My last post was a while ago but much has happened since then. On the surface me and my wife have moved out of our apartment and into a house. We are still renting but we are finally away from the pack'um and stack'um environment. I didn't realize how quite it is at night in our new house without other people on the other side of the wall. The next ventures are to get our house set up, finish the school semester, and figure out what to do about summer school. Even though I have not been writing, my mind has been busy.
We have covered much in Philosophy including Augustine's good vs evil, Descartes' "I think therefore I am", Hume's craziness, Kant's Transcendental Deduction, and recently Hegel and his infamous dialectic.
I definitely do not subscribe to Hegel's worldview. This ever changing "Devine Mind" producing new ideas for humans to discover seems to be a distorted view. How can God change? Time cannot change Him so how can this "IDEA-lism" change Him. How can two diametrically opposed ideas compromise? You would have to change each idea so much that they would no longer be what they were before. It would be a brand new idea if you took what you thought was best from these opposite ideas and combined them.
Take western capitalism and eastern communism for instance. They are pretty much opposites. Under the synthesizing power of the dialectic you get this socialism that is emerging. There was some tension between capitalism and communism and it was called the Cold War. That tension "collapsed" and it seemed that capitalism won the battle. In reality a socialism is taking its place. If you look at socialism it is not capitalism or communism. It is a new idea that was made from some of the ideas of capitalism and communism. True capitalism is opposed to socialism too. New ideas emerge from older ideas but it does not necessarily mean all opposing ideas will collapse and synthesize.
Generally better ideas prevail against worse ones and some ideas can be and need adjustment as time moves on in the light of new data. I don't think that is what Hegel is talking about. I think he has a worldview with some kind of over arching change of ideas that a God like being is constantly creating and molding as time goes on. What is the need for truth if it changes all the time? It wouldn't be truth because is constantly changes. It is a shame that Hegel's ideas have such a strong influence on modern society. Just look around and see what kind of crop has been harvested from this man's work. I think you will be surprised at what you see.
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I recently read "The Seven Men Who Rule the World From the Grave." In the section on Karl Marx, he discussed how Communism and Christianity were attempted to be "united" by Pope John XIII in 1963, under the new term Liberation Theology. The Pope was attempting to unify the two opposites by infering that Jesus came to liberate the economically opressed (the proletariat) from the reigns of the bourgeoisie. This teaching implied that money was evil, and not the love of it. The author (who was actually at the conference taught by the pope) remembered thinking to himself, "How fascinating. And how incredibly stupid."
But to those who were reading his book, and scoffed at the notion that two such opposed views could somehow merge, he mentioned how there are some key denominations in the western church who teach that it is a sin to have too much money; that it is a sin to have too nice a car; that having expensive things is wicked because it deprives the poor from aid. (Apparently my parents have been to a church like that.)
The author's point was two fold. The first was that this Liberation Theology was neither Communist, for communism is atheistic, nor Christian, due to Jesus' remarks to Judas regarding the woman with the expensive perfume and his comments about the poor always being present in the world. This Liberation Theology was a new concept completely. It was a religious socialism. This is why I mention this, because your comments reminded me of this chapter. His other point was simply to demonstrate how the weeds and thorns of Marx have infultrated the gardens of the western church, unbeknownst to the niave branches of the Bride.
Cool post. I've missed you.
Thanks Jason for the comment. Sounds to me like this "Liberation Theology" only "liberates" from truth.
Good to hear from you. Ive missed you too.
Oh you two are just narrow-minded, bigoted, right wing, christian fundametalist, warmongering, hate filled, steak eating, earth hating, ozone penetrating, carbon creating, fascist, homophobes. LOL :D (this is Anthony)
How do you like my name? I'm hip. I didn't know you had a blog Troy. Sounds like fun.
Never heard of the "Devine Mind" before. Sounds like it's retarded. :P
I had a book in my library once that talked about these things, and the debates concerning them in ancient greece. I'm going to have took look for it again. It talked about evoloutionary theory vs creationism and what ever the name is where people try to mix the two together. It also talked about the concept you called the devine mind. I'll butcher it tryng to explain it now, but I will see if I can share it with you guys later. Anyway, I'm rambling.
The devine mind sounds to me like it is an attempt to neutralize religion. Pacify its followers by aknowledging a possible existence of God and then suck them into the fold through concensus. My english teacher does this. That, however, is another story. Cheers!
Oops! Looks like I wasn't clear on a concept. Hegel didn't say that God changed. He said the world changes as history rolled out and humans started exercising freedom of coice. Hegel was a believer, and if his ideas didn't have some validity, we would all still be "East of Eden".
The Ancient Greeks couldn't have talked about Liberation Theology because they lived almost 1,000 years before Christianity was finally established as a solid religion.
I would need a cite on that Pope John XXIII Liberation Theology quote. Pope John was a great man who cared about all people.
Liberation Theology is a movement, especially centered in Central America, that asks the rich to follow Christ's commandment to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, shelter the homeless. That seems right to me.
I know of no branch of legitimate Christianity that has a doctrine that being too rich is a bad thing.
On the contrary, in mainstream Protestantism based on John Calvin's theology, if you have a great deal of material property and money, that is a sign that God looks upon you with favor.
Let's see. Communism. I think--just my personal opinion--that Communism is not a bad thing for some groups, such as small tribal cultures that are trying to move into economic status out of starvation. However, there is a wonderful program called "The Heifer Project" which helps these folks make their way from virtual starvation to economic "success". People buy animals for a community somewhere in the world that is not making it. For example, I might buy a flock of chicks for a village. The people would then raise the chicks which would provide them with eggs (protein). As the flock grows, they will have enough eggs to sell a few (cash or barter) and get necessary "stuff". In addition as the flock grows, they can sell chickens (see cash above) and they can slaughter and eat them (more protein).
That, it seems to me, is true Christianity. The Summary of the Law is: First, love God with all your heart and mind and soul; and love your neighbor as yourself. The people in this world who are starving or being slaughtered or ethnicalloy cleansed are our neighbors!
If you look at the essential Marxist statement: "From each according to his ability; to each according to his need", we get a statement that is Christian at its essence, no matter what religious or areligious economic position Marx took. So in that respect (and only that respect) Marx is not all bad!
It is certainly true that Jesus said "the poor we will always have among us", but COMPASSION was his primary message. I think--again, my personal belief--that God looks at ethinic cleansing, intentional starvastion, brutal invasions of other people's lives with the murder, rape and pillaging that accompanies them, along with all the other things we humans are allowing to take place around the world, and He weeps.
Good job on the blog, Troy! PRW
One more point! (I ALWAYS have one more point.) This is just to clarify Marx's essential statement a bit. Marx never said all things should be distributed EQUALLY--just everyone should contribute to the society to the greatest extent that they are able, and those who cannot contribute and are most needy (like starving, homeless, no medical care, but still working)should have some help. Now I think I'm done with that.
Oh, dear, I lied! One more point! Absolute Mind and Divine Mind are what Hegel called God. He did that because his philosophy was Idealism, that is all reality consists in ideas. Therefore, he called his philosophy Absolute Idealism--note Absolute; i.e., unchanging. Except that Hegel showed that we are all becoming something and the world that Divine Mind gave us is becoming something because humans have free choice. And, free choice in my view, is a BURDEN not a PRIVILEGE. God punished Adam and Eve for disobeying Him and taking the knowledge of good and evil (choice) from Him by sending them out of the Garden of Eden. After that humans are no longer totally protected by God as they go through life. They have to consider all the pros and cons of the situation, and then CHOOSE. According to both Hegel and Kant, as well as many other philosophers, we are obliged to make the choice that is for the good. Okay, I'm done. I promise (maybe). No, really. I'm done (at least until somebody responds to me!)
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