History of Christianity

The history of Judaism begins very near the beginning of recorded history itself, in the period of the earliest states, when culture was dominated by superstition, and religion was made into a justification for state power. In the fact that their culture and religion gave justification for the power of their rulers, the Jews were not different from other ancient peoples, such as the Babylonians and Hittites.

Judaism was unique in giving great emphasis to a written text, the Torah, which contained the core of the people’s laws. It anticipated “social contract” theories by making the laws come from an ancient covenant between the people and God. By giving such divine approval to the laws in the exact written form they were (allegedly) first given, Judaism created a lively interpretive tradition to preserve the meaning of the texts, leading to Pharisaism and eventually to the Talmud.

It is in the context of Pharisaism that Christianity was born. Christ gave new interpretations to the old laws, bringing them more in accordance with reason, though the superstition of the elders would not long endure this. He helped his movement spread by means of apocalyptic fervor: since the Kingdom of Heaven is coming soon, when all earthly kingdoms shall pass away and all men will be judged according to their deeds, special attention to one’s conduct seems to be called for. So it was that Christianity spread widely, but not far beyond the Jews at first.

Paul, the Apostle to the Gentiles, changed this by spreading the Christian revelation very far into the Gentile peoples. He accomplished this by having such faith in Christ’s reinterpretation of the law that he emphasized that keeping the old, peculiarly Jewish law would not matter to salvation when the Kingdom came. Since the apocalyptic message was maintained, the Gospel maintained its speedy spread, ultimately penetrating into all the peoples of the Empire.

With the Pharisees spurned as an interpretive tradition, Christianity was able to bring the law even further into accordance with reason by means of philosophy, which, by then, had already developed to a great extent. Fathers such as Augustine and Ambrose were able to read the Scriptures in light of advanced philosophical concepts which they had garnered from Plato and from the Stoics.

They were aided in doing this by support from the Roman Church, which was established as the keeper of the peculiarly Christian tradition. Since the philosophical theologians were not condemned by Rome, they could be assumed, even by the more superstitious faithful, to have brought no perversions into the divine law. The Church allowed the Christian revelation to be brought to as great a level of enlightenment as the sensibilities of the time could bear.

The Church, as an organization, was then for centuries a great aid to philosophy, because it existed independently of earthly kingdoms, and could support, with its own means, the development of doctrines which criticized the exercise of power by states. It also made people more concerned with obeying their bishops than their kings, which gave its doctrine great weight. The apocalyptic message was also attenuated by this further philosophical development, with the Kingdom of Heaven now being largely known to be clearly outside history, although this rational interpretation was not dogmatized.

After these centuries of light, however, the superstitious element flared up again. With the publication of original ancient texts of the Old and New Testaments, some persons thought themselves able to discover the true meaning of the laws with the aid, not of reason, but of history. They thought they could discover what the law meant when it was given by the Apostles, and they gave this original meaning greater credence than either philosophy or Church Tradition. So it was that Luther operated, and he enlisted the aid of kings, who were fed up with the Church’s criticism of their abuses of power, and were eager to support someone who might curb it. Soon he had many followers – and also, due to his abandonment of a ground of unity, many splintered sects.

Luther’s hermeneutical dogmatism, as might be contrasted with the hermeneutical scepticism of the enlightened Catholic centuries, was then a support, not only for extreme heights of statism – as may be seen, for instance, in Luther’s text on peasant mobs – but also for ghastly heights of generalized superstition, as may be seen in the various Calvinist attempts at theocracy. Apocalypticism, too, was sporadically reborn in its full extremity, leading to earnest predictions that “the end is near” every few decades or so.

For a time, the Catholics were embarrassed by the superstitious zeal of the Protestants, leading to a warm renewal of superstition within their own fold. It was in this context that the Church, which had allowed wildly broad speculations in the time of the Scholastics, was at length able to condemn Galileo for his hasty support of geocentrism. Hermeneutical dogmatism was able to have some effect upon Catholic theology and practice, but always tempered by philosophy, which the Church never abandoned.

Within Catholicism, at least, there may still be hope for a full return of reason to religion, and new centuries of enlightened philosophical theologians. Protestantism, on the other hand, depends for its very existence upon the dogmatist superstition, since if history cannot determine the meaning of the texts, then they ought to either accept a living authority or abandon them. Protestantism must remain superstitious until it either dies, collapsing into irreligion, or is reabsorbed into the Catholic fold.

History of thought

The history of thought might be explained in light of the two opposite habits of mind, superstition and enthusiasm, which are the twin enemies of true religion and true philosophy.

To recap, enthusiasm is characterized by an attribution of nature to art, and is most naturally found in proletarian ideology, which is created to support the proletariat’s hopes of cataclysmic revolution. Superstition, on the other hand, is characterized by an attribution of art to nature, and is most naturally found in aristocratic ideology, which is created to support the aristocracy’s maintenance in power. True religion and philosophy, which attribute to each thing its true character, are synonymous with bourgeois ideology, which supports neither revolution nor ossification, but the natural progress of society.

Besides integrating the theory of these habits into class theory, I also use these names for the corresponding habits of mind in regard to economic policy – where enthusiasm will support forcible equality of means, and superstition will support the forcible consolidation of classes – and social habits, especially regarding family and sex – where enthusiasm will support the extreme weakening of the family, likely by means of communal childrearing, and superstition will support its extreme strengthening, with great benefits accruing to membership in certain extended families. Since these names are uncommon in these fields, they have the advantage of not being confused for an a posteriori generalization from the opinions of actually-existent proletarian and aristocratic classes, although I should certainly try to account for any divergences in that regard.

With this theory laid down, we may notice that, since the earliest period of recorded history corresponds to the rise of the first states, it necessarily corresponds to the predominance of superstition. Aristocratic ideology dominates the ancient record, where religion is perverted into a support for the ruler – who is called either divine or divinely favored – and economic and social policy accordingly concur for the preservation of the power of noble families.

This happened at least until the rise of the first democratic states, in ancient Athens. This was a form of government which dominated by enthusiastic tendencies – however limited the franchise was at the time – and remarkably slow to suppress dissent. As a result, the first rise of true religion and true philosophy happened in Athens, largely in opposition to the prevailing enthusiasm of the times, and as a result, leaning (insofar as it erred) in favor of supporting superstition, as may be seen by the aristocratic structure of Plato’s Republic. Still, philosophy was not so perverted as to entirely favor superstition, and Plato’s Republic would be the least oppressive of aristocracies if made actual.

Ever since its creation, philosophy would maintain its middle position, opposing the excesses of enthusiasm on the one hand and superstition on the other; as indicated, it focused on opposing superstition in aristocratic states, and mostly enthusiasm in democratic states. Rome’s mixed constitution gave it reason, at different times, to oppose both.

In the French Revolution, philosophy allied so successfully with popular enthusiasm as to entirely overturn aristocratic superstition, leading to the general proliferation of democratic government. This proliferation, in turn, has made it useful for certain elites to cater to popular enthusiasm, partly overturning the old class allegiances. It became the fashion for violent power to justify itself through its supposed great help in restraining economic inequality. Since the Cold War, therefore, philosophy has had the most occasion to lean towards superstition, allying with the conservatives against the enthusiastic excesses of the socialists.

But the tide may change soon.

Empirical postulates of sexual morality

In the post on sexual morality, I covered only those parts of sexual morality that are necessarily true. Those propositions follow necessarily from my concepts of the human being as a rational animal that reproduces sexually, and of his sexual powers as oriented toward this reproduction; therefore, they must always remain true as long as those concepts still apply to human beings.

However, it is difficult to apply those propositions in conduct without a more detailed understanding of particular cases. It happens that the way in which I would tend to generate such an understanding is liable to the formulation of some general empirical postulates, which I believe apply for the most part, and in most cases, although not necessarily and in every case, since they constitute my generalized analysis of contingent empirical conditions, and do not follow from the anthropological concepts. To communicate my thinking as clearly as possible, therefore, I have written down these postulates.

Postulate 1 — Monogamy is, for the most part, helpful to the end of marriage, and ought to be encouraged within it.

When multiple men have sex with the same woman, it can be hard to determine the father of each child she has, which is relevant to the custody obligations involved – although this is less of a problem now that we have DNA tests. Besides this peculiarity, I believe that it is also generally difficult to efficiently arrange for the care of children when the same person is involved in multiple marriages.

Postulate 2 — Antiphysical acts are, for the most part, justified, so that a preference for them is usually virtuous.

I believe that the exceptional conditions which I said could justify antiphysical sexual acts in fact hold for most cases wherein they are performed. Insofar as this condition holds, homosexual tendencies should be considered virtuous, since they tend toward relationships of pure friendship, without debasement of the rational faculty by submission to the reproductive impulses.

Postulate 3 — Entelechic acts are, generally, not helpful to the end of marriage when done under a certain age, and ought to be discouraged in such cases.

Since teenage pregnancies are associated with negative consequences for the mother’s health and the child’s development, they produce difficulties for the end of marriage, which is childrearing; so, they cannot be rationally preferred to reproduction at a later age. Additionally, since people generally seek to establish their career and professional education during their youth, young parenthood is likely to interfere with a couple’s ability to materially provide for their child; the child’s spiritual welfare is also likely to suffer from being raised by immature parents. For these reasons, reproduction is best delayed until these issues no longer endanger the goal of childrearing, which tends to happen around age 20.

Postulate 4 — Antiphysical acts are usually not justified when done within any kind of subordinate relationship, including all relationships with a significant age disparity.

Sexual acts performed within a friendship, in the sense defined, are performed by persons who hold all things in common, including each other’s bodies. This community benefits from, and adds to, the intensity of sexual excitement; and this fact seems to be the foundation for the fact that antiphysical sexual acts may contribute to a friendship, so that they are justified within it. Within unequal relationships, it seems in turn that, similarly, their inequality is reinforced by the act; this hinders the relationship’s attaining to equality, which is the goal of all unequal autotelic relationships. Since the act is contrary to the end of the relationship in this case, it is irrational to perform, and therefore immoral.