New Words, and Beyond Them (to Ecstasy)

Sarah Palin refudiates and President Obama bemoans the shellacking his party took in the November elections. The nation is poutraged by the G.Z.M. and QE2. In the dark? Check out Sam Sifton and Grant Barrett’s New York Times piece, “The Words of the Year.”

These new words and turns of phrase illustrate how dynamic language is. The English language is especially so; each year countless words are added to the regime of the possible. Equally important are new ways of putting things. Sarah Palin may be maligned by the intelligentsia, but it’s worth noting that the Times word and phrase list includes several of her neologisms. She has an ability to put her finger on something nodal, a skill few people have.

The dynamic nature of language raises interesting problems for scriptures, which either must be translated or read in ancient tongues, and also for doctrinal statements, which have received forms. Arguably, if belief and creed are not adjusted over time, or at least explained in fresh and novel ways, they become obscurantist. The work of theology is to critically reconsider belief in light of new ways of comprehending the world, as they are brought to us in new languages and means of comprehension. This is a daunting task.

Religious communities constantly make ad hoc adaptations to new claims and ideas, simply as a result of meeting, engaging in discussion about current circumstances and the enduring meaning of their community’s claims, preaching sermons, and the like. Yet for all this, a frequent assumption—made equally by believers and religious detractors—is that religions don’t change. In fact, there are some religious critics—Sam Harris, among them—who hold that religions are most adequately represented by fundamentalists. Liberals, Harris holds (and he has most thoughtful believers in mind), confuse the issues by rethinking the core claims of faith. Better he thinks to have absolutist shout-outs with ‘true believers.’ From the standpoint of religious history, this sort of criticism makes very little sense. Even fundamentalists constantly alter their religious views in light of new claims and circumstances; they frequently fail to realize how derivative their formulations are, how yoked to contemporary motifs.

Recognizing the power of words and ideas commends the vigilant study of new ideas, means of putting things, and new values. They determine how we think, live, and act. They provide us with the primary means of experiencing the world. They are the lens through which our identities are expressed and develop over time. Religious traditions as various as Theravada Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam have argued for the importance of words and languages. Their combined insight shouldn’t be lightly dismissed.

God help us if we become beliebers.... But this raises the question of music, one of the powers of which is to unshackle us from ‘words,’ ‘concepts,’ and ‘ideas.’ Music trades on a deeper, more intuitive and emotional plane. Arguably, this realm derives from a more ancient part of mind, one that forms the basis of reason, logic, and words but is itself not them. We also should get to know this realm of non-word and pre-word, this realm of transport and ecstasy. To take a few steps in this direction, get to Jeffrey Johnson’s Sonic Labyrinth.

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What's really at stake in the Stuxnet cyberattack? Join me in discussion at Creedible: A Theology for Stuxnet

Mike Wallace Interview of Reinhold Niebuhr (1958)

Check out this 1958 Mike Wallace interview of Reinhold Niebuhr. One of the primary issues was communism, which is no longer the issue it was in 1958.

On the other hand, Niebuhr's responses are perfectly applicable to Al Qaeda, the war on terror, contemporary discussions of atheism, and the like.

We need another Reinhold Niebuhr.

Theology of the Amygdala?

We tend to avoid situations that provoke fear. Exceptions, such as when we ride a roller coaster or plunge headlong off a bridge to experience a bungee jump free fall, show that we know we benefit from fear and that we want to master it. These actions reveal that fear is not a product of ‘mind’ reflecting on the ‘body,’ but something far more integrated—a bodily reaction registered in the mind.

The Hebrew Bible and New Testament frequently invite us to fear of the Lord. The phrase ‘fear of the Lord’—as the beginning of wisdom, and related notions—is a recurring theme of the Proverbs. Whatever else you do, the Proverbs suggest, be sure to fear the Lord. In fact, make it the basis of everything else you do.

Image courtesy of
Life Science Databases.
CC-BY-SA-2.1-jp
via Wikimedia Commons

Scientists have long known that fear is a function of the amygdala, a ‘mass of nuclei’ in the temporal lobe of the brain, part of the limbic system. If the amygdala is destroyed, animals become fearless. Sindya N. Bhanoo reports today for the New York Times that a study recently published in Current Biology suggests (as was long assumed to be the case) that the same is true of human beings. In the study, scientists investigated patient ‘SM’, whose amygdala is damaged by lesions. Indeed, SM experiences very little or no fear, even when the situation she is in would demand it.

The implications of this finding for religion and belief are clear enough. Can an amygdala-damaged person experience ‘fear of the Lord?’ Leaving aside that some who wish to defend biblical doctrine will argue that such ‘fear’ is not emotional, we should ask, are we human beings simply the product of our brain activity? Is religious language that claims our bodies and souls are distinct mistaken? Is the term ‘soul’  merely a poetic way of expressing brain-powered human potential? Are we, when all is said and done, merely brain/body? Is materialism the proper creed?

Christianity long ago turned from its Hebrew roots, which are less ‘dualist’, to embrace the categories of Greek philosophy. For many ancient Greeks, not only were body and soul distinct, the body was a ‘prison house’ of the soul. Much of Christian thought has been built on these views. Most Christians nowadays take the duality of body and soul for granted.

Insofar as Christians (not to mention Muslims and intellectuals shaped by post-Christian Western philosophy) continue to embrace body/soul dualism, contemporary neuroscience will prove increasingly problematic. Many sacrosanct views of human life—that we have souls and free wills (in some quasi-divine fashion), that our identities are ours to make—will prove increasingly less likely. One by one, concepts of identity will be related to brain states and functions.

Does this mean that Christianity and Western philosophy are mooted and irrelevant? Surely not, but it does mean that they need thorough recasting in light of contemporary findings in neuroscience. Philosophers such as Richard Rorty, Daniel Dennett, and Steven Pinker have contributed substantially to this project; each, be it noted, is an articulate atheist. Theologian Nancey Murphy also is a contributor to this project. Murphy uses the phrase nonreductive physicalism to indicate that she rejects dualism but also rejects materialistic reductionism. She holds that we human beings are strictly physical, but that God meets us in and through our physical beings. Freedom is real, not illusory, she argues.

Whatever one makes of the differences of Murphy, Rorty, Bennet, and Pinker, together their work is beginning to revise time-honored constructs of body, self, soul, and identity. That’s a good thing to do, and we should try to join it, or follow along. We should do so, arguably, with the aid of the limbic system.

Christians Fleeing Iraq

Since 2003, Christians, Jews, Mandean Sabeans, and Yazidis have been forced to flee Iraq. Muslims also, of course, have suffered terribly. Though some strides in the direction of security have been made, the country has not yet established a reliable, clearly sustainable peace.

Whether a truly peaceful pluralism will ever exist in Iraq remains to be seen. Those who live in liberal societies may have learned to take religious freedom and pluralism for granted, but that is a significant mistake. On the whole, history shows that human beings are bigoted and fearful, prone to demand adherence to a single mythos or at least that the political structure rest upon and defend a single worldview.

Liberalism suggests (not quite consistently) that worldview and 'really basic needs' can be separated, as if really basic needs can be fully known apart from worldview. Liberalism proposes that so long as we agree to limit politics to really basic needs (e.g., physical security, and the like), we can allow it to possess the magistrate's power. So long as religionists do not seek to seize power, we can tolerate a plural multitude of believers.

This sort of liberalism is a creature of Christianity and is most coherent when the 'plural throngs' are various kinds of Christians, with a few unbelievers and even fewer 'pagans' on the periphery.

What to do when the plural throng entails struggle between two dominant factions of Muslims, neither one of which (on the whole) really wants to embrace the liberal notion of religion/politics, even though their US-influenced Constitution requires them to do so? What to do when Christians, Jews, Mandean Sabeans, and Yazidis are under the threat of death merely because of their religion? What to do when the liberal solution is intermixed in the Constitution with illiberal notions?

Article 2 of the Iraqi Constitution synthesizes a liberal and Islam-based concept of state:

Article 2: First: Islam is the official religion of the State and is a foundation source of legislation:

A. No law may be enacted that contradicts the established provisions of Islam

B. No law may be enacted that contradicts the principles of democracy.

C. No law may be enacted that contradicts the rights and basic freedoms stipulated in this Constitution.

Second: This Constitution guarantees the Islamic identity of the majority of the Iraqi people and guarantees the full religious rights to freedom of religious belief and practice of all individuals such as Christians, Yazidis, and Mandean Sabeans.

Article 3 addresses the issue of pluralism directly:

Article 3: Iraq is a country of multiple nationalities, religions, and sects. It is a founding and active member in the Arab League and is committed to its charter, and it is part of the Islamic world.

Article 43 guarantees religious freedom:

Article 43: First: The followers of all religions and sects are free in the:
A- Practice of religious rites, including the Husseini [i.e., Shiite] rituals.

B- Management of religious endowments (waqf), their affairs, and their religious institutions, and this shall be regulated by law.

Second: The State shall guarantee freedom of worship and the protection of places of worship.

What to do when these guarantees are not working? If history is guide, we can expect religious persecution in Iraq to be vexing for many years into the future. Thus, we will need to mix patience and impatience, support Iraqi sovereignty, and simultaneously pressure Iraqis to realize ideals entailed in their Constitution. Would that we consistently realized ideals set forth in our own.

Christians in Iraq

Join me later this week for a reflection on Christians and Christianity in Iraq.

Wikileaks, Al Qaeda, and UltraProtestantism

We have become very accustomed to worrying about Al Qaeda. Al Qaeda is especially menacing because it's a non-state actor. If it commissions a strike, the enemy against which to direct a counter-strike is hidden, like a virus, among non-combatants.

Wikileaks shows that a non-state actor need not be a 'Muslim' terrorist. In this case, Julian Assange has created a global scourge. The upshot may turn out to be as ruinous and menacing as anything Al Qaeda has done.

The most recent news in this growing story is that a wave a counterattacks is being directed against ISPs that have denied service to those who make the Wikileaks available. An 'army' of hackers is being formed (apparently now at least 30,000 strong) to punish the service providers, and they also are taking aim at the global commercial establishment, seeking to collapse key parts of the Internet in the holiday shopping season.

This is very troubling news indeed, and it shows how powerful non-state actors can be, especially when they join in anonymous ad hoc global alliances. Each member of this group is a sheer individual (an ultraprotestant) and simultaneously a member of a collective of unimaginable strength. The 'group' is protean, and there is nothing to limit the causes it may pursue. Centralized authorities (governments, armies, corporations) are more powerful than any individual, but may also prove to be more vulnerable than all of the individuals combined.

The weapons of the First and Second World War, and also the Cold War, are increasingly irrelevant, and the enemies of our time will be shape shifters. How to provide the deepest account of this? Undoubtedly we will be seeking to answer that question far into the future. The proposal of RITN is that a religious analysis is essential part of understanding such dynamics.