in man is both, “superbia and desperatio.”[1] However, Luther has more in common with Augustine than just a hermeneutical predisposition. Augustine affected Luther’s thinking so significantly because of a shared soteriological need. Luther offered more than intellectual obeisance to Augustine; he needed Augustine to lead him down a philosophical path that would clear his conscience.
Luther’s life was plagued with the same kind of religious upheaval that Augustine experienced. An important difference, though, is that Luther seemed to be cognizant of an internal upheaval that drove his various religious experiences. Augustine sought explanation for his seeming reluctance to seek Christ wholeheartedly, but Luther was so consumed by a pursuit of piety that he could not easily find solace. Luther’s early life lacked the wholehearted embrace of sinfulness that plagued Augustine, but his angst over the origin, nature, and effect of sin were strikingly similar. As a monk, Luther sought consolation in works of grace hoping for absolution and justification. However, even a strict regimen of sacramental observance and contrition left him with the dread of damnation. Luther became so obsessed with absolution that he pathologically pondered his sin and found that confession only intensified his guilt. After a foray into mysticism, Luther abandoned his strict sacramental pursuit for an endeavor in loving God. Sadly, his childhood experience with severe authority figures left him hating God instead.[2]
At the behest of his confessor, Luther entered into a lectureship at the University of Wittenberg. His superior hoped, as in the case of Jerome, that Luther would find his temptations and guilt abated in the study of Scripture. This appointment now seems providential. While preparing a lecture in the Epistle to the Romans, Luther concluded that both faith and justification are the work of God, alone.[3] This revelation about the nature of grace and its correspondence to both faith and justification were the balm that Luther required. Augustine’s work on predestination in relationship to Romans provided the fine-tuning that Luther needed. This predestinarianism, then, became for Luther what it had been for Augustine, a means of confidently receiving grace. Luther was lead to affirm predestination both because, “it was a corollary of justification by faith as a free gift of God, and because he found it amply supported by the authority of Paul and Augustine.”[4] However, this doctrine also provided a point of attack for the increasingly Pelagian Catholic Church.
Just as Augustine found cause to sharpen his predestinarianism in Pelagius, Luther found cause to refine his position because of Desiderius Erasmus. Luther and Erasmus, who had averted being involved in the conflict with reformers to this point, engaged in a published dispute over the ability of humanity to cooperate with God in achieving salvation. Erasmus’ view that the human will is capable of fighting “against the flesh or for the Spirit,”[5] was rejected wholly by Luther. He countered with arguments, which reasoned, “Man can contribute nothing toward his own salvation good enough to be juxtaposed with any work of God.”[6] Interestingly, Luther sided with the most revered scholars of the Catholic Church, Augustine and Aquinas among them, against Erasmus and the church. Luther’s defense of Augustinian predestinarianism would not be emulated by the rest of the Protestant church, though. The other Reformers took the example of Luther and the work of Augustine a step further.
The Reformation’s Departure from Augustinian and Lutheran Predestinarianism
The various incarnations of Augustine and Luther’s soteriological doctrine eventually yielded to a theological system that expunged human cooperation in faith and broadened the doctrine’s scope to the entirety of God’s providential rule over creation. Certainly, many agreed with Luther and sought to expand his influence and teaching. Many hoped, though, to expound upon or deviate from the teaching of Luther. In fact, Luther found his ideals and doctrine caught between the Catholic Church and the likes of Carlstadt and Calvin.[7]
Nevertheless, the remaining important issue revolves around Luther’s resolve in pursuing Augustinian predestinarianism, though not likely out of any inordinate dedication to Augustine himself. Nonetheless, McGrath observes that, “Of the reformers, it is Martin Luther who is closest to Augustine in his teaching on justification.”[8] He remains the closest to Augustine because he did not attempt to derive a theological system out of his notions of predestination. While Luther spoke plainly of ecclesiastical and priestly behavior he found contradictory to Scripture, he did seek to know the word of God truly, even if it meant agreeing with the church. Melanchthon viewed Luther within the Reformation context as a voice “interchangeable” with Augustine: a voice that was renewing the early teachings of the church.[9] In fact, according to McGrath, “Augustine’s conflict with Pelagianism in particular is seen by Melanchthon as an exemplar of the Lutheran protest against the Pelagianism of the sixteenth-century church.”[10]
Wallace provides helpful categorization of the change that occurs after Luther in the Reformation:
“A more significant division between doctrines of predestination is not whether it is single or double, but between those versions where its soteriological impact remains central and those where the doctrine becomes an organizing principle for a theological system and is thus intertwined with the whole consideration of providence, something which became increasingly the case in the later part of the sixteenth century.”[11]
This kind of predestinarianism seems present in Augustine and Luther. However, historians and theologians alike have long commented on the polarizing, often inflammatory, nature of both Augustine’s and Luther’s polemical treatises. Wallace notes that while there is a strong predestinarianism in Luther’s reply to Erasmus in the Bondage of the Will, a marked emphasis on double predestination does not occur in the English Reformation until it is formulated by the Swiss and Rhineland Reformed traditions.[12] These reformed traditions inherited their emphasis on double predestination from the likes of John Calvin.
It would be a mischaracterization to promulgate a claim that Calvin merely expanded the scope of Augustine’s theories. McGrath notes that Calvin, in his Institutes, does not wholly approve of Augustine’s treatment and departs from Augustine’s belief that “Christ is the source of man’s righteousness, in that the Spirit is poured into man’s heart on account of his obedience.”[13] Calvin insists that the transformative work of faith and grace are completely alien to the human nature. God is sovereign over all of creation and its redemption, and humanity is utterly depraved. Calvin’s departure from Augustine and Luther occurs most notably in the creation of a theological system that locates double predestination as one of its pillars of thought.
This shift in theology has been rejected by church councils for over a thousand years. It demands that all of Scripture bow to its methodology. Geisler points out that the consequences of this system burden humanity with a God that is the direct author of evil and that hates the non-elect.[14] As one who worked tirelessly and meticulously to avoid those very consequences in his own theology, this outcome would have been completely unacceptable to Augustine
However, it also suffers from crippling philosophical contradictions, and it should suffice to note that Augustine’s predestinarianism has been relegated to an element of theology until the emergence of lapsarianism. This system of decrees and there seeming authority, even over the biblical text, create a web of presuppositions that rest squarely on Augustine’s philosophy of the origin of evil. Robert Brown identifies the philosophical problems associated with using Augustine’s predestinarianism as a foundational system of thought, explaining that Augustine’s explanation of first sin is at best incomprehensible.[15] If it becomes something more than incomprehensible, then the system’s other claims regarding God’s nature or his culpability in creating evil is suspect at best. Geisler has already hinted at this in his theological critique of double predestination, but this is clearly his point of reference for making the claim.
Conclusion
While predestination is an unavoidably biblical concept, Augustine and Luther intended to direct the hearts of men toward God in gratitude for grace received, not to establish a lens through which all other Scripture must pass. Predestination achieved, for Augustine and Luther, a different end than what is achieved by a system based on double predestination. Augustinian and Lutheran predestinarianism provides a soteriological framework to understand how humanity, in its plight, is able to receive and be confident in justification. This predestination declares the God is the author and finisher of our faith, and that there is no person or thing that can separate us from that work.
[1] Oswald Bayer, “Freedom? The Anthropological in Luther and Melanchthon Compared.” The Harvard Theological Review, 91 (October 1998): 375.
[2] González, The Story of Christianity, Vol. 2, 16-17.
[3] Ibid., 19-20.
[4] Ibid., 42.
[5] Oswald Bayer, “Freedom,” 377.
[6] Roland N. Bainton, Christianity, (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2000): 253.
[7] Though for very different reasons. Ibid.
[8] Alister E. McGrath, “Forerunners of the Reformation? A Critical Examination of the Evidence for Precursors of the Reformation Doctrines of Justification.” The Harvard Theological Review, 75 (April 1982): 230.
[9] Peter Fraenkel, Testimonia Patrum: The Function of the Patristic Argument in the Theology of Philip Melanchthon, (Geneva: Droz, 1961) 32.
[10] Alister E. McGrath, “Forerunners of the Reformation,” 229.
[11] Wallace, Dewey D. “The Doctrine of Predestination in the Early English Reformation.” Church History, 43 (June 1974): 203-204.
[12] Ibid., 202.
[13] Alister E. McGrath, “Forerunners of the Reformation,” 233.
[14] Geisler, Systematic Theology, 567.
[15] A term Brown utilizes as an expression of a temporal happenstance with a transcendent cause. The sin of Satan and Adam may have happened temporally, but its cause is outside of our closed finite system. Brown argues that any other explanation of Augustine’s postulations results in grievous philosophical error. I contend that Brown is reading Augustine through the lens of Calvin and a theological system. If Augustine can be read concerning the origin and effect of a sinful will in relation to humanity’s ability to save itself, then Augustine has accomplished what Brown had hoped he would, a structure for interpreting one’s present existence (324). See Robert F. Brown, “The First Evil Will Must Be Incomprehensible: A Critique of Augustine.” Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 46 (September 1978): 315-329.
Augustine, Luther, And The Development Of Predestinarianism In Reformation Thought: Part I
August 29, 2009
I felt like I would try to tackle the “free will vs. predestination” debate from a different angle. I am pretty sure that I have settled the argument here (bring on the Nobel and Pulitzer prizes – read sarcasm, if you’re not sure). Consequently, I’m off to solve world hunger and the problem of evil after I have a midnight snack.
Introduction
As Augustine’s predestinarianism was developed by Luther and assimilated into Reformation thought, an inexorably flawed theological system based on double predestination quickly emerged. Prior to Luther’s utilization, prominent figures in church history left Augustine’s doctrine relatively intact. As early as the Synod of Orange in 529 and notably in the Belgic Confession of Faith in 1561, church leaders rejected the assertions of double predestination.[1] Gottschalk hazarded an attempt at interpreting Augustine in a theory of double predestination in the ninth century, but was condemned of heresy because of it in Maiz. Anselm of Canterbury promoted the Augustinian position in the eleventh century. Thomas Aquinas elaborated the Augustinian position by differentiating between God’s general will and his special will in the soteriological realm in the thirteenth century. If any real deviation from Augustine’s predestinarianism took place, it was in the Catholic Church’s general trend toward Pelagianism.[2]
For eleven centuries, then, endeavors to deviate from the Augustinian position on predestination were generally met with condemnation by the church. Though Luther played a seminal role in the Protestant church’s schism with Catholic thought, he too maintained an Augustinian predestinarianism. Scholars cannot agree concerning a cause for the longevity of Augustine’s postulation. However, history makes clear the fact that attempts to create a system of thought centered on his postulation would not be tolerated. The Reformation, though, provided grounds to contradict the wishes of the Catholic Church. This provided opportunity for the Reformation’s thinkers to speculate the value of theological system based on Augustine’s philosophy and theology independent of church councils.
Unfortunately, only one of those thinkers really understood Augustine’s agenda and, perhaps, the doctrinal consequences of basing a theological system on it. The correlations between Augustine and Luther reveal that their theologies sought to accomplish a different goal than those found in the reformed tradition that emerged from Calvin’s influence on the Reformation. The predestinarianism of Augustine and Luther was born out of a personal struggle with sin and served as the means to a soteriological end, not as the framework for a theological system.
Augustine and Early Predestinarianism
Religious upheaval, bearing profound consequences, regularly struck at the core of St. Augustine’s life prior to conversion. This upheaval centered on Augustine’s lifelong struggle over the problem of evil with near exclusivity. While his mother had trained Augustine in the tenets of Christianity, he could not reconcile the existence of evil in the world with that worldview. This and other early irreconcilable differences with Christianity drove Augustine to dabble in Manichaeism and Neo-Platonism. Fatefully, once again through the influence of his mother, Augustine agreed to hear the preaching of Ambrose, and came to a point of personal crisis regarding Christianity. Namely, Ambrose’s preaching inadvertently quelled Augustine’s most vexing contentions. However, having many of his intellectual disputes settled, Augustine struggled with the moral demands that following Christ placed on a person’s life.[3]
Ultimately, this internal upheaval replaced the external, intellectual upheaval that had dominated the landscape of his life prior to conversion. Augustine long remembered the internal struggle, and the point of his will’s desire to fight off grace’s apprehension influenced his defense of the faith. Some like Gerald Bonner suggest that Augustin’s theology of predestination began here long before the Pelagian controversy, and, in fact, that his predestinarianism was a result of his stress on original sin and internal struggling against the Spirit of God. [4] Gonzalez also identifies this internal upheaval as the point of contention between Augustine and Pelagius, noting that Augustine rejected Pelagius’ claims to the simplicity of human will. Because of Augustine’s personal struggle with sin, the reader finds him postulating, “the will is not always its own master, for it is clear that the will to will does not always have its way.”[5] For Augustine, something overrode his internal will that wanted to continue in iniquity; he identifies that “something” as the grace of God.
Consequently, predestinarianism is something that Augustine grows into. Fendt argues that Augustine’s writing in Confessions, De Libero Arbitrio, and the anti-Manichaean works adequately developed the predestinarianism “about which Augustine seems to grow more adamant as he ages.”[6] This predestinarianism, though, analyzes the role of the created will relationally to the holiness of God, not the role of God’s providential rule over the created order. This remains the important difference between Augustine’s predestinarianism as means to understanding justification and subsequent developments of the doctrine as a theological system.
At every point, Augustine’s evaluation of the will indemnifies the Creator against the guilt of creating evil, and at the same time locating the responsibility of justification squarely on the good pleasure of the greatest Good, God. Therefore, God has not created evil, propagated evil, or preemptively damned the existence of any created will; but He alone reserves the right to express grace or not to express grace to that created will. Augustine writes, “The supremely Good thus turning to good account even what is evil, to the condemnation of those whom in His justice He has predestined to punishment, and to the salvation of those whom in His mercy He has predestined to grace.”[7] Accordingly, Augustine’s predestinarianism involves itself with the business of offering salvation or offering consequences, whereas subsequent theological systems create a priori criteria and preexistent decrees that stem supposedly from the providential rule of the creator. Then all of creation is bound by the content of these decrees and restrained within the parameters of a system where God expressly creates wills in order to damn them.
The seminal stages of Augustine’s predestinarianism play a significant role in the aftermath of the Pelagian controversy as well. If, as Fendt suggests, Augustine cultivates an increasingly rigid predestinarianism, then it is because of polemics and not because of conviction. Augustine seemed destined to contend for Christianity against enemies of the faith and Fendt warns that Augustine’s later writings bear the mark of rhetorical certitude and not necessarily that of an increasingly severe idea of predestination. Fendt writes, “Augustine must feel at the time of writing this part of DCD the threat of Pelagian huzzas, for if we do not make salvation the direct determination of (predestining) grace, it sounds like it is within our power to save ourselves.”[8] Augustine, then, has polarized the issue with Pelagius somewhat. Later writings carry the weight of a hard predestination, only if the reader ignores the rhetorical context. Fendt concludes his argument by observing that Augustine not only has a vaster education in rhetoric than he does in the intricacies of philosophy but also that it is, “required of a bishop in the pressing situation to be forceful and obvious.”[9]
From start to finish, the student of Augustine can appropriately understand his predestinarianism within the context of a personal struggle with sin and the philosophical quandary over the existence of evil. Though the content of Augustine’s later writing bore the mark of reactionary pontificating, his writing should not be held hostage by a situation that can be explained within a historical context. Augustine wrote extensively concerning his early life and conversion, documenting in brilliant commentary the skirmish that he personally waged against the sinful will. This propensity for documentation not only provides modern scholars with insight into his thinking, but it also provided a young Augustinian monk going through a very similar struggle with the means to articulate his own treatises on predestinarianism.
More on that young Augustinian monk in Part II…
[1] Norman Geisler, Systematic Theology. Vol. 3, Sin, Salvation. (Minneapolis: Bethany House, 2004): 565-566.
[2] Millard J. Erickson, Christian Theology, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1998): 925.
[3] Justo L. González, The Story of Christianity: The Early Church to the Dawn of the Reformation, Vol. 1 (San Francisco: Harper, 1984), 208-211.
[4] See Gerald Bonner, Freedom and Necessity: St. Augustine’s Teaching on Divine Power and Human Freedom, (Washington: Catholic University of America Press, 2007) This contention is indeed the thesis of Bonner’s entire work, and is argued to the effect that Augustine’s predestinarianism stemmed more from this soteriological source than a polemic against Pelagius. See also Millard J. Erickson, Christian Theology, 2nd ed., (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1998), 922.
[5] González, The Story of Christianity, Vol. 1, 214.
[6] Gene Fendt, “Between a Pelagian Rock and a Hard Predestinarianism: The Currents ofControversy in ‘City of God’ 11 and 12.” The Journal of Religion, 81 (April 2001): 211.
[7] Philip Schaff, ed. Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: First Series. Vol. 3, Augustin: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises, (Peabody: Hendrickson Publishers Inc., 2004), 269.
[8] Fendt, “Between a Pelagian Rock,” 222.
[9] Ibid.
Fantasy Literature and Philosophy: Part III
August 22, 2009
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The Bestiary: Animals Who Think and Talk
The professor in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (aka Digory, Lord Digory, et al) personifies Socrates in Plato’s Republic better than any other figure among the collective writings of Tolkien, Lewis, and Rowling. He questions Peter and Susan after they have had a fight with Edmund over Lucy’s claim to have entered Narnia through the wardrobe, asking whether they ought to believe the report of a known liar (Edmund) over that of a trustworthy person (Lucy) just because the liar’s data seemed to back up what they already believed about the world.[i]
This session with the professor is the turning point in the novel regarding Peter and Susan’s attitudes toward Lucy and the possibility that there is more to reality than the world they can perceive with their senses (a lesson they have to repeatedly learn in the series). While the effect that traveling between parallel universes has on time is a fascinating philosophical problem within the Chronicles, the real elements of Platonic Form are found in Lewis’ Bestiary (yes, that is spelled correctly). The talking animals of Narnia represent what it means to be the true form of the creature. For instance, while there are non-talking (h)orses of the “normal” variety in Narnia, it is the noble, talking horses that are the “true (H)orses.” Furthermore, though there may be true Lions of the talking sort, Aslan is The True Lion. Once again, the desired affect is the creation of an order or system of Platonic Forms that will allow the reader to interact with important truths surrounding justice, forgiveness, and redemption. If the forms interacting with these truths are “real forms,” then the conclusions drawn must ultimately be “real principles.”
Magic: When the Supernatural Is Ordinary
Harry Potter’s journey into the wizarding world is just as much a journey into “real reality” as it is a journey to boarding school. Rowling uses magic in much the same way that Tolkien uses items of lore and Lewis uses the bestiary. Magic in the Harry Potter series stands in direct contrast to the technological boon that we experience on a daily basis. Characters like Mr. Weasley, who work for Ministry of Magic, are fascinated by the gadgetry of our lives. However, they never assume more than an anecdotal or trivial attitude toward modernization. The life they have experienced through magic is in tune with nature, but it is not archaic. It is, in fact, much more convenient than technology and gadgetry makes our lives in a number of ways. All of this serves to set the stage for metaphysics and Plato’s Theory of Forms.
“Them!’ said Stan contemptuously, ‘Don’ listen properly do they? Don’ look properly either. Never notice nuffink, they don’.”
Perhaps more than the other worlds, Rowling challenges other readers to doubt their certainty with reality by constructing her world alongside our own. In one scene in the Prisoner of Azkaban, one character explains to Harry that muggles never notice the wizarding world (even the most outlandish behaviors and mishaps) because they are not open to anything but their own expectations. “Them!’ said Stan contemptuously, ‘Don’ listen properly do they? Don’ look properly either. Never notice nuffink, they don’.” Rowling’s Platonic Forms take the form of the wizarding community itself. They are true people in the sense that they have seen what “real” reality is and have not shied away. It can be chaotic, untidy, and unsettling, but there is wonder in all of it. In a sense, even education becomes part of the mystical. Practices of the most existential or supernatural kind in our world take on the tone of the knowable, testable, and controllable in the classroom for Harry Potter. Something that would never be a suitable conclusion to be drawn for someone like the quintessential muggle family, the Dursleys. This is not to say that there is no danger or evil in the wizarding world. If love and friendship can be had in their truest sense, then evil and conflict take on a danger that is much more “dangerous” than those that concern the muggle world.
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