The Dialectics of the Religious and the Secular: Studies on the Future of Religion (Studies in Critical Social Sciences) 9789004263130, 9789004263147, 9004263136, 2014013632

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The Dialectics of the Religious and the Secular

Studies in Critical Social Sciences Series Editor David Fasenfest Wayne State University Editorial Board Chris Chase-Dunn (University of California-Riverside) G. William Domhoff (University of California-Santa Cruz) Colette Fagan (Manchester University) Matha Gimenez (University of Colorado, Boulder) Heidi Gottfried (Wayne State University) Karin Gottschall (University of Bremen) Bob Jessop (Lancaster University) Rhonda Levine (Colgate University) Jacqueline O’Reilly (University of Brighton) Mary Romero (Arizona State University) Chizuko Ueno (University of Tokyo)

VOLUME 67

The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/scss

The Dialectics of the Religious and the Secular Studies on the Future of Religion Edited by

Michael R. Ott

LEIDEN | BOSTON

Cover illustration: Kämpfende Formen [Fighting Forms], painted in 1914 by the German Expressionist artist, Franz Marc. Neue Pinakothek, Munich. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data The dialectics of the religious and the secular : studies on the future of religion / edited by Michael R. Ott.   pages cm. -- (Studies in critical social sciences, ISSN 1573-4234 ; volume 67)  Includes bibliographical references and index.  ISBN 978-90-04-26313-0 (hardback : alk. paper) -- ISBN 978-90-04-26314-7 (e-book) 1. Religion--Philosophy. 2. Religions--Relations. 3. Religion and civilization. I. Ott, Michael R., editor of compilation.  BL51.D46 2014  306.6--dc23               2014013632

This publication has been typeset in the multilingual “Brill” typeface. With over 5,100 characters covering Latin, ipa, Greek, and Cyrillic, this typeface is especially suitable for use in the humanities. For more information, please see www.brill.com/brill-typeface. ISSN 1573-4234 isbn 978-90-04-26313-0 (hardback) isbn 978-90-04-26314-7 (e-book) Copyright 2014 by Koninklijke Brill nv, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill nv incorporates the imprints Brill, Brill Nijhoff, Global Oriental and Hotei Publishing. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Koninklijke Brill nv provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, ma 01923, usa. Fees are subject to change. This book is printed on acid-free paper.

This book is dedicated to the memory of A. James Reimer (August 10, 1942 – August 28, 2010), who was a Canadian Mennonite theologian and Professor of Religious Studies and Christian Theology at Conrad Grebel University College and at the Toronto School of Theology. Jim was a long time participant in the Future of Religion course at the Inter-University Centre in Dubrovnik, Croatia.

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Contents Foreword – The Siebert Manifesto of the Critical Theory: An Appreciation ix Denis R. Janz Acknowledgements xv List of Contributors xvi Introduction 1 Michael R. Ott 1 The Future of Religion: Toward the City of Being 11 Rudolf J. Siebert 2 The Migration of Religious Longing for the “Other” into the Historical Materialist Critical Theory of Utopia in the Thought of Theodor W. Adorno and Ernst Bloch 38 Michael R. Ott 3 Bilderverbot and Utopia: God without Image – Other World Unannounced 69 Dustin Byrd 4 Theo-Utopian Hearing: Ernst Bloch on Music 100 Roland Boer 5 What is the Meaning of “Culture”? Some Comments and Perspectives 134 Gottfried Küenzlen 6 Towards a Global Ethos? Notes on the Philosophy of Encounter 149 Jan Fennema 7 On the Origin of Religious Discourse 157 Francis Brassard 8 The Future of Faith, the Subaltern Scientia: Lonergan and Aquinas 173 Donald Devon III

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9 Religion in the Trap of Globalization 184 Mislav Kukoč 10 Bahá’í Religion as a New Religious Movement? 194 Branko Ančić 11 Religious Freedom in Contemporary Croatian Society (From 1997 to 2008) 207 Neven Duvnjak and Ivica Sokol 12 Religiosity and Attitudes Towards Sexuality and Marriage in Croatia 220 Dinka Marinović Jerolimov 13 Politicization of the Religious Environment in Ukraine 230 Aleksandra Baranova Appendix 241 References 243 Index 274

Foreword – The Siebert Manifesto of the Critical Theory1 An Appreciation

Denis R. Janz Long books are not popular these days! Our time is one of blogging, text messaging and twittering. What “well-adjusted” person today could possibly find time for Marcel Proust’s seven-volume novel A la recherche du temps perdu (In Search of Lost Time)? Or Leo Tolstoy’s 1100 page War and Peace? Or Karl Barth’s fourteen-volume Church Dogmatics? “Winners” and “success stories” budget their time, and multi-task, and demand “executive summaries,” all in order to speed up their already frantic (and frenetic?) lifestyles. Rudolf Siebert’s attitude to all this seems to be one of good-natured disdain. And so, with no apologies, approaching the end of a long and distinguished career, he gives us this capstone: three volumes, one thousand eight hundred and forty-three pages, many thousands of references, and a two thousand six hundred-item bibliography! As a writer of short books, really small booklets in comparison, I was intimidated even before I started to read! So too, “manifestos” are hopelessly out of fashion. Marx and Engels issued theirs in 1848. For the next century futurists, anarchists, surrealists, humanists, and enthusiasts for almost every cause issued one. By today though, it’s mainly evangelicals and cranks and terrorists issuing manifestos, while post-modern thinkers declare them obsolete. Again, Rudi Siebert is undeterred: his manifesto is a clear public declaration of principles on which he has built his entire intellectual career – defended and elaborated with enormous subtlety and sophistication. Fearlessly he breathes new life into this literaryphilosophical-political genre, which many consider a relic of the past. So if it’s the trendy you’re looking for, look elsewhere. Nor is Siebert’s thought easy to summarize, reducible, say, to a major thesis or two that will fit on a bumper sticker. Rather it is rich and multi-dimensional, in a certain sense encyclopedic in scope. It is thoroughly systematic: the multitude of ideas are carefully arranged, logically consistent with one another, and governed or controlled by certain dominant themes. It oscillates constantly between the highly abstract on one page, and the concrete particular on the next. In a word, Siebert’s writing inevitably rewards the patient, careful reader. It puts us in touch with a first-class mind, one that has thought long and hard about things that matter. 1 Rudolf Siebert. 2010.

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A good way, perhaps, to introduce the subject matter of this book is to say something about its genesis and growth. Its remote origins are to be found in the Frankfurt School. Stunned by the utter senselessness and naked horror of World War I, this group of like-minded thinkers came together in the war’s aftermath to try to fathom what had happened. With the help of philosophers like Kant, Hegel, Schelling, Schopenhauer, and Nietzsche, they were determined to understand and thus prevent a recurrence. To this end, in 1923 they founded an Institute for Social Research at the Johann Wolfgang von Goethe University in Frankfurt. Their quest for a reconciled and humane future went unfulfilled. What they witnessed instead was the rise of nationalism and fascism, and then another war costing sixty million lives, followed by a Cold War, and finally by the current neo-conservative American empire-building, wars on terror, and so forth. This group, led by thinkers like Theodor Adorno, Walter Benjamin, Max Horkheimer, and Jürgen Habermas, developed its own characteristic analysis of modernity commonly referred to as the “Critical Theory” of the Frankfurt School. The proximate origins of this book can be traced to the 1960s when the trajectories of the Frankfurt School and of Rudolf Siebert’s personal life intersected. Raised as a Roman Catholic in Frankfurt in the inter-war period, Siebert experienced the war years in his teens, growing increasingly critical of National Socialism. After the war, he eventually began to study the writings of Adorno, Horkheimer, and so forth. From that point on he was in constant dialogue with the Frankfurt School, developing his ideas over the next halfcentury in a virtual torrent of lectures, papers, essays, and books. The prime venue and showcase for all this intellectual work was the annual spring symposium on “The Future of Religion,” which has now met at the Inter-University Center in Dubrovnik for thirty-six years. Founded and directed by Siebert, it attracted hundreds of scholars of every conceivable intellectual orientation from every part of the world. Many of them came, yes – to experience spring on the Adriatic Coast, but all of them came, in some measure at least, to meet Siebert in spirited, rigorous, honest, compassionate discourse. Here is where Siebert presented early drafts of all his work; here is where he forged the main contours of his ideas, hammering them into shape on the anvil of international scholarship. The final result is this book. Relatively few readers will, I predict, begin on page one and plow through all three volumes to the end. One could, of course, and those who do will find a certain logic in the sequencing of the chapters and the structure of the argument. On the other hand, readers could just as well sample a chapter here and there, at least as a way of introducing themselves to this massive work.

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One could start, for instance, with the moving essay entitled “The Owl of Minerva,” toward the end of Volume Two. I recommend this for readers who prefer to begin with biography before coming to more abstract analysis. Here, Siebert’s starting point is a dramatic episode from his own life story: as a fifteen year old student, in 1942 in Frankfurt, he did his best to help an old Jewish woman marked by the SS for transport to the work or death camps of Eastern Europe. This account, far from being a self-serving claim to heroism, leads directly to a penetrating meditation on tragedy and the profound ambiguity of all human moral action. It leads to an inquiry into how humanistic learning humanizes. Above all it leads to a passionate probing into the meaning of the Holocaust, and with Elie Wiesel, Siebert pleas for a “refusal to forget.” On the other hand, one could also begin with “The Jewish-German Tragedy,” the opening essay in Volume Three. Here again Siebert’s starting point is his own very personal and direct experience, interpreted with the help of Hegel, Horkheimer, Adorno, and so forth. Hegel, he explains, defined madness as the total alienation of the individual from the species, i.e. from humanity. All forms of ethno-nationalism are similar: nations alienate themselves from other nations, from international organizations, and in the end, from humanity. Thus German Fascism in the first half of the twentieth century, and Zionism in the second half of the twentieth century, while they are dialectically related, have this much in common. In Siebert’s view, they both allowed state sovereignty to triumph over human solidarity. However readers find their way into this book, it would be a serious mistake to skip over “New York: The Capital of Liberalism,” a lengthy essay in Volume Two. In the course of researching his wife’s family history involving two 19th century German immigrant families in New York, Siebert uncovered a fascinating story. He tells it here in rich detail, with abundant background and documentation. Both families yielded to the lure of New York City – liberalism’s golden promise of an individualism leading inevitably to freedom, wealth, happiness and progress. Shortly after they arrived, both families met bitter disillusionment and a series of heart-wrenching tragedies, culminating in the fate of Charlotte Krauss, wife of Ludwig Krauss and mother of four children. She was incarcerated for the last eighteen years of her life in New York City’s Asylum for the Insane on Blackwell Island, and the Krauss children were put in orphanages. For Siebert, this historical account is not merely a sad tale. Rather it exemplifies for him the truth about liberalism, that is, that this ideology has a dark underside: implicit in it is the constant and heartless separation of humanity into winners and losers. Thus this essay is about the losers, liberalism’s tragic victims. And New York City, so often portrayed as the capital of progress and

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wealth and freedom, is here shown also to be the capital of the hopeless – the poor, the sick, the insane, the criminal, the misfit, and so forth, on Blackwell Island, Hart Island, Ricker’s Island, etc. For those who love New York, for those who hate New York, for those whose interests are historical or political or philosophical or theological, this essay is a “must read.” Wherever readers begin in this book, they will not go far before meeting up with a number of recurring themes, ideas with are obviously pivotal in Siebert’s thought. The first of these I’d like to mention is what could be described as his forward trajectory. He never allows us to forget that his entire intellectual project is for the sake of the future: various aspects of the past are studied in depth, and current developments are analyzed with great rigor, but both are done explicitly to shape what lies ahead. Following the lead of the Frankfurt School, Siebert thinks that all possible scenarios for humanity’s future can be reduced to three basic ones. “Alternative Future I” is the totally administered society, the final denial of human freedom and dignity, exemplified in modernity by fascism and Stalinism. A second possibility, “Alternative Future II,” is the entirely militarized society. This is a world characterized by antagonism and hatred, a world governed by the law of the jungle, in which conventional wars, regional wars, civil wars, wars on terror, and so forth, finally lead to World War III. “Alternative Future III” is the ultimately reconciled society, a world in which all idolatries (including the idolatry of capital) are overcome, in which human autonomy and solidarity are balanced, in which human relationships are decent, friendly, helpful, and cooperative. Siebert’s work aims to sensitize readers to the danger signs that we are sliding downward into Alternative Futures I or II. Deep as our fear and pessimism must be when we recognize these signs, Siebert comes down, in the final analysis, on the side of the prophets and the visionaries and the dreamers, against the cold cynicism of the positivists: the hope against hope that there will be rescue for the hopeless. A second recurring theme in this book is the danger of nationalism. Coming out of the German experience of National Socialism, Siebert is acutely sensitive to this. Hitler’s Germany is the supreme example of nationalism in its extreme form. But even in its milder forms, it masks an ideology of intrinsic inequality, a division of the species into winners and losers, and finally into predators and prey. It is a collective egoism, on the one hand, and a form of alienation on the other. In the later sense, it separates nations from the community of nations, from international organizations, and from humanity itself. Nationalisms as such are forms of collective insanity, whether severe or mild. Never, Siebert avows, has he encountered what could be called a “healthy” nationalism.

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The peril of nationalism becomes especially acute when it is religiously based and legitimated. Ethno-nationalisms in particular tend to ally themselves with religions: e.g. Russian with the Orthodox Church, Chechnian with Islam, Polish with Roman Catholicism, Serbian with Orthodoxy, Croatian with Roman Catholicism, Bosnian with Islam, Israeli with Judaism, Palestinian with Islam, and so forth. Often such alliances are nothing more than the fraudulent instrumentalizing of one of the positive religions. Sometimes a nationalism attaches itself to a religion in its fundamentalist form. However and whenever this happens, religions lose their humanizing and prophetic function; they become idolatrous, and the form of nationalism they legitimize tends to become ever more extreme – finally fanatical, hysterical, and massively destructive. In short, Siebert understands nationalism as being one of the main pathologies of modernity. A third recurring theme, and the last one I will mention here, is the problem of evil. There is no essay in these three volumes, which leaves this issue untouched. And on no issue, I dare say, does Siebert express himself more personally and passionately. Here more than anywhere else, the autobiographical merges with the philosophical, historical, and theological to form a seamless whole. In Siebert’s view, it is the experience of modernity which forces the theodicy question on us most urgently. World War I, fascism, World War II, the Holocaust, the Cold War, and so forth – these experiences place a giant question mark over all existing theodicies, whether religious or philosophical. Thus, Horkheimer and Adorno left traditional Judaism behind: how, they asked, could one any longer affirm a God of Israel who is just and merciful and all-powerful? Siebert agrees. Rehearsing all theodicy solutions, religious and philosophical, he finds them all inadequate: in the name of the innocent victims, all facile answers must be rejected. And yet, Siebert does not stop there. Faced with the massive suffering of the innocent victims, many humans long for a day when justice will triumph. That yearning in itself, he thinks, is close to the heart of what religion really is. Can any meaning at all be rescued for the apparently meaningless suffering of the innocent victims? Fragments perhaps, Siebert thinks, but only if “religious” people refuse to forget: by standing in anamnestic solidarity with history’s innocent victims, they help to forge a future where there will be no innocent victims – Alternative Future III. In this sense, the suffering of the innocent victims will not have been for nothing. That is Siebert’s starting point when it comes to reflection on the theodicy question. But it is only his starting point: in no way does this do justice to the full scope of what he has to say on the subject. Indeed, there is a certain sense in which all his thinking in the end comes back to this. And I know of no thinker in the

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twentieth or twenty-first century who has dealt with it more courageously, more honestly, and more profoundly. Rarely does one find so successful a synthesis between anguished empathy and critical rationality! Chapter 28, entitled “Trust in the Eternal One,” rounds out the Siebert Manifesto. Here Siebert explicitly situates his intellectual project as a whole, which he calls his “dialectical religiology,” in relation to the Critical Theory. The Frankfurt School was of course not self-consciously “religious” in its orientation. And yet, Siebert argues, Horkheimer and Adorno were neither theists nor atheists, but “post-theists” who hoped for “the totally Other beyond the slaughter bench of nature and history,” without being able to give this a name: Up to their death, Horkheimer and Adorno were longing for and trusted and had confidence in the imageless and nameless wholly Other, the Eternal One, as well as in Freedom and Immortality…. The dialectical religiology is the heir of the theological and metaphysical trust in the Eternal One and yearning for the entirely Other intrinsic in the critical theory of society from its beginning as response to the unending theodicy experiences of individuals and nations. III: 1442–1443

What finally does it mean, to “trust in the Eternal One”? It means not to give in to the current reality in all its horror, “not to be enslaved to what is the case.” It means “to transcend this in longing and hope for Alternative Future III – the reconciled and free society.” It means to yearn “for the entirely Other than nature and history.” Such a trust, Siebert thinks, is the only real antidote to despair and cynicism and passivity, the only way to avert the impending catastrophe. And with all the great prophetic voices of the Western religious traditions, he affirms that such a trust will not be disappointed.

Acknowledgements First, I want to thank all of the authors of this volume for their excellent contributions that have made this work a reality. I also want to thank all of the participants in the Future of Religion Course over the past 36 years, who, through their commitment to the critical study of religion in modernity and their participation in the yearly discourses on the various topics, have set a standard and expectation of excellence for all of the studies presented. The chapters contained in this book have benefited from everyone’s critical and collegial contribution. I also thank the Inter-University Centre in Dubrovnik, Croatia for providing the place, structure and academic setting where such high-level, international, academic research and discourse on extremely important contemporary issues can take place. This too is reflected in the contributions to this volume. I also think I speak on behalf of all the authors of this volume in saying a very special “Thank You” to the Future of Religion course Founder and Director for the past 36, Rudolf J. Siebert, for his commitment to the excellence of this Course as well as to the theoretical and concrete, socio-historical struggle for the creation of a more reconciled and shalom-filled future society. I thank my wife, Mary Louise, for her love, devotion and support for my work on this book as well as for my continuing work in advancing the critical theory of society and religion. I also thank her for her diligent editing of the entire manuscript of this book to prepare it for publication. Finally, I thank Brill and the Studies in Critical Social Sciences editor, David Fasenfest for their excellent assistance in bringing this book to publication.

List of Contributors Branko Ančić (b. 1981, Zagreb, Croatia) is a research assistant at Institute for Social Research in Zagreb, Croatia. He is engaged at Postgraduate Doctoral Study of Sociology at University of Zagreb. His dissertation will be on the topic of religion and health connection with the title “Religious Community as Social Resource: Research on Relationship between Religion and Health.” His scientific focus is on religion in the public sphere, social expectations from religion, religiosity and social capital, new religious movements, alternative religiosity, popular and folk religiosity, religion and health connection, non-religiosity, religious education, gender and spirituality. He is also an executive editor of an interdisciplinary journal “Religion and Society in Central and Eastern Europe” (published by International Study of Religion in Eastern and Central Europe Association). Aleksandra Baranova is a Ph.D. student in Contemporary History of the Scuola Normale Superiore (Pisa, Italy). In 2009, she received MA degree in Political Science at Taurida National V.I. Vernadsky University (Simferopol, Ukraine), and started her research work at the Department of Political Science and International Relations of Taurida University. She also spent two semesters at Vilnius University (Lithuania) focusing on international relations and cross-cultural communication. Her research interests include problems of politics and religion, state-confessional and inter-confessional relations, issues of religious identity in Ukraine, Russia, Eastern and South Eastern Europe. At present, she is examining problems of religious freedom in transitional societies in post-Soviet and in ex-Yugoslavian countries. Her current research project is on “The Religious Factor in Political Process in Russia and Serbia: Comparative Study.” Roland Boer is an Australian of Dutch extraction, born a little over half a century ago (1961). His degrees are in classics (BA 1981), theology (BTh 1988), philosophical theology (MTh 1990) and biblical criticism (Ph.D. 1993). He is now a research professor at the University of Newcastle, Australia, and has focused recent energy on the relations between religion and Marxism. His most recent publications include Criticism of Earth: On Marx, Engels and Theology (Brill: 2012) and Nick Cave: Love, Death and Apocalypse (Equinox: 2012).

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Francis Brassard is from Quebec, Canada. He received his Ph.D. from McGill University in religious studies. He also studied at the Institut für Kultur und Geschichte Indiens und Tibets, Hamburg University. His research interests include Buddhist philosophy and psychology, comparative religions and philosophies, and interreligious dialogue. His book, The Concept of Bodhicitta in Śāntideva’s Bodhicaryāvatāra,was published by the State University of New York Press (2000). Some of his other publication titles include: “Buddhism” in A Catholic Engagement with the World Religions in collaboration with Franco Sottocornola and Maria de Giorgi, Maryknoll, New York: Orbis Book (2010), “Asking the Right Question” in Asian Texts – Asian Contexts: Encountering the Philoso­ phies   and Religions of Asia., Albany: SUNY Press (2010), “The Path of the Bodhisattva and the Creation of Oppressive cultures” in Buddhism and Violence, ed. M. Zimmermann, Lumbini: Lumbini International Research Institute (2006). He is now an independent scholar living in Dubrovnik, Croatia. Dustin Byrd is originally from South Haven, mi. He is currently an Assistant Professor of Humanities of Olivet College, Olivet, Michigan, usa, where he teaches Comparative Religion, Philosophy, History, and Arabic. His main subjects of research are contemporary Islamic thought as well as the Critical Theory of the Frankfurt School. He has recently published a book entitled: “Ayatollah Khomeini and the Anatomy of the Islamic Revolution in Iran: Towards a Theory of Prophetic Charisma” and continues to bring together the Critical Theory of Religion and modern Islamic issues through his other writings. Donald Devon III was born in Baltimore, Maryland usa 1981. He received a BA from Loyola University in Maryland with a double major in Philosophy and Theology and an Asian studies minor in 2005. He obtained a Masters and Mphil degree from K.U.Leuven in Belgium in 2007 and 2008 respectively. He is currently working on a PhD with Professor William Desmond and Joris Geldhof which focuses on developing a Lonergarian influenced Natural Theology He is currently teaching as an adjunct instructor for Loyola University in Maryland and Harford Community College. As of now, the classes he has taught are Intro to Philosophy, Foundations of Philosophy, Project Modernity, Ethics, and Comparative Religions. Neven Duvnjak Ph.D., is Research Associate in the Institute of Social Sciences Ivo Pilar– Regional Center Split (Croatia). He is teaching Sociology of Culture and

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Introduction to Sociology at the Academy of Arts, University of Split. Mr Duvnjak is a member of “World Conference on Religion and Peace-Europe (Croatian Chapter),” and “Association for Religious Liberties in Croatia.” His professional interests are in the sociology of religion, religious freedom and human rights, religious communities and social justice, inter-religious relations, relations between church and state, and sociology of food and consumption. The current project on which he is working is “Croatian Identity and Multiculturalism in the Age of Globalization.” Jan Fennema is a physicist and philosopher, who earned his degrees from the Free University in Amsterdam. Throughout his long career, he has taught in grammar schools, professional schools and as a professor of science and philosophy at the University of Twente, Enschede, Netherlands. For thirty years, he was also a scientist/philosopher at the Foundation for Fundamental Research on Matter and the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research. He retired from these positions in 1994. He continues his international travels and participates in international seminars and courses where he continues to struggle with the antagonism between the religious and the secular, between faith and knowledge, between the natural sciences and theology and seeks their reconciliation. Denis R. Janz was born in Canada in 1949. He received his Ph.D. in 1979 from the University of St. Michael’s College in Toronto, and is currently Provost Distinguished Professor of the History of Christianity in the Religious Studies Department of Loyola University, New Orleans. He has been a regular participant in the Dubrovnik “Future of Religion” circle for some 26 years. His numerous publications include the acclaimed 7 volume People’s History of Christianity (Fortress Press), and more recently The Westminster Handbook to Martin Luther (Westminster John Knox Press). Dinka Marinović Jerolimov graduated in Sociology and Pedagogy at the Faculty of Philosophy, University of Zagreb and received her M.A. and Ph.D. in the field of sociology of religion at the same university. She is a scientific advisor at the Institute for Social Research in Zagreb, Croatia where she leads projects in the field of religion. She is also the Principal Investigator of International Social Survey Program (issp) for Croatia. Her main fields of interest are traditional church religiosity, New Religious Movements, religious education and youth religiosity. She

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co-edited the book Religion and Patterns of Social Transformation (2004) with Siniša Zrinščak and Irena Borowik based on the works from the isorecea (International Study of Religion in Eastern and Central Europe Association) conference held in Zagreb in 2001. Gottfried Küenzlen was born in 1945 in Claw, Germany. He holds degrees of Dr.rer.soc and Dr.phil. habil. From 1995–2010, he was a full Professor and Chair of Protestant Theology and Social Ethics at the Universität der Bundeswehr (University of the Federal Army), Munich. In 2010, he became an emeritus Professor. He has numerous publications in the fields of the sociology of culture, sociology of religion, social ethics and theology. His main book publications are Die Religionssoziologie Max Webers. Stufen ihrer Entwicklung, Berlin 1981; Der Neue Mensch. Zur säkularen Religionsgeschichte der Moderne, München 1995 (2nd edition, new edition: Frankfurt 1997); Die Wiederkehr der Religion. Lage und Schicksal in der säkularen Moderne, München 2003. Mislav Kukoč (Ph.D.) was born in Split, Croatia in 1952. He is a senior research associate at the Institute of Social Sciences “Ivo Pilar” Center in Split. He currently teaches Social Philosophy, Philosophy of Technics, and the History of Social Theories at the University of Zagreb and the University of Split. He is a former president of the Croatian Philosophical Society and a Co-Director of the international course, The Future of Religion at the Inter-University Centre, Dubrovnik, Croatia. He has conducted a sub-regional unesco research program on “Postcommunism and Multiculturalism,” held lectures at Loyola University in New Orleans, usa, the Universität der Bundeswehr, München, Sapporo University, Japan; and was a visiting scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center, Washington, dc. He is the author of Fate of Alienation; Enigma of Post-communism; and Critique of Eschatological Reason (in Croatian.) He is also a co-author of Inter-Disciplinary Dictionary: Education for Human Rights and Democracy (in Croatian), and co-editor of Ukraine & Croatia: Problems of Post-communist Societies. Michael R. Ott is an Associate Professor of Sociology at Grand Valley State University, Allendale, Michigan. He received his Master of Divinity degree from Princeton Theological Seminary in 1975 and earned his Ph.D. in Sociology from Western Michigan University in 1998. He teaches courses on the Sociology of Religion, the Critical Theory of Society and Religion, Globalization, Contemporary

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Sociological Theory, and Social Problems. He has articles and book chapters on the Critical Theory that have been published in the United States, France and the Ukraine, and has published two books: Max Horkheimer’s Critical Theory of Religion: The Meaning of Religion in the Struggle for Human Emancipation (University Press of America, 2001) and an edited book entitled The Future of Religion: Toward a Reconciled Society (Brill, 2007, Haymarket 2009.) He is a Co-Director of the course on The Future of Religion, held annually for the past 36 years at the Inter-University Center, Dubrovnik, Croatia. Rudolf J. Siebert was born in Frankfurt am Main, Germany in 1927. He studied history, philology, philosophy, sociology, psychology, social work and theology at the Universities of Frankfurt am Main, Mainz and Műnster, and at the Catholic University of America, Washington D.C. He is a Professor of Religion and Society and Director of the Center for Humanistic Future Studies at Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, Michigan. In 1975, he created and has since been the Director of the international course on “The Future of Religion,” which has been held annually for the past 36 years at the Inter-University Centre of PostGraduate Studies in Dubrovnik, Croatia. He is also the Director of the course on “Religion and Civil Society” held annually in Yalta, Crimea, Ukraine. He has taught at many universities in Western and Eastern Europe, Japan, the United States and Canada. His scholarship spans five decades during which he has published over 250 articles and over 30 books on the topic of the Critical Theory of society and religion. In 2010, his three volume book entitled, Manifesto of the Critical Theory of Society and Religion: The Wholly Other, Liberation, Happiness and the Rescue of the Hopeless was published by BRILL. In 2012, he further developed the Critical Theory of Religion through the publication of four books by Sunbun Publishers, New Dehli. Ivica Sokol is an Expert Collaborator in the Institute of Social Sciences Ivo Pilar–Regional Center Split (Croatia). Mr Sokol is a member of the “World Conference on Religion and Peace-Europe (Croatian Chapter). His professional interests are in the sociology of religion and modern church history. Currently, he is working on the project “Croatian Identity and Multiculturalism in the Age of Globalization.”

Introduction Michael R. Ott This book is the third volume of selected and edited scholarly papers that have been presented in the international course on the Future of Religion, which has been held annually for the past 36 years at the Inter-University Centre in Dubrovnik, Croatia. The first volume published was: The Influence of the Frankfurt School on Contemporary Theology: Critical Theory and the Future of Religion, 1992, A. James Reimer (ed.) Lewiston/Queenston/Lampeter: The Edwin Mellen Press, which contains papers presented in the course from 1977– 1990. The second volume was: The Future of Religion: Toward a Reconciled Society. 2007, Michael R. Ott (ed.), Leiden/Boston: Brill, which contains papers presented in the course from 2001–2006. This present volume contains the work of 15 scholars from 7 countries, who from 2007–2011 wrestled with the question of the relevancy, meaning, and future of religion within the sociohistorical context of the increasing antagonisms between the religious and secular realms of modern civil society and its globalization. The authors of this volume come from the academic disciplines of Comparative Religious Studies, History, Marxist Studies, Philosophy, Political Science and International Relations, Social Ethics, empirical Social Science Research, Sociology, and Theology (Christian, Islamic, Jewish, and Buddhist). From these areas of their expertise, these authors investigated different issues arising from the contemporary crises within religion, within secularity, as well as between the religious and the secular.

The Religious and the Secular

The history of pre-modern, traditional and medieval societies reveals that there was always a differentiation or a relative union between the religious and the secular. The Canadian philosopher, Charles Taylor (Calhoun, et. al (eds.). 2011:31–53) has semantically termed this differentiation an “internal dyad,” in which both the religious and the secular are known and dependent upon the other for their own identity. For example, the notion of up is understood by its opposite, down; the direction left is identified by its opposite, right, and so too are the notions of the religious identified in terms of that which is secular, and vice versa. It has only been in Modern Western civilization – beginning with the Renaissance, through the Protestant Reformation and the resulting horror of the religious wars, the 1648 Peace of Westphalia and the resulting political

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creation of a fragile modus vivendi between the religious and the secular, the Scientific Revolution, the Bourgeois, Marxist, and Freudian Enlightenment movements, etc. – that this relative union between the religious and the secular has been called increasingly into question and ultimately divided into what Taylor again identifies as an “external dyad,” wherein secularity has acquired polemically its own identity and future without the religious as a governing notion. As a result, religion was and continues to be reduced to the privatized, soul-salvation realm of the maladjusted, “neurotic” individual, or has been structurally functionalized as a pattern maintenance institution for the religious legitimation of the existing status quo. According to the Rational Choice proponents of their self-proclaimed new “paradigm” for the study of religion, which curiously has been appropriated by church-growth marketers, the substance of religion has been further denigrated into being little more than a marketable commodity, whose value is determined by the methodological individualism of a cost-benefit analysis. This modern version of the socio-historically created ambiguity of religion, which has the inherent potential of being either a force of human liberation and redemption that can contribute to the creation of a more reconciled social totality or a systemic instrument of social domination and legitimation, has developed into the emergency situation of the increasing antagonism between the religious and the secular as experienced in the late twentieth and now early twenty-first centuries. As documented daily by news agencies around the world, this antagonism between the religious and the secular has been accelerated through the globalization of Western neoliberal, transnational corporate capitalism and its neoconservative corollary of cultural and political/military forces moving into Third World or “periphery” countries, which are still more highly grounded in their religious traditions. The late neoconservative, political scientist Samuel Huntington ominously depicted this global confrontation as leading to the possibility of a “clash of civilizations” between the so-called advanced, secular First World and the more traditional Third World societies rooted in their religious heritage. Sadly, in the first decade of the twenty-first century, this prediction has the appearance if not reality of a self-fulfilling prophecy as the wars in the Middle East and Asian-Pacific region continue to escalate. Of course, what is ideologically hidden through the depiction of this developing, global “clash” in terms of cultural and religious differences is the real systemic power behind this increasing antagonism: The dynamic of the global capitalist class pursuit of ever-increasing profit and of a us led, Western geo-political and military dominion at all costs.

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The immediate relevancy of this increasing antagonism between the religious and the secular and the urgent need for it to be addressed critically in both theory and praxis in the pursuit of its resolution has been documented in a study by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life in August 2011, entitled Rising Restrictions on Religion: One-Third of the World’s Population Experiences an Increase. The data of this research shows that 70% of the world’s population live in countries where governments impose increasingly high restrictions on religion in the so-called public sphere, for example, restrictions on religious belief and practices, the banning of particular faiths, prohibiting evangelization and conversions, and giving preferential treatment to certain religious groups.

Alternative Futures

The theory and the socio-historical reality of the dialectic of the religious and the secular has been the backdrop for all of the various themes that have been addressed in the Future of Religion course since its beginning in 1977. The very question of the future of religion itself is derived from this modern antagonism between the religious and the secular. An essential approach for addressing this concern for the future of religion and of Modernity itself has been provided by the social scientific methodology of dialectical trend analysis or “Futurology” (Flechtheim 1971). This modern trend analysis of religion in Modernity has revealed that there are three possible alternative futures contained within religion itself that point toward the development of: 1.) Increased fundamentalism, 2.) Religion’s own secularization, and 3.) A critical reconciliation between religious and the secular that could produce a more humane, just, equitable, rational, free and shalom-filled future society. Of course, these futures contain the distinct possibility if not probability in the historical process of their development of intersecting, blending and clashing with each other. These alternative futures are not preconceived, abstract, analytical ideal-type methodologies, but are understood as actual, concrete possibilities contained within religion itself. The same dynamic can be said for the scientifically envisioned three alternative futures of Modernity itself. Modernity contains within itself its own possible futures of becoming: I.) A totally administered, bureaucratic, cybernetic society, II.) A militarized, war society/empire, and III.) A free and just, reconciled society in which the socio-historical antagonisms produced by the systems of Modernity are overcome in the beginning of a post-modern society

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and history. The task of the Future of Religion course and of the scholarly work produced therein has been to analyze critically the concrete reality of religion in modern secular societies to ascertain the possibilities of mitigating if not preventing the arrival of Future’s I/1 and II/2 and of opening the door toward the possible realization of Future III/3. All the chapters of this volume address their specifically chosen topics on the dialectics of the religious and the secular with an ever-present eye toward these alternative futures.

An Overview of the Chapters

The volume opens with Denis Janz’s Forward that expresses appreciation for the work of the Future of Religion’s founder and course director, Rudolf J. Siebert. This Forward is particularly a celebration of the publication by Brill of Siebert’s three volume Manifesto of the Critical Theory of Society and Religion: The Wholly Other, Liberation, Happiness and the Rescue of the Hopeless in 2010. As Janz states, “The Manifesto is …a rich and multi-dimensional analysis of the revolutionary logic of negative dialectics, which makes ‘tiger-leaps’ between the various expert cultures, as well as between scientific analysis and the everyday narrative of human memory and experience.” Janz’s Forward is an excellent beginning to this book. It is quite fitting that the three chapters that follow are expressions of the Frankfurt School’s Critical Theory and its continuing relevance in addressing the relevancy of religion in the continuing crises of modern civil society and its globalization. In Chapter One, Siebert critiques modern capitalism’s commodification of everything and of everyone for the purpose of ever increasing profit for the capitalist class, which has resulted in ever-greater crises for the global working class. The capitalist system’s class priority for the production of capital over human well-being has been transposed into a social psychological emphasis on having over being, wherein people attempt to find their identity, security, status and freedom in what they possess and are able to further acquire rather than who they are as human beings. As an alternative to this, Siebert develops the critical theory of religion’s dialectic of having and being, with a particular focus on the theory’s explicit roots in the dialectical teachings and sermons of the Dominican theologian and mystic Meister Eckhart. According to the panentheism of Eckhart, the dialectical negation of negation was the fullness of being. Being is life, activity, birth, renewal, flowing out, becoming, productivity, the very opposite of the narcissism of having. This article emphasizes the critical theory of religion’s essential religious idea of being as the revolutionary protest that the murderers will not ultimately triumph over their innocent victims.

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As such, this chapter is concerned with the question of whether a conversion to a humanistic religiosity without dogmas, authorities, institutions and asceticism can come into existence. In 1964, the critical theorist Theodor W. Adorno and the Marxist philosopher Ernst Bloch held a public discourse on the meaning and relevancy of utopic theory in addressing the increasing antagonisms of modern civil society. In the second chapter, Michael Ott critically analyses and compares the prodigious philosophical work of both theorists on the topic of utopia. Throughout their writings, both theorists wrestled with the dialectical migration of the religious longing for utopia into the secular critique of historical materialism. Both theorists were also critical heirs of the Hegelian and Marxist dialectical methodology of determinate negation as an emancipatory method through which a more utopic and thus, reconciled future society may be created. Yet, there were fundamental disagreements between the materialist theories of Adorno’s negative dialectics and Bloch’s transcendental historical materialism on the possibility of historically creating such a utopic future. In this chapter, Ott explains their friendly yet serious theoretical and political differences on the critical relevancy and possible praxis of utopic thinking. Ott explains that both theories of utopia are a type of Flaschenpost – a note in a bottle thrown into the chaos of history in the hope that it will be found and be able to rekindle this revolutionary form of utopic theory and concrete praxis, particularly in the 21st century. The following two chapters are distinct studies on one of the theorists discussed in chapter two. In chapter three, Dustin Byrd focuses specifically on Theodor W. Adorno’s theological concept of bilderverbot and connects this to his utopian thought about the possibilities of world transformation. Byrd illustrates that the essence of the Critical Theory of the Frankfurt School and specifically the core of Adorno’s philosophy is the sensitivity toward the suffering of the finite individual in the unjust and violent world of history. Byrd also explains the political, economic, and social ramifications of the philosophical deployment and radicalization of the concept of bilderverbot in the Frankfurt School’s vision (or non-vision) of utopia. Translating the theological category of bilderverbot into the social category of utopia helps to make clear the nature of “that which doesn’t exist,” and by inference, to “that which ought to exist,” without delivering any positive articulation of what that utopian society would look like. In chapter four, Roland Boer offers a critical commentary on one of Ernst Bloch’s most neglected pieces, namely, the bravura Philosophy of Music section that opens his Spirit of Utopia. Boer makes an in-depth engagement with Bloch’s works on music that is both exposition and critical assessment, an approach

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that is indebted to the long tradition of biblical criticism. As Boer explains, Bloch’s philosophy of music is a sustained re-narration of the story of music. His story emphasizes the human nature of music, focusing on the basic category of the note and its associated features, such as hearing, voice, dance, song, and rhythm. According to Boer, Bloch listens and writes with what may be called a philosophical and theo-utopian ear, which he deploys to “hear around corners” in order to espy the contours and glimpses of utopian promise. In chapter five, Gottfried Küenzlen investigates what the meaning of the term “culture” has become in advanced civil society, particularly in the 21st century. As Küenzlen explains, the use of the term has increased in both contemporary intellectual discussions as well as in every-day language, for example, the culture of leisure, entrepreneurial culture, eating culture, the culture of dialogue, event culture, etc. However, if everything and anything can be called “culture,” the term loses its diagnostic and analytical power, and the thing so designated loses its contours and its perceptive depth. In this chapter, Küenzlen wrestles with this systemic levelling process by addressing the present-day calls for renewed reassurance as to what “culture” is supposed to mean, and what a scholarly useful reconstruction of the term and the thing might look like. The fact that “culture” became a key term at the beginning of the modern age leads Küenzlen to comment on the situation of secular culture in the modern age, through which as he states, a possible theological dimension shines. As such, this article is meant to provide a contribution to that reconstruction, both from a general cultural-philosophical and a more specific cultural-sociological point of view. In chapter six, Jan Fennema addresses the question of the possibility of a global ethic through an analysis of Emmanuel Levinas’ philosophy of the face to face encounter, the foundation of which is the religious prohibition of murdering or killing the “other” along with the reciprocal request not to be murdered. Although this prohibition is not limited to any particular religion, it is expressed explicitly in the sixth commandment of the Jewish Decalogue, which is the basis of Jewish and Christian morality, as well as in the Qu’ran, in which murder as that committed by Cain against his brother Abel is explained as the killing of all human beings. However, as Fennema states, true moral behavior results not from following external commands but as a response to what is “sensed”; from an “inner light” that illuminates the heart of the human being and urges him/her to assume a specific responsibility to and for the “other.” As a substantive pillar of Levinas’ philosophy, Fennema analyses his interpretive, phenomenological description of the inter-subjective “face to face” encounter and its potential for contributing toward the creation of a global ethic of peace.

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In chapter seven, Francis Brassard investigates the origin and nature of religious discourse that assumes the existence of supernatural realities as opposed to the modern, scientific discourse, which is based on observable phenomena. In terms of the modern division of interpretation between the religious and the secular paradigms, between symbolism and literalism, Brassard presents a survey of the major models used to identify the motivations and implications for understanding the origin and nature of religious discourse. His study critically analyses three different “causes” for the origin of religious language: “The Psychological Cause” (Freud), “The Socio-Anthropological Cause” (Durkheim), and “The Mystical Cause.” According to the psychological and socio-anthropological models, the origins of religion are to be found in humanity’s need for survival, of finding ways to predict and eventually control the environment. However, religious discourse has nothing to do with the problem of survival; in fact it stands at the very opposite end, namely, that of adaptation. To adapt is possible only when an organism gives up survival. If survival is about maintaining the integrity of the structure of a subject in a changing environment, adaptation is the transformation of the subject in a given environment. This means that with a new subject, a new environment is discovered or created. According to Brassard, religious discourse is anchored in something that existentially feels real and relevant and as such can evolve depending on its ability to fulfill that need for greater intimacy and autonomy. Chapter eight is authored by Donald Devon III, who addresses how Bernard Lonergan’s notion of “self-appropriation” utilizes several themes that are indicative of Thomas Aquinas’ conception of faith as a subaltern scientia. Although there are many parallels between Lonergan’s notion of self-appropriation and Aquinas’ notion of faith, Devon addresses one particular point of divergence that could indicate a potential flaw, not only in the way Lonergan utilizes Aquinas, but also in the Lonergarian notion of self-appropriation itself. Aquinas’ scientia is a system of knowing derived from the behavior of nature, whereas Lonergan’s notion of self-appropriation is drawn from the behavior of human cognition. By drawing from an earlier Lonergarian interpretation of Aquinas’ notion of phantasm and linking it to Lonergan’s heuristic understanding of human cognition, Devon reveals that Lonergan does have the means to avoid the implications of the Hegelian self-enclosed dialectic, and be consistent with the Thomistic tradition in such a way that will inspire future generations of religious philosophers to come. In chapter nine, Mislav Kukoč examines the ambiguity of religion that is trapped in the modern context of globalization. As Kukoč explains, there are a number of structures that comprise the contemporary globalization movement: the philosophy and economic theory of neoliberalism, the spread of

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rationalism and scientism and its development of anthropocentrism and secularism, technological innovations, and the bureaucratic control of production and social life. According to Kukoč, this accelerated globalization has caused the growth of confession based supra-territorial communities, and has given stimulus to transnational religious bonding, particularly in such universalistic religions as Christianity and Islam. This contemporary rise of collective identities rooted in religion has often been in part a defensive response to globalization. Thus, religious revitalization has frequently been shaped into a kind of non-territorial cultural protectionism. At the same time, many of these antirationalist strivings can be understood in part as defensive reactions against encroachments by global forces on established cultures. Kukoč asserts that a number of these revivalist movements have exploited global relations to advance their causes. Thus, religious revivalism has often revolted against modern secularism in the context of the clash of civilizations. The religious resurgence throughout the world is a reaction against secularism, moral relativism, and self-indulgence, as it is a reaffirmation of the values of order, discipline, work, mutual help, and human solidarity. The last four chapters of this book approach the modern dialectical relationship between the religious and the secular by means of empirical research done in Croatia and Ukraine. In chapter ten, Branko Ančić addresses the changing religious landscape in Central and Eastern Europe due to the increasing presence of new types of religions and spiritual expressions. The specific focus of his study is on the rise of the Bahái religion in these regions. As the second most widely spread religion in the world – second only to Christianity, Ančić asks whether or not the Bahái religion is really a new religious movement. After analysing the historical, worldwide development of the Bahái religion, along with its organizational structure, theological teaching, and the social and existential issues that the faith addresses, Ančić’s analysis focuses on the expansion of the Bahái faith in some ex-Socialist countries, particularly that of Croatia. Neven Duvnjak and Ivica Sokol cooperated in writing chapter eleven’s study of religious freedom in the Republic of Croatia in the period between 1997 and 2008. Their research focused on three surveys that were conducted in 1997, 2003, and 2008 among high-ranking representatives of various religious communities. The special aim of these surveys was to see the position of religious communities after the new “Law on legal position of religious communities” (2002) had been passed in the Croatian Parliament. The authors report that these surveys show that Croatia has entered the process of modernization as well as the phase of religious pluralism. This pluralism has been reduced to either a standardization of religious values or it has become a type of “cognitive

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retrenchment” wherein each religion tolerates the other. The authors advocate, however, for a third alternative to this dualism in which mutual recognition of and discourse with the other religions can take place as the challenges of secularization are faced together. In chapter twelve, Dinka Marinovic Jerolimov states that in the second half of the twentieth century, perceptions of human sexuality have considerably changed. Marital, family and sexual relationships have become more liberalized. The feminist movement, gay rights movements and their struggle for the legalization of homosexual marriages, increased divorce rates, second marriages after a divorce, experimentation with cohabitation, the development and usage of contraceptives, early entering into sexual relationships, increased tolerance to different lifestyles etc., have affected the change of the “picture” of sexuality and change of the attitudes and values related to this important aspect of human lives. In the Croatian historical and socio-cultural context, attitudes towards sexuality and marriage are partially under the influence of liberal, modern values as well as of legal solutions and policies belonging to past socialist times. These attitudes are also partially under the influence of traditional Christian values that have been increasingly promoted in the postsocialist period. The aim of Jerolimov’s study was to determine the attitudes of the population in Croatia towards some substantial questions related to the area of sexuality and marriage, respectively, and to what extent the population (dominantly Catholic) is in conformity with the norms of traditional church morality. Data on this topic was gathered from the research survey “Social and Religious Change in Croatia” that was conducted by the Institute for Social Research in Zagreb in 2004 on the representative sample of the adult population of Croatia (N=2220) in 154 towns. In the final chapter, Aleksandra Baranova addresses the dialectics of the religious and the secular in her study of the politicization of the religious environment in Ukraine. Baranova states that the active and profound politicization of the religious environment of Ukraine is evident today. It includes the interference of religious institutions in politics, on the one hand, and the use of the religious by political actors, on the other. This fact has been intensified by the high level of religiosity and public support for the churches in the country. In this situation, their different social groups and political positions identify the religious institutions of Ukraine. This presents an especially complicated situation in the Orthodox environment in Ukraine, which has three Orthodox institutions that support and are supported by different political forces, with opposite political orientations. Baranova’s study analyses the developing relationship between the church and the political realm by comparing the three Orthodox churches in relation to the economic and political

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transformation of Ukraine. What is found is that the religious structure of Ukraine is a complex system that is an integral part of the public consciousness that creates a world-view, national ideas, moral and ethic principles, and constructs various if not contentious interpretations of Ukrainian national and ecclesiastical histories.

Chapter 1

The Future of Religion Toward the City of Being Rudolf J. Siebert It may be called the irony of the spirit of the times, when in the 1970s theologians, most of them students of the existential theologian Paul Tillich, announced the death of God, while critical philosophers, psychologists, and sociologists searched for the Infinite, and proclaimed the finitude of man.1 A gigantic change of fronts took place.

Christians and Marxists

Marxists, for example, the Czechoslovakian philosopher Vitezslav Gardavsky, asked: Without God what shall man have to offer?2 Catholic theologians, such as Johannes B. Metz, sanctioned the revolutionary abolishment of an unjust civil society.3 The conversion of some Marxists was even more astonishing than the new praxis of some Christians.4 Yet, in the perspective of the critical theory of religion, or the comparative, dialectical religiology, this astonishment was valid only as long as Marxists and Christians were looked upon as mere puppets of a worldview that had long become independent, institutionalized, reified, and alienated into an authoritarian and dogmatic system.5 Already in the 1940s, Walter Benjamin – who was informed by the scholar of Jewish mysticism Gerhard Scholem, as well as by Franz von Baader, the Catholic friend of the Lutheran Georg W.F. Hegel, who were both rooted in the mystical theology of Meister Eckhart – had looked with an abyss-like smile on theology as a small and ugly hunchback, and on historical materialism as a puppet in 1 Tillich 1926; 1929; 1933; 1948; 1951; 1952; 1955a, b; 1957; 1963a, b; 1966; Horkheimer 1932; 1936; 1966; 1967a, b; 1970a–d; 1972; 1973; 1974a–c; 1978; 1981a–c; Garaudy 1962. 2 Horkheimer 1979d; 1985g:chaps 37; 40; Garaudy 1962. 3 Metz 1965; 1967; 1973c; 1975b; 1977; 1980; 1981; 1995; Metz/Habermas/Sölle 1994. 4 Dirks 1968; 1983a, b; 1985; 1987; 1988; Metz 1965; 1967; 1969; 1970a, b; 1973a–c; 1975a, b; 1977; 1978; 1980; Metz/Wiesel 1993. 5 Horkheimer 1936; 1966; 1967a, b; 1970d; 1985g:chaps 37; 40; Adorno/Kogon 1958a, b; Fromm 1950; 1956; 1957; 1961; 1966b; 1967; 1970a; 1970b; 1972b; 1973; 1974; 1976; 1992.

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Turkish attire with a water-pipe in its mouth.6 At the same time, however, Benjamin saw theology and historical materialism cooperating with each other on the chessboard of world history. Theology could legitimate historical materialism metaphysically, and historical materialism could help theology translate itself into political and historical praxis. Benjamin tried to reconcile Scholem’s mystical theology with Bertolt Brecht’s historical materialism, and found critical resistance on both extremes of the modern continuum between the sacred and the profane.7 For Hegel, informed by Meister Eckhart, as well as for Jewish and Christian mystics before, and for Karl Marx and the historical materialists, and the critical theorists later on, religion was part of the history of human reason.8 Thinkers from Lao-tse through Eckhart to Marx agreed on the dialectic of having and being: The way to action is to be. lao-tse

Men should not reflect so much on what they should do, but they should rather consider, what they are. meister eckhart

The less you are, the less you express your life, the more you have, the bigger is your alienated life.9 marx



Turn toward Marxism

Max Horkheimer was the son of a factory owner and a ceo himself of a factory in Zuffenhausen, Germany in 1915. Like all the other critical theorists of the first generation of the Frankfurt School, Horkheimer was a member of the 6 Scholem 1935; 1967; 1973b; 1977a, c; 1980; 1982; 1989; Blakney 1941; Pfeifer 1950; Quint 1969a, b; Benz 1969; Benjamin 1970:chaps 10; 11; Löwenthal 1965; 1966; 1970; 1980; 1987; 1989; 1990a, b. 7 Kant 1929; 1946; 1968; 1970; 1974a, b; 1975; Hegel 1986p, q; Benjamin 1970: chaps 10; 11; Scholem 1935; 1967; 1973b; 1977a, c; 1980; 1982; 1989; Brecht 1961; 1964; 1966; 1967; 1973; 1980; 1981; 1993a, b; 1994; 2002; 2003; 2007a, b. 8 Blakney 1941; Fox 1980; Quint 1969a, b; Pfeifer 1950; Benz 1969; Scholem 1935; 1967; 1973b; 1977a, c; 1980; 1982; 1989; Hegel 1986a, p, q; Fromm 1976:48–68; Siebert 1987:30. 9 Blakney 1941; Fox 1980; Quint 1969a, b; Pfeifer 1950; Benz 1969; Hegel 1986a, p, q; Marx 1906; 1951; 1953; 1956; 1964; 1974; Marx/Engels 1953a–c; 1955; 1960; 2005; Niebuhr 1932; 1964; Fromm 1976; 2001; Fromm/Xirau 1979.

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German middle bourgeoisie before, during, and still after World War I. Yet, after having become familiar long before with Arthur Schopenhauer, Immanuel Kant as well as with Hegel, he turned to anti-bourgeois Marxism.10 Horkheimer and his colleagues in the Institute for Social Research, the Café Marx, at the Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Universität in Frankfurt a. M., who all came from more or less assimilated Jewish families, were motivated to do so by the will to justice that had been brought into world-history by the Hebrew prophets.11 For Horkheimer and his colleagues, historical materialism was the answer to the domination of the totalitarianism from the Right – fascism and national socialism, which came into being after World War I in which he had served as a soldier in the German army.12 The same prophetic will to justice motivated Horkheimer and his friends to become critical of Eastern Marxism, when Stalin began to practice his totalitarian rule from the Left – red fascism, long before it fell victim to the neo-liberal counter-revolution of 1989. Along with the founders of scientific socialism, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Horkheimer thought that the cultural achievements of the bourgeois epoch of history, for example, the free unfolding of all productive forces, intellectual productivity, no longer characterized through violence and exploitation, i.e., genuine being in the most emphatic sense, should extend and spread in the world: being.13 What the critical theorists experienced during World War I, and in between the Wars, and during the restoration after World War II in Germany, Europe, and America, did not leave their thinking unaffected. There was the great disappointment that the working classes in Germany and Europe allowed Adolf Hitler and his German National Socialist Party and Movement to come to power in the first place, and that they did not rise against him, the employee of the Herren Club and other owners, for example, Henry Ford, who supported him inside and outside of Germany, and did not remove him and the German ruling class from power, but even marched with him – 3 million of them – into the Soviet Union and killed 27 million so-called communists, and 6 million 10

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Kant 1929; 1946; 1968; 1970; 1974a, b; 1975; Schopenhauer 1946; 1977; 1989; Hegel 1896; 1964; 1965; 1969; 1972; 1976; 1979; 1986a–c, e–j; Horkheimer 1970d; 1985g: chaps 37; 40; 1987b: 15–74; 75,148, 149–153; 295–311; 450–451, 452–454; 1988a; Gumnior/Ringguth 1973:7–21; Witte 1985 7–17; Scheible 1989:7–20; Vollgraf/Sperl/Hecker 2000:7–16. Isaiah 11; 65–66; Jeremiah 50–52; Kant 1929; 1946; 1968; 1970; 1974a, b; 1975; Hegel 1896; 1964; 1965; 1969; 1972; 1976; 1979; 1986a–c; e–q; Fromm 1966b; 1976; 1992. Neumann 1942; Abendroth 1969; Sohn-Rethel 1973; 1975; 1978; 1985; Vollgraf/Sperl/Hecker 2000:7–16; Gumnior/Ringguth 1973. Marx 1906; 1951; 1953; 1956; 1964; Marx/Engels 1953a–c; 1955; 1960; 2005; Horkheimer 1967b; 1970c, d; 1972; 1973; 1974a–c; 1978; 1981c; 1985g; 1988d: chaps. 2; 6; 7; 11; 15; 16; 17; Marcuse 1960; 1961; 1962; 1970a; Fromm 1966b; 1967; 1976; 2001; Fromm (ed.) 1966.

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Jews.14 There was also the experience during the Cold War that the states that called themselves communistic and used the same Marxian categories to which the theoretical and practical efforts of the Frankfurters owed so many insights into civil society, state, history, and culture, were not closer to alternative Future III – the realm of freedom as creative realization of all human potentials and powers, for example, that of eye, ear, memory, intellect, will, etc., and as realm of full being beyond the realm of natural and economic necessity – than the liberal countries. These communist states were no less prone to move toward alternative Future I – the totally bureaucratized society, which is characterized by reification and by the attitude of having, and in which therefore life is not living, as well as toward alternative Future II – a militaristic society that is continually engaged in wars of revenge or thievery of land, cheap labor and resources, and in which death prevails and dominates, than the liberal countries in which, so far at least, the personal autonomy of the individual had not yet been extinguished.15 When, around 1933, the critical theorists had the choice to flee from fascist Germany and Europe either to socialist Russia or to the liberal United States, most of them left for the latter.16

A Spark of the Divinity

In 1835 in Trier, Germany, the Jew and baptized Lutheran Marx had written an essay in his Abitur, his exit examination, in the discipline of religion, which sounded as if at the time he had already read not only the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament, but also some of the works of Immanuel Kant and of Georg W.F. Hegel, who had died in Berlin 4 years earlier, and in which he stated:

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Neumann 1942; Abendroth 1969; Sohn-Rethel 1973; 1975; 1978; 1985; Trevor-Roper 2000; Baldwin 2001; Vollgraf/Sperl/Hecker 2000:7–16. Kant 1929; 1946; 1968; 1970; 1974a, b; 1975; Hegel 1986: g; l; q; Marx 1871; 1906; 1951; 1953; 1956; 1981a–c: 873–874; Marx/Engels 2005 1961; Horkheimer 1970d; 1985g: chaps. 33; 34; 35; 36; 37; 40; Marcuse 1965; Fromm 1957; 1959; 1961; 1964; 1966a, b; 1967; 1968; 1970a, b; 1972a, b; 1973; 1974; 1975; 1976; 1980a, b; 1981; 1990a, b; 1992; 1995; 1997; 1999; 2001; Fromm (ed.) 1966c; Fromm/Suzuki/Martino 1960; Fromm/Xirau 1979; Marcuse 1960; 1961; 1962; 1965; 1967; 1969a, b; 1970a, b; 1973; 1975; 1979; 1980a, b; 1984; 1987; 1995; 2001; 2005; Flechtheim 1959; 1962; 1963; 1966; 1971; Flechtheim/Lohmann 2003; Siebert 2001; 2002a; Vollgraf/Sperl/ Hecker 2000:7–16. Horkheimer 1970d; 1985g: chaps 37; 40; Gumnior/Ringguth 1988; Witte 1985; Scheible 1989; Vollgraf/Sperl/Hecker 2000:7–16.

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When we consider the history of the individual, or the nature of man, we see admittedly always a spark of the Divinity in his chest, an enthusiasm for the good, a striving for knowledge, a longing for the truth. Alone, the sparks of the Eternal are suffocated by the flame of desire, passion, and greed; the enthusiasm for virtue is stunned, and stilled, anesthetized, and overpowered by the tempting voice of sin. It is mocked and sneered at, as soon as life has let us feel its whole power. The striving for knowledge is repressed by a low striving for earthly goods. The longing for the truth is extinguished through the sweetly flattering power of the lie. And so man stands there, the only being in nature, who does not fulfill its purpose; the only member in the universe of creation, who is not worthy of the God, who created it.17 From early on, the young Marx knew that to reach being, the full realization of all human potentials, it was necessary to concretely negate the attitude of having, so characteristic of antagonistic civil society. Already, following Gaunilon’s fool, the great enlightener Kant believed he had destroyed the ontological proof for the existence of God, the necessary unity of Being and nothing, Notion and existence, Infinite and finite, through reference to the contingent having or not having 100 thalers.18 The originally Jewish and Christian dialectic of having and being reached like a red thread throughout Marx’s life work.19

Theory and Praxis

Throughout his life, Marx criticized the Christian discrepancy between theory and praxis in terms of an inverse theology rooted in the tradition of the apophatic via negative.20 Already in his essay, The Leading Article of No. 179 of the 17

18 19

20

Genesis 1; 2; John 1; Acts 17; Scholem 1935; 1967; 1973b; 1977a, c; 1980; 1982; 1989; Blakney 1941; Fox 1980; Quint 1969a, b; Pfeifer 1950; Benz 1969; Kant 1929; 1974a; Hegel 1986a; p; q; r; s; t; Marx 1906; 1951; 1953; 1955; 1956; 1964; 1974; Marx/Engels 1953a–c; 1955; 1960; 2005; Niebuhr 1932; 1964; Fromm 1976; 2001; Fromm/Xirau 1979; Marcuse 1960; 1970a. Anselm of Canterbury 1962; Kant 1992; 1946; 1968; 1970; 1974a, b; 1975; Hegel 1986p, q. Marx 1953; 1956; 1961a–c; 1964; 1974; Max/Engels 1953a–c; 1960; 2005; Fromm 1966a, b; 1967; 2001; Fromm (ed.) 1966c; Bloch 1960; 1970a, b; 1971a, b; 2000; 2009; Bloch/Reif 1978; Marcuse 1960; 1961; 1962; 1970a; Niebuhr 1932; 1964. Scholem 1935; 1967; 1973b; 1977a–c; 1980; 1982; 1989; Blakney 1941; Fox 1980; Quint 1969a, b; Pfeifer 1950; Benz 1969; Hegel 1986a, g, l, p, q, Marx 1871 1906; 1951; 1953; 1956; 1961a–c; 1963; 1964; 1974; Marx/Engels 2005; Adorno 1951; 1962; 1963; 1966; 1969a–c; Adorno/Benjamin 1994; Adorno/Dirks 1974; Adorno/Kogon 1958a, b; 1970:103–110, 111–125; Habermas 1962; 1969; 1970; 1971; 1976; 1978a–d; 1987b; 1988b; 2001a; 2002; 2004b; 2005; 2006a, b.

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Kölnische Zeitung, Marx wrote that if religion became a political quality, an object of politics, there seemed to be hardly any need to mention that the newspapers not only may but had to discuss political objects.21 For Marx, it seemed from the very start of his philosophical and political life that the wisdom of this world, i.e., philosophy, had more right to be concerned with the kingdom of this world – about family, society, state, and history, than the wisdom of the other world, i.e., religion and theology. The point here was not whether the state, including family and society, should be philosophized about, but rather whether it should be philosophized about well or badly, philosophically or un-philosophically, with prejudice or without, with consciousness or without, consistently or inconsistently, in a completely rational or half rational way. According to Marx, if people made religion a theory of right and law, of family, society, state and history, then they made it into a kind of philosophy. Marx asked if it was not Christianity before anything else that had separated church and state? Marx admonished his Christian readers to read Saint Augustine’s De Civitate Dei, and to study the Greek and Roman Fathers of the Church, and the spirit of Christianity, and then come back and tell people which was the Christian State: the church or the state!22 Marx asked his Christian readers if not every minute of their practical life expressed the lie to their theory? Marx’s Christian readers in Germany did not consider it wrong to appeal to the administration of justice in civil society, to the law, to the courts, when they were cheated out of their property. However, Marx reminded his Christian readers that the Apostle Paul wrote precisely that such action was wrong.23 Marx asked his Christian readers if they offered their right cheek when they were struck upon the left, or did they not rather institute proceedings against assault?24 Marx reminded his Christian readers that the Gospel of Matthew forbids precisely that.25 Did the Christians not claim their reasonable right in this world, particularly their property rights? Did they not grumble at the slightest raising of a duty or taxes by the state? Were they not furious at the slightest infringement on their personal liberty? Yet, so Marx argued, Christians had been told by the New Testament that the sufferings of this life were not to be compared with the bliss of the future, eternal life, and that suffering in patience and the bliss of hope were cardinal 21 22 23 24 25

Hegel 1986q; Marx 1963; Niebuhr 1964:34–35. Augustine 1952; 1958; 1984; Hegel 1986g; l; Marx 1871; 1906; 1951; 1953; 1956; 1961a–c; 1963; 1964; 1977; Marx/Engels 1953a–c; 1955; 1960; 2005, Niebuhr 1964:35. Matthew 5–7; Luke 6; Romans 1–5; Hegel 1986g, l, q, Marx 1984:35. Matthew 5–7; Luke 6; Niebuhr 1934:35. Matthew 5–7; Marx 1934:35.

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virtues.26 In the perspective of the comparative critical religiology, Marx did not attack Saint Paul or the Gospels or Saint Augustine, but rather the hypocrisy of the Christian bourgeoisie in Berlin, Paris, Brussels, London, and Washington D.C. and its horrendous discrepancy between theory and practice, which is unfortunately widely spread among all the world religions.27 Still during the American Presidential campaign of 2012, which cost over 2 billion dollars, and in which no viable humanist-socialist or communitarian labor party represented the 200 million workers, the debates among Christian politicians were much more about having than being.28

Private Property

Marx asked his Christian readers if not most of their administration of justice and court proceedings, and the majority of their civil laws were concerned with private property, which at the time was connected with the so-called just wars over 10,000 years old, and in general with having rather than with being?29 Yet, the Gospels had told Christians that their treasure was not of this world.30 Marx admonished the Christians that if they based themselves on giving to Caesar the things which were Caesar’s, and to God the things which were God’s, they should not consider the mammon of gold alone, but at least just as much free reason as the Caesar of this world, and the action of free reason was what Marx called philosophizing. Marx reminded his Christian readers that when in Holy Alliance, the predecessor of the League of Nations and of the United Nations, and at first a quasi-religious alliance of states, was to be formed and religion was to be the state motto of Europe, the Pope showed a profound sense and perfect consistency in refusing to join it, for in his view the universal Christian link between nations was the Church, and not diplomacy, not a 26 27 28

29 30

Matthew 19:16–24; Hegel 1986q; Niebuhr 1934:35; Küng 1982; 1994a, b. Hegel 1986a, g, l, p, q, Niebuhr 1934:35; Lortz 1962a, b; 1964; Küng 1970; 1972; 1976; 1984; 1987; 1989; 1990a, b; 1994a; Metz 1959; 1962; 1963; 1965; 1967; 1969; 1970; 1975b; 1977; 1980. Hegel 1986q; Marx 1963; Niebuhr 1964:34–35; Fromm 1957; 1959; 1961; 1966b; 1967; 1970a, b; 1974; 1975; 1976; 1980a, b; 1981; 1990a, b; 1992; 1995; 2001; Fromm (ed.) 1966c; Fromm/Xirau 1979; Marcuse 1960; 1962; 1967; 1969a, b; 1970a; 1979; 1980a, b; 1984; 1987; 1995; 2001; 2005; Horkheimer 1974:96–97; Adorno 1997h: 9–20, 354–373, 569–574; 578–587; i/1:7–143, 143–508; I/2:7–120, 121–327; Habermas 1962; 1969; 1970; 1971; 1976; 1978a–d; 1990; 1992a; Honneth 1985; 1990; 1993; 1994; 1996a, b; 2000; 2001; 2002a, b; 2004; 2005; 2007; 2011. Matthew 19:16–24; Hegel 1986g; l; p; q; Niebuhr 1934:35–36; Fromm 1950; 1956; 1957; 1961; 1964; 1966a, b; 1967; 1968; 1970a, b; 1972a, b; 1973; 1974; 1975; 1976; Küng 1991b; 1994a; 2004. Matthew 5–7; Luke 6; Hegel 1986a, g, q, Niebuhr 1934:35–36.

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worldly alliance of states. For Marx, the truly religious state was the theocratic state. The prince of such theocratic states must be either the God of religion, for example, Yahweh himself, as in the Jewish state, or God’s representative as in the Vatican, or the Dalai Lama, as in Tibet. Such theocratic states must as Christian states all submit to a Church, which was an infallible Church. For if, so Marx argued, there was – as in Protestantism – no supreme head of the Church, the domination of religion was nothing else than the religion of domination, the cult of the will of the government and the state. In the perspective of the dialectical religiology, at least since Ernst Bloch and Walter Benjamin, it is clear that theocracies are no longer possible in Modernity or Post-Modernity: the goal of politics is not the kingdom of God, but rather human happiness.31 In the Islamic theocracy of Iran pressure mounts again and again by young people, who do not like a politics directed toward the kingdom of God, but rather toward their own happiness, without however denying necessarily the former. Like two opposing forces in nature, so also can the longing for the kingdom and for human happiness, as opposed to each other as they may be, support each other.32 Only a good Christian can be a good atheist, and only a good atheist can be a good Christian, and communism is the presupposition of the kingdom of heaven: the monastic orders have always known about this, and thus had the vow of poverty, and the beginning of Christianity was communistic.33

The Poor

According to the comparative, critical religiology, long before Marx and Engels inverted the dialectical historical idealism of Hegel into their dialectical historical materialism and initiated a communist movement, which intended to abolish the private property of the means of production that gave the owners the power over nature as well as over workers, family, civil society, state, history, and culture, and which they considered to be the root of the prevailing commodity fetishism and the idolatry of greed, and of all social evils, and long 31

32 33

Hegel 1986 a, g, l, p, q, Marx 1871; 1906; 1951; 1953; 1956; 1961a–c; 1963; 1964; 1974; 1977; Marx/ Engels 1953a–c; 1955; 1960; 2005; Bloch 1960; 1970a, b; 1971a, b; 1975a, c; 1979; 1985a–d; 2000; 2009; Benjamin 1950; 1955a–c; 1968: chaps 10; 11; Marcuse 1960; 1951; 1962; 1965; 1967; 1969:a, b; 1970a, b; 1973; 1975; 1979; 1980a, b; 1987; 1995; 2001; 2005. Benjamin 1968: chaps. 10; 11. Matthew 5–7; 19; Luke 6; Acts 2:42–47; 4:32–35; Bloch 1960; 1970a, b; 1971a, b; 2000; 2009; More 1895; 1901; 1963; Dirks 1968; 1983a, b; 1985; 1987; 1989; Metz 1987; 1989; Gutierrez 1973; 1988.

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before the critical theorists of society of the Frankfurt School, Meister Eckhart (1260–1327) described the dialectic of having and being with a penetration and clarity not surpassed by any teacher ever since.34 Thus, on the basis of the Beatitudes in the Sermon on the Mount: “How happy are the poor in spirit; theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 5:3), or “How happy are you who are poor: yours is the kingdom of God.” (Luke 6:20), and of the connected curse “But alas for you who are rich: you are having your consolation now” (Luke 6:24). Eckhart stated in his Sermon Fifteen: How A Radical Letting Go Becomes A True Letting Be: Thus we say that a person must be so poor that he or she is no place and has no place wherein God could act. Where people still preserve some place in themselves, they preserve distinction. This is why I pray God to rid me of God; for my essential being is above God in so far as we consider God as the origin of creatures. Indeed in God’s own being, where God is raised above all being and all distinctions, there I was myself, there I willed myself, and I knew myself to create this person that I am. Therefore I am cause of myself according to my being which is eternal, but not according to my becoming, which is temporal. Therefore also I am unborn, and following the way of my unborn being I can never die. Following the way of my unborn being I have always been. I am now, and shall remain eternally. What I am by my temporal birth is destined to die and be annihilated, for it is mortal. Therefore it must with time pass away. In my eternal birth all things were born, and I was cause of myself and of all things. If I had willed it, neither I nor any thing would have come to be. And if I myself were not, God would not be either. That God is ‘God,’ of this I am the cause. If I were not, God would not be ‘God’…35 34

35

Blakney 1941; Fox 1980; Quint 1969a, b; Pfeifer 1950; Benz 1969; Hegel 1986a, p–s; Marx 1906; 1951; 1953; 1956; 1964; 1974; Marx/Engels 1953a–c; 1955; 1960; 2005; Niebuhr 1932; 1964; Fromm 1976; 2001; Fromm/Xirau 1979; Horkheimer 1974:96–97; 1985 l: 286–287, 294– 296,349–397, 398–416, 436–466, 467–492; Vollgraf/Sperl/Hecker 2000; Fromm 1992; 2005; Siebert 1987:30. Matthew 5–7; Luke 6; Blakney 1941; Fox 1980:213–225; Quint 1969a, b; Pfeifer 1950; Benz 1969; Hegel 1986b: 536; g, l; p: 209; q; Marx 1871; 1906; 1951; 1953; 1956; 1961a–c; 1963; 1964; 1974; 1974; 1977; Marx/Engels 1953a–c; 1955; 1960; 2005; Fromm 1932a, b; 1950; 1956; 1957; 1959; 1961; 1964; 1966a, b; 1967; 1968; 1970a, b; 1972a, b; 1973; 1974; 1975; 1976:48–68; 1980a, b; 1981; 1990a, b; 1992; 1995; 1997; 1999; 2001; Fromm (ed.) 1966c; Fromm/Suzuki/Martino 1960; Fromm/Xirau 1979; Fromm/Reichann 1960; Gabeta 2012; Pope John XXIII: 1962;1963; Pope Paul VI: 1966; 1968; Pope John Paul II 1993; 1998; Pope Benedict XVI: 2005; 2006; 2007a–c; 2009; 2011a, b; 2012a, b.

20

SIEBERT

A major figure of the Dominican Order, a beggar order opposed to early capitalism, and a contemporary of the even more radical Francis of Assisi, the founder of the Franciscan Order, another anti-capitalistic beggar order, both stressing the vow of poverty, Meister Eckhart was a scholarly theologian and the greatest representative and deepest and most radical dialectical thinker of German mysticism.36

Positive and Negative Theology

For Eckhart, the dialectic of being and having was rooted in the tradition of the via positiva as well as via negativa of the kataphatic and apophatic theology.37 Meister Eckhart had taught already a post-theistic, panentheistic theology in his Sermon Thirteen entitled Outside God There is Nothing but Nothing: The divine One is a negation of negations and a desire of desires. What does One mean? Something to which nothing is to be added. The soul takes hold of the Godhead, where it is pure, where there is nothing beside it, nothing else to consider. The One is a negation of negations. Every creature contains a negation; one denies that it is the other. An angel denies that it is any other creature; but God contains the denial of denials. He is that One who denies of every other that it is anything except himself.38 Eckhart asked the question, how man could possibly approach, not to speak of love such a God, and gave a post-theistic, panentheistic answer: How, then, shall I love him? You are to love God aspiritually, that is, your soul shall be aspiritual, devoid of ghost-likeness, for as long as the soul is 36

37 38

Blakney 1941; Fox 1980; Quint 1969a, b; Pfeifer 1950; Benz 1969; Celano 1955; Fromm 2001; Dirks 1968; 1983a, b; 1985; 1987; 1988; Metz 1959; 1962; 1963; 1965; 1967; 1970; 1973a–c; 1975a, b; 1977; 1978; 1980; 1981; 1984; 1985; 1986; 1987; 1995; 1997; 1998; Metz/Peters 1991; Metz/ Wiesel 1993; Dörre 2009. Blakney 1941; Fox 1980; Fromm 2001. Ephesians 4–10; Scholem 1935; 1967; 1973b; 1977a–c; 1980 1982; 1989; Anselm of Canterbury 1962; Blakney 1941:188–190, 247; Fox 1980; Quint 1969a, b; Pfeifer 1950; Benz 1969; Celano 1955; Hegel 1986b: 536; p: 209; Horkheimer 1936; 1966; 1967a, b: 216–229; 248–269; 302–317; 1970d; 1985g: chaps 23; 24; 25; 26; 27; 28; 29; 30; 31; 32; 33; 34; 37; 40; Horkheimer/Adorno 1969; Marcuse 1960; 1970a; 1987; 2005; Fromm 1976:48–68; 1992; 2001; Küng 1970; 1978; 1984; 1990b; 1991a, b; 1992; 1993a, b; 1994a, b; 2004; 2009; 2011; Kuschel/Schlensog 2008:64.

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ghostlike it is a mental image and, being image-like, it will lack both unity and the power to unite. Thus, it could not love God rightly, for true love is union. Your soul ought to be de-ghosted, void of ghosts, and be kept so. For if you love God as a god, a ghost, a person, or if he were something with a form - you must get rid of all that. How, then, shall I love him? Love him as he is a not-god, a not-ghost, apersonal, formless. Love him as he is the One, pure, sheer and limpid, in whom there is no duality; for we are to sink eternally from negation to negation in the One.39 In the view of the comparative, dialectical religiology, the method of the Buddhist, Jewish, Christian, or Islamic mystics has often been negation.40 Here, with Meister Eckhart, it was a double negation. The negation of negation was fullness of being. Against the Holy Inquisition’s accusation of mostly pantheism without transcendence, which misunderstood his deeply Christian pan-entheism, Eckhart stated in his Defense IX:23 that a hundred men were many and numbered; a thousand angels were many and without number; but the three persons in the Trinity were neither many or numbered.41 If they were many, they would not be one. For Eckhart, this was true according to the Scripture: …. so that there are three witnesses, the Spirit, the water and the blood, and all three of them are one.42 For Eckhart, this was so because deprivation was the beginning of number, but the beginning of multiplicity was negation; however in God there was no deprivation, nor yet negation, since there was fullness of being.43 The reason for 39

40

41 42 43

Blakney 1941:247; Fox 1980; Quint 1969a, b; Pfeifer 1950; Benz 1969; Hegel 1986b: 536; p. 209; Horkheimer 1985g: chaps 23; 24; 25; 26; 27; 28; 29; 30; 31; 32; 33; 34; 37; 40; Fromm 1976: 48–68; 1992; 2001; Kuschel/Schlensog 2008:64. Blakney 1941:329; Scholem 1935; 1967; 1973b; 1977a, c; 1980; 1982; 1989; Benjamin 1950; 1955a– c; 1968; chaps 10; 11; 1972; 1974; 1977 chaps 10; 11; 1978a–d; 1983a, b; 1988; 1995b, c; 1996b, c; 1997; Fromm 1950; 1956; 1964; 1966a, b; 1970b; 1974; 1976; 1990b; 1992; 1995; 1997; 1999; 2001; Marcuse 1960; 1962; 1967; 1965; 1969a, b; 1970a, b; 1973; Küng 1970; 1972; 1978; 1981a; 1982; 1984; 1990a, b; 1991a, b; 1992; 1993a, b; 1994a, b; 1998; 2003; 2004; 2009; Küng/Homolka 2009; Küng/Kuschel 1993a, b; Kuschel/Schlensog 2008:64; Küng/Ess/Stiencron/Bechert 1984. Acts 17; Blakney 1941:289. 1 John 5:7; Acts 17; Blakney 1941:289; Hegel 1986 p, q; Küng 1970; 1978; 1984; 1990b; 1991a, b; 1992; 1993a, b; 1994a, b; 2004; 2009 2011; Küng/Schlensog 2008:64. 1 John 5:7; Blakney 1941:329.

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this seeming circumlocution – the double negation – was to avoid putting a verbal description on something that words could not possibly describe.44 It was in his doctrine of God that Eckhart went beyond the tolerance of his time, and perhaps beyond the capacity of ours.45 What Eckhart knew of himself and through himself, of all people in all times, and therefore what he discovered about God and the relations of God to humanity and of humanity to God: this was the gift he wished to give and did give most richly. Certainly, Eckhart lifted Christianity above any parochial conception and revealed its inner relation to the great, universal spiritual movements, which have found expression in many forms since at least the Axial Age.46 Influence In the view of the comparative, critical religiology, Eckhart’s greatest influence radiated from his German Sermons, which affected not only his contemporaries and immediate disciples, but also many German and European mystics after him in the late Middle Ages and in Modernity.47 In Germany, Eckhart’s disciples and brother Dominicans, Henry Suso and John Tauler, drew extensively from his dialectical thinking, even after the Roman authorities had condemned him twice.48 Cardinal Nicholas de Cusa, who could have accomplished the Reformation without disintegration, commented on Eckhart’s works in the fifthteenth century.49 In the 16th century, Martin Luther drew heavily from Eckhart by way of John Tauler, whom he admired unwaveringly from his youth 44 45

46

47 48 49

Blakney 1941:247, 329; Hegel 1986b: 536; p. 209; Horkheimer 1985g: chaps 23; 24; 25; 26; 27; 28; 29; 30; 31; 32; 33; 34; 37; 40; Fromm 1976 48–68. Blakney 1941 xiv; Hegel 1986a, p, q; Fromm 1992; 2001; Küng 1970; 1978; 1984; 1990b; 1991a, b; 1992; 1993a, b; 1994a, b; 2004; 2009 2011; Küng/Schlensog 2008:64; Metz 1959; 1962; 1963; 1965; 1967; 1970; 1972a, b; 1984; 1995; 1997; 1998; Metz/Habermas/Sölle 1994; Metz/Wiesel 1993. Blakney 1941: xiv, 247; Fox 1980; Quint 1969a, b; Pfeifer 1950; Benz 1969; Hegel 1986b: 536; p. 209; q; Horkheimer 1985g: chaps 23; 24; 25; 26; 27; 28; 29; 30; 31; 32; 33; 34; 37; 40; Fromm 1976:48–68; 1992; 2001; Marcuse 1960; 1970a; 1987; 2005; Küng 1991b; 1994a, b; 2004; Küng/ Ess/Stietencron/Bechert 1984; Küng/Homolka 2009; Küng/Kuschel 1993a, b; Kuschel/ Schlensog 2008:64. Blakney 1941; Fox 1980; Quint 1969a, b; Pfeifer 1950; Benz 1969; Hegel 1986a, p, q, Marcuse 1960; 1970a; 1978; 1987; 2005. Blakney 1941; Fox 1980:1–2; Hegel 1986b: 536; p; 209; q. Blakney 1941; Fox 1980:1–2; Nicholas de Cusa 1962; Lortz 1962: a, b 1964; Küng 1967; 1994a, b; 2009; Metz 1969; 1975b; 1977; 1978; 1980; 1995; 1997; 1998.

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to his final days.50 The Lutheran mystic, Jakob Boehme (1575–1620), owed much to Eckhart.51 The same is true of the radical mystical-political theologian Thomas Münzer, who was born in the same German province, Thüringia, as both Eckhart and Luther, and who became the intellectual ancestor not of the bourgeois, but rather of the socialist enlightenment movements and revolutions of the 18th, 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries.52 In England, the anonymous author of The Cloud of Unknowing, as well as Walter Hilton, and especially Julian of Norwich, demonstrated a significant debt to Eckhart. The work of the 17th century Polish mystical poet Angelus Silesius has been called a 17th century edition of Eckhart.53 Also, Eckhart influenced the fourteenth century Flemish mystic Jan van Ruysbroek. Through the intermediary of the Flemish mystics, Eckhart’s dialectical thought found its way anonymously even to Teresa of Avila and Saint John of the Cross, since the Spanish dominated the Netherlands, and the exchange of ideas was a regular one between the two countries. Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuit Order, is recognized to have known Eckhart’s dialectical mystical theology. His brother Jesuit, Peter Canisius, who edited John Tauler’s works in 1543, was also indebted to Eckhart. Saint Paul of the Cross, founder of the Passionist Order in the 18th century, owed much to Eckhart’s dialectical spirituality.

Idealists and Materialists

Modern philosophy, as represented by the 19th century idealist Friedrich W.J. Schelling, and his friend, the philosopher of evolving spirit, Hegel, the greatest of the German idealists, admitted an indebtedness to Eckhart.54 Eckhart has even been credited with being the father of German idealism.55 Baader, a Catholic student of mysticism, and according to Leo Löwenthal a religious

50 51

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53 54 55

Blakney 1941; Fox 1980:1–2; Lortz 1962a, b; Küng 1994 a, b. Blakney 1941; Fox 1980; Boehme 1938; 1962; 1992; 2005; Hegel 1986:534, 536; e: 122; h: 28; I: 30, 133; j: 293; k: 198, 227; q: 240, 244 r: 232; t: 64, 69, 70, 74–119, 142–143, 166, 182, 196, 252, 233, 256, 445. Engels 1962; 1967; Bloch 1960; 1970a, b; 1971a, b; 1975a–e; 2000; 2009; Bloch/Reif 1978; Lortz 1962:a, b; Küng 1994a, b; Boer 2012; Siebert 1965; 1979a–d; 1985; 1986; 1987a–d; 1989; 1993; 1994a–d; 1995; 2000; 2001; 2002a–c; 2004a–c; 2005a–f; 2007a–g. Blakney 1941; Fox 1980; Hegel 1986m: 478. Blakney 1941; Fox 1980:1–3; Hegel a:101; b:9–138; Jamme/Schneider 1984; Habermas 1990: chap. 1; 2005:188–189. Blakney 1941: xiii; Fox 1980.

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sociologist of sociology, reported that he was often with Hegel in Berlin.56 Once, Baader read to Hegel a passage from Eckhart. Baader was not aware that Hegel had become familiar with Eckhart already during his youth, namely, during his time in Bern and that already then he had made excerpts from his work.57 Baader thought that Eckhart had only been a name for Hegel before he introduced him to him.58 When Baader read the passage from Eckhart to Hegel, he was so excited by it that the next day, Hegel delivered to him a whole lecture on Eckhart, which ended with: “There, indeed, we have what we want!”59 Hegel’s archenemy, and the father of modern metaphysical pessimism, Arthur Schopenhauer’s The World as Will and Representation shows the greatest familiarity with Eckhart’s writings.60 Max Horkheimer started his philosophical life by reading Schopenhauer after his life-long friend Friedrich Pollock introduced him to the great philosopher before the start of World War I. Horkheimer was connected with Meister Eckhart first through Schopenhauer, and only much later through Marx and Fromm.61 Also Sigmund Freud, the teacher of Fromm and Thomas Mann, the friend of Theodor W. Adorno, became Schopenhaurians, and were thus connected with Eckhart.62 Ernst Bloch and Fromm invoked Eckhart as a forerunner of the spirit of Marx and Freud.63 Horkheimer and Theodor W. Adorno were certainly not too far removed from Eckhart and Hegel, when they defined theology as the longing for the imageless and nameless, totally Other as the Truth and as the Negation of all negativity – for example, abandonment, alienation, and injustice, and all the other perils of human existence; 56 57 58 59 60

61 62 63

Blakney 1941: xiii; Fox 1980; Benjamin 1950; 1955a–c; 1968: chaps 10; 11; Löwenthal 1965; 1966; 1970; 1980; 1987; 1989; 1990a, b; Löwith 1967. Hegel 1972; 1979; 1986a, b: 536; c; p: 209; Siebert 1987:30. Hegel 1986b: 536; p:309; Blakney 1941: xiii; Benjamin 1950; 1955a–c; 1968: chaps 10; 11; Fromm 1976:48–68; Löwenthal 1965; 1966; 1970; 1980; 1987; 1989; 1990a, b. Blakney 1941: xiii; Fox 1980; Hegel 1986b: 536; p: 209. Blakney 1941: xiii; Fox 1980; Schopenhauer 1946; 1977; 1989; Horkheimer 1985g: chaps. 4; 9; 21. The same is true of the work of Baruch Spinoza. Blakney 1941: xiii; Fox 1980; Hegel a:74; b: 10, 37,106, 196, 229–230, 265, 327, 339–352, 339–341, 345 351, 401, 409–410. Blakney 1941; Fox 1980:1–2. Adorno/Mann 2003. Blakney 1941; Fox 1980:1–2; Marx 1871; 1906; 1951; 1953; 1956; 1961a–c; 1963; 1964; 1974; 1977: Marx/Engels 1953a–c; 1960; 2005; Freud 1939; 1946; 1955; 1962a, b; 1964; 1969; 1977; 1992; 1993; 1995a, b; Bloch 1960; 1970a, b; 1971a, b; 1975a–c; 1979; 1985a–e; 2000; 2009; Fromm 1932a, b; 1950; 1956; 1957; 1959; 1961; 1964; 1966a, b; 1967; 1968; 1970a, b; 1972a, b; 1973; 1974; 1975; 1976; 1980b; 1981; 1990a, b; 1992; 1995; 1997; 1999; 201; Fromm (ed.) 1960c; Fromm/Suzuki/Martino 1960; Marcuse 1960; 1961; 1962; 1970a;1980a, b1995; 2001; Reich 1971;1976; Küng 1978.

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or as yearning for perfect justice and unconditional love; or as hope, that the murderer shall not triumph over the innocent victim, at least not ultimately.64 Protest Erich Fromm has pointed out that already one of the main themes of the Hebrew Bible had been: leave what you have; free yourself from all fetters: be.65 In Fromm’s view, the New Testament continued the Hebrew Bible’s protest against the structure of having.66 Its protest was even more radical than the earlier Jewish protest had been, since it came from the lower social classes: from the poor and socially despised, from the downtrodden and outcasts, who like some of the old Hebrew Prophets castigated the rich and powerful and denounced without compromise wealth and secular and priestly power as unmitigated evils.67 The Sermon on the Mount was the speech of a great slave rebellion. The classic source for Eckhart’s views on the mode of having is his sermon on poverty based on the Sermon the Mount. Eckhart does not want to speak of external but rather of internal poverty referred to by Matthew rather than by Luke, which he defines by saying: He is a poor man who wants nothing, knows nothing and has nothing.68 According to Fromm, Eckhart used being in two different, though related, ways and meanings.69 In a narrower psychological sense, being denoted the real and often unconscious motivations that impel human beings, in contrast to deeds and opinions that separated them from the acting and thinking person. The second meaning is wider and more fundamental: being is life, activity, birth, renewal, out pouring, flowing out, and productivity. In this sense, being is the very opposite of having – of ego boundness, egotism, egoism, and narcissism. Being means to be active in the classic sense of the productive expression of one’s human powers, not in the modern sense of being or keeping busy. Today in the early twenty-first century, Catholic priests and even Bishop Gumbleton in Detroit continue the protest of the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament, Eckhart, and Fromm against the structure of having, when they call capitalism, the private appropriation of 64 65 66 67 68 69

Horkheimer 1985g: chaps 37; 40; Habermas 1962; 1978a; 1986. Blakney 1941; Fox 1980; Fromm 1976:48. Matthew 5–7; Luke 6; Acts 2:42–47; 4:32–35; Fromm 1976:53–54. Fromm 1976:53–54; 1992. Fromm 1976:60–65. Fromm 1976:64–65.

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collective labor, the most morally evil economic system ever invented and developed by man.70

Cain and Abel

However, Horkheimer was not the only one devoted throughout his intellectual and political life to the Eckhart-influenced Schopenhauer, but also the critical theorists’ deadly enemy, Adolf Hitler, carried his work in his backpack as a soldier in World War I.71 Hitler and Joseph Goebbels discussed Schopenhauer up to their last days in Berlin in 1945.72 Mysticism, like Mother Eve, has two kinds of children, Abel and Cain.73 For the Abel-kind, almost everything good is to be said. For the Cain-kind, almost everything evil is to be said. Out of mysticism the great life giving, biophilous impulses of civilization have come. However, out of the mysticism of the Cain-kind, necrophilous tendencies have come, and the National Socialist movement of Germany, and fascism were also born: a Satanic dialectic.74 According to the National Socialists, Eckhart was a member of their party in good standing. Alfred Rosenberg, the author of The Myth of the Twentieth Century, praised Eckhart, saying that the springs of National Socialism were to be found in the fourteenth century mystic Eckhart’s teachings. In his essay of 1940, Germany’s New Religion, Wilhelm Hauer professed to be a disciple of Eckhart, or at least in sympathy with him, and therefore he too, yearned for a God, who was more than God.75 In the twentieth century, Martin Heidegger, formerly a Catholic theologian and later a fascist thinker, not only called Eckhart a master of letter and life, but took even one of the famous words Eckhart had invented, Gelassenheit – “letting be” – as a title for an address delivered in Germany in 1955, 11 years after the end of World War II, when he was still under harsh criticism because of his National Socialism, from which he never converted, just like Carl Schmitt, Hitler’s jurist and political theologian, or Mircea Eliade, the phenomenologist of religion, who belonged to the extremely Anti-Semitic Rumanian Iron Guard, and who 70 71 72 73 74 75

Blakney 1941; Fox 1980; Fromm 1957; 1959; 1961; 1966b; 1967; 1970a, b; 1972b; 1973; 1974; 1975; 1976; 1980a, b; 1981; 1980a, b; 1992; 1995; 1999; 2001 Fromm (ed.) 1966; Moore 2009. Schopenhauer 1946; 1977; 1989; Hitler 1943:305; 1986:131; Trevor-Roper 2000:89, 358; Groh 1998; Bessel 2001; Mehring 1992; Meier 1994. Fest/Eichinger 2002. Genesis 1–3; Blakney 1941: xv; Horkheimer 1974:288–289. Blakney 1941:xv; Hitler 1943; 1986; Trever-Roper 2000. Genesis 1–3; Blakney 1941: xv.

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wrote 50 articles in favor of Franco, and other fascist leaders: they all never distanced themselves from fascism up to their death.76 Carl Gustav Jung, who in his fascist period created an Aryan psychology in opposition to the Semitic psychoanalysis of his great teacher Freud, and who saw in Hitler a symbol of the archetype of Self, confessed that Eckhart offered him the key to opening the way to grasp what liberation meant in a psychological context. Jung wrote: The art of letting things happen, action through non-action, letting go of oneself, as taught by Meister Eckhart, became for me the key opening the door to the way. We must be able to let things happen in the psyche. For us, this actually is an art of which few people know anything. Consciousness is forever interfering…77 From Freud’s enlightenment formula, where Id is, Ego should be, Jung regressed to the romantic, anti-enlightenment principle: where Ego is, Id should be. After World War II and the defeat of fascism, Jung distant himself from it and then discovered that the Germans had projected the shadow of the archetype of Self on the Jews, and therefore had tried to annihilate them in Auschwitz and Treblinka, and elsewhere. While Cain too was a mystic, Cain-mysticism was not the fault of Eckhart. It merely illustrated in fascist Germany and Europe, how great an error can be made using a noble name to support a partisan purpose, when those who use it have learned nothing from him who bore it. Tillich, the friend of Horkheimer and the teacher of Adorno, without whom Horkheimer could never have become the director of the Institute of Social Research, was deeply frustrated when he discovered that one of his important biblical categories – kairos – was also used by fascist theoreticians.78 For his friends, Hitler was the great phenomenologist, who also always knew the right time, when to act politically and historically.79 76

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Blakney 1941; Fox 1980:1–2:213–223, 226–273; Heidegger 1968; 2001; Groh 1998; Meier 1994; Mehring 1992; Eliade 1961; Adorno 1997b; c: e: 347–380; h: 354–372, 397–407, 408–433, 578–587; i/1:7–141,145–509; i/2:11–120,127–324; Holloway, etc. 2009; Apostolidis 2000; Guardini 1925; 1935; 1948; 1952. Blakney 1942; Fox 1980:2; 213–225; Freud 1931; 1939; 1946; 1955; 1962a, b; 1964; 1992; Jung 1933; 1958; 1966; 1990; Fromm 1932a, b; 1950; 1956; 1957; 1959; 1961; 1966b; 1967; 1970b; 1972b; 1973; 1976; 1980b; 1992. John 7:6–7; Tillich 1921; 1929; 1933; Horkheimer 1985g; chaps 23–29; 37; 40; Vollgraf/Sperl/ Hecker 2000. Hitler 1943:305; 1986:131; Trevor-Roper 2000:89, 358; Groh 1998; Bessel 2001; Mehring 1992; Meier 1994.

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Far Eastern Religions

Asian scholars like D.T. Suzuki, a friend of Fromm, spoke of the closeness of Eckhart’s dialectical way of thinking to that of Mahayana Buddhism, especially of Zen Buddhism.80 S. Ueda from Kyoto said that Eckhart broke the sound barrier of the normal intellectual world of Christianity, and thereby entered into the world of Zen. The Trappist Thomas Merton agreed, saying that whatever Zen may be, however you define it, it is somehow there in Eckhart.81 Merton confessed to having been entranced by Eckhart. It can be documented that Merton’s conversion from being a Romantic, dualistic, Augustinian-minded monk in the 1950s to being a prophetic Christian in the 1960s occurred while he was studying Zen and Eckhart. Hindu scholar Ananda Coomaraswamy compared Eckhart to Vedantist traditions. Certainly Eckhart lifted Christianity above any parochial conception and revealed its inner relation to the great, universal spiritual movements.82 Eckhart lived on the same highlands of the spirit that were disclosed in the Upanishads and Sufi classics. To go where Eckhart went, is to come close to Lao Tse and Buddha, and certainly to Jesus of Nazareth. To be sure, the religions that have grown up around these great thinkers fall with time, each into their own positive parochial form and idiom, and each acquires its own crust, its own shell that encases one or two germs of the one universal life. Yet, Eckhart stated in Thüringian dialect: “Wiltu den kernen haben, so muostu die schalen brechen.” Eckhart was a breaker of shells, not as an iconoclast breaks them, but as life breaks its shells by its own insurgent power. It was from Eckhart, that his great successor, Hegel, learned to break the shell and to penetrate through the bark of things into their very core – their dialectical notion: the self-particularizing and self-alienating, as well as self-singularizing and self-reconciling Universal.83

Spiritual Seekers

The Quaker mystic Rufus Jones acknowledged a debt to Eckhart as well he should, for Quaker founder George Fox was in many ways influenced by Eckhart.84 Jones’ notion of the spark of the soul seemed to be as little accidental 80 81 82 83 84

Fox 1980:2; Hegel 1986p; Fromm 1950; 1956; 1957; 1959; 1961; 1964; 1966a, b; 1967; 1970a, b; 1974; 1976; Fromm/Suzuki/Martino 1960; Küng/Ess/Stietencron/Bechert 1984. Blakney 1941; Fox 1982; Merton 1963; 1978. Hegel 1986p, q; Blakney 1941; Fox 1980:2. Blakney 1941; Fox 1980; Hegel 1964; 1965; 1986a, c, e–j, l, p, q. Blakney 1941; Fox 1980:2.

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as Fox’s. The Hegelian Josiah Royce and Rudolf Otto also revived Eckhartian studies inside of Christian theological circles.85 In the twentieth century American letters, the writers Saul Bellow, John Updike, and Annie Dillard, as well as spiritual seekers such as Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Alan Watts, and Intensive Journal guru Ira Progoff have made extensive use of Eckhart. He attracted theologians and Marxists, and even fascist philosophers and psychologists, Zen thinkers and Hindu scholars, Polish poets and American novelists. Eckhart has a universalist appeal. Eckhart’s dialectical intellectuality and spirituality seems to be uniquely suited for an age of the global village, and of ecumenism of all world religions.86 Of course, all these debts to Eckhart go back much further than just to him. The debt goes back to the Greek and Roman classic writers of Antiquity, to the Torah and the New Testament, to Greek and Latin Church Fathers, and to the Scholastics. The number of authorities that Eckhart quoted and used as springboards for his new dialectical thinking is amazing and overwhelming. Eckhart’s writings still affect all those people in the twenthy-first century, who are seeking guidance to a non-dualistic, nonascetic, non-authoritarian, non-dogmatic, non-theistic, and rational, yet religious, philosophy of life.87 According to Hegel, Adorno, and Habermas, the great world-religions belong to the history of human reason.88 In spite of the fact that Eckhart belonged to a pre-modern age, in which individual, family, society, state, history and religion, were less differentiated from each other, he can still help religious people from Western as well as Eastern religions, to enter the public sphere, and thus to have a therapeutic effect on members in liberal society by freeing them from the compulsion of having into being.89 By learning from Eckhart, as well as from Boehme and Hegel, to find the reflection of his trinitarian notion and logic of God in nature as well as in man, family, society, state, history, and religion, religious people can try to overcome dialectically in a new way the still growing, modern, abyss-like dualism between the internal and the external world, between the sacred and the profane.90 Religious people can still learn from Eckhart how to deduct from the logic of 85 86 87 88 89 90

Otto 1969; 1991. Blakney 1941; Fox 1980:2; Küng 1965; 1970; 1978; 1984; 1990b; 1991a, b; 1994a, b; 2004; 2009; 2011. Blakney 1941; Fox 1980; Fromm 1976; 59–65. Hegel 1986: p, q; Adorno/Kogon 1958a, b; Habermas 2001a; 2002; 2004b, c; 2005:12–13; chaps 1; 5; 7; 2006a, b; 2007; 2011a. Blakney 1941; Fox 1980; Fromm 1950; 1956; 1957; 1959; 1961; 1964; 1966a, b; 1967; 1968; 1970a, b; 1972a, b; 1976; 2001. Blakney 1941; Fox 1980; Hegel 1986: a–t.

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the Creator God, reflected in his creation, in nature and man, values and norms by which they can judge, what in modern liberal, socialist, or fascist society ought not to be, and thus should be changed through political praxis.91 Eckhart can help them to modify at least Post-Modern, alternative Future I – the onedimensional, totally administered society, and to resist Post-Modern, alternative Future II – the entirely militarized society, and to move toward Post-Modern, alternative Future III – a sane, humanist-socialist world, in which being is more important than having.92

Against Opium Religion

The question, who was more competent for Marxism, the young or the old Marx, who called religion opium of the people besides the outcry of the oppressed creature and the heart of a heartless world, may not let come to rest those people, who with anger or with malicious delight would like to discover contradictions in historical materialism.93 Before Marx, Hegel had called Hinduism, the Religion of Imagination, alone the opium of the people.94 Marx generalized the notion and applied it to all religions. Before Marx and Hegel, Kant had called opium a religion, which consoled people in such a way that it did not sharpen, but rather dulled their conscience in the face of horrible injustices.95 In the view of the critical theory of religion, today in America, Christians may face urban slums or over one million casualties in Iraq and Afghanistan, mostly collateral damage, with a quiet and undisturbed conscience, by simply saying: Christ is my Savior. For Kant, while bad religion was opium for the conscience, good religion sharpened it. In terms of the critical theory, a good religion may 91

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93 94 95

Ballney 1941; Fox 1980; Hegel 1986a–t; Horkheimer 1970; 1985g: chaps 37; 40; Küng 1970; 1978; 1980; 1981a, b; 1984; 1990a, b; 1991a, b; 1992; 1994a, b; 1998; 2003; 2004; 2009; 2011; Küng/ Homolka 2009; Küng/Kuschel 1993a, b. Blakney 1941; 1980; Hegel 1986g, l, p, q; Huxley 1968; Adorno 1997a/1:47–71,72–96, 97–122, 254–288; Horkheimer 1985g; Fromm 1950; 1956; 1957; 1959; 1961; 1964; 1966a, b; 1967; 1968; 1970a, b; 1972a, b; 1976; 1980a, b; 1981; 1990a, b; 1992; 1995; 1997; 1999; 2001; Fromm (ed.) 1966c; Eggebrecht 1980; Macuse 1960; 1961; 1962; 1965; 1967; 1969a, b; Eggebrecht 1980; Flechtheim 1959; 1962; 1963; 1966; 1971; Flechtheim/Lohmann 2003; Habermas 1962; 1969; 1970; 1976; Honneth 1985; 1990; 1993; 1996; 2000; 2001; 2002a, b; 2004; 2005; 2007; 2011; Honneth/Joas 2002; Fraser/Honneth 2005; Hedges 2003; Hedges/Sacco 2012. Marcuse 1960; 1961; 1962; 1965; 1967; 1969a, b; 1970a, b; Habermas 1962; 1969; 1970; 1971; 1975; 1976; 1977; 1978a, c, d; 1985a. Hegel 1986p, q. Matthew 5–7; Kant 1974:3–99.

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genuinely console as well as sharpen the conscience at the same time.96 According to Kant, morality lead indispensably and vitally to religion.97 Through religion morality broadened itself to the idea of a powerful moral lawgiver outside of humanity. In Kant’s view, in the will of this moral lawgiver, precisely that which was the ultimate purpose of the creation of the world, could also be at the same time, and ought to be, the ultimate goal of humanity.98 For Kant, the sentence: “There is a God, and therefore there is a highest good in the world” was as an article of faith, and was merely to originate out of morality, a synthetical apriori sentence.99 This synthetical apriori sentence, in spite of the fact that it was assumed only in a practical relationship, nevertheless, went beyond the notion of duty, which morality contained, and which presupposed no matter of arbitrariness, but rather merely formal laws of morality. Therefore, the sentence There is a God and therefore there is a highest good, could not be developed analytically out of the notion of duty or morality. Kant asked, how such a sentence a priori was possible? Kant had to admit that the agreement with the mere idea of a moral lawgiver of all human beings was identical with the moral notion of duty as such. Insofar as this was the case, the sentence There is a God, and therefore there is a highest good, which demanded this agreement, would be analytical. However, so Kant insisted and argued, the assumption of the existence of such a moral lawgiver said more than the mere possibility of such an object. Yet, in any case, for Kant not only morality, but also religion was not a matter of pure reason, but rather of practical reason. There was no moral or any other proof for the existence of God, but morality was not possible without at least the postulate of God, as well as of freedom, and immortality. Along with Rudolf Otto, Karl Barth, and Ernst Bloch, Adorno and Horkheimer, informed by Kant, inverted and translated this postulate of the existence of God into the longing for the utterly Other than the phenomenal world with all its injustices.100 With Gaunilon and his Fool, more than with Anselm of Canterbury and his Proslogium, Monologium, and Cur Deus Homo, and more with Kant and Schopenhauer than with Hegel, the critical theorists of society stood in the apopathic rather than in the kataphatic tradition, and walked more the via negativa than the via positiva: toward the radically transcendent Theos 96 97 98 99 100

Blakney 1941; Fox 1980; Hegel 1986p; q; Gutierrez 1973; 1988; Berrigan 1978. Kant 1974:7–8; Hegel 1986a, g, l, p, q; Horkheimer 1970d; 1985g: chaps 37; 40. Kant 1974:7–8; Hegel 1986a, g, l, p, q. Kant 1974:7–8; Hegel 1986a, g, l, p, q. Kant 1974:7–8; Hegel 11986a, g, l, p, q; Otto 1969; 1991; Bloch 1960; 1970a, b; 1971a, b; 2000; 2009; Horkheimer 1985g: chap 3; 4; 9; 13; 14; 15; 16; 17; 18; 19; 20; 21; 25; 26; 27; 28; 29; 30; 32; 34; 37; 40; Benjamin 1977: chaps. 10; 11.

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agnotos.101 Hegel had, like Eckehart before, dialectically combined the cataphatic and the apophatic tradition and the via positiva and the via negative.102

The Murder of the Poor Man

While the younger Marx still stood with the Torah, the New Testament, and Hegel in the cataphatic tradition, the older Marx moved with Kant and Hegel into the apophatic one.103 Yet, even the older Marx still quoted in The Capital and other writings not only Kant and Hegel, but also the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament.104 The older Marx also still took his children to church in London, in order to listen to the music. When his children asked Marx what the music was all about, he answered that there was once a poor man, and that the rich people murdered him.105 The older Marx also indignantly still asked the London bourgeoisie: why do you make a liar out of him – Jesus of Nazareth – with every word you say, and with every deed you do. In the view of the critical theory of religion, the rich – slaveholders, as well as feudal lords, and capitalists – have never stopped murdering the poor ever since.106 For Horkheimer, informed by the younger and the older Marx, Jesus died for all human beings.107 He could not avariciously hold himself back for himself. Jesus belonged to all that suffered. According to Horkheimer, the Greek and Roman Church Fathers made out of this self-giving death of Jesus of Nazareth a religion.108 They made out of his self-sacrificial death a teaching, which was a 101 Genesis 1–2; Exodus 20; Acts 17; Anselm of Canterbury 1962; Blakney 1941; Fox 1980. 102 Blakney 1941; Fox 1980; Hegel 1896; 1964; 1965; 1969; 1972; 1976; 1979; 1986a–c, e–j, l, p, q; Horkheimer 1967:252, 259–261, 311–312; Horkheimer/Adorno 1969:29–30. 103 Genesis 1–2; Exodus 1–2; 20; Acts 17; Isaiah 11; 61–66; John 1; Revelation 21–22; Kant 1929; 1946; 1968; 1970; 1974a, b; 1975; Hegel 1986:a c, g, l, p, q, Marx 1961c:873–874; Horkheimer 1932; 1936; 1966; 1967a, b; 1970d; 1985g: chaps. 37; 40. 104 Kant 1929; 1946; 1968; 1970; 1974a, b; 1975; Hegel 1986:a c, g, l, p, q, Marx1871; 1906; 1951; 1953; 1956; 1961a, b, c: 873–874; Lischer1979; Norris 1974. 105 Matthew 26–28; Marx1871; 1906; 1951; 1953; 1956; 1961a, b, c: 873–874; Lischer1979; Norris 1974; Fromm 1992; Reich 1971; 1976; Zizek 2007; 2009; 2012; Zizek/Milbank 2008; Zizek/ Gunjevic 2012; Zizek/Crockett/David 2012. 106 Hegel 1986a–g, l; Marx 1961a–c; Zizek/Crockett/David 2012; Metz 1980; 1995; Gutierrez 1973; 1988; Siebert 2010b; 2012a–c. 107 Matthew 26–28; Horkheimer 1974:96–97. 108 Matthew 26–28; Horkheimer 1974:96–97; Lortz 1962a, b; 1964; Küng 1965; 1970; 1976; 1978; 1982; 1984; 1987; 1989; 1990a, b; 1991a, b; 1992; 1993a, b; 1994a, b; 2003; 2009; 2011; Metz 1965; 1969; 1977; 1980; 1981; 1984; 1995; 1997; 1998.

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consolation also still for the evil people without a conscience, or a dull one. In Horkheimer’s view, since then this religion has been so successful in the world, that the thought of Jesus has no longer anything to do with the actions of the people, and certainly not with their immense suffering.109 In Horkheimer’s view, whoever read the Evangelium and did not see that Jesus died against his present day representatives, could not read at all.110 This theology was the most furious, fierce, and severe scorn and sheer mockery that has ever happened to any thought. Finally, after many internal struggles, the early Church accepted soldiers into its community. The Church did not yet bless the murder weapons of two hostile armies, or, so the critical theorist of religion may add – the atomic bombs to be dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The religion that appealed to Jesus of Nazareth, redirected the spiritual energies that had been awakened through his unheard of deed of self-giving, which broke through the coldness of the ancient world, from mimesis to cult, from action to adoration.111 However, if that had not happened, so Horkheimer had to admit, Jesus would probably have been forgotten, and his followers would have wasted themselves. They would have gone under in darkness. Instead of an economically and politically successful organization, which was also not poor in educational results, nothing would have remained. The good and bad deeds and institutions of Christianity would not have been written down in any history book. Jesus would have remained right with what he spoke before Pilate, the Roman Governor of Palestine, a notorious mass murderer, shortly before his execution: Mine is not a kingdom of this world; if my kingdom were of this world, my men would have fought to prevent my being surrendered to the Jews. But my kingdom is not of this kind.112 Horkheimer did not dare to say what would have been better: total forgetfulness or ecclesiastical distortion. The critical theory of religion prefers distortion to complete forgetfulness, since the former still allows at least some remembrance of the truth that Jesus confessed before Pilate, the skeptical Roman judge: 109 Schopenhauer 1946; 1977; 1988; Horkheimer 1970d; 1974:96–97; 1988a; 2006; Adorno 1997b. 110 Matthew 5–7; 26–28; Luke 6; 22–24; Hegel 1986q: 342 344; Schopenhauer 1946; 1977; 1988; Horkheimer 1974:96–97. 111 Matthew 26–28; Horkheimer 1974:96–97; Lortz 1962a, b; 1964; Küng 1965; 1970; 1976; 1978; 1982; 1984; 1987; 1989; 1990a, b; 1991a, b; 1992; 1993a, b; 1994a, b; 2003; 2009; 2011; Metz 1965; 1969; 1977; 1980; 1981; 1984; 1995; 1997; 1998. 112 John 18:28–40; Horkheimer 1974:96–97; Zizek/Crockett/David 2012.

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Yes, I am a king. I was born for this. I came into the world for this: to bear witness to the truth; and all who are on the side of the truth listen to my voice.113 On November 25, the Church celebrates the Feast of Christ, the King of the Universe.114 Like Fromm, Horkheimer saw in Jesus of Nazareth an extraordinary and exemplary man of being, rather than of having.115

Faith Idea

In 1969, Horkheimer differentiated between the critical theory of society and the Christian faith idea.116 Horkheimer admitted that his, Adorno’s, and Fromm’s idea, which was to express in the face of the positive sciences as well as of the whole historical situation after Auschwitz, the notion of an all-mighty and all-benevolent Being no longer as dogma but rather as an X-experience, or as longing for the imageless and nameless utterly Other, so that the horrible events, the injustice of the previous world history would not be the ultimate fate of the victims, seemed to come close to the Protestant, more precisely the Calvinistic solution of the theodicy problem through the central role of the faith idea.117 However, according to Horkheimer, the essential difference between the critical theory of society and the Protestant faith idea consisted in that faith was expected to accept all too many hard to digest representations, as, for example, the idea of the Trinity; and that it was connected with an authoritarian coercion, which could almost no longer be recognized; and that it became in spite of all protest once again a dogma. Horkheimer explained through those aspects of the Protestant faith idea the tendency toward an aggression, which understood itself as being religious.118 According to 113 John 18:28–40; Hegel 1986 q: 218–346, 347–536; Horkheimer 1970d; 1985g: chaps. 17; 27; 28; 29; 37; 40; Metz 1970; 1972a, b; 1973a–c; 1977; 1978; 1980; 1981; 1985; 1986; 1987; 1995; 1997; 1998; Metz/Wiesel 1993. 114 John 1; 18:28–40. 115 Matthew 5–7; Luke 6; Horkheimer 1974:96–97; Fromm 1932a, b; 1950; 1956; 1957; 1959; 1961; 1964; 1966a, b; 1967; 1968; 1970a, b; 1972a, b; 1973; 1974; 1975; 1976; 1980a, b; 1992; 1995; 1997; 1999; 2001; Reich 1971; 1976; Zizek/Crockett/David 2012. 116 Horkheimer 1974:218–219. 117 Bloch 1960; 1970a, b; 1971a, b; 2000; 2009; Horkheimer 1970d; 1974:218–219; 1985g: chaps 37; 40; Barth 1950; 1959; Otto 1969; 1991. 118 Bloch 1960; 1970a, b; 1971a, b; 2000; 2009; Horkheimer 1970d; 1974:218–219; 1985g: chaps 37; 40; Fromm 1966b; 1972b; 1973; 1992; Reich 1971; 1976; Barth 1950; 1959; Otto 1969; 1991.

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Horkheimer and Adorno, the key idea of the critical theory of society was a religious and a theological one: the longing that the murderer may not triumph over his innocent victim, at least not ultimately.119 The fundamental idea of the critical theory of society is connected to and rooted not only in Kant, Schelling, Hegel, Schopenhauer, Marx, Nietzsche, and Freud, but also, and even most of all in the three Abrahamic religions.120 According to Horkheimer, particularly the Jews felt themselves to be the chosen people because they were obligated as individuals and as a nation to the only God and to God’s righteousness.121 Through his will to justice, the Jew was the enemy of everything totalitarian on the Right, or on the Left, and precisely in that lay one of the roots of the global anti-Semitism in the past, as well as in the present – in 2012.122 In his letter of October 1, 2012, Edmund Arens, Professor at the University of Luzern, Switzerland, and former student not only of Johannes Baptist Metz, but also of Jürgen Habermas, has recognized that since the 1980s our teaching and research in the comparative, dialectical religiology has been faithful to the critical theory of society of Schopenhauer’s, Adorno’s and Fromm’s, as well as my own hometown Frankfurt a. M., and that we have developed it creatively further, and that we have passed on its not yet realized inheritance to the younger generations: particularly its religious key idea of the imageless and nameless utterly Other than the horror and terror of nature and history.123 This critical theory of religion has always been dialectically connected with pedagogical as well as political praxis of being rather than having in Europe as well as in America.124 At the same time, Professor Helmut Fritzsche, University of Rostock, Germany, admired our far reaching renewal of the critical theory of society and our contribution to the Christian, inter-religious discourse.125 He was sure that it would work as a milestone for the generations to come. He 119 Horkheimer 1979d; 1985g: chaps. 17; 23; 25; 26; 27; 28; 29; 30; 32; 37; 40. 120 Kant 1974a; Schelling 1977; Hegel 1986p, q; Schopenhauer 1946; 1977; 1989; Marx 1951; 1953; 1956; 1964; 1974; Kaufmann 1986; Freud 1939; 1946; 1962b; 1964; Niebuhr 1932; 1964; Horkheimer 1970d; 1985g: chap. 37; 40; 1985 l: 294–296; 1988c: chap 16; 1996s: 32–74; Fromm 1959; 1966b; 1967; 1970b; 1976; 1992; 2001; Marcuse 1960; 1970a; Küng 1991bl; 1994a, b; 2004; Arens 2012; Siebert 2010b; 2012a–d. 121 Exodus 20; Horkheimer 1985g: chaps. 37; 40; Fromm 1950; 1959; 1966b; 1967; 1970b; 1974; 1978; 1992; 1995; 2001; Marcuse 1960; 1970a; Küng 1991bl; 1994a, b; 2004; Arens 2012; Siebert 2010b; 2012a–d. 122 Horkheimer/Adorno 1972:168–208. 123 Exodus 20; Kant 1929; 1946; 1068; 1970; 1974: a, b; 1975; Hegel 2986p, q; Horkheimer 1985g: chap. 37; 40; 1996s: 32–74; Arens 2012; Siebert 2010b; 2012a–d. 124 Siebert 2010b; 2012a–d. 125 Fritzsche 2012.

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confirmed that all that we had been looking forward to for decades, concerning the community of fate between the modern civilization and religion, is happening now, and our call for a worldwide revival of religion seemed to him the most important matter in the world of spirit today. Furthermore, Professor Fritzsche wanted to bestow his high respect for our courage to address the concrete political, social, and caring issues of the day in our theoretical philosophical reflections. According to Professor Fritzsche, in contrast most of the authors today take pains to bypass the real world, and humanity’s real sufferings.126

The City of Being

As critical theory of religion, informed by Eckhart, Hegel, Marx and Freud, evolves further, it is concerned with the question whether a conversion to a humanistic religiosity without dogmas, authorities, institutions and asceticism can come into existence: love instead of asceticism.127 Such humanistic religiosity has been prepared for centuries through the non-theistic movements from Buddhism to Marxism and Freudianism. According to the comparative dialectical religiology, in the present world historical transition period from Modernity to Post-Modernity, people do not stand before the alternative to become victims of a culture industry and mass culture characterized by sex, car, and career, on one hand, and the acceptance of the Abrahamic notion of God, as it appears in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.128 The new humanistic religiosity may develop in family, society, state, history, and culture, without the need for a separate religious organization. The demand for a new non-theistic, non-dogmatic, non-ascetic, non-institutionalized humanistic religiosity is not directed against believers of the great, traditional world-religions, in so far as they experience authentically the humanistic core of their faith, and sharpen the conscience. The demand for a new humanistic religiosity is not an attack against the traditional religions. It is, however, an appeal to the Abrahamic religions to return to the spirit of their first paradigms: for example, to the Roman Catholic Church to convert itself from the Roman bureaucracy to the spirit of the Evangelium, as promised in the Second Vatican Council. The demand for a new humanistic religiosity does not mean that the former socialist countries in 126 Horkheimer 1974:552–553; Fritzsche 2012. 127 Fox 1989:243; Fromm 2001:192–193; Siebert 2010b; 2012a–c. 128 Fox 1989:243; Horkheimer/Adorno 120–167; Fromm 2001:192–193; Küng 1991b; 1994a, b; 2004.

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Eastern Europe remain de-socialized after the successful neo-liberal counterrevolution of 1989, but rather that the former bureaucratic socialism, not to speak of red fascism, will be replaced in the future by a genuine humanistic socialism.129 The goal of the new humanistic religiology is Post-Modern alternative Future III – the City of Being.130 In this City of Being is concretely superseded the Catholic vision of the City of God, which inspired the Medieval culture.131 In the City of Being is also determinately negated the vision of the earthly City of Progress, which energized the people in Modernity. Since the twentieth century, particularly since the end of World War I, this vision of the City of Progress has taken on characteristics of the Tower of Babel, which in the twenty-first century seems to move from one crisis to the other, and may finally collapse and bury the people under its ruins.132 When in terms of the Hegelian and Marxian dialectical logic the heavenly City of God and the earthly City of Progress represented thesis and antithesis, then a new synthesis is the only alternative to chaos and barbarism.133 The new synthesis is The City of Being. It is the synthesis between the internal and the external world; between the sacred and the profane; between the religious core of the Medieval culture, and the development of the modern world with its scientific thinking and its emphasis on the individual, since the Renaissance and the Reformation; between personal autonomy and universal, i.e. anamnestic, present, and proleptic solidarity; and also between having and being: having concretely superseded in being.134 129 130 131 132 133

Fromm (ed.) 1966; 2001. Fromm 2001:192–193. Küng 1994a, b. Genesis 11:1–9; Fromm 1966b; 2001:192–193. Hegel 1896; 1964; 1965 1969; 1976; 1979; 1986: a–j; Marx 1961a:17–18; 1985l: 286–287; Benjamin 1977:252–253; Fromm 1966b; 2001:192–193. 134 Genesis 1–2; Exodus 20; Acts 17; John 1; Blakney 1941; Fox 1980:251–265; Quint 1969a, b; Pfeifer 1950; Benz 1969; Hegel 1986a, p, q: 342–344r–t; Marx 1906; 1951; 1953; 1961c: 873–874; 1956; 1964; 1974; Marx/Engels 1953a–c; 1955; 1960; 2005; Niebuhr 1932; 1964; Horkheimer/ Fromm/Marcuse 1936; Fromm 1966b; 1976; 2001:192–193; Fromm/Xirau 1979; Flechtheim 1959; 1962; 1963; 1966; 1971; Flechtheim/Lohmann 2003; Jung 1933; 1958; 1966; 1990; Habermas 1962; 1969; 1970; 1971; 1976; 1977; 1978a–d; 1982; 1986; Mendieta 2002; 2005; Siebert 2001; 2002a; 2010b; 2012a–c.

Chapter 2

The Migration of Religious Longing for the “Other” into the Historical Materialist Critical Theory of Utopia in the Thought of Theodor W. Adorno and Ernst Bloch Michael R. Ott In a 1964 public discourse between Theodor W. Adorno and Ernst Bloch on the topic of the contradictions of utopian longing (Bloch 1988:1–17), Adorno stated that Bloch was the one responsible for restoring honor to the notion and critical relevancy of “utopia.” Almost 50 years after Adorno made this statement, however, the social relevancy and validity of utopic thinking has not improved. Utopia, as that future-oriented, religious and/or secular expression of a society so organized as to put to an end to the horror of humanity’s ­pre-history through the production and reproduction of itself in all of its structures for the well-being and happiness of all its people, as well as that of nature, is still disparaged and remains all but forgotten. Because of its revolutionary potential, especially in the midst of the contemporary globalization of Western capitalist “interests” and of its corollary of military domination, the notion of utopia has been devalued strategically to the realm of culture in the forms of science fiction movies, video games, and/or narrative apocalyptic projections of the historically experienced horrors of class warfare, experienced particularly in the lives of the oppressed masses, into its completion in a totally administered, “iron cage” (Horkheimer & Adorno 1972; Adorno 1973, 1974, 2008; Weber 1958:181) future society – a dys – or cacotopia.1 In response to the increasingly deadly globalization of us led neoliberal, transnational corporate capitalism as well as of its equally deadly neoconservative covert and overt acts of espionage and wars for regime-change and 1 John Stuart Mill is credited with coining these terms in an 1868 speech before the British House of Commons in which he along with others denounced the British government’s Irish land policy. Among the numerous dystopia novels published since the beginning of the 20th century, the Critical Theorist Erich Fromm (1949:259 ftnt.) identified Jack London’s prediction of fascism in the United States in his 1908 published The Iron Heel as the first, modern negative utopia.

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2014 | doi 10.1163/9789004263147_004

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empire,2 this chapter raises anew the question of the critical relevancy today of the dialectics of utopia, understood as the humanistic and humanizing longing that has the potential of creating a historically grounded, revolutionary theory and praxis for that which is “not-yet,” for that which is “other” – if not also for the religiously conceived totally “Other,” the new creation of God. As an expression of resistance and alternative to this strategic historical and systemic debasement of the critical and liberating potential of utopic thinking and concrete, socio-historical action, this chapter addresses the dialectic of the religious and secular complexities of utopic thought and of its relevancy in any revolutionary struggle for a more reconciled and humanistic future global totality. The focus for this study is on the theoretical work on this topic by the critical theorist of the Frankfurt School, Theodor W. Adorno, and the Marxist philosopher, Ernst Bloch. As expressed throughout their prodigious philosophical writings, both theorists wrestled with the dialectic between the religious and the secular notions of utopia as well as with the dangerous contradictions and the critical possibilities for revolutionary social change in the theory and praxis of utopic thinking. It was due to their life long philosophical work that exposed, critiqued, and sought the revolutionary, determinate negation of modern, bourgeois civil/capitalist society and its progressive advancement into ever newer forms of barbarism that Adorno and Bloch met in a public discourse in 1964 to discuss their differing theoretical notions of utopic thinking and its concrete possibilities. This chapter gives an all too brief but important analysis of these two scholars dialectically divergent work on the religious and secular notion of utopia in the hope of making a contribution for the very needed rebirth of this revolutionary form of utopic theory and concrete praxis in the 21st century.

Religious Foundation of Utopia: Eschatology

Both Adorno and Bloch acknowledge that the modern, revolutionary, utopic longing for a better future in history is rooted in the myths, narratives, and teaching of the world religions. Particularly, the hope-filled utopic genre in time has its origins within Judaism’s and Christianity’s world-shattering 2 For example, see The National Security Strategy of the United States of America 2002, 2010 & 2013 Draft, as well as the text of the us President Barak Obama’s un General Assembly speech on September 24, 2013 (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/25/us/politics/text-of-obamas -speech-at-the-un.html?_r=0).

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prophetic, Messianic, eschatological/apocalyptic theodicy proclamations that announced God’s kairos: the Infinite breaking into the finite world-order and history to liberate and redeem the enslaved, the oppressed, the suffering, dying and dead, in order to bring an end to this barbaric pre-human history and create a good “new creation” in preparation for the coming of God’s kingdom (for example: Exodus 2:23-15:21; Deuteronomy 26:5b-10; Psalms 2, 9–10, 12, 14, 22, 33–34, etc.; Isaiah 9, 11, 60–66; Micah 4; Matthew 5–7; Luke 4:4–18; Acts 2:42–45, 4:32–35; Romans 8:18–25, 12:1–2; 2 Corinthians 5:17–21; Ephesians 4:17–24; Revelation 21:1–6; Horkheimer 1972b:129–187; Fromm 1992, 1966b; Bloch 1970b:118–141, 1972, 1986:I–III, 2000; Tillich 1926, 1968; Brown 1965; Moltmann 1967, 1969, 1996; Metz 1977, 1980b, 1981; Gutierrez 1973; Cardenal 1978, 1979, 1982; Zizek 2000; Ott 2001, 2007). As Bloch (1986:1193) states: And if the maxim that where hope is, religion is, is true, then Christianity, with its powerful starting point and its rich history of heresy, operates as if an essential nature of religion had finally come forth here. Namely that of being not static, apologetic myth, but humane-eschatological, explosively posited messianism. It is only here – stripped of illusion, godhypostases, taboo of the masters – that the only inherited substratum capable of significance in religion lives: that of being hope in totality, explosive hope. Particularly for Bloch, the Bible contains within itself a covert yet foundational underground, non-theocratic element of subversion, which biblical criticism and historical materialism has revealed. The biblical scriptures proclaim not only the Deus absconditus (the hidden, unknown God) but also the homo absconditus, the hidden or not-yet human being, who was originally expressed in terms of Eritis sicut deus scientes bonum et malum (“You shall be like gods knowing good and evil” – Genesis 3:5) to the later prophetic, Messianic notion of the “Son of Man” (Daniel 7:13; Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Revelation 1:13, 14:14). For Bloch (1972a:82), it is this hidden human being, who is the revolutionary substance of the Biblia pauperum (the paupers’ picture bible), that expresses the biblical intention of “overthrowing every state of affairs in which man appears as oppressed, despised and forgotten in his very being.” In the biblical Hebrew and New Testaments, it is this revolutionary underground intent that is the foundation for the creation of a utopia of religion’s non-mythical elements. Although this revolutionary, religious potential became reified in the dogmatic notion of God, the original biblical call for people’s covenant with this God for the sake of God and humanity’s mutual future gave expression to future-oriented essence or entelechy of

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humanity.3 For Bloch, the religious and secular utopic longing is “the pervading and above all only honest quality of human beings.” Christianity’s eschatological hope and revolutionary praxis for a new creation or new age in this world is the universalizing determinate negation (Aufhebung) – i.e., the negation, preservation, and furtherance – of Israel’s remembrance and hope of the liberating God of Exodus and the prophetic, Messianic promise of a time of peace, justice and integrity coming in which there will no longer be any type of predators and prey as the “the wolf will live with the lamb, the panther lies down with the kid, calf and lion cub feed together, with a little child to lead them” (Isaiah 11:6–9); wherein the weapons of war, domination, fear and death (swords, spears, guns, bombs, tanks, missiles, wmds) will be turned into instruments not of aggression and death but those that create life and happiness, e.g., plowshares, pruning hooks, universal health care systems, free education, etc. (Micah 4:3–4; Isaiah 2:3–4). The revolutionary, historical materialist theory and praxis of utopia is the continuation of this determinate negation as it is the secular translation or inversion of Christian eschatology and its social utopias (Bloch 1970b:118–141; 1972a; Adorno 1973:207; Fromm 1992:3–94, 95–106, 147–168, 203–212; 1966b; Ott 2001, 2007: 167–196, 273–306).

Doctrine of the Last Things

According to the German critical, political theologian Jürgen Moltmann (1967), Christian eschatology was long called the “doctrine of the last things” or the “doctrine of the end.” According to this doctrine, the “fallen,” pre-history of humanity will be brought to its end through God’s kairos – the dawning of God’s New Creation. As a result of this New Creation being the work of God and not humanity, eschatology was theologically pushed to the end of history and thus, increasingly was seen to have little if anything to say about life in the world. Christianity’s eschatological hope for God’s New Creation, has thus become little more than an embarrassing addendum to the Christian evangelion, and as such, has become increasingly irrelevant. Coupled with this, the more Christianity became an institution of the Roman Empire and thus a religious component of the Roman state religion, the more eschatology and its concrete, revolutionary, prophetic and Messianic purpose in history 3 See the biblical covenant calls to faith through which the faithful’s identity and future are open to the future in the dynamic relationship with their God: Abram (Genesis 12:1–9); Moses and the Hebrews in the Exodus (19:3–8); Jesus’ call to discipleship (Mark 8:34–9:1).

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was betrayed by the Church (Moltmann 1967, 1969, 1974, 1996; Metz 1980, 1981; Horkheimer 1972:129–131, 1974:34–50, 1985:385–404; Ott 2001, 2007:167–186; Reimer 2007:71–90). This demeaned and forgotten hope and praxis for a new and good future did not die out, however, but migrated into the struggle for a better future as expressed in the thought and action of revolutionary groups, e.g. the revolutionary Christian social utopianism of the thirteenth century Calabrian abbot Joachim di Fiore, the 16th century German radical reformer and Peasant War leader Thomas Münzer, Karl Marx and modern expressions of historical materialism, as well as the third-world base-Christian communities and the “Theology of Liberation,” etc. (Moltmann 1967, 1969, 1974, 1996; Metz 1973c, 1980b, 1981; Bloch 1970b:118–141; 1971a:54–105, 159–173; 1972a; 1972b; 1986a; Engels 1926; Gutierrez 1973, 1983; Cardenal 1976, 1978, 1979, 1982). Yet, in critically returning to the Hebrew and Christian biblical texts to confront the historical church’s betrayal of its own living and world-changing gospel – the dangerous, revolutionary memory, hope, and praxis of freedom in Jesus the Christ, critical, political theologians have made it clear that eschatology and its hope of a new future given by God is not the end but the beginning and dynamic, prophetic and Messianic purpose of Christianity (Metz 1980b, 1981; Moltmann 1967, 1969, 1974, 1996). One is not to worry about one’s life, about one’s need of food, drink, clothing, commodities, nor even about tomorrow, but rather is “to renounce oneself and pick up one’s cross” for the sake of the oppressed so as to negate the fearful power of the cross and of death itself by setting one’s “heart on (God’s) kingdom first, and on (God’s) righteousness” and by so doing “all these other (material needs) will be given you as well” in the new, future community of love, equity and shalom – the new society/ creation/history of which followers of Christ are to be “ambassadors” (Mark 8:34–38; Matthew 7:25–34, par. 33; 5:1–12; Acts 2: 42–47; 2 Corinthians 5:17–20; Romans 12:1–2; Ephesians 4:17–24; Colossians 3:9–11; 4:32–351 Peter 3:13–15; Revelation 21, 22). As Bloch (1970:118–125) stated, there is no other book that remembers the nomadic God of freedom over and against the static gods of place and time and describes the corresponding nomadic institutions of “primitive semi-communism” as does the Bible. A single line, full of curves but recognizable as one and the same, runs from the Nazarites’ memories of primitive semi-communism to the prophet’s preaching against wealth and tyranny and on to the early Christian communism of love (Acts 2, 4). In its background the line is almost unbroken; the famed prophetic depictions of a future kingdom of social peace reflect a Golden Age, which in this case was no mere legend. bloch 1970:119

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From the “Alpha” to the “Omega,” from the beginning to the end, Christianity is eschatology, an anamnestic and proleptic hope and praxis for the promised and redeemed future of humanity and God. Again, as Bloch stated …nowhere is the Omega of Christian utopianism so untranscendent and at the same time so all-transcending, as in the ‘New Jerusalem’ of Revelations 21, 22. Religion is full of utopianism, as is evident above all in the Omega which lies at its heart…This is a realm…where the world is totally transformed, so that (humanity) is no longer burdened with it as with a stranger.

Parousia Delay

It is this future-oriented hope for the Omega – the New Creation of God and humanity – that is the dynamic truth of Christianity that can lead to a revolutionary socio-historical praxis that transforms the present. However, it is also this promise of and hope for the coming of the Omega that confronts Christianity with its destructive theodicy problem: the parousia delay. In the gospel of Luke (9:27), Jesus told his disciples: “there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the kingdom of God.” It has been almost 2000 years since this statement was made and yet the end of the barbaric, pre-human history with the arrival of the Omega/kingdom of God has not happened. As history has shown, religions rise and fall in importance based on their ability to address convincingly and redemptively the theodicy question of the innocents’ suffering and dying in the world. Because of the delay of the parousia as Christianity’s theodicy answer, the very prophetic, Messianic and eschatological substance of the Christian evangelion – to defiantly pick up the revolutionary “cross” of the present in order to negate its systemic power and deadliness in the hope for the promised New Creation of God – ends up sharing the same fate today as that of utopia: as being little more than a irrelevant myth.

“The Spirit of Utopia”

It was with the publication of Bloch’s (2000) The Spirit of Utopia that the notion of utopia was re-introduced into academic and political discourse. Written in the midst of the horror of World War I, and published at the War’s end in 1918 and republished in 1923 – in the beginning years of the nascent Weimar

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Republic, Bloch’s book was a defiant philosophic, Messianic theological, and transcendental poetic proclamation of utopic hope in the midst of the latency of the revolutionary “not-yet.” that is located in the darkness of the present. So it goes without saying that even this: that we humans are, represents only an untrue form, to be considered only provisionally. …we are located in our own blind spot, in the darkness of the lived moment, whose darkness is ultimately our own darkness, being-unfamiliar–to-ourselves, beingenfolded, being-missing. … Yet – and this is of decisive importance – the future, the topos of the unknown within the future, where alone we occur, where alone, novel and profound, the function of hope also flashes, without the bleak reprise of some anamnesis – is itself nothing but our expanded darkness, than our darkness in the issue of its own womb, in the expansion of its latency. Just as in all the objects of this world, in the “nothing” around which they are made, that twilight, that latency, that essential amazement predominates where merge the reserve and yet the strange “presence” of seeds of gold blended into, hidden in leaves, animals, pieces of basalt; whereby precisely the very thing-in-itself everywhere is this, which is not yet, which actually stirs in the darkness, the blueness, at the heart of objects. bloch 2000: 200–201, emphasis in the text itself

In an article written in 1965, Adorno (1992:211–212) stated that he first read Bloch’s book in 1921 when he was an 18-year-old student and found that like a trumpet blast, it aroused such profound expectations as to bring traditional philosophy into suspicion of being shallow and unworthy of itself. Through Bloch’s book, as though “written by Nostradamus himself,” philosophy escaped “the curse of being official” and “calibrated to the abominable resignation of methodology.” Bloch’s book was seen to be one continuous protest against thought’s positivistic conformity to conventional patterns, and thus gave a “promise of heresy” in a double sense of being mystically explosive and thus, of going far beyond the ceremonial expectations of the established intellectual culture. Adorno was so moved by this, that “prior to any theoretical content,” he identified himself with Bloch’s critical intent and because of this, he did not believe that he ever wrote anything without either an implicit or explicit reference to this book. For Adorno, what is specific to Bloch’s entire philosophy is his emphasis on “the gesture” toward that which is other than what is. This gesture is the dynamic potential within everything and is not to be understood as merely a subjective reference to the objective world. Bloch (1972:264–265) spoke of this also “as the un-assuaged, explosive hunger of the life-force,” as the

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search for meaning, for “the Not-yet of true human possession.” It is only in this pursuit for the fulfillment of humanity’s utopian needs that “the radical, subversive dream of the Bible” can be realized. This even applies to Bloch’s central and organizing notion of the messianic end of history and the corollary revolutionary praxis of historical transcendence. This dialectical, liberation theory of utopia, of the “not-yet,” of its hope and the possibility of its continual realization in a truly new socio-historical future birthed from within the hidden “darkness” of the given, capitalist class dominated “civil society” was the dynamic emphasis of all of Bloch’s writings. Yet, for all of Adorno’s praise of his friend’s work on the topic of utopia coming from within their shared dialectical methodology of historical materialism, there were fundamental differences in their theoretical understanding and approach to this important notion and its praxis.

Religious Migration

As heirs and critics of Hegel’s idealistic and Marx’s materialistic dialectical translations of religion into secular theory and praxis, both Adorno and Bloch also gave conflicting expression to the need for the religious to “migrate” into secular form. Both Adorno’s and Bloch’s dialectical theories are deeply grounded in and expressive of the historical materialist “inversion” of the Judaic and the Christian prophetic, Messianic and eschatological religious content. For both, their critical philosophy contained within itself religion as an inheritance, as the dialectical determinate negation of the religious into their critical, materialist logic and theory of critique and of revolutionary social transformation. Both theorists knew that if religion was to have anything of relevance and truth to contribute in critically addressing the increasing irrationality and barbarism of the capitalist system, the religious form – the language, dogma, rituals, symbols, institutions, reified traditions, etc. – would have to be translated into modern secular emancipatory language and praxis. It was Adorno who stated explicitly the need of the theological content of religion to migrate into modern secular form. In his article entitled “Reason and Revelation,” Adorno (1998:136) stated: If one does not want either to fall under the sway of the notion that whatever has long been well known is for that reason false, or to accommodate oneself to the current religious mood that – as peculiar as it is understandable – coincides with the prevailing positivism, then one would do best to remember Benjamin’s infinitely ironic description of theology,

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“which today as we know, is wizened and has to keep out of sight.” Nothing of theological content will persist without being transformed, every content will have to put itself to the test of migrating into the realm of the secular, the profane. Emphasis added by author

This dialectical transformation of religion into the secular critical theory of Max Horkheimer, Adorno, Benjamin, et al. is expressed by Adorno’s as an “inverse theology” into which, as he told Benjamin, he would “gladly see (their) thoughts dissolve” (Adorno and Benjamin 1999:66–67, 52–59 (par 53–54), 104–116, 116–120; Adorno 1973, 2008; Horkheimer and Adorno 1972). Like Horkheimer, Benjamin, and Marx, Adorno’s inverse theology is a radicalized application of the second and third Commandment of Judaism’s Decalogue against imaging or naming the sacred (Exodus 20:4–7). The second and third Commandments state: You shall not make yourself a carved image of any likeness of anything in heaven or on earth beneath or in the waters under the earth; you shall not bow down to them of serve them. For I, Yahweh your God, am a jealous God and I punish the father’s fault in the sons, the grandsons, and the great-grandsons of those who hate me’ but I show kindness to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments. exodus 20:4–6

You shall not utter the name of Yahweh your God to misuse it, for Yahweh will not leave unpunished the man who utters his name to misuse it. exodus 20:7

The critical theorists radicalized these commandments against any type of idolatry through the inversion of the religious faith in God into the secular, historical, critical longing for that which is “other” – if not totally “Other”/God – than the social and natural catastrophe produced throughout history by the dominant classes’ warfare on the powerless masses of humanity for their attainment of ever-more power and capital. It is this course of pre-human history that, in Adorno’s (1972:365ff) words, forces materialism upon metaphysics and religion, its traditionally conceived antithesis. Adorno (1972:365ff; 1998:191– 204; 1997b) explains that his modern dialectical synthesis of two formerly opposite forces is the result of the “Shoah,” summarized by the name of the largest Nazi extermination camp – “Auschwitz,” in which human reason was used instrumentally and strategically to create not the highest good but absolute evil through the systematic persecution and mass genocide of

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Jews, the mentally ill and disabled, gypsies, homosexuals, Christians of the non-conformist “Confessing Church,” protesting students – e.g. “The Edelweiss Pirates,” “The White Rose,” Communists, Socialists, and many other nationalities deemed “unworthy.” This monstrosity of the mind and of reason has produced a new categorical imperative for modernity: that Auschwitz never happens again (Adorno 1998:191–204). This horror is not to be reduced to a mere intellectual and moral discourse on what happened. The morality of this new imperative, imposed on modernity by Hitler and the Nazis, is rooted not in the mind but in the practical bodily pathos of solidarity with the innocent victims and thus, and an outrage against such barbarism ever happening again. As Adorno (1972:365ff) states, it is in such materialistically driven undistorted, genuine and practical solidarity with the innocent victims of history’s slaughter-bench that morality survives at all.

The Rise of Reason

According to Adorno (1974:238–244; 1972:23–24; 1973:207) the religious development of Monotheism was the rise of human consciousness through “‘judicious reason’ that had elevated itself to the notion of one God” that showed it to be to some degree more free of earlier forms of human submission to the power of nature. The “great,” prophetic, Messianic, eschatological religions of Judaism and Christianity are expressions of the rational development of humanity in its still rational pre-maturity. Both Judaism and Christianity – with its eschatological proclamation of the resurrection of the flesh at the dawning of the Kingdom of God – took very seriously the dialectical inseparability of the spiritual and physical. In the Jewish religion, the dialectical disenchantment of the world and thus, the advance of human consciousness beyond magic and myth is expressed in the second and third commandments prohibition of making any image of or pronouncing the name of God (Horkheimer & Adorno 1972:23–24). Judaism allows no word that would alleviate the despair of or bring consolation to that which is mortal. In Judaism, hope is expressed negatively in the ban against making anything finite into infinite; of making the lie into truth; of making the limited and thus, false into the Absolute. Humanity’s emancipation, happiness, redemption and salvation are dialectically conceived of as the rejection of anything that would replace this negative and thus, historically dynamic hope of the oppressed. It is for this reason, as Walter Benjamin (1968:253–264) and Yosef Haytim Yerushalmi (1996:5–26) have made clear, that Jews were not to be concerned about the future. The future and the coming of the Messiah was the concern of God alone.

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Rather, in resistance against losing the historical foundation and identity of Israel’s covenantal faith with Yahweh, the Hebrew biblical texts (e.g. Exodus 20:1–3; Deuteronomy 26:5–10) instruct Israel to remember (Zakor) the redemptive acts of Yahweh as well as the deeds, hope and suffering of the faithful in the past. In Judaism, the truth of the being and notion of God is preserved in the faithful pursuit of its not being reified into an idol and thus, equated with anything finite. Particularly, Adorno’s negative dialectics is the consistent, radicalized application of these Judaic prohibitions against hallowing anything in this world as an expression of the Holy, the Good, the Truth or anticipating what the future will be. Adorno particularly applied this prohibition to the notion of utopia.

Dialectical Methodology

Adorno and Bloch both inherited their dialectical logic and method from the idealistic dialectics of Hegel and the historical materialist dialectics of Marx; both of whom were the heirs of the dialectic within Judaism and Christianity. In Adorno’s critical theory of society and religion, these religious prohibitions have migrated into the dynamic substance of his negative dialectical methodology of “determinate negation.” Since the time of Plato, dialectics has been understood to be the method of achieving something positive – the new – by means of “mediation” or negation (Hegel 1967a: (par. 80–88); 1969b; Adorno 1973; Bloch 1976; Žižek 1993; Siebert 2013:7–31). For Hegel (1967a:81–82), “the truth is the whole.” However, the truth only realizes itself through the process of its own unfolding. This logical and historical transition is accomplished via mediation, which “is nothing but self-identity working itself out through an active selfdirected process; or, in other words, it is reflection into self…It is pure negativity, or…the process of bare and simple becoming” (Hegel 1967a:82). Truth, philosophically understood, means the agreement of a content with itself. However, God alone is the genuine agreement between Concept and reality; all finite things, however, are affected with untruth; they have a concept, but their existence is not adequate to it. For this reason they must perish, and this manifests the inadequacy between their concept and their existence hegel 1991:60

The dialectical method of negating the negative (Aufhebung) is thereby understood to free the historical process of that which prohibits the creation of the

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positive: the “entelechia of the All!” (Bloch 1976:6). For Hegel (1969b:836f) “the negative of the negative, is immediately the positive, the identical, the universal.” Marx’s materialistic inversion of Hegel’s idealistic dialectical methodology envisioned the same positive in terms of the historically new, communist society that would be achieved through the revolutionary negation of history as the story of class domination. Adorno’s negative dialectics rejects both of his predecessor’s positions (as well as that of Bloch (1976)) as being too “militantly optimistic.” As an expression of the theological ban on naming or imaging the Absolute, the dialectical negation of the negative does not automatically create or naturally unfold the positive. Instead as history has shown, such hope filled negation of what is can produce even more horrifying conditions than what existed before. This is the historical epitaph of the French Revolution turning into the terror of the guillotine and the Russian Revolution turning into Stalin’s gulags and the extermination of millions of peasants.

Negative Dialectics

For Adorno, the negative dialectics of determinate negation translates every image as writing; a method that reveals in its very process the limitedness and falseness of such images, while yet appropriating them in the historical pursuit and longing for truth. Unlike positivism that reduces and thereby reifies the dialectical relation between the subject and object, between thought and reality into a “scientific” system of identity and thus domination, for Adorno (1973; Horkheimer & Adorno: 1972), dialectics is an “anti-system” that expresses the consistent sense of non-identity; that subjective concepts, images, language, and knowledge cannot grasp (Begriff) the entirety of its object. For Adorno, that which is contradictory to the reified civil society of capitalism is that which is non-identical to the identity producing system of society. That which contradicts the system and the manufactured consciousness of an identity producing social totality is the non-identical that has the threatening capability of exposing the authoritarian lie of a positivistic, identity producing social system of domination. Thus, dialectics is not the taking of an ideological standpoint. Rather, it is the awareness that reality goes beyond the thought of it. Dialectics is the awareness of thought’s insufficiency in giving expression to reality. The dialectical methodology of determinate negation acknowledges that there is always an objective remainder that lies beyond the concept of it; that the concept does not exhaust the thing conceived. As such, dialectics is born from within the experience of the negative and, thus, is the consistent sense of nonidentity (Adorno 1973:3–57, esp. 5, Part II; Marcuse

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1941: vii–xiv). The Hegelian/Marxian dialectical logic and its methodology of determinate negation are thus, much more than the “algebra of revolution” (Rees 1998: par. 145, 60n). Dialectics arise from and apply to every aspect of human experience and knowledge in the pursuit of truth, human liberation and happiness. Yet, in socio-historical terms, the methodology of dialectics is at least this method of revolution as it identifies the reified untruth of every system of domination and seeks its overthrow. It reveals not only that the authoritarian concept does not express that which it is supposed to grasp and represent in truth, but also that the class-dominated social system that creates the ideology of identity falls far short of its expressed cultural and political ideals. The dialectical methodology of determinate negation ruthlessly identifies the contradiction between the concept and experience and reveals that there is “something missing” (Brecht 2007:20), that there is a non-identical, contradictory “residue” (Bloch 1988:2ff.) or “remainder” (Adorno 1973:4–8, Part II) that lies outside of the representation and control of the system and ideology of identity production. Thus, the dialectical dynamic of determinate negation is the negation of that which limits humanity in its struggle toward freedom, solidarity, and happiness. As expressed by Hegel, Marx and the Critical Theorists, the method of determinate negation is not abstract or total negation, which divides knowledge and thus life into antagonistic realms, but the negation of that specific element that no longer allows the significance, meaning, happiness or truth of life to be expressed adequately or experienced. This realization produces of itself the dialectical dynamic of determinate negation as the perpetual pursuit of objective knowledge and truth through the negation of those specific forms of knowledge that are not adequate to its object.

Negating the Negative

Adorno’s negative dialectics is thereby materialistically grounded in the experience of life’s pain and negativity; the knowledge that in the metastasizing global system of capitalism, there is no life any longer. It is the awareness that “there is no longer any beauty or consolation except in the gaze falling on horror, withstanding it, and in unalleviated consciousness of negativity holding fast to the possibility of what is better” (Adorno 1974:25). Adorno thereby brought the theological ban on images into secular form “by not permitting Utopia to be positively pictured,” which would hypostatize the utopic as something known toward which those with such knowledge will lead. For Adorno (1974:50; 1993:87; 1973), the truth is not the whole but rather “the whole is the false/the untrue.” This untruth of totality is not merely mythical but a very real,

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socio-historical force of systemic domination and illusion that entraps and subsumes everything. By exposing the untruth of totality, thought satisfies the postulate of determinate negation. Thus, the possibility of a utopic redemption of life is to be contemplated negatively, not as dystopia but as the living, historical theory and praxis of determinately negating that which causes the suffering and destruction of humanity and nature. “In the end hope, wrested from reality by negating it, is the only form in which truth appears. Without hope, the idea of truth would be scarcely even thinkable…” (Adorno 1974:98). As Adorno (1974:247) stated, this determinate negation of the negative is the religious notion of redemption that has been translated into his historical materialism. It is this materialistic understanding of redemption that is the “light” of knowledge – the light of the history. As Adorno (1993:88) stated, “The ray of light that reveals the whole to be untrue in all its moments is none other than utopia, the utopia of the whole truth, which is still to be realized.” The dialectical methodology of determinate negation “is the ontology of the wrong state of things” and as such serves the utopic end of achieving reconciliation (Adorno 1973:6–11). All other forms of knowledge are seen to be little more than positivistic techniques to “progressively” reconstruct what already exists. For Adorno, Horkheimer, and Benjamin, from the experiences of those who are “nonidentical” – the poor, the oppressed, the weak, the dying and the dead, critical perspectives and interpretations need to be created that reveal the deadliness of existing society and its history “as it will appear one day in the messianic light.” In this can be heard the materialistic inversion of the prophetic, Messianic, and eschatological longings for the future of the Omega God, who broke into the nightmare of history to set at liberty the oppressed and to make all things New, as proclaimed in the biblical texts of Judaism and Christianity. Here, in the historical struggle for the negation of the causes of suffering and of that which prevents the fulfillment of satisfying human need, materialism comes full circle to be united with theology, as it too seeks the resurrection of the body of humanity and of nature in a new history and thus, a new creation. This, as Adorno states, is the task of knowledge in the light of redemption and of its revolutionary praxis. Yet, as he states, this task is an “utterly impossible thing” since it is a perspective that idealistically stands outside of the reality of which it is a part. “Hic Rhodus, his saltus” (Hegel 1967b:11). This perspective and knowledge of redemption is thus infected with the same disease that it seeks to escape (Horkheimer 1972b:129–131). This is a positively conceived utopia of “perfect justice” that in its idealistic flight beyond the cruel reality of the present ultimately dissolves into irrelevancy and tragically sinks unconsciously into the quagmire of injustice that it wants to change. In the spirit of the

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radicalized Decalogue prohibitions translated into his materialist negative dialectics, Adorno asserts that this positive utopic impossibility must be acknowledged for the sake of that which is possible. It is because of Adorno’s (1998:133–142; 1973) translation of Judaism’s prohibitions of naming and/or imaging the Absolute into his negative, materialist dialectics that he rejected of any type of revealed faith and its utopic image of a redeemed future and steadfastly held on to the radically negative materialist interpretation of the religious prohibition of images. This negative dialectical approach to the utopic, quite simply, is the substance of Adorno’s critique of Bloch utopic thought, as well as it being the basis of Bloch’s critique of Adorno’s.

Religion as Inheritance

Bloch (1972:82) also expressed the need for the translation of Christianity’s utopic, eschatological substance into the historical responsibility and praxis of human beings in saying that: the Bible only has a future inasmuch as it can, with this future, transcend without transcendence. Without the Above-us, transposed, Zeus-like, high up-there, but with the ‘unveiled face,’ potentially in the Before-us, of our true Moment (nunc stans). In speaking of the relevancy and future of the Bible and of the biblical religions ability to “transcend (the present) without transcendence,” Bloch changed the traditional vertical axis orientation of Hellenistic theological thinking in Christianity back into that first apocalyptic paradigm of early Christianity; to the revolutionary Jewish and Christian responsibility for making the religion’s utopic hope of the eschaton – of the mythologically conceived “end-time” – a goal of history (Küng 1995:CI-II). Because of this, the critical, political theologian Moltmann (1969:Chapt. VIII) stated that Bloch’s entire philosophy of hope results in a type of “meta-religion.” To be heirs of this religiously expressed explosive hope for the end of the continuing history of inequity and misery through the dawning of a new and just creation, historical materialism must embody religion’s – especially Christianity’s – eschatological hope. For as Bloch (1987:1370) states, “Marxism, in all its analyses the coldest detective, takes the fairytale seriously, takes the dream of a Golden Age practically; real debit and credit of real hope begins.” The Judeo-Christian archetype of the prophetic, Messianic, and eschatological Kingdom of Freedom overthrowing and historically transcending – without reducing this to other-worldly

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transcendence – the reified and deadly Kingdom of Necessity towards a concrete utopia in the future is the dynamic religious heritage of revolutionary Marxism (Bloch 1972; Žižek 2000, 2003, 2010; Žižek and Milbank 2009). For Bloch, it is only Marxism that has taken the utopic substance of Christianity’s expressions of hope and liberation and transformed them into the revolutionary theory and praxis for a better world; one that does not abstractly repudiate the present world but seeks its metaphysically inspired determinate negation so as to allow its materialistic Meta, the Novum contained and restrained within the present, the “Tomorrow within the Today,” the “Not-yet-essentiallybeing” and the moral “Ought” to unfold and develop its truth logically in history. For Bloch (2000:179–186), it is in this inward, transcendental and thus, becoming understanding of humanity and history that Kant’s Subjective Idealism and Schelling’s Transcendental Idealistic Philosophy of Nature triumph over or “burns through” Hegel’s Absolute Idealism, which Bloch states has objectified all their “inward” utopic vision and impulse into his “explicitly concluded system.” Because of Bloch’s almost ontologically conceived historical materialism, which metaphysically envisioned the historical necessity of nature and humanity’s freedom and truth ultimately realizing themselves in and through each other, Habermas (1983:61–77) called Bloch “a Marxist Schelling.” Adorno expresses the same critique of Bloch’s utopic philosophy, albeit more critically.

Fundamental Differences

Although both Bloch and Adorno identify themselves as historical materialists, and are thoroughly grounded in the dialectical methodology of both Hegel and Marx, there is a fundamental theoretical and political difference between them. Both of these differences were expressed by Adorno (1991b:200–215) in his 1959 revised review of Bloch book Spuren (Traces). In this review, Adorno also compares Bloch’s utopic philosophy with that of the Romantic philosophy of Schelling and with literary Expressionism, which express their discontent with the reification of modernity. However, according to Adorno, Bloch is not content to stay in the midst of the objective, social negativity and seek to create something wherein human subjectivity can find itself. While his historical, philosophical focus remains on the experiences of individuals, Bloch nevertheless addresses the objective conditions in a regressive expressionist, narrative form of knowledge that belongs to the past. Adorno (1992:218–219) expresses this lack of critical philosophical substance in Bloch’s philosophy by comparing it to the invention of a Hassidic tale and as being “in close

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proximity to sympathy for the occult.” Adorno (1999:8) harshly expressed his critique of Bloch’s philosophy of utopia in a letter to his friend Siegfried Kracauer as being “the toilet stench of eternity.” Adorno (1973:56–57) rejected Bloch’s more transcendent use of dialectics, since for Adorno dialectics focuses on the content of reality, which is not reified. Unlike positivism, which is the mythology of what already exists and has become today the new, albeit perverted form of enlightenment, dialectics is the protest against all forms of mythology and its cyclical reification of reality. “To want substance in cognition is to desire a utopia,” since it is the content of reality that produces this desire for utopia and the consciousness of its possibility. Utopia, therefore, is prevented by the dream of its possibility, but not by the immediate reality in which the possibility of the utopic can be found. From within the midst of reality, real thinking is in the service of the utopic as a concrete element of existence that points beyond itself – no matter how negatively – to that which is not. As Adorno (Adorno & Horkheimer 2011:1–17, esp. 4–5) said in a discourse with his close friend Horkheimer, thinking cannot be limited to the mere positivistic reproduction of what exists. However, the dynamic truth of Reason, which can instrumentally keep the machinery of society running, also contains that which is other than what is. Of course, there is no guarantee that this other will ever be realized, but there is no thinking without the thinking of that otherness. The positivistic reification of thinking, knowledge, reality and of life itself in the socio-historical development toward total integration of everything into the dominating empire of capitalist equivalence is the consequence of modernity’s rejection of utopia. When the sigh and longing for the utopic, for that which is “not yet,” is rejected, then reason and thinking die. Historical materialism, thus, is the prism in which the color of utopia is refracted as the not guaranteed possibility of determinately negating the negativity from within the concrete present. Adorno’s (1977:151–176) critique of Bloch’s philosophy of utopia extended into his – as well as Georg Lukács’ and Brecht’s – enthusiastic celebration of Soviet society as the beginning realization of the hoped for utopic reconciliation of past antagonisms. However, the antagonisms and their terrible consequences remained, and thus, exposed the assertion that they were being overcome as a lie. Because of this, Adorno (1991b:214) accused Bloch of telling stories about the transformation of the world as if it was the fulfillment of what had been pre-decided, with little reflection on what had happened to the Revolution or to the concept and possibility of revolution under completely changed socio-historical conditions. For Bloch, on the other hand, it was precisely Adorno’s unrelenting negativity, of his radical application of the Decalogue prohibitions to utopic thought

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that raised despair to a level in which any revolutionary struggle for change is meaningless that Bloch could not accept. According to Bloch, Adorno’s, “…reified despair counts for no more than reified confidence of the kind that has been practiced from time immemorial by the church and the authorities with their highly conformist message ‘Be consoled’ (Claussen 2008:273).” Against its own intentions, such negativity allows the status quo to remain the same.

Realized Utopic Dreams

These similarities and differences in Adorno’s and Bloch’s (1988:1–17) theories of utopia were given quite concise expression in their 1964 public discourse that was aired on radio in Baden-Baden, Germany. Adorno began the discourse by asserting that many of the particularized utopian dreams of former times, e.g., T.V., space travel, moving faster than sound, the wish to fly, already have been realized. According to Adorno, by the realization of these particular dreams, their very best element – their future-oriented, utopian dynamic/ spirit/purpose – is increasingly endangered of being forgotten and thus, lost. This very real fear, of course, is grounded in the reality of the capitalist culture of consumption that systemically and ideologically reduces humanity’s utopian longing into a commodity fetishism that prioritizes “having” over “being” (Siebert, et al. 2013; Fromm 1976). These realized utopian dreams have become nothing more than tiresome, positivistic facts produced by the success of modern science and technology. As such, these realized wishes become ideologically deceptive – producing a “false consciousness” – with regards to any utopian longing. The fulfillment of the wish takes something away from the future-oriented, “erotic” utopian vision and dynamic from which the wish began (Bloch 1988:1). Such realized longings are emptied of their utopian dynamic of the hope for that which is other than what is. Civil society’s technological success in fulfilling a specific utopian wish reduces the critical substance and dynamic of utopian thought into being little more than a scientific/ technological justification of bourgeois historicism’s concept of “progress.” Utopia and its hoped-for future strategically become absorbed into the static status quo, the eternal positivistic now, which transposes the dynamic, future oriented, hope-inspiring utopic dynamic of the “not-yet” into the progressive expectation for the given economic productive forces to provide consumers – today called “customers” not citizens – with the ever-new realization of such commodified dreams. This abstract, chronological notion of “progress” on a historical continuum into an empty and homogenous future quantitatively replaces the qualitative, utopic theory and praxis for a new, more humane,

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reconciled future society. This loss of the dream, longing and hope for that which is “other” than what is the case is a consequence of the success of an instrumental rationality and logic made socially concrete by modern technology and a mass culture that lauds its ability to realize these specific utopian wishes. Adorno (1974:110) gave expression to this absorption of the cry and hope for utopic social transformation into the existing antagonistic social totality through the example of modern bread factories reducing Christianity’s “the Lord’s Prayer” for God to “give us this day our daily bread” (Matthew 6:9– 13) into mere poetry, which might edify the person saying the prayer while the horrific need of the poor for bread continues. Through the mass production of a staple of life, technology absorbs the religious utopic promise and hope of a new creation into the apparent success and continuing potential of the existing status quo. Utopic theory and praxis for that which is “other” than what is becomes reduced to the flat-lined, ideological continuum of progress. As Adorno asserts, this development becomes a strong argument against the possibility of Christianity and its eschatological hope, even more so than all the modern critiques of the life of Jesus (Horkheimer 1972b:129–131; 1974c). Residue Bloch agreed with Adorno that technology has this type of effect on specific realizations of utopian wishes – it destroys them. Yet, for Bloch (1986b:2ff), there always remains a still meaningful, utopian “residue” that falls outside of and is not fulfilled by such technological accomplishments. For Bloch, the historical movement toward a totally administered, cybernetic and dehumanized society had not yet been achieved. Although, as stated above, Adorno was much more skeptical than Bloch about the possibility of an alternative to civil society’s progressive transition to a totally administered system and world, his entire philosophy was nevertheless a negative dialectical critique of the falsity of Modernity’s historicist philosophy of history and its “unity principle,” which has been given its logical justification through a subjective identity philosophy that dualistically and thus, imperialistically privileges the authority of an abstract, isolated subject and its all-defining Concept in knowing and dominating objective reality. As Adorno stated in a 1956 discourse with his close friend, colleague, and the Director of the “Frankfurt School” in exile Max Horkheimer, from within the ever-increasing “hell” of capitalist class domination and the “creative destruction” it produces in Western civilization and globally, a crisis that is ruthlessly moving like a juggernaut into a positivistically conceived empty and meaningless future, their entire critical theory – as well

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as that of Walter Benjamin – could be described in the best possible way as a “Flaschenpost,” an emergency message in a bottle of social critique of the increasing crises, and hope for the creation of a more reconciled future global world. (Adorno & Horkheimer 2011: chapt. 10, esp. p. 100; Adorno 1974:209; Bloch 1989; Benjamin 1968: 253–264; 2003 IV:389–411; 1999:101–119, 456–488, 651–670, 693–697, 698–739, 779–785, 787–795, 800–806; Marcuse 1964; Neumann 1942). This message was not to be passed on to the oppressed masses or to powerless individuals, but “to an imaginary witness,” who one day might take responsibility for it so that it would not perish with its authors (Horkheimer and Adorno 1972:256). For both Adorno and Bloch, the objective world is heterogeneous, in terms of both nature and history, and thus epistemologically falls outside the definitional control and self-serving meaning of such classinterest driven, identity-creating concepts that seek in god-like ways to create the world in the bourgeoisie’s own image (Genesis 1–2; John 1:1–5; Colossians 1:15–17; Adorno 1973). Since, as an expression of the “premature birth” or “pre-history” of humanity (Bloch 1976:3–4; Marx 1970, 1973; Benjamin 1968: 253–264; 2003 IV:389–411), such concepts and the meaning and values they express are the intellectual reflection of the dominate class’s interests and the social system that is created to further those interests, it is this systematically marginalized, “non-identical” if not meaningless “other” that is the dynamic essence of dialectics and its methodology of determinate negation (Hegel 1967a:67–130, par. 118–130; 1991b:136–152; Adorno 1973: Intro. & Part I; 2008: Lecture 1; Adorno and Benjamin 1999:104–116).

The Utopian “Other”

According to Bloch, every technological realization of utopian wishes or dreams, which can produce a disempowerment of further utopian thought and longing, also produces a utopian residue that continues to foment. This residue exposes the negativity from within the identity system and is, as such, the footing for the revolutionary resistance and hope that can lead toward utopic social change. For Bloch, the technological fulfillment of utopian wishes is very limited to particular “wish dreams.” The critical question that needs to be asked is to what future do these dreams point? Is it toward the ever-increasing production of consumer commodities? Toward newer, faster, bigger versions of what already is: cars, computers, I-pods, technological gadgets, airplanes that hold more cargo/people and are faster, global communications, military weapons, everything that increases the need for heightened security measures such as spy technology and centers, anti-immigration walls

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between nations – all expressions of the defensive and retaliatory jus or lex talionis? Or, does the dominance of an instrumental reason and its technology keep the door open toward a more humane, just, rational, loving, merciful, hopeful, shalom-filled future society and world? Although he doesn’t explain what is meant by this or what it will take for its realization, it is this later possibility that Bloch calls the “residue” of a capitalist society and its technological fulfillment of utopian wishes, a residue of that which is still not realized by the already existent economic, social, political, scientific, and technological means of production possibilities. The residue is the “other” – this hope of a more reconciled future society – that is, for Bloch (1988:11–17), rooted in the intelechy of humanity unfolding its “being” toward what “should be.” It is this “other,” this “residue” that is expressed in the Jewish foundational narrative and hope of the Exodus, which is anamnestically and proleptically to be remembered and to be personally identified with by the faithful (Deut. 25). This “residue” of otherness is also the dominant and defiant substance and dynamic of the Golden Rule and the Sermon on the Mount – “So always treat others as you would like them to treat you; that is the meaning of the Law and the Prophets” (Matthew 7:12; Horkheimer 1985:390; Küng 1991c, 2000); the same Law and Prophets that Jesus says he came not to cancel but to fulfill through his present prophetic and eschatological praxis (Matthew 5:17–18); the very same Torah which calls Israel – God’s people, those who wrestle with God and humanity to bring about a more redeemed future and prevail (Gen. 32) – to become a good nation – a light to the rest of the nations who will come to Israel to learn of its/god’s ways – in the hope of the coming of God’s Reign – the totally “Other” (Matthew 6:25–33; Bloch 1970b: 73–92, 111–117, 118–141; 1972a; 1986: I, II, III; Küng 1991c; 2000). In this, utopia is not conceived of as a place but a living dialectical praxis through which the possibility of a more utopic society is created – ever created. It is in this sense that the concept, theory, vision and praxis of utopia has not become meaningless or ridiculously unreal, as it has been defined defensively by modern civil society.

Utopian Possibilities

Bloch believed that the modern epoch lives much closer to the possible realization of utopia. According to Bloch, due to the power and capability of technology and science to realize some utopian dreams, the modern epoch may have elevated the possibility of utopian thought more than hinder it. Although the word utopia has fallen out of use, terms such as “science fiction” in technology and “grist for one’s mill” or the “principle of hope” in theology

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have taken its place and thus, keep the utopic other alive. As Bloch states, Thomas More’s (2003) Utopia was located in space – on an island in the South Seas. The utopias that followed focused more on time – of utopia being in the future, particularly those of the 18th and 19th centuries. More’s conception of Utopia in space meant that the utopia was here now, but that I/we are not there. However, in placing utopia into time meant that not only were we not in utopia, but also that utopia wasn’t here yet. Placing the utopian into the future did not empty it of its meaning and critical purpose as though it did not and could not exist. The utopian does not exist yet but depends on people living and working now to realize it in the future – a more reconciled, good, just, humanely equitable, beautiful, rational, autonomous freedom in collective solidarity, shalom-filled future social totality. Bloch very optimistically images this as the more we travel toward the future isle of utopia, the more it will arise from the sea of the possible – out of the present chaos, which the sea represents. For Bloch, it is the ever-present “residue” and dynamic hope of utopia that can overcome the deadly rejection of the utopian longing for that which is other than what is and its justifying positivistic metaphysics of “progress” made real through specific technological creations of new commodities. Specific things may progressively be altered, even created and thus give the appearance of change and of the new, but the crushing, class dominated social totality and its system remains the same – increasingly the same. For Bloch, defiant utopian wishing, dreaming, visioning and consciousness, rooted in the nature of being human, has the critical, concrete capability of critiquing and transforming the existing social totality and its relations of production and power. For the owners of the means of production – the capitalist class power-elite, such potential change of the social totality, which is constructed to serve their class profit motive, must be prevented at all costs. It is for this reason that a critical, eschatological culture that transcends the boundary of the status quo is dangerous to the capitalist class domination of society.

Lost Consciousness

Adorno’s critique of modernity’s antagonism between a class dominated social totality and its technological capabilities of creating a more reconciled society expresses the difference between the two theorists concerning the possibility of utopia and its realization. Because of the narrow, specific realization of utopian dreams by technology, Adorno thinks that people have lost their utopian consciousness or imagination that the social totality itself could be something

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other than what it is. Within this socially manufactured collapse of thinking for that which is “other” than what exists, particular changes within the existing status quo can be imagined if not hoped for, but not change of the status quo/social totality itself. Thinking in categories of the Absolute, universality, totality has been jettisoned ideologically as being the anachronistic, “Grand Narrative” metaphysics of totalitarianism or as that which cannot be scientifically analyzed and proven. This rejection of the philosophical category of totality is ideological since the globalization of neo-liberal capitalism through its various international structures, e.g., the World Trade Organization, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and its Structural Adjustment Programs, etc., as well as the political, cultural and military policies of its neoconservative hand-maid, is directed toward nothing but the totality of global domination. This systemic dummying down of human consciousness and knowledge, particularly that of the working class, gives concrete expression to Marx’s (1976:91) warning of capitalism as being the deadly Medusa head that is veiled and thus, unknown. Thus, there is little to no consciousness and knowledge of the reality of the capitalist “system” of globalizing domination, which thereby disembowels any thought of revolutionary praxis to change the dominant and manipulative power relations that determine the social totality. It is this class dominated social totality of Western capitalism and its ideology producing “culture industry,” which has produced the “strange shrinking of the utopian consciousness,” that is the focus of Adorno (1988:3–4; 1973; 2008, 1991a) negative theory of utopia. For the masses, ignorance, cynicism and apathy reign, as the system moves ineluctably toward its consummation in a totally administered, antagonistic social totality. It is Adorno’s thesis that deep down human beings feel or intuit that life and society could be different, that people’s needs could actually be satisfied and that they could be happy and free, both subjectively and objectively in solidarity. However, according to Adorno (1988:4), “a wicked spell has been cast over the world” by an increasingly reified class system that prevents people from attaining such a universal utopian consciousness and thus, living for its realization. This spell is the mystification or “aura” of capital and its fetish of commodification, which, along with a cultural and media industry that incessantly advertises and creates the idolatrous need of such things as being the fulfillment of life, causes people to reject any alternative to the existing status quo and to identify with their masters. Adorno’s solution to overcoming this contradiction is for people to be compelled by this contradiction – to become critically conscious of this contradiction – in order to enter into the sociohistorical struggle to determinately negate it; to identify themselves with the utopian “impossibility” and make it their own. This ownership of the utopic

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impossible is the materialist expression for the religious faith commitment to a hope for that impossible “Other.”

The Content of Utopia

The fundamental difference between Adorno’s and Bloch’s theory of utopia is expressed clearly in the different paradigms they use to answer the question about the content of utopia. Both Adorno and Bloch agree that the content of utopias is dependent on the existing social conditions and possibilities of its realization and that it is not comprised of one single, isolated category, i.e., happiness, freedom, etc. The objective, scientific, economic, technological, productive forces of the existing social totality must be taken into account in any discourse on the content of the utopian other as it is this socio-historic context that gives the meaning and purpose to all of the individual utopian categories. As Adorno (1988:3) states, “Whatever utopia is, whatever can be imagined as utopia, this is the transformation of the totality.” The consciousness of this possibility of the society’s transformation can only occur negatively, through the knowledge of the social totality as antagonistic. Thus, utopia is to be found in the determinate negation of the falseness, the negativity of what is, which thereby points through the negative to what should be, but is not guaranteed. In his final aphorism in his Minima Moralia entitled “Finale,” Adorno (1974:247) gave expression to this negative utopic endeavor. Here, Adorno materialistically inverts Judeo-Christian religious categories of redemption and “the Messianic light” as the dialectical lens through which to contemplate the negativity of the social totality. The only truth that knowledge has to offer to the world is the redemptive/liberating determinate negation of the existing negativity. Anything else isn’t an expression of real knowledge and its redemptive task of educating and thus, redemptively leading humanity out of its enslavement to the historical system of domination. From such negative, dialectical knowledge, alternative perspectives are to be created that expose the antagonisms of the existing social totality as they “will appear one day in the messianic light” (Adorno 1974:247). Such perspectives are not just an issue of abstract theory construction, but are to be derived from “felt contact” with the reality of the antagonistic social totality. This is the sole task of thought, which is not absolute but also conditioned by the negativity of the system of which it is a part. This ever-present negativity, conditionality and thus, impossibility of an absolute knowledge has to be acknowledge for the sake of achieving the possible through the determinate negation of the

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existing negativity. The wisdom and truth of utopia is manifested in the continuing, vigilant, historical act of negating the social conditions that destroy humanity and nature. Longing Also, for Bloch (1988:12, 5), “the essential function of utopia is a critique of what is present.” Although the utopic content changes depending on the social conditions of the time, the transcendental, humanistic longing for utopia remains the same. For Bloch, that drive for the “other” than what exists is rooted in the historical becoming process of being human which is expressed as “longing”; “a longing that is the pervading and above all only honest quality of all human beings.” Unlike Adorno, for Bloch utopia is the goal of being human and is not completely endangered by the barbarism of history and its development toward a totally administered society. Unlike Adorno’s (1973, 1974, 2008, Adorno and Horkheimer 1972) assertion that history is moving toward the realization of a totally class-dominated, cybernetic, dehumanized future society and thus, toward the end of utopia, Bloch (1988:15) does not believe that utopia can be removed from history in spite of everything, since it is rooted in what it means to be and struggle for being human.

The Social Totality

For Adorno and Bloch, there is no one, singular utopian content. The concept of utopia is not defined by the transformation of one particular category, such as happiness or freedom. Each category of the existing social totality can change itself according to its own experience. However, this reduction of the meaning of utopia to one, isolated category equates utopia to the subjective epistemic meaning and purpose of idealism. The socio-historical context or totality, which connects all the categories, must be taken into account in any discourse on the content of utopia. It is this socio-historical totality that gives the established meaning and purpose to all of the particular categories, be it in terms of the modern bourgeois and even reactionary post-modern social construct based on the paradigm of an isolated, monadic, ego-centric subject that stands against any and all “others” – the bellum omnium contra omnes, or a collectivist notion of humanity in solidarity expressed the mutual recognition of the “other” and objectified in the system’s economic productivity and humanistic distribution of wealth and power. Particularly, in the later expression

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of a socialistic social totality, the transformation of a one utopic category, e.g. happiness, freedom, equality, justice, etc., would necessitate a change in the other categories, which no longer stand in isolation from each other as subjective ends in-themselves, but fulfills itself in terms of the newly created social context. Death However, for Adorno and Bloch, the crucial and determining issue for utopian thinking is the elimination of death, which also necessitates the elimination of the jus/lex talionis – the law of retaliation and revenge (Exodus 21:23–27; Qur’an 2:178–179, 16:126). Within the given modern antagonistic social totality, the elimination of death is considered to be the most horrific thing possible for a necrophilic globalizing social totality. Even the suggestion of the utopic elimination of death threatens the very existence of an antagonistic social totality that produces and reproduces itself by means of cruelty. The consciousness, theory and praxis for a more reconciled future society are the enemy of every system of domination and it must be abolished. The social totality’s identification with death, which produces the same hopeless identification in the oppressed social classes, is a reality that once was religiously called “evil.” Yet, there is no secular term that can replace the word “evil” in expressing the depth and breadth of the horror created by the capitalist social totality and its globalization. The biophilic, utopian consciousness is one that contains nothing horrific about death as it holds out the possibility that people no longer have to die, or suffer, fear, be or become defensive, despairing, hopeless, etc. However, this biophilic utopian consciousness is at present trumped by the absolute anti-utopia that sanctifies and makes death absolute. Although there is no one category that alone can realize the utopian consciousness and longing, the elimination of death is the most important dynamic purpose of utopian theory and praxis. For Bloch and Adorno, the fear of death is the fundamental root of utopian thought. This was expressed in the scientific, utopic pursuit of medicine as well as religion in their attempts to combat the power of death and ultimately conquer it. Particularly, Christianity proclaims the ultimate victory over death with the proclamation of the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. The elimination of death and the fear of it, thus setting people free from the “final enemy” (1 Corinthians 15:26; Revelation 21:4) is proclaimed throughout the eschatology of the New Testament and particularly in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5–7; Luke 6:20–49) – the prophetic and Messianic

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proclamation, vision, dynamic longing that inspires concrete social praxis of/ for a good, just, reconciled future without death and its consequences. Faith According to Bloch (1988:9–10), there are two parts to utopian thought: social utopias – construction of social totalities in which there are no exploited and dominated human beings, and natural law – in which there are no degraded, humiliated people. To this, however, Bloch adds death itself and the transcendental element of faith as the third component of utopian theory and praxis; faith in the elimination of death; faith as the victory over death that humanity cannot do for its self. For this, a transcendental “Other” is needed. “So we need the help of baptism, Christ’s death, and resurrection” (Bloch: 1988:10). Faith in a totally “Other,” which can negate the final enemy, the anti-utopia of death and its power of fear, dialectically belongs to utopia while it also transcends it. Adorno agrees with Bloch that without a faith in that which is totally “Other” than what is, without the notion of a life freed from death and everything connected with it, which is not solely an issue of science, the very idea of utopia cannot be thought. Where the idea, threshold, reality, antinomy and aporia of death is not considered, then there can be no utopian thought or praxis as the resistance against it. Thus, particularly for Adorno, because of the existential, social and historical reality of death, the very content of utopia cannot be imaged in a positive but only negative dialectical manner. As in all things, Adorno applies the very same prohibition of the second and third commandment of the Jewish Decalogue against naming or imaging positively the Absolute, the totally “Other,” to any consideration of utopia. Only that which utopia is not can be stated. According to Adorno, the horrific reality of death is the metaphysical reason why utopia cannot be spoken about in a positive but only a negative manner. For Adorno (1988:10), utopia can only be expressed as the struggle to determinately negate the negativity of an antagonistic social totality that operates through the power, system, and structures of death. Utopia thereby includes and yet goes beyond death, as death is “nothing other than the power of that which merely is” (Bloch 1988:10). Thus, for the sake of the continuing consciousness of and historical struggle for the possibility of utopia, nothing can be imaged, named, or known of utopia, as it is the struggle itself. Bloch’s theory agrees with Adorno’s negative dialectical critique and revolutionary rebellion against every social system of domination. Yet, Adorno warns that the voices of utopic longing must always be on guard against

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compromised, patchwork solutions or of becoming satisfied with progress in addressing the powers of death, which creates a false consciousness of being victorious in the struggle with the socio-historical manifestations of death that, as a social totality, remain in power. One cannot negotiate with the devil. The negative dialectical, eschatological critique against all systems of domination and oppression, against that which should not be, in terms of the secular if not also religious longing and struggle for the utopia of the elimination of the socio-historical powers of death must be kept alive. This is done through attaining in solidarity with others the undaunted commitment to this negative utopian consciousness of transcendence for that which is historically beyond what is, that keeps the life-giving longing for that other/”Other” dynamically and concretely alive in terms of both theory and praxis. While Adorno focuses on the determinate negation of the specific negatives of humanity’s and nature’s destruction in a social system moving toward its consummation in a totally administered, class dominated society as the dynamic of utopia, Bloch, nevertheless presents his theory of utopia in a transcendental optimism for the ultimate, revolutionary overthrow of the social totalities of death.

Something’s Missing

In their discourse, Bloch quoted the lumberjack Paul Ackermann in Brecht’s (2010:19–21) City of Mahagonny, who proclaim that he is leaving Mahagonny because “something’s missing” there. According to Bloch (1988:15), this phrase that something is missing in the “paradise” of Mahagonny (capitalism) was one of the most profound and truthful statements ever penned by Brecht. Brecht’s play expresses the dehumanizing deadness of capitalism that at best treats people as livestock: providing them soporific and diversionary entertainment, as they are lead daily to the slaughterhouse. The productive system of capitalism remains hidden, while the working class decays with no work, no meaning, no happiness, no life, and no future. For Adorno, Brecht’s statement gives expression to his thought that people are conscious that life could really be different than the way it presently is. It could be just. It could be peaceful. It could be reconciled and happy. People are conscious, “deep down,” that what is missing is utopia, a concrete socio-historical utopia. The truth and purpose of utopia is to negate the conditions that turn human beings and nature into nothing but reified objects, whose spirit and life is reduced systemically to nothing. Bloch (1988:15) too critiques this horror by quoting an old peasant proverb, “There is no dance before the meal.” Until

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people have their immediate needs fulfilled, there is no dancing, no play. “Only when all the guests have sat down at the table can the Messiah, can Christ come.” Bloch’s and Adorno’s friend, Walter Benjamin (1968:254–255; 1978:312–313; Matthew 7:33) expressed the same materialist inversion of Jesus’ teaching in the demand that the concrete needs of people for food, water, clothing, shelter, and happiness must be met first, whereupon the kingdom of God will then be added to you. In terms of historical materialism, utopia has to be taken out of the clouds so as to address the unjust material conditions of the present to become a force of socio-historical critique of the necrophilia of modernity and of revolutionary change. In this sense, for Bloch, Marxism itself is only a precondition for utopia – not utopia itself. Marxism is that which allows all people to the table, that which seeks to meet the human needs of all people. It sets the stage for the beginning of a human history and life in freedom, happiness, possible fulfillment, creativity and content – beyond that of mere necessity. Again, at the end of their discourse, Adorno expressed the concrete difference between Bloch’s transcendental approach to historical materialism’s utopic critique of capitalism and his own negative dialectics of determinate negation as utopia. Adorno critiqued Bloch’s use and explanation of Brecht’s statement of “something is missing” as coming strangely close to St. Anselm of Canterbury’s (1962) ontological proof of God. To say that something’s missing means that the seeds, the incipient foment of that something is already present, without which no one would know that it is missing. The concept of God or utopia already contain the elements of the utopic reality that is missing, and it is from this knowledge and experience that utopia can be realized. Without this eschatological dynamic, no notion of utopia or of thinking itself would be possible. For Adorno (1991b:200–215), Bloch’s transcendental materialist theory is entirely too optimistic that such change can and will ultimately happen. For Adorno, Bloch is a mystic in the paradoxical way in which he unites theology and atheism. Bloch’s theory of utopia is a materialist metaphysics that naively constructs the theological notion of transcendence into the profane realm of history, which thereby turns philosophy back into idealism, into a “phenomenology of the imaginary.” The oppressive and deadly reality and power of the increasing negativity of capitalism – and of all authoritarian systems of domination – is acknowledged but transcendentally and thus, logically glossed over in the hope filled struggle of its negation. For Adorno, it is the seriousness of suffering and death itself that is the horrifying power and reality of capitalism as a globalizing juggernaut moving toward its consummation in the iron cage of a totally administered, prison society that is missing in Bloch’s theory of utopia.

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Hope Of course the difference between Bloch and Adorno must not be reduced into a dualistic, zero-sum equation. Bloch, as Adorno, was a dialectical philosopher of historical materialism, deeply grounded in Hegelian dialectics and Marx’s revolutionary critique of capitalism. He knew of capitalism’s negativity and power. He also knew of the historical expressions of revolutionary resistance against all systems of domination, especially that of Judaism and Christianity, the alternatives presented in aesthetics, as well as of the French, Russian, and even Weimar revolutions. For Bloch, the systems of death are to be critiqued, resisted, and negated by the theoretical and practical power or “principle” of hope. For Bloch, hope is concerned with and envisions perfection. Max Horkheimer (1972:129–130) addressed the issue of perfection as an anachronistic illusion that has been carried over into modern social practice from the religious longing of the past. For Horkheimer, the realization of perfection in reality is impossible, for even if a better society is created that negates the negativity of the given society, it still will be impossible to rectify or redeem the suffering of the past’s innocent victims in history or nature. The transition of the religious longing to transcend the horror of the present into the modern “impotent (conceptual) revolt against reality” is part of humanity’s historical development. However, as Horkheimer states, what differentiates a progressive person from a retrogressive one is not the refusal of the idea of tran­ scendence, but the understanding of the historical limits to its fulfillment. For Horkheimer and Adorno, the concern for perfection is a “vain hope.” Yet, for Bloch, the critique of that which is imperfect, incomplete, and should not be so contains within itself the conception of and longing for the possibility of perfection. For Bloch, perfection is understood to be the possibility of the negation of the present negativity. It is here, from the theory of Adorno’s negative dialectic methodology, that Bloch becomes overly hopeful. The determinate negation of negativity does not produce the possibility of perfection. The negation has possibly overcome a specific form of the social totality’s negativity, which, as history shows, is often recreated into another, more strategically “rationalized” form of cybernetic of negativity. Nevertheless, for Bloch (1972:264), hope is “the unassuaged, explosive hunger of the lifeforce, (that) presents itself as the continual Not-yet of true human possession.” It is from this hunger and hope for that which is other than what is that feeds and empowers people to live and work for utopia. According to Bloch (1972:264–265), it is from this defiant, hope-filled work for utopia that “the radical, subversive dream of the Bible” for the future, “to the great dimension of light with which the world is pregnant” comes into being. Hope is not

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confidence of that for which it hopes, as it is well aware of its being surrounded by the power of negativity. Hope can be thwarted, but for Bloch (1999:16–17), that does not mean it is defeated. Even in the midst of its decline and disappointment, hope still nails a flag on the sinking ship’s mast, for the decline is not accepted. For the hunger of hope is “an irrepressible sense of the awakening of meaning,” and, as such, true hope is an expression of never ending defiance against all odds for the Not-yet-being, whose ultimate realization will be the beginning of the true Utopia. Both Adorno and Bloch fought tirelessly to overcome the “wicked spell” of capitalism and of its epistemological mythology of positivism. Nevertheless, this authoritarian system of death has continued to spread across the globe, destructively creating it in its own deadly imperialistic image. Although their historical materialist methodologies and theories of utopia differed, this system was theirs and our common enemy. Their theories are indeed “Flaschenpost” – notes in a bottle cast into the chaotic and irrational sea of capitalist dominated modernity in the hope that they would be found, understood and determinately negated by people in the future. Bloch and Adorno’s theories of utopia, although fundamentally different, need to be determinately negated and thus critically revived in the twenty-first century to help in the present day fight against the much further developed anti-utopian, capitalist system of domination and its deadly threat not only to the present but also to the past and to the future. Through such committed and continuing work on their dialectical materialist theories of society and religion – particularly, by the religions and by academia – against the progressive collapse of modernity into the positivistic reproduction of hell, the possibility of a more reconciled future may be created, even if it is just a little bit.

Chapter 3

Bilderverbot and Utopia

God without Image – Other World Unannounced Dustin Byrd

For many philosophers and theologians, Theodor Adorno’s invoking of theological concepts in his Negative Dialectics and others works engenders some confusion. The theologian would ask, why would an atheist philosopher, rooted in Freud, Marx, and Nietzsche, continually deploy theological language such as “messianic,” “redemption,” and “bilderverbot,” to such a degree that some could accuse him of being a crypto-theologian? On the other side, the secular philosopher is just as puzzled. He asks, “has not religion and theology already been abandoned due to its inability to defend its claims against the Enlightenment?” “Has not the metaphysics of religion been already so discredited that to reintroduce them back into philosophy is to commit a crime against reason; has not religion been responsible for so much death and destruction that we should leave it in the past?” Looking at the history of absurd theological obscurantism and the suffering that theological disputes bore, it is sensible to ask why this atheist philosopher would want to resurrect certain theological categories in a secular age and in a secular philosophy. However, Adorno is insistent that the transcendent and prophetic semantic and semiotic qualities of the theological must be rescued from religion itself, and further transformed, reoriented, and reintroduced within philosophy. Only critical philosophy, and more specifically non-identity forming dialectical philosophy, has the capacity to wield such potent and historically baggaged language without the threat of artificially creating a new totalizing system of thought that furthers the suffering of the subject, or delivers him back to his master through positive (statusquo affirming) religion. In doing so, Adorno inculcates a critical philosophical dimension to old theological concepts; imbuing them with a new prophetic – dialectical spirit. In this chapter, I examine what I understand to be the core theological concept that gives substantive meaning to Adorno’s Negative Dialectics and his philosophy of suffering; that is the notion of bilderverbot, or the theological ban of images. I claim that the essence of the Critical Theory of the Frankfurt School and specifically the core of Adorno’s philosophy is the sensitivity toward the suffering of the finite individual in the unjust and violent world of history. Equally important to Adorno’s concern for suffering is the imperative

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that he identifies as having been “imposed by Hitler” to direct our “thoughts and actions so that Auschwitz will not repeat itself, so that nothing similar will happen” (Adorno 1999:365). Adorno’s conception of bilderverbot takes on a more radicalized meaning than what it is generally understood to convey within the Jewish tradition.1 His radicalized conception of the image ban assists Adorno’s understanding of the events of the Shoah (Holocaust, Tremendum), and is directed against the re-occurrence of Auschwitz in any form to anybody. I will attempt to elevate and highlight the notion of bilderverbot to the position that I believe it deserves; as a key concept in understanding the theological element in Adorno’s dialectical and utopian thought. The secondary aim of this essay is to elucidate the political, economic, and social ramifications of the philosophical deployment and radicalization of the concept of bilderverbot in the Frankfurt School’s vision (or non-vision) of utopia. By determinately negating the original Jewish conception of bilderverbot and therefore preserving and extending the concept beyond its original and sole theological meaning, Adorno and the Frankfurt School clarify the inherent double negativity of bilderverbot as well as the concept of utopia. It is with its connection to utopia, as the “totally other society,” as the bilderverbot expresses the “totally otherness” of the divine, that connects the Frankfurt School’s notion of utopia to the ban on any positive articulation of the divine. By translating the theological category of bilderverbot into the social category of utopia, they aid in making clear the nature of “that which doesn’t exist,” i.e. utopian absence of positivity, and by inference, “that which ought to exist” without delivering any positive articulation of what that utopian society would look like. It is my goal to concretely connect Adorno’s theological – bilderverbot language/concept, to his utopian thought about the possibilities of world transformation.

The Ugly Hunchback of Historical Materialism

Walter Benjamin, Adorno’s friend and teacher, and in many ways the one that most influenced Adorno’s theological thinking, wrote in his Theses of the Philosophy of History that theology is so ugly within secular society that it has wizened up and now must “keep out of sight.”2 However, Benjamin claims that 1 This is also true for the Islamic tradition. 2 See Walter Benjamin, 2007:253. Many have argued since Benjamin articulated this thesis that the opposite is in fact true for the contemporary: that historical materialism is so ugly that it must disguise itself within theology, or that philosophy itself, which has become exhausted

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it is this same ugly theology that animates historical materialism (it is the Hunchback that controls the Puppet), and that only when historical materialism wizens up and “enlists the services of theology” will it “win all the time.” It was Benjamin that impressed upon Adorno the residual significance and power of theological concepts, and that for Benjamin, what religion and theology warranted was a determinate negation, not an absolute negation; therefore the theological impulse must be rescued from religion. He did not advocate any form of an a-historical return to religion as a way of addressing modern society and its inner-antagonisms; the retreat into a naive traditional religious life was simply not possible post-Enlightenment or post-Auschwitz. Un-reflexive and uncritical religion itself, as understood by the Critical Theory, too often contributed to the very suffering that the Frankfurt School’s philosophy and sociology wanted to diminish. Yet, there was something remaining within theology that elicited their attention as worth rescuing due to its liberational qualities.

Theology Inverted

In the midst of a world that is increasingly moving towards alternative future one, the totally administered society as well as alternative future two, the totally militarized society, and the resulting increase in violence, oppressive corrosion into a totalizing political-economic schema, domination of instrumental rationality, the depletion of meaning, stupidification of the masses in democracies, and the instrumentalization of the arts as manipulative propaganda and public relations, Adorno was convinced that the theological impulse kept open the possibility for alternative future three, a more reconciled form of society; one that would not abandon all of human life to the dominance of the status quo of modernity – a state of perpetual suffering due to unnecessary social antagonisms unleashed by the dialectic of enlightenment, i.e. the man’s domination of nature and other men, the domination over men by the products of his own labor, totalen krieg (total war) against man and nature, and the triumphalism of the suffering it produces. Adorno insists, in agreement with Kant, that the thing-in-itself (in this case the divine) cannot be penetrated by pure reason and therefore we must remain favete linguis (keeping silent, e.g. the impossibility of a positive articulation of the divine) about the ultimate nature of divinity – a restriction that doesn’t allow any positive articulation of the divine, nor does it allow us to positively construct a vision of a totally-other in the face of global capitalism, has no choice but to be rescued by theology. See Milbank, Žižek and Davis, 2010.

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society. Yet, despite the limits of reason, modern philosophers and theologians are impelled to continue to probe and theorize about the possibility of another society that fully negates the negativity of this society. For the critical theorist, the distance of the divine, and the impossibility of fully penetrating its existence and meaning, should not arrest critical thought from turning a skeptical eye towards human history in an attempt to alleviate future suffering by way of a future reconciled society; to abandon such an endeavor in the face of despair is to condemn all of human history, present, and future to the suffering that they wished to alleviate, and to leave the victims of history unredeemed in their unwarranted and unsolicited martyrdom/annihilation. Therefore, silence on the divine can not and should not translate into silence on society or human history, but just as theology is rescued by its inversion in critical philosophy, so too should discourse about society deploy the inverse negativity of “utopia” in its longing for a fully reconciled society. For Adorno, the possibility of an inverse theology should be coupled with the real-world possibility of a “totally other society”; to separate the two would be to diminish the possibility of either and fall back into a wait-and-see eschatology – an option that neither rescues the living hopeless nor redeems the suffering of the dead. Furthermore, according to Christopher Craig Brittain, it is the very negativity of Adorno’s “inverse theology” that resists the dominant schema and coordinates of the status quo from “silencing those who cry out against oppression and who work for a more human and rational society” (2010:14). For Adorno, it is the rescue of the semantic and semiotic material from theology that allows “perennial suffering” to actualize its “right to expression,” i.e. inverse theology allows the suffering to be expressed without being absorbed into the coordinates of the existing society and thus resisting it’s distortion, absorption, and commodification within the already existing society (1999:362). Adorno, echoing Marx’s definition of religion, views theology as the expression of historical wounds and suffering, and without it the cry for emancipation, reconciliation, and redemption is rendered mute, or simply a matter or telling history through protocol sentences – devoid of all moral claims and ethical values judgments. Because of this, Adorno says, “the need to lend a voice to suffering is a condition of all truth. For suffering is objectively that weighs upon the subject; its most subjective experience, its expression, is objectively conveyed” (1999:18).

Adorno’s Radicalization of the Bilderverbot

In a letter to Otto O. Herz following Adorno’s death and burial, Max Horkheimer explained critical theory’s connection to Judaism and to the

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second commandment of the Jewish Decalogue concerning the construction of images. Horkheimer says, I tell you this in order to make Adorno’s complicated relationship to religion, his religious allegiance, comprehensible. On the other hand, may I say that the critical theory that we both had in developing has its roots in Judaism. It arises from the idea: Thou shalt not make any graven images of God. clausen 2008:365

From this quote, Horkheimer explicitly identified the roots of critical theory as being within the Jewish bilderverbot. The theological core of Critical Theory, no matter how encompassing the Frankfurt School became in its development of its theories, cannot be denied. The negativity of the Jewish bilderverbot is the soil in which the theories grew. Consequently, Adorno’s appropriation of the second commandment of the Decalogue does not limit itself to the ban on any positive articulation of the divine, either by image or by word, but instead goes radically further.3 In his article “Reason and Revelation,” Adorno addresses many issues concerning the importance and danger of “positive religion.” Adorno sees the modern return to religion to be rooted in human longing and need, which is abundant due to the alienated, reified, and violent condition of humanity in contemporary society, and not an expression of the validity of religious truth-claims. For Adorno, this return to homo religiosus sacrifices reason on the altar of what religion provides for humanity (even if it is delusional). Following Freud, Adorno sees positive religion as both providing a false sense of security and assurance, that existence is inherently meaningful and that some ahistorical metaphysical being is ultimately in control. Religion, in this nonprophetic sense, is also inherently positive; i.e. that it affirms the status quo as opposed to lending its support towards the protest against the injustices and crimes of the status quo.4 Furthermore, Adorno remains skeptical about the reintroduction of religious metaphysics within a secular age; he fears that such 3 In traditional Jewish understanding, the bilderverbot of the Decalogue bans not only the construction of images, but also the linguistic articulation of any mental and or conceptual image of the divine. All forms of anthropomorphism of the divine, or any positive utterance about the nature and or attributes of the divine, are seen as an attempt to drag the infinite into finite language and capture it. To do so is an attempt to control the divine itself. This will have an interesting influence on Adorno’s notion of non-identity thinking. 4 There will be a further discussion of “positive religion” later in the chapter.

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a move could only lend itself to the reproduction of suffering due to the instrumentalization of religious metaphysics by capitalism, totalitarianism, and their ruling elite. For uncritical theologians and believers, the hope for a reconciled society directs itself towards a placating eschatology, one that stresses a rapturous divine intervention into history (Kingdom of God), as opposed to a reconciled society brought about by human activity (Utopia). Positive religion can only placate the masses by falsely delivering to them that which they psychically need (the opiate), while leaving the already established and antagonistic society unmolested and intact. For Adorno, the only thing that can be rescued from religion and theology is its oft hidden and neglected negativity. Consequently, Adorno (2005:142) sees that positive religion must be left behind, as “no other possibility than an extreme ascesis toward any type of revealed faith, an extreme loyalty to the prohibition of images, far beyond what this once originally meant” is the only option available to the critical theologian, philosopher, and believer; to rescue the negativity of religion, that which is prophetic and essential, from the positivity of religion is the only way religion can survive itself by its own self-ideologization. Thus, in his book Negative Dialectics, Adorno returns to the concept of bilderverbot and deploys it in a radicalized direction.

Reason and Revelation

We should not mistake Adorno’s intentions when invoking the notion of bilderverbot; he does not advocate a positive role for Judaism and or Christianity as systematic worldviews (theologies, rituals, sacred spaces and individuals, etc.) in his critical philosophy or “inverse theology” – that would be a halfhearted return to positive religion as an escape from the already existing society through an attempt to take refuge in irrational religiosity; a religiosity that has no substantive potential for the alleviation of human suffering but can only placate the psychological needs of the masses and /or mask the social, economic, and political antagonisms of modern capitalist society. However, the negativity of theology, embodied in the notion of the bilderverbot, which says nothing positive about the object of cognition (the “totally other”), maintains a space for thought to transcend immanence. Negative Theology is not burdened or limited by that which is the case, but continues to ponder the possibility of that which ought be the case without ever constructing a positive plan, blueprint, or theory, that would serve as another totalizing system (something that Adorno wants to avoid). By thinking through “the given,” and at the same time resisting the temptation to construct a totalizing system of

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thought that could transcend the given, Adorno contends that out of necessity negative theology articulates itself through what he calls “constellations” – a way of thinking which provides an understanding, comprehension, and vision without building a new iron cage schema which forces all existence into a totalizing conceptualization. Thus, the nature of theology, and by definition negative theology, is that it always pushes beyond the existing coordinates of what immediately appears to us as reality (the metaphysics of positivism that dictates to us that what is the case is all that there is). In doing so, theology can rescues the protesting voices of the victims of history – those left in the ditch of human existence – and does not render their voices unmusical and unheard by diminishing them to simple material existence (as the positive sciences do) or to abandon their suffering to fate (as in some forms of religion and mythology), for it gives voice to their suffering and protests against that which causes them to suffer in a hope for an concrete existence not defined by what is the case. Their voices embody the longing for happiness and fulfillment, the opposite of suffering; and within those voices, the potential for the reconciled society is preserved and advanced, as their expressed suffering forever testifies in the indictment against the inherent violence of nature and the ever-expanding Golgothic history, while at the same time poetically calling for an ultimate state of reconciliation – that the murderer shall no longer triumph over the innocent victim and that society should be rooted in non-possessive love and agape/solidarity. The negativity of theology, its resistance to what is the case, it’s insubordination to the unjust material world, it’s ability to envision another society, and its concern for the suffering, serves as the vehicle for the hopes and longing of the innocent victims of history and nature. The Hebraic ban on images says, You shall not make for yourself a graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them or serve them; for I the Lord your God am a jealous God. exodus 20:40

Horkheimer and Adorno invoke the Jewish iconoclasm in the Dialectic of Enlightenment, but at this point do not philosophically extend the ramification of the bilderverbot beyond that which it is understood to mean within Judaism itself. They write, The Jewish religion brooks no word which might bring solace to the despair of all morality. It places all hope in the prohibition on invoking

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falsity as God, the finite as the infinite, the lie as truth. The pledge of salvation lies in the rejection of any faith which claims to depict it, knowledge in the denunciation of illusion. 2002:17

Christopher Craig Brittain points out that this passage can be seen as a form of ideology-critique, but from a close reading of this section, it is clear that the authors here do not explicitly have a conception of bilderverbot that is radically beyond that which can be found within the Jewish tradition itself, and therefore it is not quite yet an articulation of what Adorno means by when he says in Reason and Revelation that we must have a “extreme loyalty to the prohibition of images, far beyond what this once originally meant” (Brittain 2010:89, Adorno 2005:142). Furthermore, in order for the bilderverbot to be radicalized, the religious image ban has to migrate from the depth of the mythos into secular reason and discourse, and it must extend beyond the nonidentification, articulation, and image of a divine being for it to be the loci of Adorno’s critical philosophy of history, society, and human suffering. If Adorno’s bilderverbot is radical beyond its original intent, then it has to go far beyond Jewish theology without losing the theological claim that grounds it. Although the seeds of the radicalization of the bilderverbot are expressed in the Dialectic of Enlightenment, it is in Adorno’s Negative Dialectics that the concept reaches its full radicality. For Adorno, that which is theological must become applicable to the material world in which human history dwells. Although philosophical abstraction is not alien to Adorno, the theological abstract concept of bilderverbot, if it is to be rescued from theology, must become radicalized and adorn the attire of the Turkish puppet (Benjamin’s historical materialism) without folding into a petrified dogmatism or “weltanschauung” characterized by “vulgar Marxism,” e.g. Sovietism or Brecht (1999:200, 204).

Bilderverbot Secularized: Contra Identity Philosophy

Adorno’s Negative Dialectics not only secularizes the Jewish concept of bilderverbot, i.e. the non-identification of the divine, into a critical philosophy of society, but he extends the meaning of that “which cannot be articulated” from strictly speaking and imaging the divine to a possibility of conceptualizing anything in its full givenness. Not only does the notion of God (the divine thing-in-itself) resist penetration by way of reason and its inherent conceptual schema, but the universal “object” also resists such a conceptualization. It may

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be a mistake to even say that the knowing subject fully knows itself. Bilderverbot has become radicalized to the point where all is thoroughly inconceivable to the other in its full givenness or from within itself. Adorno contends that reason violently imposes certain structures, definitions, qualities, etc. upon the objects. These false imports that are projected onto the object by reason’s impulsion to categorize deny the subject the ability to grasp the object itself, as the qualities of the object that remain recalcitrant to the conceptualization are ignored and or severed. The violence of the imposition of the concept renders the object something other than what it is – for what it is must include that which is non-conceptualizable – that which was severed when conceptualized – the recalcitrant remainder. The mode of reasoning that remains oblivious to it’s own dominating force is what Adorno calls “identity thinking.” According to Adorno’s student Gerhard Schweppenhäuser (2009:41), “confusion of rational categories with nonobjective reality amounts to an identity compulsion: the human mind cannot avoid classifying objects according to normalizing and deviant characteristics, according to the criteria of identity and nonidentity.” Identity thought, which serves as a “single cognitive schema” has a twofold function. First, it serves as the object’s pervasive structure of knowing, and secondly, it dismantles the singularity of the object so that it fits easily within the schema of our conceptions and perceptions. In doing so, the conceptualization violently transubstantiates the object into something that it is not. The conceptualization of the object can never fully grasp the object itself, and therefore there always remains a remainder, i.e. the nonconceptual. Despite this, according to Adorno, the philosopher has no choice but to work through concepts, for it is “inherent in thought itself…To think is to identify” (1999:5). Despite this impulse to conceptualize, the dialectician must remain perpetually cognizant of the tendency of the concept to distort and dominate the object, for “dialectics is the consistent sense of nonidentity” and thought which is directed “against itself” (1999:5, 365). For Adorno, this awareness of the violent and deformative nature of the conceptual is missing in Idealisms’ tendency to conflate thought with the object – rendering it impossible to grasp the very thing that idealism set out to understand (Schweppenhäuser 2009:41). As stated before, Adorno transfers reason’s inability to grasp the “totally other” without turning it into a stagnant idol (which limit’s the totally other to a certain time, space, and being, which is the most extreme form of theological identity thinking) down to the level of the subject’s inability to grasp the object through conceptualization. However, because humanity cannot live within a conceptless world, and has no choice but to construct concepts, the ability to say that the object that appears in front of him is a “totally other” is not

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acceptable. The “totally other” can only apply to that understanding of what the divine is (and simultaneously isn’t). A complete transference of the theological bilderverbot to a social, material, and historical bilderverbot is not possible, as it would render human life unintelligible, as human thought and being would be impossible. Adorno is forced to make a compromise with the radical nature of the theological bilderverbot, i.e. the subject must attempt to grasp the object with conceptual thought, with full understanding that his conceptualizations cannot fully comprehend, grasp, or possess a full penetration of the thing-in-itself. What’s equally important, it must constantly be engaged in a rethinking of the object itself as not to petrify and stagnate the concept – object. The dialectical philosopher (the subject) must always be mindful of that which resists conceptualization, i.e. the singularity and uniqueness of the object. Binding yet elastic statements concerning the object comprise a philosophical “constellation” of thought – characterized by its fluidity (absence of absolute coordinates), and thus escaping the production of a system of thought that seems to renders all of reality intelligible. Knowledge of reality in its totality is false (in its claim to completeness) as it becomes akin to the idol when it claims to be divine, (a false claim of being absolute). In essence, Adorno’s insistence on the non-identical in thought is a philosophical bilderverbot that is less radical than the theological in the sense that it cannot make reality into the “totally other,” as the discourse about the divine does, but more radical in that it forces the subject to see the non-conceptual as being beyond the discourse about the divine and is extended into the discussion about the physical world and society in which we live. For Adorno, the theological ban on images must migrate into the secular discussion about society if it is to be relevant in the modern-secular world.

Bilderverbot and the Suffering of Auschwitz

The notion of bilderverbot finds its ultimate importance in Adorno’s concern for suffering of the finite individual. Rejecting the traditional answers to the theodicy question, as well as a descriptive analysis of Auschwitz, and wanting to rescue the autonomy or irreducibility of the suffering of the innocent victim, Adorno writes, After Auschwitz, our feelings resist any claim of the positivity of existence as sanctimonious, as wronging the victims; they balk at squeezing any kind of sense, however bleached, out of the victims’ fate. And these feelings do have an objective side after events that make a mockery of the

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construction of immanence as endowed with a meaning radiated by an affirmatively posited transcendence. 1999:361

Adorno rejects any conceptualization of the suffering of Auschwitz, as any attempt to construct a positive interpretation of the event would render it meaningful; a prospect he finds perverse and absurd. For Adorno, Auschwitz remains and must remain without any meaning; as all attempts to imbue the mechanized extermination of a people, the production of corpses, with some form of altruistic purposivity, whether that be philosophical, theological, or ideological, would be a mockery of the meaninglessness of their suffering, as it would imply that Auschwitz was an inevitable part of some divine or cosmic plan – that it’s occurrence was simply a moment in a meaningful blueprint of human history, as opposed to understanding it as a product of perverse social organization that was completely unnecessary and should have never happened. Furthermore, Adorno understood that any attempt to impose a conception upon the victim’s fate would inevitably fail to comprehend or account for every micrological moment of suffering, pain, humiliation, and agony. Suffering of the innocent victim is, for Adorno, that which can never be conceptualized. As such, there is no possibility for any concept to grasp Auschwitz without denying the suffering of the victim; the moment of suffering exists as the “remainder” that at all times resists the deformative violence of the concept. For Adorno, any form of positive meaning for Auschwitz would originate from the analyzing subject, never from the object, i.e. those suffering. It is only on the “authority of those who suffer” that such suffering can be analyzed for meaning; yet even then it will always resist ultimate meaning and remain in the realm of subjectivity (Schuster & Boshert-Kimmig 1999:24). The agony of transcendence (prayer) without countermovement (a divine response) in the concentration camp, which didn’t bring the intervention of the totally other, but only the brutality of the SS and their cries of “Deus Volt”; the inconceivability of the bourgeois “coldness” that was required to exterminate children by the thousands; the humiliation of witnessing humans being beaten and starved; the dance of the “walking dead” (muselmänner in lager language); the assembly line production of corpses; the extreme instrumentalization of human life, all defy meaning as they are moments of sustained somatic terror and suffering which escapes any positive articulation. Language is provoked by suffering but is utterly incapable of formulating a single sentence that can convey or transfer the experience of suffering from one individual to another. The fullness of somatic suffering can only be experienced, as linguistic expression fails to relive the completeness of the moment

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or state of suffering. Therefore for Adorno, every theological, philosophical, and historical attempt to provide such conceivability, and thus render it meaningful (such as the theodicy answers), only leads to the further victimization of the victims – to render their suffering conceptually less than suffering, to render their agony understandable, and to render their brutal deaths meaningful. This impulse to conceptualize must not be allowed to re-victimize the victims. Faced with the violent and destructive nature of conceptuality, Adorno states “Auschwitz confirmed the philosopheme of pure identity is death” (1999:362).

The Jew as Concept, the Jew as Remainder

For the Jews, the concept of Der Juden, and all its perceived negative connotations, diminished the uniqueness of every Jew, and rendered every Jewish individual into a conceptual framework that portrayed each Jew as a threat to the Deutsches Volk. This allowed for them to be conceived of as the perpetual enemy. Unlike centuries before, where Jewish religion, especially the messianic claims, was the core insult of the Jews for Christendom.5 However, the Jews’ very existence in Hitler’s Europe was a threat to the Aryan race. In thinking so, and as a concept, every Jew was stripped of his or her individuality and was rendered “life unworthy of life.” and a mere “specimen” (Adorno 1999:362).6 On the other side of the conceptualization, i.e. what is German, the Nazis understood the “remainder” which resisted conceptualization within the Deutsches volk as the Jew, and as such had to be eliminated, as it served as the persistent reminder that Europe is not how it is conceived to be (or ought to be) by their racial ideology. To intellectually conceive of Europe as Jew-free, led to the attempt to physically make Europe Jew-free. In the Nazi consciousness, the Jew was both the non-conceptual component in Europe, as he resisted a full integration into the Nazi conception of Europe and their cult of Aryanism, and therefore was the perpetual and unwanted “other.” Furthermore, the Jewish remainder, the non-conceptualizable recalcitrant, was not simply a benign phenomenon, but was conceived of as a disease, a plague, and an existential threat. For the fascist, the non-conceptual/concept had to be eliminated. In Adorno’s estimation, the identity thought of the Nazi’s led directly to the gas chambers because the Jews were first that which remained outside the conceptualization of Christian/Aryan Europe, and second, a conceptualization of the degenerate and dangerous other. In essence, the Jews were both 5 See: Lindemann & Levy, (eds.), 2010. 6 See: Glass’s 1997.

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non-concept and concept, and as such posed a double threat that had to be terminated. In explaining his position that poetry after Auschwitz was inconceivable, Adorno (2001:110) stated, …just as I said that after Auschwitz one could not write poems…it could equally well be said, on the other hand, that one must write poems…that as long as there is an awareness of suffering among human beings there must also be art as the objective form of that awareness. Faced with the alternative of remaining silent concerning the human catastrophe that was Auschwitz, Adorno chose to rethink his poetry-ban, and in remembrance give voice to suffering of the past. However, for Adorno, in giving expression to the suffering of the finite individual through art and poetry, one must not violently impose some form of meaning through conceptualization upon the suffering object, but invokes a constellational moment of insight that allows the subject an insight into the suffering – a moment of somaticempathy/experience that does not propose to render a judgment, an understanding, and or a conceptualized meaning. Poetry, the specter behind the thought, the ‘thereness’ and equally ‘not-thereness’, opens the space for the voice of the suffering, so that remembrance of the innocent victims is sustained and their history of suffering is never forgotten, but does not fall into the conceptualizing temptation of prose.

Bilderverbot and the Negative Utopia: Non-Defining of that which doesn’t Exist

The Critical Theory of the Frankfurt School has been highly influential on the theory and praxis of sociology, psychology, history, philosophy, and religion. The first generation of Critical theorists, Theodor Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Herbert Marcuse, Erich Fromm, and Leo Lowenthal, etc., came from variable Jewish backgrounds.7 Although many of these thinkers moved from a religious context, into a secular theory-praxis orientation, as we have seen, they nonetheless retained certain religious and prophetic impulses within their theory that where deeply rooted in messianic and prophetic Rabbinical Judaism. 7 Although the degree to which their families adhered to a religious life is variable, it is certain that all were exposed to Judaism via their Jewish heritage, whether that be a religious exposure or simply to cultural Judaism as practiced by assimilated Jews of Germany.

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In the second part of this essay, I will discuss various details concerning the Frankfurt School’s notion of utopia, especially how it relates to religion and most specifically Horkheimer and Adorno’s notion of the “totally other,” as a gesture toward defining (by way of not defining) God, i.e. the concept of bilderverbot, and the “longing for the totally other” as a definition of religion. I will attempt to make explicit, if it is theoretically possible, what the critical theory of religion, in its prophetic form, only leaves implicit within their discussion of utopia. Furthermore, the ultimate goal of this section is to elucidate the connection between the “negative utopia” of the Frankfurt School, and the “negative theology” that is rooted in Adorno’s radicalization of the Jewish bilderverbot.

Exodus to America

Most of the first generation of critical theorists that escaped Hitler’s fascist Germany came to America in search of sanctuary.8 They did not come looking for a new permanent home, as they had always intended to return to Germany after the defeat of fascism, nor did they accept Zionism as a valid response to fascism and emigrate to Palestine although they did have great concerns for the safety of Jews in the newly formed state of Israel (Kundnani 2009:58). The Frankfurt School theorists believed the Jews of Europe had an immense role to play in the redemption of Western civilization, not only through a reconciliation between the Jews and Gentiles, but for a critical redemption of the European Enlightenment project itself – the very movement that liberated them from the ghetto’s of Medieval Europe. However, while they found refuge within the us and were greeted warmly by the New York academic community at Columbia University, and eventually in California as well, they nevertheless remained reserved on many political and social issues, due to the pervasive suspicion of foreigners, especially those who where German, of the political left, Marxist, and or represented a critical view of American democracy and or capitalism. The “Red Scare” was not only directed towards Russian Bolshevism, but Western Marxism was also a target of suspicion and persecution. When the Frankfurt School scholars did speak, they spoke in an idiom that was not accessible to the average American, and hardly accessible by those in their own 8 Walter Benjamin was the one exception. He was unable to escape Europe and eventually committed suicide in Portbou, a small town on the Spanish-French border in the Pyrenees. Herbert Marcuse and Erich Fromm decided to stay in America, yet Fromm would eventually return to Europe via Switzerland. See: Wheatland 2009.

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philosophical and sociological fields (at least in the American academic academy), a problem that still perplexes many today when reading their literature. However, their relative silence and philosophical obscurantism should not tempt one to think that they retreated from dialectical philosophy and sociology. Although some enjoyed a comfortable life, most especially Adorno, they refused to conformed even slightly to American consumerism or the ideology of liberal democracy and capitalism; they remained the genius loci (guardian spirit of a place or issue) of critical leftist thought within academic circles and later within the 1960s youth movement (Kundnani 2010:25–28, 37, 44, 57–59, 78–80). In the global context of Auschwitz, world war, genocidal aggression, nuclear bombs, and increased oppression and suppression of substantive freedom, what Schopenhauer identified as “Golgotha history,” or what Hegel called “the slaughter-bench of history,” the critical theorists conceived their philosophy within the inevitable sadness of the age, but imbued it with ageless hope, while resisting the vulgar Marxism of Russian Bolshevism and the the cultic “actionism” as exemplified by the ‘68 generation (Wheatland 2009: 44–45, Klapwijk 2010:94, Adorno 1999:378).9 It is part of my argument, that this irrepressible hope for a future reconciled society, while actively engaging in a dynamic and dialectical analysis of the world torn apart by reason made myth, fear made praxis, and love made murder, has its roots in the longing for a messianic age (without expecting it) – or a development of a society rooted in the transvaluation of all capitalist values, i.e. the utopian society of reconciliation and peace.

Horror of History and Utopian Reaction

According to Horkheimer, modern utopian thought and theory are reactions to the rise of bourgeois society and its “legitimating philosophy” that reifies an antagonistic system of political economy, rooted in man’s exploitation and domination over mankind, into the realm of nature; thus causing it to appear as inevitable and natural. The “Aristocratic law of nature” – the guiding principle of fascism, which augments the inherent “mechanistic killing cycle” of nature to the level of normative human interaction – is indicative of modern capitalist society, and as such, it is the “dispossessed classes of people (peasants, farmers, proletariat) who have to bear the cost and suffering” of 9 I define “hope” to be the perpetual belief in the possibility of negating what is the case; the horror and terror of history and nature. Horkheimer seemed to be less hopeful than the rest concerning the prospects of a second Enlightenment or a self-correcting enlightenment.

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such a system (Ott 2001:47). Within the pain and suffering of such a society, the utopian impulse is born (Ott 2001:47, Adorno 1999:361–408). As such, utopia expresses the sum of desires to negate what is the case in nature and history, to relieve the suffering of man and nature in a society that would be, if it could be, endorsed by the divine, especially that of the Abrahamic God. Utopia, as an all-encompassing social concept of negativity, i.e. criticism of all that exists coupled by the desire to replace it with that which doesn’t exist but is nevertheless longed for, reflects the notion of the “kingdom of God,” i.e. the eudaemonic society of man rooted in absolute justice, perfection, unconditional love, and closeness with the divine. Utopia is not that which is, and thus the meaning of the word: “that which has no place” (Greek: οὐ “not,” and τόπος  “place”). Yet, since it is not that which is, it also contains within it the ­dialectical-critical function of the prophetic – it remains outside of the “metaphysics of what is the case,” as Adorno identified scientism-positivism and vulgar materialism, and stands as both the accuser and inquisitor of existing society (that which is the case).10 The utopian impulse of critical theory is ­constitutional; having been rooted in and appropriated from utopian impulses in Marx, Freud, Hegel, the prophets, and eschatology. Furthermore, for the Frankfurt School, it was their background in the messianic Jewish upbringing and education (bildung), with its theological concept of bilderverbot that, as explained by Leo Lowenthal, was co-determinate with secular socialism in their desire for a more reconciled society.11 For the Frankfurt School, working in a secular capitalist post-Christian society, a very important absence that gives rise to the desire for utopia is the parousia-delay – the non-appearance of the promised messiah (Jewish and Christian), and the absolute longing for reconciliation and the cancellation of suffering and despair that would accompany the advent of the messianic.12 However, the promised “kingdom of god,” which was to be the fully reconciled and godly society, seems to have been abandoned, not by the masses and their move toward scientific, materialistic, mechanistic, and naturalistic causal explanations of existence, but for many by the divine itself. The Enlightenment, a project that they remained fundamentally committed to, was an attempt to 10 11

12

See: Brittain 2010. For the first generation of Frankfurt scholars, messianic Judaism’s task was not only eschatological and theological, but was a political task assigned to present a model of what life on earth should be if all things were perfect. See: Lowenthal 1987, and Rabinbach 1985:78–124. Although the Critical Theorists did not include this, it is clear that the Islamic longing for the messianic would also be included in this image.

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liberate man from his superstitions, and therefore cultivate a sense of agency in man – that he is the master of his own history – and thus recognize the fact that the divine has abandoned human history through his non-intervention and or that God, as Ludwig Feuerbach insisted, simply didn’t exist outside of humanity’s projections. Indeed, Nietzsche’s “God is Dead” didn’t propose the death of God, but the inability of the modern masses to believe that a thing such as God could ever exist.13 Although they paid homage to the divine and his revelation, modern man found his morality and ethics elsewhere. Furthermore, many of the assimilated modern Jews could no longer believe that a God so-conceived could exist, especially after what would appear to be his flagrant violation of his covenant with, and his neglect of, the “Chosen of Israel” in the Holocaust/Shoah. One can see this very dynamic in the trial of God in Auschwitz-Birkenau, where through the deployment of reasoned juridical arguments, a group of Jews put God on trial and found him guilty for his violation of the covenant through his involvement in Jewish suffering (or noninvolvement in ceasing Jewish suffering, or active involvement in imposing Jewish suffering). Although reason and law, both understood to be creations of the divine in Judaism, were used to condemn God, some inmates in the extermination camp, awaiting their last minute of life, returned to their unreasonable prayers after they found God guilty of violating his covenant (Schuster & Boshert-Kimmig 1999:7–52). However, some found praying in Auschwitz disgusting and absurd, and could not address the divine via prayer within the barbed wire of the camp (Levi 2011:98). Yet even prior to Auschwitz, many enlightenment and utopian thinkers expressed through deistic language their impatience for the messianic age. As all of history disclosed itself to them as a piling up of one catastrophe after the next, as Walter Benjamin’s “Angel of History” saw it, they became pessimistic about the possibility of a divine intervention and or rescue (Benjamin 2007:257). Many disillusioned believers concluded “if the God of justice and mercy is unwilling to intervene in human history on the side of the victims, the oppressed, the murdered, and the raped, then humanity is unwilling to wait for him.” Why should humanity wait for the promised messiah if in its worst suffering that messiah seemed not to take interest nor did he appear – despite his promises and ability? Can humanity not do for itself what was once promised by the divine, especially since humanity has advanced it capacity to determine its own future and environment 13

It’s interesting to note that Nietzsche’s Zarathustra announces the death of God to the marketplace, and indicts those who are going about their “business” there as the murderers of God. The bourgeoisie, Nietzsche tacitly announces, are the executioners of the divine. Why do they laugh at him? Because they already know they’ve killed God.

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since the days of the Prophets? Consequently, for those who still maintained a belief in a divine being that is active in human history, the theodicy problem, or questions of God’s justice in the face of the absence of justice in his world, had driven many to seek a utopian solution without the blessing of the divine, regardless if they still believed in the divine. Marx’s secular communism is an attempt to do just that; that in the face of the totally other’s non-appearance, non-intervention, and unconcern, man should make the “kingdom of heaven” on earth without the divine’s blessing or input – that it is a historical necessity that cannot wait for the uncaring, powerless, or absent God. He was Deus Absconditus, and thus irrelevant for human society. However, this utopian impulse, which can be found in Marx, Freud, Bloch, and other critical voices, preserves the utopian impulse of the theological inspired kingdom of god, while negating the religious imperative of God’s intervention into history to bring about such a utopia. The promise of and longing for reconciliation, justice, and peace remains powerful within human relations, while the notion of a divinity becomes ever more distant.14 Because the divine was not only “imageless” within the concept of bilderverbot, but also seemingly remained unavailable for human petition, the responsibility for the construction of an optimal society is increasingly viewed as a human obligation and not that of an eschatological event or the interjection of the divine into history.

Religion, Utopia, and Suffering: Dal Segno al Coda

Unlike other modern theories that claim to be secular in nature, the Critical Theory of Religion of Adorno, Horkheimer, Benjamin, Habermas, Siebert, etc. does not unreflexively reject religion and religious claims as mere ideology (like certain forms of Marxism does), as residues of mental material that truly belongs to the historical infancy of humanity (the “universal mass neurosis” of Freud), or the projections of human wishes and desires into a metaphysical realm (Feuerbach), or as slave morality, moralizing all that is weak over all that 14

Despite what the “sociology of religion,” currently championed by Peter Berger, tells us about secularization and religion, all points of reference within the family, civil society and the state are geared towards the ever increasing nature of secularization – which sparks the “religious” reactions of many individuals and groups. Unfortunately, they take this reactionary stance by the few as being proof of a societal-global return to religion. It is precisely because of the fact that society, polity, economy, etc., is becoming more secular, that some choose to be religiously reactionary. The Berger thesis unfortunately puts the cart before the horse.

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is strong (and therefore good) as Nietzsche tells us.15 On the contrary, the Critical Theory of Religion takes seriously the emancipatory and prophetic claims and desires of religion, while it attempts to rescue certain semantic and semiotic materials from the depths of their mythos (sacred story) and reformulate them into revolutionary theory and praxis. While such material is preserved within the critical theory, the mythology, untrue ideology, pathology, and criminality of positive religion is negated.16 Determinate negation (bestimmte negation), as taught to the Frankfurt School by Marx, and Marx by his dialectical teacher Hegel, is applied to religion, to liberate its emancipatory potential from its violent criminality and distorted pathological history and orientation. The truth and power of the story, its prophetic core, often located within the micrological details of every moment of human suffering, have been embraced, amplified, and therefore preserved within the theory.17 As discussed before, this rescue of the negativity of theology from religion is what Walter Benjamin pressed upon the younger theorist Adorno. Furthermore, an integral component of critical micrological analysis of society and individuals is the rescue of the desire for a “utopian other” than what is the case, the remembrance of past suffering, with the practical intent to diminish future suffering; suffering that is often expressed in small details of the pain and existential anguish in the lives of those who find themselves in the ditch of history.18 Through the micrological focus on the suffering, pain, and misery of human existence, what Adorno identifies as the non-identical or nonconceptualizable, which remains secure in its’ particularity, the experience of the individual does not get absorbed and lost in the totalizing whole. As stated before, for Adorno (1999:361–408), by thinking about human suffering and the singularity of the individual through constellations (as opposed through systems), the utopian alternative becomes recognizable, if only in its negative form, i.e. that which utopia is not yet. Furthermore, the utopian image through constellation thinking escapes the destructive tendency to become an 15 16

17 18

See: Eduardo Mendieta (ed.) 2005. I use the term “positive religion” here to mean a religious orientation that confirms the status quo of nature and history, or one that does not engage in an active attempt to move history toward the prophetic. I will discuss in detail later. See: Siebert 2006. A good example of a micrological hope for a reconciled society is Herbert Marcuse’s 1967 identification of “benches” in Hanoi that only seat two people, “so that another person would not even have the technical possibility of disturbing.” In this small detail lies the hope for a future society rooted in inter-subjectivity and unconditional love. Also see: Adorno 2005:191–204.

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encompassing and dogmatic whole – a closed system that warrants orthodoxy, developmental stagnation, and an authority to enforce its coordinates. The non-conceptualizable constellation – which is only accessible in insightful flashes – that vague but powerful notion of the messianic – utopia, yet unknowable force, allows the deployment of its prophetic course without retreating into a oppressive cannon of being – the idol. The remembrance of the pain and suffering of the victims of history garnishes a response from the spirit of utopia, but does not press the suffering into a conception that does violence to its singularity. Ultimately, every micrological moment of somatic, intellectual, and spiritual suffering, gives birth to the utopian ideal of what a society without unnecessary suffering would be, without its concrete articulation. It remains vague, but the longing only increases.

Capitalism and the Abandonment of Utopia

Despite the Critical Theory’s rootedness in an utopian negation of the aggressiveness and destructiveness of nature and society, recent history and recent trends toward alternative future number one, the totally administered society, and number two, the totally militarized society, have led some to abandon the utopian ideal, alternative future number three, the totally reconciled society; some have done this out of despair, i.e. Leo Lowenthal, and others out of pragmatics, i.e. Jürgen Habermas (Siebert 2001:53). In a lament of current society and history, Löwenthal (1987:237), the critical theorist of society and literature, said, What has not been lost is, of course, the critical approach: the process of analysis, retaining the good and rejecting the bad, the need to accuse, the indictment of all that exists…, but without explicit hopes. What has occurred is not a retreat into skepticism or cynicism, but sadness. The utopian motif has been suspended. The horror of Critical Theory can been read from this text; despite the desperate need for the destruction of “socially necessary illusions,” (those untruths that sustain, perpetuate, and legitimate already existing society) it is those illusions that posses the minds of much of humanity, and as such the social, political, cultural, and economic power of capitalism, with its tendency to reify, objectify, commodify, commercialize, and oppress, turning all living organisms into a meaningless part of the “exchange society” (tauschgesellschaft). For the Frankfurt School, who saw WWI and WWII, Hiroshima & Nagasaki, the Shoah

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and Vietnam, etc. as consequences of such a society, it was incredibly disappointing to see an entrenchment of such a society as it becomes more barbaric; Golgotha history perpetuates, while the slaughter-bench expands to make room for even more victims. The march towards alternative future No. 1, the totally administered society, and No. 2, the totally militarized society, continues to expand and invade more and more of the earth; subjugating whole societies as it infiltrates their culture and consciousness via globalization (neo-liberalization). This move towards a society of control, instrumental rationality, and bourgeois callousness, as Adorno described it, also continues to penetrate deeper in the Western world from where it originated. However, through an analysis of social, economic, and political trends in the 1960s and 1970s, the Frankfurt scholars, now second and third generation, foresaw the capitalistic turn towards its own death through the increasingly more radicalized free-market, especially of the kind advocated by the University of Chicago economist Milton Friedman. Yet, despite capitalism’s inherent suicidal antagonisms, state sponsored attempts to resurrect capitalism were viewed as superfluous, because it would inevitably decline, but would not die. They foresaw that through state interventions into the economy (back to basics ideology), those most geared towards social justice could nurse the capitalistic system back to health, via modifying and taming it; capitalism with a smiling face. Herbert Marcuse saw this clearly when he described the “working class,” Marx’s agent of historical change, as having exhausted its energy to resist capitalism, and had been co-opted into the system – thus giving them something to lose if a socialist/communist revolution were to occur. The working class had become apologists for their masters and would defend them and their system at all costs. This led Marcuse to identify those on the margins of society, the students, minorities, hippies, “revolutionary communists,” 1968 generation, to be the new possible agent of change.19 This Neo-liberal trend opposed a radical departure from the already existing society towards alternative future three – the fully-reconciled society, i.e. the creation of a utopian-like existence through socialism; a society that could be later endorsed by the Messiah.20 Now in the 21st century, we must say that Löwenthal and the Critical Theorists have a justified right to be sorrowful with these turn of events, but do not have an absolute obligation to be so. If to accept the notion that the utopian motif has been suspended, then should it not, in the name of those who suffer while refusing to abandon hope for a reconciled society, be vigorously resuscitate as the philosopher Slavoj Žižek has recently 19 20

See: Marcuse 1964. See: Žižek 2009:9–85.

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challenged the political left to do?21 In light of the centrality of the utopian motif in the first generation of the Frankfurt School, it appears that the utopian impulse cannot be abandon into sadness for it remains constitutive of the Critical Theory itself. Implicit in Löwenthal’s “sadness” is the reality of capitalism’s barbaric victory and the retirement of a radical vision for a just and reconciled society. However, we have to question whether or not the elimination of the negativity of the utopian motif would collapse the entire project of Critical Theory into banal skepticism, meaningless nihilism, or uncritical description, and thus perpetuating the sum of all antagonisms already entrenched within the status quo. In fact, coupled with the concern for the suffering of the finite individual, it is this very longing for the totally other than what is the case that is at the heart of the Critical Theory. Without it, Critical Theory retires itself into pure academics; a critique that it has already been accused of during the 1960s youth movement in Germany.22

Utopia and the Theological

As stated above, most of the first generation of Critical Theorists took refuge in the United States during the Fascist period in Germany. Knowing that they were not in a Left-friendly country, as the primary ideological enemy of the us prior to World War II was Bolshevism, and that the alliance between Roosevelt and Stalin was only pragmatic and not a reconciliation between the Bourgeois and Marxist Enlightenment, Horkheimer and Adorno, et al. were careful not to blatantly demonstrate their leftist and socialist political philosophy for fear of retaliation and or deportation (but neither did they abandon it). Conservative America was not a friend of their political and philosophical orientation and consequently they understood that their position within the

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See the film Žižek, dir. Astra Taylor, with Slavoj Žižek, Zeitgeist Films, 2005. Also see Marcuse’s 1967 article, “The End of Utopia,” where he expressly points out the need to abandon, not the substantive idea of utopia, but the pejorative nature of the word “utopia.” If we forgo the use of the word (while preserving the concept), so that the word no longer stands in the way of its actualization, then we can begin to make the necessary changes to produce the real possibilities of utopian change, without the undermining effect of the accusations that such a project is merely utopian. Marcuse’s point is well taken, and it may be the case. Yet, another possibility is the aggressive defense of lost causes, or causes to be, even if they are utopian (in the pejorative sense of the word). See: Kundnani 2009:78–80.

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us was precarious at best.23 We have since learned that those scholars associated with the Frankfurt School in American exile were under surveillance by the us government, and thus confirming that the Institute in exile was correct in being careful about publicly articulating their positions in the 1930s, 1940s, and after.24 However, despite the obvious historical reasons for Critical Theory not to articulate a positive utopia (as the indictment of all that exists), there is a much more important reason. The Frankfurt School thinkers understood themselves to be utopian iconoclasts, having philosophically appropriated the Hebraic ban on images (bilderverbot). As such, Adorno (2008:210) defines Utopia in his lectures on negative dialectics as, consciousness of possibility, adheres to the concrete, the unspoilt. Its path is blocked by possibility, never by immediate reality; this explains why it always seems abstract when surrounded by the world as it is. Its inextinguishable colour comes from non-being. Thought is its servant, a piece of existence that extends, however, negatively, into that which does not exist. In much the same way that they adopted a radicalization of the second and third commandments of the Decalogue, the ban on making images or names for the imageless and nameless “totally other,” so too have they adopted this position in terms of utopia. Utopia, by its very definitional nature, treads very close to the definition of the divine, as the totally other then what is the case. Utopia, is the “totally other society” than what is the case in really existing society, articulated via the servant of thought. The Jewish ban on idolatry, which includes any positive statements about the divine, is taken seriously by the Critical Theory of Religion, not because they were Jewish, or even religiously committed to Judaic law, but that it is within this hope for the totally other – in the possibility of the nameless and imageless other’s redemptive existence – that there is any hope for the rescue of absolute meaning, perfect justice, human compassion, and unconditional love, etc. The sorrowful 23

24

Even though it generally remained on a friendly basis, the Frankfurt School often had serious and open disagreements with American Leftist intellectuals. For a good review of their critical discourse with Pragmatists scholars, see Wheatland 2009. See: Jenemann 2007:180–183. Herbert Marcuse however was very vocal and active against the Vietnam war and admonished other members of the Frankfurt School for retreating into the University and not standing with the students in their revolt against the “established society.” Also see: Kundnani 2009:80.

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longing for the messianic return, the parousia event, or the coming of absolute justice, so that the unrepentant murderer shall ultimately not triumph over the innocent victim – that the injustice of history and nature is not the final word of all – expresses the need for such a hope.25 For the Critical Theorists, the complete and total abandonment of the longing for the totally other is a complete and total abandonment of humanity, left simply to the devises of nature and history – the “Aristocratic Law of Nature” (Hitler 1943) – which fascistically extends into human society. The grave risk associated with such an abandonment is to increase the suffering, despair, and violent annihilation of man at the hands of man, and his continued enslavement to his passions, irrationality, instrumental reason, aggression, narcissism, sado-masochism, and self-destructiveness. The Critical Theory of Religion understands religion to be the echo of the cry of the innocent masses, and their longing for absolute justice – of which the Critical Theory has sympathy and fully identifies with, because at its core is the sensitivity for the finite human creature and their suffering.26 The first generation of Critical Theorists understood that to make an image of or name for the totally other is to drag the infinite into finite language (species language) within a finite world, and thus cancel any hope in the totally other, as it has become less than the totally other (Horkheimer & Adorno 1986:23, 24). Likewise, the utopian desire must remain the unknowable society if it is to remain the relentless inquisitor of all that exists within nature and history. Any positive articulation of the utopian ideal is to make it a idol, a false ideology, and thus a tool for manipulation in the hands of those who would manipulate for the benefit of one over “the other,” and as such reinstate an antagonist and dictatorial “unfree” society. As Adorno expressed, it is utopia’s non-being (that it does not participate in the reality of what is the case) that gives it other-worldly emancipatory power, or what Adorno calls its “colour.” Furthermore, positive religion (which is a full participant in what is the case), as a set formula of dogmatic statements, takes on administrative quality, an enforceable orthodoxy, which calls for an enforcer – the priest – who then, because of his power position, has the power to enforce uniformity that orthodoxy demands, and thus stifle the free and creative articulation of human thought and action – the emancipated being (Fromm 1981:41–57). Positive 25 26

See: Ott 2009:167–186. The Critical Theory has taken seriously the entire quote of Marx from his “Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right”: “Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.” See: Andrew McKinnon, “Opium as Dialectics of Religion: Metaphor, Expression and Protest” in Goldstein (ed.) 2009.

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religion, especially rooted in authoritarian hierarchy, abandons its prophetic geist (if it’s a prophetically inspired/revealed religion) when it becomes a petrified system – a system that stands in direct competition with the totally other society of utopia. However, with inverse theology, or cipher theology as Adorno identified it, religion has to be forcibly rescued from the hands of those who functionalize it as a “contingency management experience subsystem.” For the Critical Theorists of Religion, the only way to do that is to rescue God from religion, and justice from the world – as all attempts to posit God in the positive lead to idolatry, and all historically mediated human attempt to bring universal and perfect justice are ultimately failures, for the dead cannot be resurrected, the raped cannot be made pure, and the maimed cannot be made whole again by man’s hands alone.27 Consequently, the utopian impulse must also remain only in the negative – or expressed only in such a way that it articulates that which it is not. The double-negativity of utopia, first by definition as “that which has no place,” and secondly by only being able to be expressed in the negative, that which utopia is not, is the only way to effectively understand the phenomenon without loosing its quality as a sum of all negations, and thus its prophetic geist. With this political-theological maneuver, the Frankfurt School takes a tacit position on utopia – like the Jewish second commandment, banning all positive images of the divine, so the Frankfurt School, still rooted in a secularized Jewish prophetic and messianic hope, refused to positively identify any notion or system of utopian society.28 Utopia is inexpressible. This is what Lowenthal meant when he said that utopia is the “indictment of all that exists…without explicit hopes.” In agreement with Ernst Bloch’s notion that the only true believer is the atheist, so to the only true believer in Utopia is the atopists – those who believe but leave any notion of a positive utopia unarticulated. The only way to rescue the utopian motif from total abandonment is to preserve it in silence via its double negativity. In this sense, the Critical Theorist were more utopian that the classical utopianists. 27

28

See: Siebert 1994. It is interesting to note that the English word “cipher” derives from the Arabic “sifer,” which means 0 (Zero). Zero, according to Mathematics, serves as a “placeholder” for the negative space. With this in mind, Adorno’s negative or “cipher” theology is a placeholder theology, devoid of positive content. This is one of the reasons that the Frankfurt School could not endorse the Soviet Union and other “Communist” countries, despite their initial excitement about their creation. Marcuse most likely remained the most optimistic about Soviet and other Communist societies, although he had serious doubts as to whether it could distinguish itself radically from capitalist society due to the inherent violence and oppression in both systems, despite the differences in how that violence and oppression manifested itself.

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No Utopia with Positive Religion

Horkheimer and Adorno identified religion as the longing for the totally other than the terror and horror in nature and history, and as such utopia, which is the negation of such conditions, cannot be compatible with any positive religion.29 For the Critical Theory, “the longing” expresses the indictment against history and nature; it expresses the prophetic critique against unjust society; it expresses the Socratic questioning of all presumptions and assumptions, all ideology that masks itself as “common sense,” and all ideological truth claims. Therefore the notion of utopia is inherently contra mundum (against the world as it exists) without being “anti-world,” as the possibility of another world (way-of-being-in-the-world) was certainly imaginable by the Frankfurt School.30 They saw, with the Bourgeois Enlightenment, that religion became more positivistic, privatized, and atomized; it was pushed further into a dark closet of personal experiences, kept out of the public sphere, and depleted of it’s dialectics. It was thoroughly castrated of all its potential for substantive social critique. The predominant use that the ruling classes had for religion was as a “contingency management experience system,” a system to restores equilibrium to political economy through the calming and soothing “opiate” religion, for the benefit of stabilizing civil society and or nation-state within any given historical catastrophe.31 Religion’s positive injunctions concerning life in this finite world – such as Apostle Paul’s encouragement to obey all legitimate authority,32 suffer peacefully while waiting for the coming of the Messiah, and the ascetic abandonment of the prophetic for a mystical retreat into oneself, were functionalized by the Bourgeois for their own benefit, separating religious critique from the state and economy. However, the hypocrisy of the situation was apparent, as the Bourgeoisie expressed no sincere belief in such unscientific, irrational, and obscure metaphysics, but nevertheless found it a useful tool for the control and exploitation of the 29 30

31 32

See: Theodor. W. Adorno, “Observations on the Liberalization of Religion” in Mendieta (ed.). 2005:255. Also see Adorno 2005:135–142. Despite their lack of optimism, the Frankfurt School scholars remained imprisoned in hope about future human relations. They did not retreat into Schopenhauerian pessimism, although they learned a lot from his philosophy. See: Siebert 1985. “Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. Therefore he who resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment.” (Rom. 13:1–2).

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manipulated masses.33 The religious worldview and life-world were soon replaced by a new social ethos in which the market and exchange society became the dominate mode of public existence, while religion, and its prophetic indictment of society, stayed a private affair between the divine and the individual, not to be consulted on matters of national importance (at least not the prophetic side of religion).34 As the market-oriented way-of-being-in-theworld became socially dominate and civil society became the most powerful force within and on the life-world of the individual, its influence penetrating into the family and state, religiously mandated or inspired social tendencies toward rituals, theologies, morals, ethics, and institutions had to be made docile and complacent, and thus non-prophetic and uncritical of civil society. The Bourgeois ruling class, although personally in contempt of religion, especially its leftist prophetic core and its rightwing obscurantism, allowed for its continual existence in society albeit in the form of “positive religion.” This was especially true in the United States where the separation of church and state allowed for an abundance of religious life; religion became democratized and commodified, which also fractured and privatized it, robbing it of its collective social power. However, what remained was religiosity in its most status-quo affirming positive form, which reifies and affirms the existing class structure, unjust economic conditions, inhuman imbalance of wealth and power, environment catastrophes, and the systematic subjugation and destruction of part of humanity for the benefit of another part of humanity. As such, Jesus and the Prophets were reconciled with the American economic ideology. The social nature of religion, that which would posit what the world ought to be based on the teachings of Jesus, Moses, Muhammad, etc., was de-emphasized for the quest for personal redemption and social-political-economic legitimation, as 33

34

In the 20th century, the functionalization of religion was coupled by the functionalization of psychology. Positive religion legitimated the political-economy, and positive psychology, through the use of marketing and public relations, helped maintain the conspicuous consumption that perpetuated it. Both religion and psychology, which at their core is the liberational intention, were both used to enslave in capitalist political-economy. The first critical study of the functionalization of psychology for the benefit of capitalist politicaleconomy was done by Vance Packard (1957). Although some of the material is certainly dated, it is well worth the read as it sheds light on the genesis of consumer market manipulation that is still in use today. Also see: Adorno 1991. Of course Western prophetic religion resurrected itself mainly among minorities and the dispossessed at various times during the 19th and 20th centuries, e.g., Dr Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, Liberation Theologians in Central and South America, etc. Although these movements were generally successful in reforming the societies they were located in, they nevertheless did not radically transform them.

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opposed to social renewal and transformation – the kingdom of God was sacrificed for this worldly empire. The social gospel was all but canceled as a civilizational imperative and was at best given occasional lip service and followed exclusively on an individual basis if at all. The Nietzschean “master morality” of competition, greed, and aggression, those qualities needed in civil society, became the new moral code, as capitalism’s core values extended into the state and family, which, according to the bourgeois philosopher Hegel, is disastrous for both.35 This “domestication” of the prophetic religion is precisely what Marx was critical of in his last of three definitions of religion, the “opiate of the masses,” i.e. a religion that normativizes unjust social relations and reconciles humanity to such injustice. For Marx, people should not be harmonized with social antagonisms, and it was ideological to claim that they already were reconciled under the present capitalist society – they were not, regardless of what their consciousness told them. Horkheimer and Adorno likewise identified that in the post-Bourgeois, Freudian, and Marxist enlightenment, positive religion was and is the dominant mode of religiosity in the West.36 Nevertheless, the critical-prophetic aspects where taken over, rescued, and often fulfilled by secular Marxist revolutionaries, who were generally honest about their opposition to positive religion, while appreciating the revolutionary aspects of religious thought and history, for example, Friedrich Engel’s and Ernst Bloch’s work on Thomas Münzer, the theological and political leader of the Peasant’s Revolt in 1524. These Marxists, including Marx himself, and subsequently the Frankfurt School, already engaged in an inversion of religious motifs, semantic and semiotic potentials, into secularized principles, values, etc., not motived by their dislike for religion, but for their appreciation for its liberational qualities and the need to preserve and further develop those qualities (Horkheimer 1974:49–50). For these revolutionaries, it was painful to see that those who would proclaim to follow the “religion of love” could not see that the gospels’ ideals had been dialectically rescued and transformed into secular “solidarity.” It only confirmed their suspicion that Christianity had exiled itself far away from its historical critical-prophetic core, and had become fossilized in a positive form, especially post-Constantine and his Romanization of Christianity.37 Marxism was not only the self-critique of bourgeois liberalism, but for the Frankfurt School it was also the self-critique of Judaism and Christianity. 35 36 37

See: Hegel 2010. See: Horkheimer and Adorno 1986. See: A. James Reimer, “Constantine: From Religious Pluralism to Christian Hegemony” in Ott, (ed.), 2007.

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Because positive religion affirms the status quo and therefore its unjust conditions, utopia, as the sum of all negations of injustice and imperfections in society, stands in complete contrast. There is no place for a positive religion in utopia, for if utopia where to be actualized, there would be a lack of injustice for positive religion to affirm. As such, positive religion is the ideology that stands in perpetual opposition to negative utopian thought, and as such, utopian thought will continue to be the enemy of the conventional religious believer as nearly all attempt to build a secular-utopian society have rejected by the traditional believer. The possibility of a historical utopia, sadly for the Frankfurt School, is not commonly accepted by the traditional believer who will continue to suffer within alternative futures No. 1 and No. 2 – and thus, as Löwenthal says, it is in sadness that utopia was abandoned.

No Theocracy? But Who’s Behind the Puppet?

In Walter Benjamin’s (1978:312) brief essay “Theologico-Political Fragment,” he addresses the temptation for humanity to confer upon themselves the power of the Messiah when he states, Only the Messiah himself consummates all history, in the sense that he alone redeems, completes, creates its relation to the Messianic. For this reason nothing historical can relate itself on its own account to anything Messianic. Therefore the Kingdom of God is not the telos of the historical dynamic; it cannot be set as a goal. From the standpoint of history it is not the goal, but the end. Therefore the order of the profane cannot be built up on the idea of the Divine Kingdom, and therefore theocracy has no political, but only a religious meaning…The order of the profane should be erected on the idea of happiness. For Benjamin, the Messiah represents the total end of history, the messianic jetztzeit (now-time) that stops the clock of history; the total consummation of all that has gone before and the redemption of the suffering and those who have suffered.38 It is the messianic breakthrough into history that ushers in a society that is at the present time, and with the present language, unable to be articulated. For Benjamin, it is not a possibility for humanity to construct a society that fully embodies that which the messianic intervention would 38

See: Dustin Byrd, “Walter Benjamin’s Theory of Divine Violence and Political Messianism” in Miri (ed.), 2011:185–224.

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establish. However, Benjamin, like Adorno, although leaving a positive vision of a utopian existence unannounced, does leave us with a small criteria, one that can be used to guide the building of the best society that man can build, i.e. that it should rest of the foundation of mankind’s happiness. Without getting into the particulars of what each individuals’ happiness is, because some surely garnish pleasure from cruelty, exploitation, and oppression, and that is not what Benjamin is proposing, we should understand Benjamin to be saying that such a society should direct itself towards justice, compassion, equality, solidarity, and peace; i.e. the succession of man’s domination over man, domination over nature, and his self-destructive ways. If such a society could be created, it would produce the conditions for which every individual could fulfill themselves and their talents within the bounds of justice, yet it would not seek legitimacy from any notion of the divine. Needless to say, if such a society was brought about by human activity, as flawed as it would be, Benjamin and the rest of Frankfurt School would understand this to be the end of bourgeois society and capitalism, as the values of such are anathema to the values of a society rooted in happiness via the incarceration and eventual abolishment of injustice, violence, and needless suffering. For Benjamin, the point is not to reject the prophetic values, principles, and goals of a messianic theocracy, but to secularize those prophetic tendencies into a secular society that can be endorsed by the Messiah if and when he ever enters into history. If there is a vague image of the utopian potential within the corpus of the Frankfurt School, it is the secularized prophetic theocratic society; the society that is explicitly governed by the values of historical materialism (the puppet), but are tacitly rooted within the ugly little dwarf (prophetic theology). Furthermore, if Ernst Bloch is correct in his understanding that the only true believer is the atheist, because unlike the theist, his absence of faith leaves the divine unarticulated and therefore secure in its complete otherness, then we can say, in light of Benjamin’s ban on theocracy, that a just society, absent the intervention of the Messiah, could only be brought about by an a-theocratic state and society, as it would be the society that does not make a mockery out of the divine by rooting its existence in it, which would inevitably bend and distort the divine towards its own earthly ends, or by claiming that it is doing the work of the Messiah, which, according to Benjamin, is the end of history, not a movement within it. For the Frankfurt School, without the Messiah, only the secular state and society can adequately address the needs of humanity, by allowing those prophetic values and principles from prophetic religion to migrate into legislation and culture; any legitimation appeal to the divine would render the divine less-than-divine, and utopia as less-than-utopian.

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Nemo surdior est quam is qui non audiet39

In the case of the Frankfurt School’s refusal to articulate a positive vision of a utopian society, it is not that they lack the ability to intellectually construct what a blissful existence of full reconciliation, absolute justice, and non-­ possessive love would appear to be concretely, but they leave that to the silence of the messianic. They refuse to fully articulate what ought to be the case in the positive, a comprehensive and concrete vision of a utopian society, for no other reason other than their commitment to the radicalized 2nd commandment of the Decalogue – the ban on any image of the divine, but instead root their critique in the double negativity of the bilderverbot, which does not allow the construction of a false idol, nor a kingdom of God on earth. Yet, this radicalization extends from theology into political-economy, where what is currently wrong with a globalized neo-liberal world is clear to all those who want to see, as it pushes society into ever increasing social antagonisms, advanced technological and administered control of humans, perpetual wars on mankind and nature, loss of existential meaning, religion castrated of its prophetic potential, dominance of instrumental rationality, and the threat of global Auschwitz through a nuclear totalen krieg. For the Frankfurt School, the prophetic and anti-idol essence of the bilderverbot is the most important conception of Abrahamic religion; it is the very negativity of the bilderverbot, it’s refusal to comply with the existing coordinates of the world, which allows religion to remain critical. Furthermore, as we have shown, the theological negativity (Benjamin’s hunchback) also animates the notion of utopia, the “unarticulated no-place,” which, for the Critical Theory of Religion, needs to be preserved, augmented, and deployed in a dialectical critique of all that is; the triumph of positive religion, the eternal enemy of utopia, is the assassination of the philosophical grand inquisitor in the advance of a non-prophetic, neo-liberal globalized society of hopelessness, despair, and suffering. In sadness the Frankfurt School may retreat, but it must not forget the new categorical imperative that was imposed on us by Hitler, that they (we) are to “arrange their (our) thoughts and actions so that Auschwitz will not repeat itself, so that nothing similar will happen” (Adorno 1999:365). 39

No man is more deaf than the one who will not hear.

Chapter 4

Theo-Utopian Hearing Ernst Bloch on Music Roland Boer This study offers a critical commentary on an unjustly neglected dimension of the work of Ernst Bloch, namely, his philosophy of music. The key text is the long opening section of his Spirit of Utopia, although a number of other shorter pieces are also relevant (gathered in Zur Philosophie der Musik, of which a selection has been translated as Essays on the Philosophy of Music). By critical commentary I mean an in-depth engagement that is both exposition and critical assessment, an approach that is indebted to the long tradition of biblical criticism. Briefly put, Bloch’s philosophy of music is a sustained re-narration of the story of music. His story emphasises the human nature of music, focusing on the basic category of the note and its associated features, such as hearing, voice, dance, song, and rhythm. Bloch listens and writes with what may be called a philosophical and theo-utopian ear, which he deploys to ‘hear around corners’ in order to espy the contours and glimpses of utopian promise. I propose to offer a critical commentary on what must be one of Ernst Bloch’s most neglected pieces, namely, the bravura Philosophy of Music section that opens his Spirit of Utopia (Bloch 2000:42–164).1 Like Adorno’s Kierkegaard book (Adorno 1989, 2003), more than one critic has admitted that Bloch’s sustained reflections on music are as sibylline as his writings can get. So I will keep it relatively simple, for what follows is in large part – as Marx put it in regard to 1 For ease of cross-referencing, I use the version that opens the collection, Essays on the Philosophy of Music (Bloch 1985c), which is itself a selection from Zur Philosophie der Musik (Bloch 1974). The only recent work on Bloch’s philosophy of music is the book, Listening for Utopia in Ernst Bloch’s Musical Philosophy by Benjamin Korstvedt (2010). While an extremely welcome and useful work, its interest is musicological, seeking to develop the potential of Bloch for musical analysis today, especially with regard to the composers with whom Bloch himself deals. So one finds detailed analysis of scores from Mozart, Beethoven and Wagner, in an effort to fill out Bloch’s treatments and then take them further. Unfortunately, the book fails to deal in any extended fashion with the philosophical core of Bloch’s philosophy of music, a problem exacerbated by the tendency to build an argument from specific analyses. The result is that we never move from the fragments to a systematic and coherent treatment, for Korstdevt prefers to retreat into yet more micro-analyses. It does not help that Korstvedt treads gingerly around both Bloch’s Marxism and misses crucial features of his thought, especially his heavy debts to theology and the Bible and the very human nature of music.

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2014 | doi 10.1163/9789004263147_006

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his notes on Hegel – an exercise in self-clarification. This study may best be described as a critical commentary, an exposition laced with critical assessment, a commentary that is both intimate and immanent and has its own neglected heritage deep within biblical criticism. However, before the commentary begins, let me offer a brief statement of what Bloch sets out to achieve in his philosophy of music: it is a thorough retelling of the belated story of music by emphasising its very human nature, recounting that story in terms of the basic category of the note and its hangers-on (hearing, voice, dance, song and rhythm); Bloch listens with a philosophical and theo-utopian ear that is able, every so now and then, to hear around corners.

Overview: Theo-Utopian Hearing The ear perceives more than can be explained conceptually. bloch 1985c:113; 1974: 135

Let me say a little more about each of the carefully weighted terms in this brief description. To begin with, Bloch’s philosophy of music is a thorough retelling of the story of music. Now, at one level Bloch assumes that music itself does not have a narrative and that it cannot be represented in conventional terms. As David Drew writes in his detailed introduction to the English translation of Bloch’s musical essays: ‘it is essential to his philosophical purpose that music is imageless and without narrative form’ (Drew 1985:xxv), precisely so that Bloch may assume that music is itself philosophy, requiring the merest gloss and clarification. True enough, at least as far as this position enables Bloch to avoid the narrative pull of those forms he favours, such as song, fugue, sonata and opera. However, at another level Bloch offers a profound retelling of the story of music, now in terms of the twisting fortunes of the note. More of that in a moment, for now I wish to reprise the second phase of my brief description: the story of music is a belated one. Although he later qualifies the point,2 Bloch argues that it is crucial for understanding music that it appears lately, as one untimely born: ‘The Persians, Chaldeans and Egyptians, the Greeks and schoolmen, all of them without any music worth mentioning’ (Bloch 1985c:136; 1974:159, 160). Why? Not only does music take up the role of a seemingly fading religion, but the lateness of music gives it a uniquely dialectical 2 In The Principle of Hope Bloch modifies his earlier bold statement, noting the contributions to musical theory (but not practice) of Pythagoras, Boëthius, Petrus Hispanus and the Scholastics (Bloch 1985c:213, 214; 1974:300, 301).

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role in the anticipation of utopia, for it both negates and transforms, or rather sublates (Aufhebung) the hope embodied in religion. Further, Bloch never tires of emphasising that music is a distinctly human activity: ‘We hear only ourselves’ is the opening statement of the whole work (Bloch 1985c:1; 1974:7). Known only through that most embedded of sense receptors – the ear – and manifested first as a listening to oneself, music is what we would now call a very human construct. For Bloch, this means that the building blocks of music are, after the note, voice, song and dance, in which rhythm first manifests itself. But it also means that Bloch opposes any argument for the mathematical, supra-human and divine existence of music, whether of spheres, planets or angels (Pythagoras and his myriad successors); or rather, he reads these in a dialectical fashion that enhances intimate human creativity in and through music. I have already mentioned the pivotal role of the note in Bloch’s philosophy, as indeed its fellow travellers on the journey (voice, song, dance and rhythm). The note follows a varied and twisting path; or rather it cuts a very new path through what are a mostly European collection of musical forms and a German collection of musicians. What Bloch does with his dialectical readings of the fugue and sonata, or Bach, Beethoven and Wagner, is thoroughly recast the story of music so that, in transforming its past, the future of music begins to looks decidedly different and more hopeful. Three items remain in by brief statement of Bloch’s philosophy of music: he listens with a philosophical and theo-utopian ear, all the while striving to hear around corners. The first is obvious, especially in light of my earlier point that Bloch – the philosopher – sees music as philosophy in and of itself, needing but a touch-up here and a gloss there. However, Bloch’s philosophical interest has a particular curve, for his lifelong pursuit was for a philosophy of hope, seeking not only to discover within the existing, albeit limited, parameters of philosophy its own irrepressible utopian drive, but also to reconstruct philosophy with an opening to utopia. Hence the ‘utopian ear’; but theo-utopian? As any reader of Bloch’s Philosophy of Music soon discovers, theology is never far from the surface. And when Bloch comes to close the various sections of the work, particularly the work as a whole, theology comes into play, explicitly, heretically, apocalyptically, in what I like to call his theo-utopian flourishes. More than one commentator has become uncomfortable with this theological Bloch, preferring to see such flourishes (elsewhere in his work, for few have commented on the Philosophy of Music) as unfortunate slips or at best peripheral rhetoric. I cannot disagree more and cannot emphasise enough how important theology is for understanding Bloch’s work as a whole, let alone his musical reflections (see further Boer 2007a:1–56). This theo-utopian ear has

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two dimensions. First, Bloch is astute enough to realise that the Bible and theology are laced with utopian themes, especially those relating to the last days, the eschaton and salvation, whether individual and collective, themes that he is keen to appropriate and reshape in a utopian direction. Second, we must not forget that Bloch saw music picking up the mantle of religion, a mantle that had slipped with the onset of modernity and secularism. So it should come as no surprise that eschatological themes from theology infuse his philosophy of music, for music functions as the Aufhebung of theology itself. Finally, what does hearing around corners mean? Simply put, it is an intuitive grasp of the deeper urges and drives of music, well beyond analysing scores, techniques of production, performance and recording, or assiduously learning the ‘rules’ of musical (dis)harmony. For Bloch that hearing is, as we have seen, distinctly utopian, dialectical and theological, for the ear ‘perceives more than can be explained conceptually’ (Bloch 1985c:113; 1974:135). So it will not do to analyse what musicians say about their own work, or to criticise Bloch for his obvious lacks concerning musical history, theory and technique (some of which he sought to correct in his later work), or to challenge his interpretations of composers such as Bach, Beethoven and Wagner, or indeed – as I  am inclined to do – to castigate him for a very European and especially German focus (both of which may feasibly be argued to be anomalies within world music).3 Instead, the specifics become the means to a deeper insight into the very workings of music, requiring what he calls a clairvoyance in interpretation. Yet, this also means that Bloch’s approach is far more amenable to analysing material seemingly at some distance from what he does study – in my case, rock music after 1950. But that is another part of the story of the note, beyond my mandate here. Structure Bloch’s concise study is organised into two equally weighted sections. After some introductory comments on the earliest moments of music and the method for what follows, the first section deals with the history of music, while the second concerns the philosophy of music per se (one may easily peruse the headings of each section in my appendix to gain a sense of Bloch’s own structure). In perhaps too good a dialectical fashion, each part is divided into three, 3 In this respect I differ sharply from Korstvedt (2010), who mines precisely these very German composers even more deeply. I am interested in a very different path from Bloch, from his philosophy to the potential with rock music.

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with greatest weight given to the third section – three quarters of the total argument is found in these two final sections. As for history, Bloch is keen to develop a working model that feeds off Lukács’s curious idea of the ‘carpet’ (Teppich),4 alongside a dialectical structure that moves through three types of song: singing-to-oneself, the uniform song and open-ended song. Each of these forms corresponds to what is constitutive, impinging and fulfilled. Or, in terms of the following schema: (a) singing-to-oneself, which is manifested in the dance and in chamber music; a form that is constitutive and not merely prior or preliminary, awaiting its sublation in a more sophisticated form. (b) the uniform song (geschlossenes Lied), secular version of which is the oratorio (with which Bloch spends relatively little time), while the sacred one is the fugue; a form that is impinging, expecting something more, not so much so that it can be discarded but be transformed. (c) the open-ended song (offenes Lied), the place of the sonata, of Beethoven and Bruckner, of the transcendent opera, the symphony and Wagner; this form is fulfilled in a way that draws the other two forms into itself, realising their potential and transforming them in the process (Bloch 1985c:14– 15; 1974:22–23). How do the song – a deliberate choice, emphasising the human nature of music – and the constituent-emerging-fulfilled schema relate to one another? The first is a pure form which is corrective in nature, for which Bloch uses not Plato (God forbid!) but Lukács’s term Teppich, or ‘carpet’, which is ‘a certain encircling or a certain encompassing, detailing of the possible contents’ (Bloch 1985c:14; 1974:22). The second item, the schema from constituent to fulfilled, is where reality bites. This threefold structure provides the key to the whole first section, which we will explore in a moment. Before we do so, one might question the rigidity of three phases, precisely because of its theological (Trinitarian) and Hegelian pedigree. Bloch himself is a little nervous, postulating myriad qualifications and then proposing comparable ‘syllogisms’ – in painting, (still-life, portrait and large landscape), ornamentation (linear ornament, plastic art and multidimensional ornament), story-telling (short story, lyric poetry and great epic or dramatic poetry), theology (emotional craving for miracles, Protestantism and then the mediated faith of the Church), and of course music (the Grecian Mozart, Gothic Bach, the Baroque Beethoven and the incomparable Wagner). 4 For a detailed treatment of the Teppich metaphor, see Korstvedt 2010:5–18.

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Philosophically, Bloch is less resolute about a distinct schema, for now he wishes to lay heavy emphasis on his own preferences for a philosophy of music: the stress on very human creativity and musical production, the emphasis on the note and thereby dance and rhythm, harmony, the song, fugue, sonata and opera, and the search for the inner workings of music, to locate the ‘thing-initself’ of music, the utopian promise that is just around the corner. Yet even here dialectics are never far away, with Bloch seizing yet again (it is a key feature of the first section) on the relation between the Bachian fugue and the Beethovenian sonata in order to seek out the deeper-lying hope. Perhaps this is a good moment to outline a double-problem and a proposal. The first part of the problem: as I have already indicated, Bloch works overwhelmingly with European and particularly German music, so much so that he is really offering a Western philosophy of music, in content at least. The trap is a common one, for the very particular and anomalous history of Western economics and culture (D’iakonoff 1999) becomes the norm for universalising ‘the’ philosophy of music. The second part concerns Bloch’s tendency to focus on individual genius – Bach, Beethoven, Bruckner, Wagner are merely the most common names. Of course, Bloch realises the difficulty and therefore offers a defence of such genius, which may be accounted for to a limited extent through socio-historical context, but which does not in the end answer the simple question: why did Beethoven appear when he did while the Greeks provided no one of such stature (Bloch 1985c:7–10; 1974:14–17)? To my mind, Bloch does not solve this conundrum; suggesting a more complex relation between individual expression and socio-economic situation without elaborating what this might mean is not sufficient, especially when Bloch clearly sides with individual, largely German, composers. He is by no means the only one to operate with such assumptions – German and individual – but I flag them as problems here both in order to keep them in mind and seek possible ways to step beyond these foci. And that brings me to the proposal: what I seek in Bloch is a working method for approaching music. I am interested less in the historical reconstruction (its outline will appear below as part of the exposition) and more in the philosophical agenda, namely the effort to hear around corners with a theo-utopian ear. History …that realm of heretical freedom which, in Bloch’s world, is music’s own, but which music has nevertheless had to reconquer again and again through history. drew 1985:xxiii

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Bloch opens his account with an important if somewhat contentious argument: the flourishing of music has come belatedly (Bloch 1985c:2–4; 1974:8–10). In both theory and execution, music is a late bloomer, one who arrives when the party is almost over. As we saw in my earlier summary, Bloch opines that the ancient Mesopotamians and Egyptians (from the fabled ‘fertile crescent’), let alone the Greeks, had little to show in terms of music. The Greeks might have left an incomparable body of drama and philosophy, if not the first historical writings (at least, around the pond known as the Mediterranean), but virtually nothing musically. The same might be said of those who produced the Bible, or the body of Roman Law, or the intricate systems of Medieval thought. Even the Thomist Schoolmen of the Middle Ages left dry, academic theories of music that had little life in them – in sharp contrast to the popular and inventive music of troubadours, folk songs, drinking songs and so on. To be sure, Bloch will later, in the section on music from The Principle of Hope, qualify this argument somewhat (Bloch 1985c:213, 214; 1974:300, 301), pointing out key elements of musical theory that include Pythagoras, Boëthius and the contrapuntists of Burgundy and Flanders (Jean de Muris, Jacob of Liège and Philip of Vitry).5 But these theoretical elaborations come too close to the mathematical and heavenly theorists of the supra-human eternity of music to make Bloch feel overly comfortable. As we shall see, he attacks such arguments in the name of the humanity of music on more than one occasion. Does Bloch’s argument hold water? Restricted to the West, yes – although the untroubled classicism whereby the ancient Greeks become forebears of Western civilisation needs to be troubled. With these qualifiers in mind, the great flourishing of musical practice and theory does indeed only emerge with the modern West, of which the infinitely rich variety of rock music is but the latest instance. No matter how much effort goes into reconstructing the music of, say, the ancient Israelites or Etruscans or Thracians or Greeks of Romans, the results are paltry. Yet for Bloch the point is but a precursor, for it gives him an insight into the utopian function of music, on at least two counts. First – and less persuasively – the very youthfulness of music is the means by which it leaps back over the 5 One may detect the qualification of his earlier stark statement in the way Bloch uses a favoured Luther quotation concerning the scholastic Josquin: ‘The other masters of song have to do as the note wants; but Josquin is the master of the notes, and they have to do what he wants’ (Bloch 1985c:3; 1974:9). Here it designates what might be possible if the dry academicism of scholastic music were to receive a jolt from below, from the inventive troubadours and popular customs. Later, in The Principle of Hope (Bloch 1985c:202; 1974:287), the same quotation, albeit with Bloch’s characteristic rearrangement, recognises the achievements of Josquin’s complex works.

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accretions of centuries to regain what is simplest, oldest and most basic.6 Here Bloch runs the danger of a search for origins, which in musical terms (reiterated ad nauseam in discussions of rock) means the recovery of the primal, instinctual, Dionysian nature of music. Far better is his other dialectical take on the belatedness of music. A few lines above I wrote the ‘modern West’; it should have included ‘secular’, for Bloch’s argument is that music comes into its own only when secularisation begins its long and bumpy path, unwinding the theological certainties of the feudal era and signalling in its own way the emergence of the modern world – which he would soon enough describe as capitalist. All that is theologically solid melts into air, to gloss Marx. Only now, in a world abandoned by God (Lukács) is music able to find its stride, because, as Bloch puts it, modern times ‘need and love the musician’.7 The reason: kicked out of its primitive torpor by popular song and dance, music appropriates and transforms many of the functions of religion, including experiential ecstasy, formal diversity, theoretical elaboration, orthodoxies, orthopraxis and heresies, but above all – for Bloch – the deeply utopian function of theology. We can see how this dialectical argument for the utopian interplay of religion and music works itself out in Bloch’s argument, not least because the theological tenor of that argument is a major concern of mine.

Phase One: Magic Rattle, Human Harp

All of this means that Bloch is most interested in the last of his three stages (outlined a little earlier), namely, the phase of the open-ended song, the fulfilment of the previous two stages. Indeed, his discussion of this third stage dwarfs the combined work of the other two by a ratio of 4 to 1. So brief is his discussion of the first phase – concerned with singing-to-oneself and dance (Bloch 1985c:16; 1974:24) – that we need to consider other works to fill in the 6 ‘Because they go deeper, musical structures do not possess youthfulness simply as an attribute. Rather, they grow younger precisely by virtue of the fact that they are growing older and rest upon themselves, thus attaining the new-and-old of the secret behind this repose.… And in the end it is exactly what is most reckless and painful, most “breakaway” and paradoxical that is closest to what is old, most primevally basic, simplest, given, longed for in a previous world, lost in an adult one’ (Bloch 1985c:12; 1974:20). 7 The full text reads: ‘If, therefore, the modern note is in itself the better one, it is certainly not because of its young looks or its surprisingness, attractive only to those who crave change. It is better because the times – modern times, the time of Advent understood as symbol – need and love the musician’ (Bloch 1985c:13; 1974:20).

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picture (and not merely see what he says later about them in the grand dialectical uptake of the third phase). In particular, in the brief essay, ‘Magic Rattle, Human Harp’ (Bloch 1985c:140– 145; 1974:202–207),8 he offers in nuce but with different emphases yet another sketch of the history of music. Here we go behind the first stage of song to identify the first moment of music itself. Before this moment, the instrument was primary, the note an attribute. This is the time of magic drum, rattling shells, tinkling bells. Endowed with magical power, the instrument itself heals, brings rain and ensures a favourable outcome in war. However, at an indefinable moment, the note detaches itself from the instrument, using it now as a means of assistance but gaining a life of its own. For Bloch with his European focus and unchallenged classicist assumption of the Greek origins of the West, the pan-pipe marks this crucial turning point. No longer a collection of ‘fearsome and muffled sounds’ but a well-ordered series of notes, music itself is born, ‘music as a shout of sorrow or pleasure and not as material magically sounding’ (Bloch 1985c:140; 1974:202). One may wish to question the assumption that music must be well-ordered sound and not noise, as Attali (1985, 1977) also assumed, or even that noise itself does not have its own patterns, but this feature of his argument is not a necessary one. The point that the note lifts from its base to set out on its own still stands, marked – to extend Bloch – by the role of the note itself rather than the instrument as a cure for one’s ills (as with David playing of the harp for a troubled King Saul in 1 Samuel). Indeed, when music itself is born, one could argue that the instrument too emerges, for it becomes an aid to the note rather than the prime focus. And the signal of the note’s autonomy is that the note may be played by any number of instruments, since no longer is the note tied to its specific instrument. One does not need feathers, incisions or animal tails to enhance the power of the instrument, nor does one wear the instrument as amulet, since it has slipped into the background: ‘The musical note evinced much vigour in turning from the attribute of a thing to the very thing that matters, in a developed state; from an adjective into a substantive; from a fortuitous excrescence of objects that were rubbed, struck or blown into a universal, though purely “artistic”, realm with melodic and above all human relations of its own’ (Bloch 1985c:141; 1974:203). Of course, traces of this material connection remain, as in the continued association of trumpets with kings and trombones with priests, but now that the note is autonomous three further developments take place. First, the voice itself comes into play. Here we have the necessary correlate with Bloch’s abiding concern with the human dimensions of music, manifested in the song as a 8 The argument is repeated in The Principle of Hope (Bloch 1985c:196–197).

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central category of analysis. The open-ended song is the natural outflow of the voice, manifested most intimately as a singing-to-oneself. Secondly, as an inescapable accompaniment to the voice and its song, the tapping of the foot, the gentle bobbing of the head and the first signs of a sway take place, almost involuntarily. The vibrations of the vocal chords do not take place in isolation, for the dancing body is itself part of the picture dance. Third, now we arrive at the following dialectical point: through the note’s autonomy from the instrument, it is now enabled to appropriate the voice as a physical, instrumental location. In a fashion we will encounter with the third stage of the song, in which the previous two stages are transformed, so also does the pre-history of music return in a different form. With the singer, we have a body that sings, not so much a beating drum or sacred instrument, but a human harp. The singer, writes Bloch, ‘is distinctly in touch with the archaic remains, with music as the object set in motion and emitting its own sound’ (Bloch 1985c:144; 1974:206). But why make such a dialectical argument? Bloch is in the end a historical materialist and not an idealist: for that reason this argument provides the underlying logic for the persistent theme of the humanness of music, a theme that resonates through the following analysis.

The Uniform Song

As we pass to the next stage, Bloch draws into this category (of the uniform song) the many-faceted shapes of the song – folksong, Minnesingers, aria, cantilena, even opera. Yet he is keen to focus on recognisable composers in order to further his argument. The two who appear here are Mozart and Bach, the one a representative of the secular side of the uniform song and the other of its sacred side. Both have a role to play, although Bloch favours Bach over against Mozart, whose songs are light, enchanting, buoyant, aerial (The Magic Flute is the key reference9), but also charming and amiable, lacking the tensions and contradictions of what Bloch seeks: ‘no energy is charged and discharged; snowbound passes, the mist and the forest are lacking, there is no going astray and no warm light in the distance’ (Bloch 1985c:19; 1974:27). By contrast, Bach is the one who cracks open the sheer dominance of the solo melody line of the voice, thereby opening up the possibility of the fugue (his own forte) and the sonata of Beethoven. He does so by taking the singularity of the human voice as instrument and rendering it yet another instrument in the orchestra, 9 See especially Korstvedt’s effort to extend and deepen Bloch’s analysis of The Magic Flute (Korstvedt 2010:125–152).

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a move that had the dialectical effect of opening up many more possibilities for the voice through the union of the orchestra and contrapuntal development – precisely the conditions for the fugue and sonata. Despite his obvious affection for Bach, Bloch is keen to identify the utopian moment in both. For Bach it is a matter of glimpsed possibilities, of the way the limits of his instruments anticipate future possibilities (for example, music composed for the harpsichord had to await the grand piano to realise Bach’s full potential), or of the way his music looks towards another universe. By contrast, Mozart gives voice to the Luciferan and very human rebellion against the oppressive and dogmatic powers that be. Or, in Bloch’s words: ‘Hence Mozart presents the – always small – secular, Luciferan self, and Bach the – again always small – sacred Christian self, the self of goodwill or the released Adam attainable through the more subjective, Protestant outlook which comes closer to it…’ (Bloch 1985c:23, 24; 1974:33).

Fulfilled, Open-Ended Song

At the dawn of the modern age, the note encounters a moment as immense as its first breath of freedom, for now it breaks out of the confines of the previous stage, desirous of stretching its legs and seeing the world. Or, in a theological register, ‘The early cloister is opened, and the chaotic world, the external dream before the genuine cloister shines in’ (Bloch 1985c:24; 1974:33).10 Yet, just when the note sets its eyes on wide horizons, Bloch paradoxically restricts his references to names like Wolf, Strauss, Klopstock, Weber, Marschner, Schubert, Hayden, Beethoven, Bruckner, Mahler and Wagner – all German (with an Austrian or two), although his – flawed – heroes are Beethoven and Wagner. I will come back to them in a moment, for first I wish to draw attention to the key features of this long section. 10

This breaking out of the cloister does not necessarily mean the beginning of the end of religion, as the secularisation hypotheses would have it, but a deep transformation of the nature of religion. As Bloch puts it in terms of collectives: ‘Now, the old religious community has burst apart, and we can no longer enjoy or even create a choir, the work of this community, as a religious force: we can only have it as a longed-for strength and unity. There is now a different gathering together, a different seeking and finding on the part of the souls firmly united in this gathering. There is a different longing for organisation and above all for the coherence of something global which will bring men together and will, in the choir, endow them with a thousand voices in order to seek for the one God, to proclaim their vigil to the heights, to invoke salvation with a thousandfold, now musically transcendent cry…the community has less to praise the Holy Spirit than to bear witness to it’ (Bloch 1985c:27; 1974:36).

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To begin with, as the final step in the dialectic, this stage draws the other two up within it, transforming them in the process. Thus, while the promise of the fugue is realised in Beethoven’s sonata, when the internally sacred focus of the former turns to the world, the earliest phase of singing-to-oneself and dancing is thoroughly sublated first in Bruckner’s chamber music but above all in Wagner’s grand project. Second, Bloch is careful not to let his enthusiasm for Beethoven or Wagner get the better of him, for he balances an awareness of their breakthroughs (and in Wagner’s case defends him against his critics (Bloch 1985c:44–45; 1974:56–57)) with sustained criticisms – especially of Wagner. The reason: they have glimpsed in only a glass darkly the utopian promise of music. Third, I note again Bloch’s resolute focus on the song so to keep the human orientation of music to the fore. Finally, woven into the fabric of his argument is his – heretical – theological concern to identify the utopian mantle music has picked up from the ground where it was dropped by religion. Beethoven, the wrecker of keyboards. Bloch moves quickly to Beethoven, who clears away the false and stifling, the leaden and the distorted. As ‘Lucifer’s benign offspring (Luzifers gutter Sohn)’ (Bloch 1985c:31 and also 132; 1974:42 and 156), he embodies ‘the universal spirit of music who wrecked keyboards (der die Klaviere zerstrümmert), swept in like a hurricane and turned even the strongest orchestra to jelly in the face of his music’s a priori exorbitancy’ (Bloch 1985c:30; 1974:40).11 Beethoven carries on Bach’s task, blasting open the voice for vastly new purposes, dialectically relegating it to the choir so that it may emerge renewed and multitudinous. The result is the sonata, which Bloch traces from the tail-end of Bach’s duothematic music, through Hayden’s persistent development of this approach until it emerged in the polyphonic sonata, Beethoven’s authentic form, with its passion, pain, cheerfulness and liberation. In an ecstatic couple of pages (Bloch 1985c:34–35; 1974:44–46), Bloch outlines why Beethoven is so important: in providing the decisive break into the secular realm, Beethoven embodies that rebellious spirit found in Lucifer or Prometheus, in Eve and Cain, in the Murmuring Stories of the wilderness of Sinai and the courageous protest of Job. Yet, it is also implicitly atheistic, as the 11

Or, as far as the note itself is concerned: ‘The extravagantly treated note, the surging sound and the constant admixture composed of tension, chaos and destiny overflow into a style of music which is largely non-melodic, which is melismatic in terms of recitative, thematic in terms of motifs and develops purely symphonically as a whole’ (Bloch 1985c:26; 1974:35). On melisma – a melodic passage of several notes sung to one syllable of text, as a utopian moment when the vocal melody breaks free of the signifying word, when music itself tries to reach for the absolute – see Korstvedt (2010:80).

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conclusion to Atheism in Christianity also postulates, in which the exodus out of Yahweh is an atheism of protest. Similarly, Beethoven offers a secular voice that grows with strength as the old religious myths and their universe fall away and a new human claim is made. All the same, Beethoven does not dispense with these myths; instead, he transforms them into a renewed utopian promise, for this Luciferan figure is ‘the seed of the Paraclete, the active substance of humanity itself’ (Bloch 1985c:35; 1974:46).12 Yet even Beethoven fails to make the distance, falling short, for his promise is barely an outline and nowhere a full utopian picture. On reading Wagner, dialectically. What, then, of Wagner? Why does Bloch wish to retrieve him, and at such length (Bloch 1985c:43–65; 1974:54–80)? Wagner, I must admit leaves me cold, so it is a salutary lesson to see what Bloch does with him.13 Indeed, it should not surprise me that Bloch wishes to retrieve Wagner’s utopian dimensions and that for three reasons. First, Bloch seeks to show how Wagner draws up the previous two phases, the singing-to-oneself and the uniform song, fulfilling their utopian potential. Further, as with Heritage of Our Times (1991), Bloch does not want to hand Wagner over to the fascists, as Adorno is wont to do;14 instead, he wishes to locate the utopian element in midst of Wagner’s dross. In doing so, Bloch provides an incise assessment of Wagner’s greatness and deep failures. A third deployment of the dialectic focuses on Wagner’s wholesale parleying with myth, which now brings out Bloch’s strategy for the discernment of myth, later to come into full 12

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The complete theo-utopian text reads: ‘Beethoven in contrast stirs up the rubble and magic of the end quite differently. He does so with a violence that can indeed enter upon the three higher stages, Faith, Illumination and the Apocalypse, as the stages of the complete self. Here, and in just this way, it is no longer the first Jesus and not yet the second Jesus that is Beethoven’s guardian spirit and object. The role is filled by Lucifer: the fighter in the front rank, the seed of the Paraclete, the active substance of humanity itself’ (Bloch 1985c:35; 1974:46). Here and elsewhere: see also ‘Paradoxes and the Pastorale in Wagner’s Music’ (Bloch 1985c:146–182; 1974:218–255), ‘On the Text of Beckmesser’s Prize Song’ (Bloch 1998:178–184; 1974:208–215), ‘Hans Sachs’s Address to the Elder-Blossoms: On a Passage in Wagner’s The Mastersingers of Nuremberg’ (Bloch 1998:186–188; 1974:214–217), and especially the comparable dialectical analysis in ‘Rescuing Wagner Through Surrealistic Colportage’ (Bloch 1991:338–345; 1974:176–184). See the detailed treatment in Korstvedt (Korstvedt 2010: 87–124), where he traces Bloch’s efforts to reclaim the utopian dimensions of Wagner amidst the dross. In this respect, Bloch offers a better reading of Wagner than Adorno’s very undialectical reading (Adorno 1981, 2003 (1971)). As Drew puts it so well: ‘The disillusionment Adorno pursues and cherishes so ardently belongs within the dark circle at the foot of Bloch’s lighthouse’ (Drew 1985: xlii).

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play in both Atheism in Christianity and in parts of The Principle of Hope (Bloch 2009, 1968, 1995, 1985a), but also at other moments of musical analysis (Bloch 1998:138; 1974:199). In essence, Bloch’s discernment – which I have had occasion to call upon more than once (Boer 2007a, b; 2009) – designates a sophisticated approach that does not hand over myth to reaction, wrestling out the emancipatory moments of myth from the midst of its oppressive narrative; indeed, it argues that those instances of liberation are enabled by the patterns of oppression. Let us take each point in turn. As Bloch makes clear in his opening lines on Wagner, the latter thoroughly sublates the two earlier phases of the song, especially in terms of voice, harmony and rhythm. Thus far we have had the breakdown of the uniform song by means of the voice being relegated to the choir and then the orchestra, a move that had the effect of breaking up its former patterns (solo melody, uniform patterns) so that now it is ready for a new role. Bach may have first put the crowbar to the uniform song, Beethoven may have wrenched it open and given us the sonata, but Wagner offers the full breakthrough, in which the voice is no longer a melody influencing the course of events, but leaps out of the orchestra into vocal polyphony. But as it does so, singing-to-oneself returns – the feature of the first phase, the thoroughly human origins of music itself. So also do the harmonic features of the first phase return, which Wagner completely recasts through his renovation of the chord. In order to show how, Bloch retells the story of the chord, recalling Bach, Bruckner and Beethoven as they lead in to Wagner, via fugues and symphonies and counterpoint. Above all, Wagner dialectically brings together the other levels, now in terms of the subtlety of chamber music (from phase one) and the sacred fugue of the uniform song (phase two). The result: in Wagner’s chords ‘all the notes are actively moving, all going somewhere, leading or being led; the third strives upwards, the seventh downwards, until the key asserts its will and the concluding consonance appears’ (Bloch 1985c:49, 50; 1974:62). And so also do dance and rhythm return from the first phase, which Wagner retrieves through the shock of syncopation. ‘Discovered’ by Beethoven and fully exploited by Wagner, Bloch defines syncopation as follows: It is a dragging or urging forwards, a retarding or anticipation of the melodic impulse; or, as Grunsky first accurately defined the syncope in answer to Hugo Riemann, a new way of emphasising and freshly accentuating unstressed passages, a new element to the beat, a bracing and matching of the stressed against the unstressed and vice versa. By means of the friction arising through the presence of different time-divisions, it thus becomes possible to execute several rhythms simultaneously, even if

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these can only be sensed in the jolt at the end of the beat. By this means, but not of course through this alone, the beat is frequently subdivided. Indeed it is a useful exaggeration to say that one beat now turns into myriad, and with unstable, strongly syncopated, poly-rhythms there is now room for any kind of polyphony. bloch 1985c:46; 1974:58-9

I must admit that it requires an effort for me to perceive the shock effect of syncopation. For one who has played rhythm and lead guitar, both solo and with bands, syncopation seems so natural, so much part of the way music works, it requires a moment of estrangement to sense the outrage caused by syncopation’s first deployment, before (as Bloch points out earlier with each renewal of music) it became part of the accepted way in which music operates. But how does syncopation recover and transform the first phase’s focus on dance? In a brilliant move, Bloch argues that syncopation is actually a dialectical pick-up of ancient practices – dervishes, the rotating souls of Dionysius the Areopagite, David dancing before the Ark of the Covenant, or indeed (to go beyond Bloch), the complex poly-rhythms one finds in some forms of African drumming and so on. All of these Wagner appropriates, transforms and deploys in new ways. Nonetheless, Bloch is not thoroughly mesmerised by Wagner. In the great final flourish on Wagner (Bloch 1985c:52–65; 1974:65–80), with a focus on Tristan, Bloch brings the retelling of the story of the note to a close. Wagner offers much, for through his sublation of voice, harmony and rhythm, he touches on the promise of what Bloch calls the astral myth, in which the hero is a usurper, reaching for the sun and overthrowing the old gods. Yet, Wagner falls short, miserably so.15 Much in Wagner is musically undesirable (Bloch 1985c:60; 1974:74), for the note lapses into emptiness, if not mere brutishness. Indeed, redemption becomes futile, a narcotic to dull one’s pain, and what seemed to offer the promise of revolutionary utopianism turns out to be nothing more 15

In the midst of the initial praise of Wagner, an early hint suggests the assessment will not remain so rosy: ‘But however thoroughly the quieter, more deeply Christian splendour of the adagio already overlies this, the fact remains that what is behind the yearning ­process – repose, out-and-out soul, the Bachian fugue as musica sacra, the metaphysical adagio, music as “space”, the music of the Paracletian self, architectonic counterpoint of the highest order – all this remains unachieved because of the profoundly un-Christian mysticism of the universal and general in Wagner’ (Bloch 1985c:57; 1974:70, 71). See also the later comments, in which Wagner may be the elaborate working out (unknowingly at first) of Schopenhauer’s philosophy of music, but in which they both come up very short (Bloch 1985c:125–130; 1974:147–153).

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than a facade, a ‘world of cardboard, greasepaint and grotesque heroic poses (von Pappe, Schminke, und heilloser Heldenpose)’ (Bloch 1985c:61; 1974:75). Why the trenchant criticism after hailing Wagner’s breakthroughs? The reason for such a discernment of Wagner’s promise and failings has much to do, I would suggest, with the Nazi appropriation of Wagner. Much is ‘smut, gold and narcotics, provided in terms of its breadth, bogus ecstasy and impersonal glory in the service of the Nature principal’, so much so that the music becomes ‘pathologically poisoned’ (Bloch 1985c:64, 65; 1974:78–79, 79). If Bloch had rested with such assessments, he would have sided with Adorno’s undialectical assessment. Yet he does not, for he wishes to retrieve from the midst of Wagner’s flimsy constructions and narco-redemption a genuine utopian moment, one that could not have happened without all that is dystopian about Wagner. A similar strategy operates in Bloch’s approach to myth in Wagner. The content of Wagner’s works is thoroughly mythical, seeking to recover the richness of especially Teutonic mythology. Bloch digs deep into the mythical roots of Wagner (Bloch 1985c:58, 59; 1974:72, 73), especially with the basic astral myth in which the solar cauldron is stolen from the giant, the grail is attained, the sun conquered, rain brought and light mastered. And this cauldron or pitcher of light is also the grail with which Joseph of Arimathea collected the solar blood, the blood of the Saviour. Bloch espies revolutionary gunpowder here, in this storming of heaven that promises something vastly new. And it is by no means completely pagan, for it is woven with Christian themes that are atrophied if one applies an artificial separation of pagan and Christian. For Bloch, this division is simply mistaken, missing the point that the real concern is whether liberation may be found. In other words, unlike Adorno or Benjamin or even the out-and-out liberal, Ernst Cassirer, or in our own day, Badiou, Bloch does assume that myth is the default territory of reaction. Indeed, he challenges the nationalistic and even racist recovery of ‘serious’ myth in the 18th and 19th centuries – with its IndoEuropean hypothesis, the northern origins of human civilisation and the championing of the Volk (see Lincoln 2000) – by arguing for an inescapable emancipatory element in myth. The same may also be said for his effort to see the positive dimension in Wagner’s recovery of rhythm through syncopation and the dance, for here we find myth, chthonos, paganism and the body’s lower register. Bloch attempts a dialectical reading of this feature of music without falling into a dead-end primitivism (or at least he tries to): It (syncopation) is also accompanied, in practice, by the paganism embodied in it from ancient times. One purpose of this was to communicate its Dionysian character; another was to dictate to music all manner of

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delirious self-destruction, tyranny of the lower body and physiologically earthbound, indeed starbound, Dionysian-Mithraic, astral transcendent. bloch 1985c: 49; 1974: 62

When I read comments such as these, Bloch begins to provide the nascent elements of a dialectical theory of rock, but that is another task. So, for Bloch, Wagner provides the resolution of the earlier phases, in terms of voice, harmony and rhythm, and he offers a utopian glimpse in the midst of all his dystopian and reactionary rubbish. Like Bach or Beethoven, Wagner is but a frail forerunner and necessary precedent for the new ‘realms of the note’. In what has by now become an expected theo-utopian flourish at the end of each section of his text, Bloch writes: ‘the complete freedom and consistency of objective music, the incipient speaking in many tongues and hence the Luciferan-Paracletian willing of the man-linked spirit of music itself could have proclaimed the true mystery, the mystery of the intelligible realm’ (Bloch 1985c:65; 1974:79, 80). So much for the history of music, with which I have taken some time, for this is as much an expository as a critical study. The twisting path of a very human note (even if it sings with a noticeably German accent) still finds us short of its promise. But at least Bloch has listened closely for the theo-utopian strains of the note, even if it lacks eloquence just yet, ‘a fervent stammering (heisses Stammeln) like that of a child’ (Bloch 1985c:65; 1974:80) so that it still cannot be fully understood. But now we leave the history of the note in order to examine the philosophy of music. Philosophy For as hearers we can keep closely in touch, as it were. The ear is slightly more firmly embedded in the skin than the eye is (Bloch 1985c:73; 1974:89). There is no music of fire and water or of the Romantic wilderness that does not of necessity, through the very note-material, contain within it the fifth of the elements: man. bloch 1985c:227; 1974:316

In the second part of his study on music, Bloch shifts from history to philosophy, from wholesale reconstruction of the past in order to generate a different possibility for the future to an effort to provide the glosses on music’s natural philosophical curve. I shall focus on the main aspects of the philosophical side, stressing the most important and fruitful. The two foundational features of his

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analysis are, firstly, the very human nature of music, a humanness emphasised by stressing hearing and singing, and, secondly, the proactivity of the note – whose story, we should remember, this is. With these prolegomena kept in mind, I focus on the massive third section of part two, called ‘Means, formulae, forms and phenomenal aspect of the transcending theory of music’. At first appearance, the structure of this section is obvious, for it concerns four topics: means, formula, form and phenomenon. However, the detail is a little more complex, for Bloch squeezes six categories into four (two go into each of the last two). The four may be summarised as follows (before I sink into more detail). While means designates the note and its very human nature (concerning which I will already have said enough), formula designates an old tension in music, between technique and expression, mechanical skill and feeling. Bloch returns time and again to this topic, so I bring together those various discussions, drawing attention to the tensions in and between Bloch’s treatments. The third category is form and here Bloch includes both an insightful treatment of rhythm and then a contrapuntal dialectic between Bach and Beethoven, a topic to which he returns in The Principle of Hope, now sharpening the opposition so that Beethoven’s breakthrough takes on the colours and shapes of revolution. In the fourth and final level we come across the phenomenon, which designates the effort to hear around corners, the search for another way of hearing. It is thoroughly dialectical: while one expects that Bloch’s increasing theo-utopian momentum would squash the note’s humanity, the opposite is true. The more he stresses the transcending, theological dimension of the note’s internal drive to utopia, the more does its deeply human nature come forth.

We Hear Only Ourselves: On the Humanness of Music

I have already indicated clearly that for Bloch music is an intimately human practice, but now I explore that inescapable feature of his philosophy of music in a little more detail. After some general comments, I focus on two dimensions of this human music, namely hearing and singing. To begin with, if we thought that the note was entirely autonomous from its human maker, then we miss the mark by a long way indeed. No matter how much the note may lead one to an ecstatic, ‘explosive aha!-experience of the parting of the mist’, no matter how visionary it might be, the note is still ‘heard and used and apprehended…sung by human beings and conveying human beings’ (Bloch 1985c:92; 1974:111). For the note cannot, of course, sound out by itself. It needs human

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beings to be a note at all. Or, as Bloch puts it, beautifully, more extensively and with a Christological touch: It is only within us that it can flower and awaken. The note is intensified by us, qualitatively coloured and dispersed immediately by us. It is only we who exalt it – more than that, who stabilise it and allow it to be animated with our life. True, it is no accident that precisely this delicate, transparent body is chosen. Certainly intoxication lies not in the wine but in the soul; nonetheless, there is palpably at work in the natural note a preternatural buoyancy and eloquence which renders it pre-eminently suitable as the material of music. bloch 1985c:93; 1974:112

Above all, the humanity of the note is most obvious in two dimensions, welling up in both hearing and singing. For Bloch, any philosophy of music that does not fold back and include the act of listening within its deliberations shirks its responsibilities. So we find that both of the two great sections of the essay are introduced with a typical Blochean statement: ‘We hear only ourselves (Wir hören nur uns)’ is the opening statement of the first part; ‘All we hear is ourselves (Wir hören aber nur uns selber)’ begins the second (Bloch 1985c:1, 66; 1974:7, 81). Note what has happened: a philosophy of music involves not merely a listening to music produced by others; it begins with hearing ourselves. What does that mean? Music is internal; it is not heard from outside and then appropriated, but comes from within. Music is not alien to us (he uses the image of being absorbed by a forest of which are a part), like a fire ‘in which not the vibrating air but we ourselves begin to quiver and to cast off our cloaks’ (Bloch 1985c:1; 1974:7). Here of course dance emerges, closely and intimately from this hearing ourselves. When Bloch returns to this theme in the second part of the essay, he shifts focus slightly. True, hearing is a thoroughly intimate bodily experience, for the ‘ear is slightly more firmly embedded in the skin than the eye is’ (Bloch 1985c:73; 1974:89). But now he stresses the imperfections and uncertainties of hearing, the lapses in attention, the weaknesses of the ear, the limits of one pair of faulty ears. Add to that levels of tone deafness, histories of deafness within one’s own family (which threaten to afflict one’s own ears), the knowledge of those infinitely more talented, and Bloch’s point is well taken. Of course, Bloch also means that inability to hear more deeply, the difficulty of developing a utopian clairvoyance (which we will meet in a moment) or a listening around corners. Yet, lest we begin to think that Bloch speaks of hearing for a blessed

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and supremely-endowed elite of hearers (as one might expect given his tendency to focus on individual musical geniuses), he both dispenses with the strange deafness of academic listeners, musicologists, savants and artists (Bloch 1985c:66; 1974:81) and emphasises the central role of the ordinary listener, for such listening is the key to wonder and the utopian ground of the soul. In fact, in order to hear our own selves, the ‘deeply moved, supremely innocent listener (zutiefst unkennerische Zuhörer) must be preserved and comprehended just as he is in order for him to re-emerge as the man for whose sake the whole thing is happening’ (Bloch 1985c:130; 1974). All of which is a welcome correction to, if not also a tension with, his liking for individual – and usually German – geniuses like Bach, Beethoven and Wagner. But what of singing? More physically intimate than the ear is our own throat. We are able to hear ourselves precisely because we sing to ourselves. As we have already seen, at the heart of music is the simple act of singing to ourselves, which is as bodily original as dance. The hum while engaged in a mundane task, the whistle along the path, the riff that we sing again and again, the tune that is stuck in our head – in these ordinary and everyday moments singing and hearing are almost inseparable and, for Bloch, the foundations for any philosophy of music. Hence his description of the voice as the ‘human harp’ and his point that the key to a piece of music is not the values of the notes themselves, but what ‘it contains of the actual person singing, and thus of the quality the singer or player “puts into” the note’ (Bloch 1985c:68; 1974:83).

The Proactive Note

A second foundational feature of music is, as we have seen, the note. In my discussion of the first part of Bloch’s essay, I traced the way his retelling of the history of music becomes the story of the note. In the second, philosophical part of the essay, the emphasis on the note is perhaps even stronger, but now in terms of the note’s own initiative and in a search for the utopian dimensions of the note, as phenomenon and as thing-in-itself. I shall return to the second point later, but here my concern is the proactivity of the note (never forgetting its intimately human and bodily nature). The sharpest statement of that proactive nature is found in a section called ‘the creative musical setting’, which I will exegete for a few moments (Bloch 1985c:73–84; 1974:89–102). To begin with, Bloch argues that the note renders ‘every happening sharper, more penetrating, more sensuous’ (Bloch 1985c:73; 1974:89). What does this mean? He draws upon an oft-used example of the way sound in a film encourages hearing to fulfil the role of all the other senses bar

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seeing (Bloch 1998:156–162; 1974:185–191). With the eyes taken up with viewing the screen, the remaining senses are denied any role, blocked out and silenced. But then the music seeks to fill the gap; or rather listening to the music makes up for the lack, with hearing now representing smell, touch and taste. Bloch first made this argument in relation to silent film, in which a live pianist or even an orchestra would play as the reel rolled, but it applies just as well to the so-called sound track on ‘talkies’. The second element in the proactive nature of the note is its role in leading us towards what Bloch calls the ‘truly significant’ – to be distinguished from the ‘merely striking’ (Bloch 1985c:73; 1974:89). Little more needs to be said on this point, in which Bloch warns us away from florid excess and urges us to exercise restraint in what is best described as a cranking up of the (utopian) potential of the note so that it may spring forth at the right time. But how does one tell when the note achieves this status? It seems like a deeply intuitive grasp of the promise of music, when a piece of music breaks through and touches me just there, triggers a deep and unexpected association, a memory, a person or a place, catching me unawares and unmasking a glimmer of possibility that another world might be possible. It is what they used to call the revolutionary power of music (back in the sixties at least, although that is by no means the only time the power of music has been felt). Bloch’s language is more theo-utopian: ‘the beam of a musically penetrative awakening, realisation, accentuating’; or ‘that mystical musical area of ultimate reality’, which ‘exhausts the spiritual ontologies beyond any possible world-destiny, any continuing epic of the world’ (Bloch 1985c:75; 1974:91, 92). The third and fourth points deal with the relation between note and word.16 Partly for polemical reasons (Bloch directs his criticism at a certain Pfitzner17), he distinguishes sharply between note and word, to the detriment of the former. Thus, his third point is that when the note and the word come into contact with one another, the note itself takes the lead, ‘composing’ under its own steam and even producing ‘a dramatic outline of its own making (einen selbsttätigen dramatischen Umriss)’ (Bloch 1985c:75; 1974:92). Dramatic action becomes subservient to the note, which now draws the word after it. Is this really the case? Does the note count rather than the word, the music over against the lyrics? Are not the two intrinsically entwined? In Bloch’s favour, 16 17

See also the subtle revisiting of this question in The Principle of Hope (Bloch 1985c:203– 207; 1974:289–294). As a good polemicist, Bloch did not hold back when engaging in public debate concerning music. See ‘Lehár–Mozart’, ‘The Full Beard as Harp’ and ‘Arrival and Overtures’ (Bloch 1998:11–17, 184; 1974:192–195, 201).

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one need only recall the function of the riff in a song, especially one that has entered into the sub-stream of ‘great’ songs. For it is not usually the words that mark the song, but its riff, even if we designate the song by its title: ‘Smoke on the Water’ by Deep Purple, ‘Aqualung’ by Jethro Tull, ‘It’s a Long Way to the Top’ by AC/DC, ‘The Fifth Symphony’ by Beethoven… Fourth, ‘the whole of the action that can be spoken is latently overtaken in this way by the sounds originating in us, by the subjective streak in the note’ (Bloch 1985c:79; 1974:96). That is to say, the very human quality of the note enables it to take the lead in its relation with the word, drawing it up and elevating the word in the process. Thus, allowing the word to overtake and dominate the note leads to a ridiculous outcome; by contrast, when the note takes the lead, it lifts the word up to new levels in which even the modest boatman has oars of gold. Does it always happen this way with the relation between word and music? I suspect not always, for at times the poetry of the lyrics may stand alone and not to their detriment. The words of a militant anthem are as important as the music and hymns have long been recognised as key statements of faith. Yet when we expand what is meant by the ‘word’ beyond lyrics and into the realm of interpretation and criticism, Bloch’s argument has a point. Not only are the words of critics inadequate to the music heard, but the spoken or written words of a composer are invariably highly dubious. Bloch cites Wagner’s ‘most questionable of interpretations’ (Bloch 1985c:81; 1974:99), to which I would add Nick Cave’s incessant speaking and writing, often with a view to directing interpretation of his own music (see Boer 2005). Or as Elvis Costello once said, ‘Writing about music is like dancing about architecture’ (Gracyk 1996:vii). Yet Bloch wishes to go further, for the note itself in incomparably more capable of drawing us to utopia, not least because the qualitatively different simply cannot be described in terms of words: ‘even the well-chosen word (das gute Wort), the word that has poetic value, will necessarily fall short of the note’ (Bloch 1985c:82; 1974:100). Bloch takes an example from one of his favoured authors, Hoffmann, to show how the note outpaces the word, drawing it breathlessly along in the ride to utopia: The voice in every great song, every profound setting of words, is like the voice of that ghostly traveller from Hoffmann’s Kreisleriana who tells of many distant, unknown countries and people and unusual destinies on his far wanderings, and whose speech finally “died away into a wondrous sounding in which he intelligibly uttered unknown, extremely mysterious things without recourse to words”. bloch 1985c:80; 1974:97

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Transcendence of the Note

Thus, far we have explored the deeply human nature of music, especially in terms of hearing and singing, and then witnessed the emergence of the note from behind the scenes, whether in terms of its sharpening effect, its potential to unearth an unexpected utopian moment and its superiority over the word. Now I pick up the third section of the second part of Bloch’s essay, a vast chunk of text that is supposed, according to Bloch’s announcement at the beginning of the plunge, to lay out the means, formula, forms and phenomenal aspect of the note (Bloch 1985c:93–133; 1974:112–157). However, what he really means is the human nature of the note, which I have already discussed, the contradiction between technique and performed interpretation (formula), the philosophy of rhythm and (contrapuntal) dialectic (forms) and a final theo-utopian push to locate what he calls the thing-in-itself of the note (phenomenon). Since this long section forms the main part of Bloch’s philosophical discussion, I will deal with each item in turn – apart, of course, from the human note. Technique versus interpretation. I begin, then, with one of the great tensions in music, between technique and feeling, skill and intuition, mere reproduction and interpretive ‘attack’, even static score and dynamic performance – the way one posits the opposition unveils yet another angle. Again and again Bloch returns to this opposition, reiterating his arguments or taking a fresh approach. So, apart from the discussion in the section under immediate consideration here, ‘The Theory of Harmony as Formula’ (Bloch 1985c:93–99; 1974:112–119), we find him already broaching the issue in the opening pages of Philosophy of Music (Bloch 1985c:5–7; 1974:12–14), in the sections called ‘Attack’ (Bloch 1985c:68–72; 1974:83–88), in the essay entitled ‘On the Mathematical and Dialectical Character in Music’ (Bloch 1985c:183–194; 1974:267–279), in his reprise of the philosophy of music in parts of The Principle of Hope (Bloch 1985c:208–219; 1974:295–307) and briefly in ‘Magic Rattle, Human Harp’ (Bloch 1985c:141–212; 1974:202, 203). Throughout these various discussions Bloch is caught between two positions: he wishes to maintain a dialectical approach, attempting to locate the utopian possibilities within a resolute devotion to technique (see Bloch 1985c:208–219; 1974:295–307),18 and yet he obviously prefers the side of feeling, intuition and interpretation, as one would expect, given his expressionist leanings. Already in the opening pages of The Philosophy of Music (Bloch 1985c:5–7; 1974:12–14) he accords technical mastery second place, for otherwise one loses 18

Korstvedt mistakenly argues that Bloch consistently takes a dialectical position concerning this relationship (Korstvedt 2010:74, 81–87).

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the reason for such technique in the first place. However, more is going on in Bloch’s various analyses, for each time he discusses this problem, he does so from a slightly different angle. I am reminded of a room with a number of different windows; all of them look into the same room, but each one provides another view, a different perspective. So in order to gain a full sense of his argument, I will consider each window in turn. To begin with, technique-versus-inspiration is the first window through which I choose to look – ‘The Theory of Harmony as Formula’ (Bloch 1985c:93– 99; 1974:112–119). Here it becomes a question of the tension between hard theory and cold, calculating technique (used by the best composers for maximum effect) on the one hand, and the knack, inspiration, the passion and miracle of musical performance on the other.19 Despite a full awareness of the power of carefully deployed technique, of exploiting the ‘rules’ of music to one’s advantage, Bloch sides with the latter: ‘the most successful methodical musical mind takes care that form does not override its object as a purpose in itself’ (Bloch 1985c:94; 1974:113). The whole section seeks to back up this assertion. Breathing the spirit of Schoenberg, Bloch effectively deconstructs one so-called rule after another: the idea of key (Schoenberg’s last movement in his F sharp major Quartet has no key notation), harmony of the chord (via vagrant, unusual, exposed, new and thereby expressive chords), counterpoint (in which anything can be countered by something else), the assumed moods of minor and major (even Bach disregarded them). In short, the difference between an untalented and a talented composer is that rules become barriers for the first and education for the second. But just when we might think that Bloch is tied too closely to the breakthrough of ‘New Music’ (to which Adorno had signed up), Bloch indicates once again the larger picture, namely the utopian glimpse in which inspiration overrides technique: ‘The song closes, then, with something new, unending or unfulfilled. It travels without arriving, the sense being in the path it takes’ (Bloch 1985c:96; 1974:115). The second window offers us a slightly different view, now from the perspective of musical score and the performed piece, between the written music and its expressive performance (Bloch 1985c:68–72; 1974:83–88). Take a song, suggests Bloch (his example is the German hymn, ‘O Sacred Head Sore Wounded’), and trace its wildly various incarnations, all the way from folk love song to resounding Easter hymn. Or take a song that is ‘covered’ by another 19

So also: ‘The “what” of artistic creation is amply defined, rather, by how the artist is and not by virtue of how he does it, quite apart from the fact that a sober, purely technical working definition is incapable of doing justice to the needfulness, the exuberance of the artistic will and its object’ (Bloch 1985c:85; 1974:103).

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artist and one can immediately see what a difference the performance of the same piece can make. Out of a long, long list, one might mention Bob Dylan’s ‘Hard Rain’ as it was thoroughly revamped by Bryan Ferry, or the Hunters and Collectors’ classic ‘Throw Your Arms Around Me’ as sung by Neil Finn or Eddie Vedder (of Pearl Jam), let alone the more acoustic performances by Mark Seymour of Hunters and Collectors, all of which gains a completely new twist when both Eddie Vedder and Mark Seymour played the song together (one may fruitfully listen to all these variations on Youtube). However, when it seems as though Bloch has sided firmly with the expressive side of the ‘attack’ or interpretation of a piece of music, he begins to hint at the utopian dimension of the necessarily unfinished business of the score. For the musical score is merely a rough a rough indication of what might be: ‘For what happens in the note is still empty and uncertain’, for what exists in the work does so ‘as a rough indication, as a mere code for its realisation’ (Bloch 1985c:71; 1974:86–87). Indeed, ‘Until it is performed, sound remains blind’ (Bloch 1985c:69; 1974:84). In other words, precisely because the score remains unfulfilled does its utopian possibility emerge. Is it fulfilled in the interpretation of the performance? Sometimes Bloch suggests as much,20 but then he realises that even with the most expressive performance one could imagine, the performance too falls short. All of which leads him to see the dialectical value of both elements: A piece of music, when viewed from the technical angle, will be perfectly in order and tell us nothing, like an algebraic equation; but when viewed from the poetic angle, it says everything and decides nothing – a peculiar dichotomy in which, seething as the content is, any centre and any reconciliation accessible to the understanding is still lacking. Hence it is pointless to confine ourselves to the technical element, which will remain a lifeless stereotype unless it is interpreted through its creator. It is also pointless to confine ourselves to the poetic aspect so as to force the ‘infinitely hazy character of music’, as Wagner put it, into categories which are not proper to it. The only remedy is to listen well and to wait expectantly for whatever may take shape in music – this pealing of bells from a wholly invisible tower – in terms of eloquence and supreme explicitness both supra-formal and supra-programmatic. bloch 1985c:72; 1974:88

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‘Sound wants to turn towards the human being. With all music it is important to heed the expression which is only added to the written notes through the act of singing them, through a violin section’s bowing, a pianist’s attack, but above all through that creative practice without which neither dynamics nor rhythm could be tackled in the way the composer intended’ (Bloch 1985c:70, 71; 1974:86).

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Through the third window Bloch peers more than once. It may best be characterised as the tension between the objective and subjective dimensions of music, that is, between music as an objective, mathematical entity that exists independent of human beings and to which human are subject, and music as a contingent, frail human product. We have already seen enough to know that Bloch sides with the latter. So on at least three occasions – in The Philosophy of Music, in ‘On the Mathematical and Dialectical Character in Music’ and in The Principle of Hope (Bloch 1985c:121, 122, 183–194, 214–217; 1974:267–279, 301–305) – he attacks the ancient and long-held idea that music is like mathematics, that it is exists independent of human beings. Whether the mathematical deliberations of Pythagoras, or the Platonic music of the spheres, which was then transformed into the planetary intervals (of which there as many as the planets), or angelic and thereby divinely established harmonies to which we, mere mortals, can falteringly approximate – Bloch argues that all this is so much nonsense, albeit a nonsense that deflates any possibility for human agency in both music and utopia. In short, it has the effect of ‘taking us away from man’ (Bloch 1985c:189; 1974:273). All the same, lest we think that Bloch’s dialectical rigour has finally failed him, he turns even this argument around in at least three ways. To begin with, he points out that the mathematicians do not own the question of musical time, for such use of number is anything but eternal and universal, a contingent guide and spur for a musician rather than an inflexible law that must be followed. Further, when speaking of form, Bloch does not dismiss it as mere secondary technique, but prefers to push back, as it were, pointing out that the search for form and precision is a foundational moment for any composer: ‘It is a question of the actual forming process, the concerns of precision, those questions of the will to influence and to communicate which, for an artist, can even come before the question of the content which is our one consideration’ (Bloch 1985c:86; 1974:104). And if form is an inescapable element in human creativity, then it is also important for any utopian dialectics of music. Thus, by the time Bloch comes around to his third foray into the mathematical nature of music, he argues that we must move beyond the opposition itself – between objective and subjective, mathematical and human, eternal and contingent, cold form and human expression – to a ‘form-utopia’ (Bloch 1985c:217; 1974:304). What can we say about this opposition in Bloch’s thought? He is, of course, not the only one to reflect upon it, although I would suggest it is intimately connected with his distinction between the warm and cold streams of Marxism, between its very human concerns and the need for scientific analysis. Here too Bloch more often than not prefers warm Marxism, or at least attempts to gain a reputable place for it within the Marxist coalition. However, he is too much

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of dialectician not see that cold Marxism too is part of the dialectical and utopian promise that Marxism offers. So it is also with his philosophy of music. Rhythm and dialectics. Having broached the issue of form already, it now becomes the centre of attention in the next section (Bloch 1985c:99–104; 1974:119–124), except that now it allows Bloch to reflect on one of my own favourite topics, rhythm, and for him to return to one of his own favourites, namely the opposition between Bach and Beethoven. Let us begin with rhythm, which (as we have seen) emerges from the body’s own inner vibration, inseparable from a singing-to-oneself and thereby hearing. A small element of scandal creeps into Bloch’s favouring of dance, for the dance he envisages belongs to the realm of popular and folk culture and not the stylised forms of ballet and so on. For those familiar with Bloch, a feature of his philosophy is the weaving in of the everyday activities of working people, the Ludwigshaften factor of his thought (see Bloch 1985b:208–211),21 and the role of dance and rhythm is yet another instance. But why scandal? Dance is intimately of the body, sensual and thereby sexual, for as he suggests in his opening lines, the inner vibration at the heart of dance leads to the removal of one’s clothing. Left unsaid but hinted at are the multiple rhythms of sex. Yet the main point of Bloch’s main section on rhythm is to argue for the intrinsic role of rhythm with and within the note – contra Wagner et al, who would see rhythm as the most external feature, the outward point of contact with the world and we as hearers, that which draws us to the inner world of music. This is not an unexpected argument from Bloch, given the metaphysical importance of time for his philosophy, with its ‘Not Yet’ and ‘Novum’ and the eschatological tenor of his utopian explorations. But here he runs through a number of examples to show how rhythm – and thereby time – is integral for Wagner, Mahler, Tintoretto and especially Beethoven. Why not offer a systematic reflection on time and music? Why rhythm specifically? Apart from the embodied element of dance, rhythm here means not merely a beat, the time signatures or strikes of the bar, but anticipation and delay, departure and arrival, striding and climbing, the very energy of music itself. Perhaps it is best if I let Bloch speak, now on Beethoven: In Beethoven’s music in particular, the rhythmic tonic takes precedence over all harmony. It assumes the latter’s office and, as the explosion of 21

This resort to the popular practices of music is a constant theme in Bloch’s occasional pieces. See especially ‘On the Threepenny Opera’ (Bloch 1991:211–213; 1974:165–167), ‘TimeEcho Stravinsky’ (Bloch 1991:214–220; 1974:168–175) && and ‘Rescuing Wagner Through Surrealistic Colportage’ (Bloch 1991:338–345; 1974:176–184).

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tonality advances, becomes increasingly destined for victory. For how else could Beethoven be understood, without this music within the music? He drives restlessly on, lets go in order to build up energy in the meantime, compresses his material quietly and imperceptibly so as to set it alight later all the more fearsomely. He leads it, pulls it awry, sends hither and thither, treating his small melodic structures like lifeless creatures, and he sees, does this tremendous strategist of time, masses of music before him and under him from which he selects those that best suit his purposes. Whole groups of notes follow one another like a single lean, economical, stretching family line. But now, at the crucial moment, with a single bar of genius more than richly endowed with rhythmicdominant power, comes the flash of prodigality, and the enormous masses discharge their load. bloch 1985c:102; 1974:122

Needless to say by now, Bloch is keen to espy the utopian vibrations of rhythm, not only in those discontinuous moments when one may glimpse utopia, but also in the time when all the various rhythms sound together to signal an imminent change.22 Once again, when I read Bloch on rhythm and dance (let alone the note and song), I see a nascent theory of rock, so much so that Beethoven in Bloch’s hands becomes a drummer in the ‘best fucking band in the universe’.23 Rhythm is, however, but one element in Bloch’s reflections on form. The other offers a return to Bach and Beethoven, but now in an explicitly dialectical register (Bloch 1985c:104–115; 1974:124–137). The specific issue at stake is the relation between the fugue and sonata, particularly in terms of contrapuntal technique (which naturally opens itself out to dialectical analysis). Bloch offers not one but two analyses of this same theme, one a milder version in The Philosophy of Music and the other a much sharper Marxist analysis in The Principle of Hope. In sum, while Beethoven’s musical breakthrough has, in the first argument, only muted political implications, in the second it becomes decidedly revolutionary. 22

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As he puts it in one of his more esoteric formulations: ‘Musically, it passes into the sonantcontrapuntal space-stratum of a fugue or collective symphony; philosophically, into the lucid, qualitatively discontinuous historical space of a self-contained epoch or even the whole history of the world just as soon as the whole of it, disregarding the decrescendo of the contemporary reality unrolling again with a particular finale, can vibrate in a sufficiently unified, utopian way’ (Bloch 1985c:103; 1974:124). As Chris Bailey, lead singer in The Saints (Australia’s first, if not the world’s first punk band), said when introducing Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds on Goat Island, Sydney, 2008.

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Thus, the purpose of the long and involved section of The Philosophy of Music is to use counterpoint as a key instance of mutli-layered dialectics, which, by transcending counterpoint itself, lifts us once again to a utopian moment. Bloch tracks in some detail the formal style of the 19th century fugue (Bach), before showing how it is broken open in the new use of counterpoint in the sonata (especially Beethoven but also Bruckner). Beethoven’s stunning use of rhythm is the key to this breakthrough. Running through this analysis are multiple dialectical layers: the contrapuntal patterns of, first, the fugue, and then the sonata, the interactions between them and then the generation of a new level through this fourfold interaction.24 Nonetheless, the political element is at best muted in this analysis. Bloch offers the relatively brief assessment that the fugue constitutes solidity and stratification, that it embodies the ‘mediaeval idea of society, put into music’, much like the careful scholastic explanation of dogma. By contrast, in Beethoven’s sonata we find a break with such an ordered social formation, for here ‘freedom, the person, Lucifer reign, not Jesus and completely rounded theocracy’ (Bloch 1985c:107; 1974:128). Yet even these observations are prefaced with a cautious ‘cum grano salis’ (Bloch 1974:128).25 By contrast, in The Principle of Hope the qualifier disappears and the political and economic analysis is 24

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All of which is summed in the following: ‘There are, then, four great hierarchies of contrapuntal technique. The relation which they possess to the ethico-metaphysical spheres of the “I” is a constitutive one, although it has to be complemented by listening, by creative activity and is thus not direct, not demonstrable without further ado. Mozart, according to this classification, is Grecian and offers the small secular self; he is lightness, Attic counterpoint, pagan joy, the self-aware or sentient soul, the stage of the self that takes the form of play. Bach is mediaeval and offers the small sacred self, built in a sturdy and hallowedly uniform fashion, a musical ruby glass, architectonic counterpoint: filled with charity and hope, the commemorative or authentic “I”-soul, the expiated soul of Adam, consequently the stage of the self that takes the form of faith. Beethoven, Wagner have revolted against this. They are adjuring and lead into the great secular, Luciferan self, questing, rebellious, not to be satisfied by anything given, full of militant presentiments of a higher life, bound on an ineffable march of discovery, as yet without obvious booty; they are the masters of dramatic counterpoint and assaults upon the interior, ultimate heaven. But what is still absent, the great sacred self, the upper stages of human essentiality, music that has reached its final destination, will be the art of the later Holy Roman age. In its arrived state, crowned by eloquence and triumph, this unimaginable music would have to condense sequential counterpoint into the simultaneity of an expressive statement, an understood significance that could be instantly grasped, a musically emphatic language of prophecy a se, a really telling musical meaning’ (Bloch 1985c:115; 1974:137). The English translates as ‘to stretch a point’ – not quite the same thing (Bloch 1985c:107).

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much sharper. After revisiting the relation of fugue and sonata, first via Schoenberg, Bloch points out that the contrapuntal oppositions of Beethoven’s sonata was ‘full of revolutionary tension’ (Bloch 1985c:233; 1974:323), signalling class conflict and the anticipation of a break.26 The key to the sonata is its moment of arrival, without which the tensions would be meaningless. For class struggle works itself through revolution: ‘a tension and resolution – at a new level’ (Bloch 1985c:234; 1974:323).27 Even the fugue – which he calls elsewhere ‘the song of the sacred soul’ (Bloch 1985c:132; 1974:156) – is caught up the excitement; no longer the negative moment of the comparison, the solidity of the ruling order against which the sonata revolts, the fugue also embodies such tensions in its own way. All of this is, to my mind, a bravura piece of analysis, offering an extraordinarily good model as to how one might go about a dialectical analysis of music.28 For my own purposes, I am less interested in Bloch’s baptism of counterpoint as the revolutionary moment par excellence (in The Principle of Hope he compares it favourable with the capitalist flatness of ‘new music’). Rather, I prefer to use the form of analysis for other purposes, especially in dealing with rock music (Boer 2012). How to hear around corners, or, recovering clairvoyance. The final topic of Bloch’s study deals with the phenomenon of music, music as thing-in-itself, that is, as inherently utopian (Bloch 1985c:155–133; 1974:137–157). It is followed by a last, great theo-utopian blast called ‘The Mystery’ (Bloch 1985c:133–139; 1974:157–164). However, since Bloch’s text in these last pages is laced with theology, I propose to bring them together in terms of Bloch’s inescapable theoutopian preferences. As I have already pointed out, Bloch tends to complete the various section of his philosophy of music with a flourish that I have 26

27 28

See a comparable analysis of The Magic Flute, which portrays the space before all revolutionary periods (Bloch 1998:250–255; 1974:261–266). By contrast, Stravinsky is ‘so far removed from revolution’ (Bloch 1991:218; 1974:172). See also the subtle Marxist analysis earlier in The Principle of Hope (Bloch 1985c:200, 201; 1974:285–287). As one example, again on Beethoven: ‘It is at this point that the notes spiral upwards, striking fire, but the impetuous flight does not lack stability. Another element arises continuously and with growing intensity: the struggle or soul of the emergent relation… We can sense how, from a rapidly vanished cadence or at an apparent full-stop, there grows a tiny structure. At first barely visible and without significance, it then becomes strong, seeks allies, goes to war with the old element, and soon overgrows the whole situation with powerful limbs, with sovereign fulfilment. This music speaks of rallying, flagging and setbacks, a going astray, argument and victoriousness, presented either in close succession or in sweeping movements…’ (Bloch 1985c:110; 1974:131–132).

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dubbed theo-utopian: elements from the eschatological traditions of the Bible and Christian theology share the space with heretical strands drawn from paganism, secular challenges to theology and myths of revolution. Lucifer joins a rebellious Christ along with the revolutionary human beings, as long as they all stand up to oppressive powers that be, spying in the distance the contours of a very different land. The themes in this vast collection of theologically inspired utopian moments are as varied as their sources: it may be God’s awareness of himself (Bloch 1985c:10; 1974:17); the time of Christ’s ‘Advent understood as symbol’ (Bloch 1985c:13; 1974:20); the kernel of eternal life, ‘this Jericho and first township of the holy land’ (Bloch 1985c:139; 1974:167); the ‘correspondence between the motion of the note and the motion of the soul’ (Bloch 1985c:123; 1974:145); the eschatological hope embodied in a new language of the soul, in which what ‘is still a fervent stammering at the moment will one day share in the eloquent language of music, in increasingly expressive certainty’ (Bloch 1985c:133; 1974:157); the breakup of the old religious community in Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis as the necessary revolutionary task, carried out by the Holy Spirit, in order to achieve a universal choir that may seek God as one (Bloch 1985c:26– 27; 1974:35–36); Beethoven who transcends both the first and second Jesus (of the Second Coming) and invokes ‘Lucifer: the fighter in the front rank’ (Bloch 1985c:35; 1974:46). The theological invocations roll on: it may be the ‘leap of faith’ (Bloch 1985c:89; 1974:108), the ‘projection of the heart of Jesus into things’, the ‘statement “it is I”, an inner God-seeking devoid of images’, the ‘transcendence of the direct or religious object’ (Bloch 1985c:90; 1974:108–109), the anticipation of an ‘as yet unbefallen beyond’ (Bloch 1985c:120; 1974:142), or music as ‘miraculous and transparent’, which is both the first moment of the divine human face and the name of God recovered (Bloch 1985c:133; 1974:157). In sum: Music is so completely the guarantee of the beyond, a song of consolation, Death’s enchantment, a yearning and our own arriving simultaneously. It is a nocturnal flower of faith which gives strength in the ultimate dark, and the most powerfully transcendent certainty between heaven and earth. bloch 1985c:132; 1974:155–156

This collection might go on endlessly, but it does at least reinforce the point that any analysis of Bloch, which ignores his theological tendencies, is hobbled from the beginning. How are we to understand the role of theology in Bloch philosophy of music? My answer to this question has four parts: first, I draw out a narrative of secularisation and music from Bloch himself; second, this

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narrative leads to Bloch’s call for a new clairvoyance, which is really another way to speak about hearing around corners; third, the question of language makes an appearance; finally, I dig out what may best be called a dialectic of transcendence and immanence. In order to establish the need for interpretive clairvoyance, as well as (yet again) the utopian function of music, Bloch traces a vast narrative – of what can only be called secularisation – that compares in its daring breadth with that of Adorno and Horkheimer’s narrative concerning enlightenment. Well before them, Bloch argues that already in the Hellenistic world one may trace a loss of a sense of the preternatural, transcendence and the occult in the face of the determined advance of reason (embodied by the privileged and elitist sight). By the time of Caesar Augustus, reason had come to dominate, only to be outflanked by the birth of Christ, who is the metempsychosis of God Himself. So much for the first stage of reason and religion; in the second stage, which runs from Luther and the Renaissance, the rebirth of reason has led in two opposite paths: the black night in which all external spiritual light fades; the bright interior of the soul, which believes that Christ will return even while the empirical evidence suggests he will not. Already clairvoyance is needed to mediate between the moral self who keeps a candle burning in the darkness and a God ‘who is falling silent, leaving us and hesitating on the brink of His transformation into the Holy Spirit on the other’ (Bloch 1985c:135; 1974:159). More of that in a moment, for now a third stage appears: the belated arrival of music, which, as we have already seen, takes up the fallen utopian mantle of theology. I can hold off the discussion of clairvoyance no longer. The provocative association with occult practices, crystal balls and smoky rooms is no accident, although Bloch seeks not so much deeper insight as a ‘clair-audience’ (Hellhören), a word he coins from the German for clairvoyance, Hellsehen (Bloch 1974:163).29 Elsewhere he calls it a ‘metaphysics of divination and utopia (Metaphysik von Ahnung und Utopie)’ (Bloch 1985c:131; 1974:154), or, as I have preferred until now, a hearing around corners to identify the utopian dimension of music. In Bloch’s terms, the planet of music has not revolved enough yet for us to see what is on the other side. And since we still live within the intersection of stages two and three, within the late arrival of music and the focus inwards, clairvoyance needed both to discern what goes on deep within ourselves and to see the dark side of that vast planet. 29

So Korstvedt 2010:153, although one might also translate as ‘clair-hearing’, except that Korstvedt’s rendering has a certain resonance with clairvoyance. ‘Visionary hearing’ in the translation by Palmer is less than adequate (Bloch 1985c:138).

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The third question begins with a moment of hesitation, for I have wondered on more than one occasion why such an ecstatic Bloch is so appealing for me, given my suspicions of ecstasy. The best way to make sense of Bloch’s appeal is that in those regular theo-utopian crescendos, if not in the dense, prophetic and ecstatic style favoured by Bloch, he tries to tap into the often theological language of myth. Fully aware that we do not have a language adequate to speak of a qualitatively different world known as ‘utopia’, a major strategy is to make the most of the vast utopian resources of myth and theology. What he writes in an analysis of The Magic Flute in relation to symbols also applies to myths, for they are ‘deployed as mirrors of what has not yet come into existence’ (Bloch 1998:255; 1974:266). Finally, Bloch’s theo-utopian anticipation moves both vertically and horizontally, temporally and ontologically. It may look forward to a better world, but it also lifts on the wings of heavenly anticipation (heaven here understood as a persistent criticism of earth). Does this mean Bloch leaves behind the very human focus that has characterised his philosophy of music until now? Not at all, for the more theo-utopian he becomes, the more resolutely human is his focus. Music may well appear beyond us, containing a full metaphysics well clear of the banality of harmony, of thirds and fifths, beyond even the physical note, embodied above all in the ‘acoustical atrocities’ of the late Beethoven,30 and yet this music comes from within ourselves, from our bodily vibrations, our impulses to dance and sing and therefore hear ourselves. The metaphysical note, beyond anything yet experienced, is not external to us but produced by us, for ‘we are the origin of what the note of music says’ (Bloch 1985c:137; 1974:161). If there is a mystery, then that mystery is nothing less than the human object, ‘which in practice is hidden from its own sight’ (Bloch 1985c:138; 1974:162). Is that not in the end a dialectic of transcendence and immanence, in which the key to transcendence lies in its radical immanence and vice versa? Conclusion This, however, is a place where one has never been before, although it is still native to us (Bloch 1985c:120; 1974:142). 30

Bloch speaks of the B flat major Sonata and the Diabelli Variations: these ‘acoustical atrocities’ are ‘ultimately unplayable because they are written for an instrument which has never existed and never will exist’. These two works ‘do not employ real sound but incorporeal, purely cerebral abstractions of sound, borrowing the language of the keyboard only as a rough, basically sketchy alphabet’ (Bloch 1985c:118; 1974:140).

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Those people who listen will have found another way home (gelangen anders nach Hause). bloch 1985c:86; 1974:104

Thus, the note in all its metaphysical, utopian and ontological dimensions is thoroughly human, even if that human being remains hidden from a full realisation. The way forward: ‘If, therefore, we do not advance with the note, nothing can continue singing’ (Bloch 1985c:115; 1974:137). But any advance with the note must realise that the ‘has consequences’ (ibid.), especially those that ‘do not yet exist musically’ (Bloch 1985c:116; 1974:138) and for which we must brace ourselves.

Chapter 5

What is the Meaning of “Culture”? Some Comments and Perspectives Gottfried Küenzlen Within us there must burn a noble desire to contribute from our own means to the rich legacy of truth, morality, and liberty, which our ancestors have bequeathed to us and which we must now pass on to our successors – a desire to link our fleeting existence with the imperishable chain that winds through all generations of mankind. (Ein edles Verlangen muß in uns entglühen, zu dem reichen Vermächtnis von Wahrheit, Sittlichkeit und Freiheit, das wir von der Vorwelt überkamen und reich vermehrt an die Folgewelt wieder abgeben müssen, auch aus unseren Mitteln einen Beitrag zu legen, und an dieser unvergänglichen Kette, die durch alle Menschengeschlechter sich windet, unser fliehendes Dasein zu befestigen. schiller 1816:60 f.

When the newly appointed history professor Friedrich Schiller concluded his inaugural lecture at the University of Jena with those sentences, he had no need of the word “culture.” Yet, this quote includes what culture use to mean – particularly in the German tradition of education (“Bildung”): As man, in his “fleeting existence,” poses both a question and a challenge to himself, he needs purpose-providing cultural messages in whose traditions he is invariably placed but which he constantly needs to adopt and form anew. Yet, in this day and age, such a concept of culture has become a thing unknown and incomprehensible to most people. We do, however, witness an almost inflationary use of the term culture in the current intellectual discussions as well as in our every-day language: the culture of leisure, entrepreneurial culture, eating culture, the culture of dialogue, event culture, etc; there is hardly any field in our social lives and behaviours that may not be marked with the tag of culture. Yet, if everything and anything may be termed “culture,” the term loses its diagnostic and analytical power, and the thing so denoted loses its contours and its perceptive depth. This situation calls for renewed reassurance as to what “culture” is supposed to mean, and what a scholarly useful reconstruction of the term and the thing might look like. This essay is meant to provide a contribution to that reconstruction, both from a general cultural-philosophical and a more specific © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2014 | doi 10.1163/9789004263147_007

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cultural-sociological point of view; yet, that contribution is limited to some selected hints and comments, which, while invariably referring to fundamental issues of the concept of culture, will necessarily remain sketchy and sometimes fragmentary. The fact that “culture” became a key term at the beginning of our modern age has led to some comments on the situation of secular culture in the modern age in the last part of this essay, at the end of which even a possible theological dimension shines through. By way of introduction, reference is made to the basic concept associated with the term “culture,” which mainly results from the etymology of the word: The Latin cultura (colere) at first referred only to agricultural care and preservation (agricultura), but later its meaning was metaphorically extended to refer to the cultivation, education, preservation and care of the soul and the spirit (philosphia termed cultura animi by Cicero). This etymological reference goes to show that in a specific context culture forms a counterpart to the raw, uncultivated, unpreserved nature. This is linked to another basic aspect: Culture has to do with ascriptions of meaning, with purpose orientations needed by man to give direction and orientation to his way of living, which is diffuse and aimless by nature, and in order to cope with the principally unbounded openness of his world. Even on that elementary level, culture is associated with “purpose,” it is a “finite segment of the meaningless infinity of the events of the world, filled with purpose and meaning from man’s point of view” (Weber 1922:180). (“ein vom Standpunkt des Menschen aus mit Sinn und Bedeutung bedachter endlicher Ausschnitt aus der sinnlosen Unendlichkeit des Weltgeschehens.”)

The Universality of Culture

This universality is based upon a specific anthropological constitution of man. Here, reference needs to be made to the insights of the so-called “recent philosophical anthropology,” which has been developed by Max Scheler, Arnold Gehlen, Helmut Plessner and Erich Rothacker, in particular. The following statements are based especially on the work of Arnold Gehlen. According to him, man is the being that depends on culture. It is not that man merely has culture: he is only through culture and because of culture. The starting point is the concept of man as a biologically deficient being – a concept already brought forward by Herder – because, as opposed to an animal, his way of living is not controlled by some sort of nature-given, instinctdriven automatism. Without those instinct-controlled directives to guide his way of living, man is un-protectedly exposed to the “field of surprise of external

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reality” (Gehlen 1962). So, the fact that man lacks an animal’s instinct-controlled integration into the environment results in his principal open-mindedness towards the world. As man is denied his own “niche of existence” (Gehlen 1962), he is the being consigned to culture. Apart from any content-related determination of cultural inventories and objectivations, culture means in the first place the possibility of being able to deal with the principal open-mindedness towards the world and with the “field of surprise” of external reality in a successful and meaningful way. In culture, man establishes routes to canalise the principal diffusiveness of his impulses to which he otherwise would remain exposed because of his biologically deficient “status naturae.” In culture, therefore, man is able to “turn the deficient conditions of his existence into opportunities of his subsistence” (Gehlen 1962:36). So, culture provides man with the protective shell that he is denied by nature. Culture frees man from his natural defencelessness, from the chaos that he would otherwise be banned into because of his biological non-specialisation, swamped by the unorganised onslaught of external stimuli. Culture thus is the principal mission of man, which compels him to create for himself within it a “second nature” in which only he is able to live. So as to add another pillar to support the concept of man as a cultural being, it seems appropriate – again following the tradition of Gehlen – to at least briefly sketch a second fundamental finding that would corroborate the special status of man in nature: It is about the structure of drives pertinent to man in his ­open-mindedness towards the world. Man, who is risk-prone because his behaviour is not predetermined by nature, needs to be able to control his drives and to accumulate his driving energy – quite contrary to an animal which, circumstances permitting, succumbs to its drives on the spot and without any inhibitions. By accumulating his driving energy, however, man builds up a reservoir that may be described as a surplus of driving energy. Without it, man would not be at all capable of creating what he absolutely depends upon: the protective shell of culture. In this context, Gehlen introduces the term “hiatus,” which leads into the depth of Gehlen’s definition of man as a cultural being. Hiatus denotes the fact that man is capable of keeping his impulses, wishes and interests to himself, decoupling them from his actions, which may occur either automatically (at rest) or intentionally, as man does rather not blindly pursue them, and it is only through this that that they come to the fore as his inner world. It is the hiatus which forms the very essence of what is called the soul. gehlen 1971:52

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So it is exactly because the external world alone denies man the control over his life that he is in need of an internal control of his way of living, which gives him orientation so as to find his way in the external world of life. It is the “internal goal images” that provide this orientational effort in and of themselves. Without those “internal goal images” for man to underpin his drives, man – as a naturally undetermined being – would become lost in the complexity of external reality. Only those who see the images of the wishes that drive them within themselves, as they do not perceive them to be outside themselves, will be capable of changing the world in such a way that they will meet up with them tomorrow. So, the hiatus which we call ‘soul’ is nothing but the abyss reflected in man himself, which actually separates our needs from their fulfilment; it is the ‘underpinning’ with goal images of that which drives us, which is what actually reveals the inner world and makes it possible to find a designation for it; and it is the condition for satisfying those drives tomorrow. gehlen 1971:53

Without following the mindful lines of Gehlen’s concept any further, we may state as a preliminary result: It is the “inner world” of man, the goal images guiding his actions, that allow man to establish himself in his world, that is, in the second nature created by himself. The special status of man is that he is the being which creates culture and which is dependent on culture – or: Man as the creator and creation of culture (Michael Landmann introduction in Simmel 1968). An interim remark will have to suffice where indeed a more detailed explanation would be in order: Man’s principal open-mindedness towards the world may also cause him to experience action uncertainty and existential powerlessness. Because open-mindedness towards the world, a constituent of the freedom of man, not only provides the basis for both the necessity and the opportunity of shaping the world; it may also cause uncertainty, powerlessness and even anxiety when the freedom of man, unbound by natural directives, is felt to be a burden or even a threat. The “vertigo of freedom” (S. Kierkegaard) is one of the burdens that come with man’s open-mindedness towards the world.1 Finally, one thing should be stated once again: Culture is universal because man is the being that depends on culture. So, human action is always linked to purpose orientation, existence concepts and interpretations of reality, 1 Cf. the existential ontology developed by Heidegger in “Sein und Zeit.”

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interpretations of the world, to ideas or even fully developed world concepts. Thus, man’s natural environment is always arched over by the “symbolic universe of culture,” which is the universal constituent of man’s position in his world. This finding may be summarised by quoting Ernst Cassirer (1960:39): Man lives in a symbolic universe, and no longer in a merely natural universe. Instead of dealing with things themselves, man is in a sense constantly conversing with himself. He has so enveloped himself in linguistic forms, in artistic images, in mythical symbols or religious rites that he cannot see or know anything except by the interposition of this artificial medium. Another characteristic of the universality of culture is the fact that – based upon the described anthropological determination of man as a cultural being – any culture, especially culture as man’s second nature, has to solve certain basic tasks that emerge at all times and in all places. These may be termed “transcultural constants” (W.E. Mühlmann) and include, for example, types of housing, rules on sexuality and procreation, the configuration of legal conditions, agreements on what is right or wrong, good or bad, beautiful or ugly, the ritual reverence for the gods to whom one feels bound in their fascinating and fearful appearance. Since this is not the place to embark on a deeper reflection on the relationship between nature and culture, it should suffice to state the following: As inevitably as man is rooted in culture as his “second nature,” the ontological justification of culture from the perspective of cultural philosophy holds true that culture is not just a phenomenon of consciousness. Invariably, culture is dependent on nature, which precedes it and – while never visible to man “in and of itself,” as he is by necessity a being predetermined by culture – does, ontologically speaking, indeed represent the cause of culture, as it exists as a non-cultural or rather pre-cultural form. Gehlen (1940:17) calls it “nature not yet de-poisoned” or “first-hand” nature, which puts man in his privileged position.2

The Particularity, Plurality and Historicity of Culture

As certain as the universality of culture is valid at the elementary level of anthropological observation, as much is the actual historical-empirical realisation of 2 As to the issue of ontological culture justification, cf. the works of Erich Rothacker, 1966.

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culture characterised by particularity, plurality and historicity. Put more pointedly: There is no “culture,” there are only cultures. Culture exists only in its plural form, as humanity itself represents a continuous mixture of peoples and their guiding cultures, which succeed each other and exist next to each other, with each other, and against each other (Hellpach 1944). The first person to develop a view of the particularity, plurality and historicity of culture was Giambattista Vico (1668–1744), who was far ahead of his times and remained largely unnoticed in his days.3 In terms of the history of effects and ideas, Vico is so important because he stood out from the basically ahistorical concept of culture which prevailed in his era and which was determined by the philosophy of enlightenment. That concept was totally embedded into the idea of universal progress subscribed to by the “philosophes” of the 18th century, which implied that the light of reason as a “lumen naturale” was the same everywhere and at any time, even if people were too weak, too ignorant or just too barbaric to discover it for themselves. This way of thinking finds poignant expression in Voltaire. While Voltaire did indeed direct his view to other and earlier epochs of mankind (Essais sur les moeurs et l’esprit des nations, 1756) he was convinced that eras that had not been reached by the light of reason were hardly worth being noticed at all. According to Voltaire, it meant nothing to ask if “by the banks of the Oxus or the Ixartes, one barbarian succeeded another.” Nobody wanted to know that “Quancum succeeded Kincum and Kincum succeeded Quancum” (Berlin 1992:76). Basically, there was only one culture – although Voltaire, to the best of my knowledge, hardly used that word and did not even need to use it – and that was the culture of enlightened reason, which was a principally ahistorical and timeless concept of the nature of man, and thus of society. Quite differently, Vico was the first in the modern age to consider the uniqueness, unmistakable character, and authenticity of each culture. This was due to his specific concept of history, which was far ahead of the rationalism of his era and which permits to refer to Vico as the initiator of the ‘school of human sciences’ (Herder), as the founder of historical philosophy” and, in the context of our topic, “as the critical pioneer of historism, who works the ‘miracle of intellectual history’ (F. Meinecke) in thoroughly understanding strange mentalities of mankind without measuring against the advanced consciousness of one’s own era, and thus misinterpreting them (Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart 1986). 3 The following statements are mainly based on the relevant studies of Isaiah Berlin, cf. mainly: I. Berlin, 1992, esp. p. 72–122, and ibid., 1981, esp. p. 196–218.

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So, it is indeed about us learning to understand – in La Scienza Nuova, Vico refers to this understanding as the “fantasia” – what human self-expression reveals in the myths, stories, metaphors, allegories and in the multitude of languages of other cultures. This is about the character, the authenticity of the various cultures, which are not, after all, “merely different branches of the same huge tree of enlightenment”4 reaching out for that one universal progress. Vico intended to analyse the collective self-awareness of culture in its respective uniqueness, that is, to learn to understand the thoughts, ideas, feelings, wishes and aspirations of people in their struggle with the physical nature as expressed in institutions, monuments, symbols, ways of writing and speaking, by means of which human beings seek to explain and interpret their own existence. Of course, it was first of all Johann Gottfried Herder (1772; 1784) who developed this concept of variety and uniqueness of peoples and cultures in his works. It is not possible to explain in this essay the content and the meaning of those works and the history of their effects, which started as early as with their effect on the young Goethe; rather, a few summaries will have to suffice. Time and again, Herder emphasised the uniqueness of the various peoples and their cultures, particularly pointing out their incommensurability and the variety of the evolutionary paths they had followed in the past and continued to follow at present. His concept of history and, more specifically, of culture is based upon the assumption of principal individuality as a special characteristic of any historical formation, be it that of an individual, a people, an era or even a positive religion. This idea of the individuality of all things historical led firstly to the concept of a people’s spirit or soul as the fundamental and inspiring creative character, which leaves its imprint on any work, action, achievement and individual of that people; secondly to the realisation that any cycle of history and any era of history has an intrinsic right and life in and of itself as a period of a particular blooming and configuration of humanity; and thus to the rejection of the arrogance of the era of enlightenment, which regarded all history before its own time to be merely a step of the general progress towards the perfection of enlightenment. hirsch 1964/1949:211

4 I. Berlin, 1992:79.

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Finally: The historicity of culture. Again, it was – in the context of the history of ideas – Vico and Herder, in particular, who took the historicity of any culture for a fact and who thus provided a major contribution to the very formation of a historical consciousness as a constituent of modern thinking. When Herder states that the culture of a people constitutes the “bloom of their existence,” this organologic metaphor comprises the historicity of culture. Cultures grow, bloom and wilt. As opposed to the assumption of a mono-linear evolutionism of a continuously advancing cultural development, which may eventually bring universal happiness for all mankind – an assumption that was (and still is) the constituent of a certain strand of enlightenment and, although in quite a specific way, was valid for Kant, too,5 – historicity of culture according to Herder means: cultures come and go, they have a period of incubation, of blooming and of wilting. The concept of the historicity of any culture eventually results in the concept of man as a being that may change with history. This brings us back to the above-mentioned relationship of anthropology and culture and to the thesis: Man not only “has” culture, but he “is” by and within culture. And thus: Any culture, be it religious or secular, provides an answer to the question what man is. But if the answers to the question what man is are reformulated, if the objectives, value preferences, needs, and mental horizons of people change, if the ideas they believe in change or, to put it shortly: If the “light of cultural issues has moved on” (M. Weber), the historicity of man as a creator and a creation of culture becomes evident.6 So, cultures come and go. They do so in particular if people do no longer “believe” in them, for example, if other cultures are moving in, whose interpretations of our existence replace those that are out-dated and obsolete.

Culture in the Secular Modern Age

Culture: A key term of the secular modern age. “Culture” became – particularly in the German tradition – a key term of the secular modern age. This happened during a process where the term and the object assumed an independent existence. One sign of this process which caused culture to become a concept in its 5 Cf. Immanuel Kant, 1912: For Kant, this ‘representation of the first history of mankind’ leads to the fact ‘that the destiny of the species (of man)…is nothing but the progress towards perfection…a progress from the worse to the better.’ 6 The concept of the historicity of man is mostly based on Wilhelm Dilthey; cf. O.F. Bollnow, 1980.

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own right is the mere observation that only in 1800 did the German term Kultur become more widespread without the genitive attributes that used to be added in order to denote the object that was to be cultivated. Thus, the term turned into a collective singular.7 That culture could become a key term is closely associated with the emergence of new secular orientations of existence and new powerful beliefs whose claim to truth decisively determined the genesis and historical course of the occidental modern age (Küenzlen 1994/1997). The cultural situations of pre-modern societies – which includes the Middle Ages – during all their different historical stages and epochs, which certainly were extremely varied in and of themselves, were characterised by the fact that orientations of existence were based on, maintained and warranted by religion and myth as the last authorities of a valid world order and additionally were guaranteed by the institution of the church. The emerging new secular, worldly interpretations of life, their teachings and promises meant that the old interpretations of existence preserved in religion and myth and institutionally administered by the church ceased to be valid, for these new interpretations referred to autonomous reason, philosophy and especially science in their claim to current, new and different interpretations of reality. Once the “old” world powers had been deprived of their culture, their teachings and certainties, immanent culture increasingly became an autonomous place where one could find self-reassurance, all by oneself, particularly as a result of the influence of new streams of ideas – including all the attempts made at interpreting traditional religion such that it would fit into the new horizons, thus giving it a new foundation, splendid examples of which are provided by the theological history of Protestantism.8 This process of culture assuming an independent existence and Kant’s definition of culture as “the last purpose” then became one of the core elements of German idealism and the German classical period: culture as a place where man’s mission is found in himself, self-perfection being his permanent task and aim. Accordingly, for Kant, man was the “cultural being” to whom the following applied: While man is the titular master of nature, since he is the only creature on Earth endowed with reason, and thus with the capability to set aims for himself according to his own will…he is invariably so to a limited extent 7 As Emanuel Hirsch demonstrated, the German term Kultur without a genitive attribute is found, for the first time, already in the writings of Samuel Pufendorf, cf. E. Hirsch, 1964 (1949), vol. I, p. 80. 8 For an – even today – impressive work on this subject, cf.: E. Hirsch, vol. I–V, 1949.

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only, as he must understand and be willing to give to nature and to himself such a purpose-based relationship which is independent of nature and sufficient in itself, and is consequently an ultimate purpose to itself which need not even be sought in nature.… Spawning a being of reason that is fit to pursue whatever purpose (and which, accordingly, possesses freedom) is what is referred to as culture. Therefore, in consideration of the human species, it can only be culture that we are induced to attribute to nature as its ultimate purpose. kant 1921,Vol. VI:332, §83

This is also the definition of culture that the concept of the “cultivated man” of the 19th century was rooted in – especially in Germany – whose idealistic aim Friedrich Schiller (1816b:210) formulated as follows: The more facets (sensualist) receptiveness will develop…the more man will grasp of the world…the more power and depth personality will acquire, the more freedom reason will gain, the more man will comprehend of the world.… This means that his culture will consist in combining the utmost wealth of existence with a maximum degree of independence and freedom while not losing himself to the world, but rather appropriating the latter with all its infinite manifestations, subjecting it to the unifying power of his reason. From the point of view of cultural sociology, it must be added: Wherever autonomous culture has the permanent mission to design and produce orientations of existence, it will inevitably be characterised by plurality, rivalry and potential antagonism, particularly since the church and its teachings lost their authority and thus there is no one left to decide upon the final validity of the respective claims to truth. In this context, the position and special meaning of a cultural intelli­ gentsia  in the secular culture of the modern age must at least shortly be mentioned: Certainly, also pre-modern culture – during all its different stages of ­development – had to rely on people who produced, preserved and proclaimed cultural meaning and who, for example as priests and prophets, as scribes and wise men, made the cultural messages and cultural powers known; who because of their authority guaranteed the binding nature of the latter, formulated them and thus made it possible to convey them to others in the first place. Within the autonomous culture of modern secular societies, a cultural intelligentsia, who considered themselves to be just as autonomous and secular, acquired the standing and authority that enabled them to interpret

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the new reality, to proclaim their cultural messages and powers and to develop the language to do so. Not least, it was up to the secular intellectual strata of society in the field of the political/secular religions of the modern age to translate their ideas into political objectives. Their task was to find ways to make ideas turn into slogans. The fact that this conversion actually did take place and such mottos succeeded in decisively influencing the course of history in the modern age is, not least, the doing of a secular cultural intelligentsia. Friedrich Tenbruck (1990:84f) produced a concise summary of the process outlined above during which culture, which is autonomous and must be understood as inherently secular, assumes an independent existence, and which caused – and forced – the term “culture” to become a key concept of the modern age: The development of a secular cultural intelligentsia, the incessant production of ever new cultural goods and the internal dynamism of these cultural processes were the reasons why culture took on a life of its own, with the modern age coining the new German term Kultur and making people aware of it as a new situation of existence. For this concept precisely denotes the new situation by identifying “culture” as the now valid source of public interpretation of existence, that is, an undefined and open variable no longer tied to any binding assumptions or teachings because it intends to first produce them itself. The term reflects the new awareness that people themselves create their cultural contents. Accordingly, culture for the modern age not only describes a unique new situation but also a new responsibility. With the concept of culture, the modern age starts seeing itself as a cultural mission to be achieved through permanent cultural activity, with no everlasting truths to be relied on. The collective singular term Kultur – which developed around the year 1800 – thus became a key concept used by the secular modern age to formulate its own self and to interpret the newly developed situations. How the dynamism of scientific and technological progress has left its mark on culture. Certainly, culture’s self-given authority and the ideas and messages guiding it have had a powerful and decisive effect on the genesis and historical course of the secular modern age. Nevertheless, it is also true that social structural conditions and developments of modern societies in turn also have exerted a fundamental influence on culture and its manifestations. The humanities and social sciences, whose influence even reaches out to philosophy and theology, for a long time regarded “culture” as a mere derivative – or,

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from a Marxist perspective, as a mere superstructure of social conditions, which made them blind for the power of culture. Even so, today’s turn towards “culturalism” is not free of a new sort of blindness which consists in making culture the all-determining factor while overlooking, or at least attaching less importance to, the structural conditions of modern societies and their powerful repercussions. But: Just like society is based on culture, culture is based on society (Tenbruck 1990:8). As a result, the following must be noted with respect to our subject: The tremendous dynamism of the technological evolution shaping modern societies not only has changed the outward situation of human existence, but also man himself; or, to put it more precisely: the question of man as a cultural being has been, and still is, changing in industrial and post-industrial times and keeps finding its new answers. In this context, the following comments must suffice: One of the characteristics of scientific/technological developments is the fact that they create new needs that man has not felt before, or, as Arnold Gehlen (1994:13) puts it: “Technology provides and invents means for non-existing purposes or needs that it creates itself in the process, because nobody feels them as yet.” This process of radical scientific/technological changes and its enormous influence on culture could be illustrated more clearly by the present developments in the field of medical technology, but this subject must be limited here to the following short remarks: Only generations ago, prenatal diagnostics, which confronts parents with the decision to either want or abort a child, would have been an inconceivable notion, not only as a technological possibility, but also from the point of view of the horizon of meaning provided by culture – such a situation would only have been an unbearable burden on the soul, causing confusion and tribulation. Today, this has become a reality, not only as a medical technological option, but also as a culturally well-established, assimilated idea. In this way, technological progress itself contributes to the new patterns of interpretation and interpretations of sense that are being weaved and give answers to the new situations. These findings can also be illustrated by the example of what is referred to as the “brain death criterion”9 – an example which is particularly well suited in the context of our questions because, unlike the current discussions on destructive embryonic research, the death criterion “brain death” has long ago entered our cultural horizon of meaning, has become culturally accepted there and hardly causes any potential of cultural irritation anymore. However, equating brain death and death since 1968 was not a mere further development of 9 Cf.: G. Küenzlen, 2003, p. 241 ff.

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traditional cultural death criteria, according to which a human being is “dead” once all organs and bodily functions have come to an irreversible standstill, but represented a break with this tradition: A person is dead if his/her brain functions have died irreversibly, even if his/her other organs continue to be “alive.” The consistent consequence then had to be to declare a brain dead person, whose other bodily functions in many cases still continue, a “non-person,” which means that, for example, a still breathing body is considered to be that of an already “dead” person. The first thing the example outlined above shows: We must rid ourselves of the idea that the technological, in this case medical technological, developments remain detached from their cultural interpretations and allocations of meaning. On the contrary, man as a cultural being never can do without the latter. Another aspect: The increasing omnipresence of technology is seeking its cultural meaning, even if the latter re-formulates, re-interprets or totally dismisses the traditional occidental concept of man as a person. To sum up: The dynamism of scientific/technological evolution denotes a process that determines and changes man to his core. What was formulated by Hans Freyer (1963:318) and Helmut Schelsky in 1963 with a view to the transforming power of the highly industrialised period changing man himself holds even more truth today considering the present radical technological changes: There has been an increasing awareness that the (technological/industrial) production of a new environment ‘also produces forever new bits of society and human psyche’ (H. Schelsky), not only since effective human technologies started to manipulate man himself, but already when it became clear that apart from producing useful objects, machines also change the working man…. The tragedy of the secular culture of the modern age. That the route taken by the secular culture of the modern age – whose course throughout history has left such a distinct mark on the modern way of life – also was a route to its own tragedy is a thesis particularly associated with the work of Georg Simmel and Max Weber. In spite of all their different academic approaches and priorities, both shared the insight that culture in the modern age, due to its own prerequisites, i.e. in fact due to its inherent logic, cannot but drift towards a development that may be described as “tragedy.” For Simmel (1968:116), it was the culture that had developed into solidified shapes (“objective culture”) which, during a certain stage of the cultural process, must conflict with individual freedom and “life itself” (“subjective culture”) and thus, no longer being able to serve life and the needs of the

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individual’s soul, cannot but fail what for Simmel’s cultural philosophy is the very purpose and aim of culture: “The route of the soul towards itself.” The result is as follows: “Thus, in the course of history, the ‘tragedy of culture’ inevitably develops – tragedy (and not only sad) because what exerts its destructive power on life here does not come from outside but from within life’s own deepest levels and necessities” (Simmel 1968:12). In Max Weber’s work, the term “tragedy of culture” is not explicitly used, but the facts this concept describes are of central importance to Weber’s analysis and diagnosis of the occidental modern age. This only is revealed once the standard phrases of common and frequently reductionist interpretations of Max Weber are left behind. The following short remarks on Weber are mainly based on the Zwischenbetrachtung of the Wirtschaftsethik der Weltreligionen (Economic Ethics of the World Religions) – which is famous, but whose factual content has only rarely been fully exploited – for I am convinced that it contains decisive, if only brief and partly enigmatically outlined statements by Weber on the situation and the fate of the occidental culture of the modern age; therefore, full literal quotations will be used in the following.10 In order to understand the dimension of Weber’s interpretation of the tragedy of autonomous secular culture, the tragedy of religion, as seen by Weber, must at least be outlined first. The reason of this tragedy is the fact that in the process of occidental disenchantment – whose genesis cannot be understood without its religious roots – religion rendered itself meaningless. Occidental religion reached its end, although certainly not actually its historical end but its end as a culture-determining vital power (“Lebensmacht”), because it could now no longer be the bearer of the rationalisation process that had been initiated already in early Judaism and had then been carried on and developed further throughout the history of Christianity, but finally was shaped and completed by inner-worldly cultural powers. This applied to the inner-worldly “irrational” powers: art and Eros, whose immanent nature it is to promise “inner-worldly salvation from rationalisation” (Weber 1921:566; 560). Religion’s promise of salvation was replaced, in a very distinct and decisive way, by the one inner-worldly power that was to become the crucial formative power of the modern age: science. This now meant that it had finally become impossible to attach meaning to a world felt to be futile, that the “postulated cosmos of ethical, causality-based compensation” of a redemptive religion had been abolished forever (Weber 1921:569). 10

My following remarks are based on my previous work on Max Weber’s Sociology of Religion, G. Küenzlen, 1980, esp. p. 126 ff.

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Rational insight, which ethical religiousness itself had appealed to, shaped – in an autonomous and inner-worldly manner, following its own standards – a cosmos of truth which no longer had anything at all to do with the systematic postulates of rational religious ethics: that the world as a cosmos meets their requirements or has any kind of ‘meaning’. It even had to refuse this claim as a matter of principle. weber 1921:569

This had resulted in the creation of a culture whose assimilation meant aiming at inner-worldly self-perfection of man as a cultural being. Its own tragedy consisted in the fact that the aim it had committed itself to encountered a limit: However, this cultural property, i.e. what to the ‘inner-worldly’ man was the highest in the world not only was characterised by the burden of its ethical guilt but also by something that had to devaluate him in an even much more definitive way: meaninglessness, if evaluating him by his own standards. For religious thinking, the meaninglessness of purely innerworldly self-perfection in order to become a cultural being, i.e. of the final value that ‘culture’ seemed to be reducible to, followed from the obvious meaninglessness of death – when viewed from this inner-worldly standpoint. Death, especially under the conditions of ‘culture’, seemed to finally mark life as meaningless. weber 1921:569

If “the farmer could die ‘full of life’ like Abraham…,” (Weber 1921:569) this can no longer apply to man in his quest for “self-perfection in the sense of the assimilation of creation of ‘cultural contents’” (Weber 1921:570). Fulfilling a “circle of life” and thus reaching inner-worldly perfection is denied to “cultivated man” in principle. “For in principle, his perfectibility tended to be just as boundless as that of the cultural goods” (Weber 1921:570). It is due to the inherent nature of culture itself and it is the cause of culture’s tragedy that it cannot deliver what it promises to those who strive for its goods: self-perfection and inner-worldly perfection.

Chapter 6

Towards a Global Ethos? Notes on the Philosophy of Encounter Jan Fennema “Am I my brother’s keeper” (Genesis 4:9b)? These are classic words ascribed to the mythic figure named Cain. They are moreover words that everyone knows who lives and has been brought up in the cultural sphere that has its roots in the Mediterranean region. Cain’s words testify of his confusion, after he apprehended clearly that the death of his brother Abel was the consequence of his act of violence. Evidently, we must consider him to be aware of the undeniable fact of the death of this brother, and that his responsibility could not be escaped. He felt guilty and tried, in vain, to silence his conscience. Yet, in a way, Cain’s words are also evidence of a basic ethic. Implicitly, his words refer to the rule that a human being should not take the life of another human being. And we are to assume that Cain was aware of this rule. Accordingly, one of the commandments of the Decalogue, the Ten Commandments, which is crucial with regard to the subject on hand, is “Thou shalt do no murder.” The Ten Commandments have become the basis of Jewish and Christian morality; and in the Islamic religion, murder as perpetrated by Cain is explained by the Koran, 5th sura, explicitly as murder of all human beings! And finally, following legend, the Decalogue was translated into the languages of all people “at the day of the creation of the world.” According to the relevant tradition, the Ten Commandments were written on a stone, where they had been, in a respected formula transmitted since that time, “engraved by the finger of the Eternal One.” As a matter of fact, commandments that are written are external to the human being, who is expected – summoned, rather – to follow the commandments and carry them into practice. In this way the commandments may become internal and appear to be “his/her flesh and blood.” The prophet Jeremiah, a visionary of Old Testament times, has put in full light that rules which are to constitute the basis of a morality must be internal indeed. In one of his visions he prophesied that, in a time which is still to come, the “law” will be “engraved on the heart” of the human being instead of on a stone (Jeremiah 31:33). This view may be interpreted to mean that in a time that is still very distant, moral behavior will take place as a result of what is sensed. Thus, moral behavior is not considered to constitute the application or “consequence” of words that are read or heard © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2014 | doi 10.1163/9789004263147_008

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and thereupon taken to heart. True moral behavior is not the putting into practice of some rules, but follows spontaneously from what may be called the “hearts’ fullness.” It is equivalent to performing actions as the result of an “inner light,” which illuminates the heart of the human being and urges him/her, for instance, to assume a specific responsibility. And only when the intent to act has manifested itself, may the motivation of the action become clear to the actor and the validity of a rule be discerned. Yet, what do we sense? The eschatological time of Jeremiah’s prophecy is not ours. So far the obvious question, what is “sensed,” has received only ambiguous answers. The knowledge obtained of the dispositions of human beings teaches us that they are equivocal; worst of all, human rationality may go adrift and turn humanity’s best – “enlightened, utopian” – intentions into mere tyranny and terror. Hence, as it appears, good and evil intentions never go apart totally; they often join and cannot properly be separated, very much like the different strings twined together to make a rope cannot be separated unless the rope is untied and as such is lost. In fact, it is hard to believe that the absolute good exists or will exist, and analogously, that the absolute evil exists or will ever exist in the human world. Thus, whether good or evil prevails in human behavior will be strongly dependent on the circumstances in which the human being in questions finds him-/herself and on the incentives that are experienced. In the preceding century the rule, “Thou shalt do no murder,” has become the corner stone of the philosophy of Emmanuel Levinas, a French philosopher. The horrors of World War II had convinced him that ontology, that is the philosophy of being in its quality of being, makes no contribution to what is most crucial in real life, namely, the experience of the Other. This term “Other,” written with a capital “O,” designates the human being as considered by the observing being in its quality of being an other human being, that is, other than the observing being. For, in contradistinction to what is often taken for granted in naive philosophizing, a human being that is encountered cannot be considered an entity that is part of a totality of whatever entities of which only one being is met. If the act of meeting constitutes a true encounter, the human being that is encountered, the Other, is not a part of a universe that rests in the hands of the observing being, but is a totality or universe itself! In this connection Levinas preferably uses the term “infinity” to describe the impression the Other makes, which was highlighted by writing capital “O.” The Other presents itself and cannot be categorized. It is not concealed or hidden but stands naked before the eyes of the one who is observing. Evidently, the face of the human being who is thus met is essentially open, and may be inviting or hostile. Levinas explains that the question that can be read in this open face always

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implies the basic request not to be killed: “Thou shalt do not murder.” It requires that the one, who confronts this open face and is aware of it, does not indulge his/her will to expand, but is prepared to withdraw or retire, “contract,” thus leaving space and time for the Other to live. Facing one another, a vis-à-vis, may indeed be the beginning of a peaceful relation, because of the mutual recognition and respect obtained, provided that word and deed are one. Yet, can a human being “read,” grasp, the wordless question that may be in the face of another human being? As everyone knows, the very basic request not to kill is often not understood or heard, even if it is accompanied by a cry of distress. The victims may be unobserved by their oppressor – which in a way means that they have no face! In the past one hundred years, two world wars have swept over the surface of the earth, not to mention the other wars, declared or not declared, and the massive persecutions in several countries, which have caused terrible devastation, disrupting the life individuals and communities. Moreover, warfare has become more and more the waging of distant wars, when the belligerents, victims and those who perpetrate violence, who may as it happens be victims too, are far away from each other. Thus, warfare is becoming anonymous to a scale that surpasses imagination, which implies that individual guilt turns into participating in the collective guilt of a body of warriors, which includes combatants and non-combatants. Clearly in the case of massive violent actions personal confrontations are absent. The wordless message in the face of the victim will remain unobserved. Yet, also in the case of a personal confrontation the message in the face of a human being may remain unobserved, misunderstood at least. For grasping such a message and understanding it often implies the crossing of a cultural barrier of some kind, religious, ethnic or other, and in a sudden vis-à-vis the face of someone who represents a cultural environment that is essentially different from one’s own may appear enigmatic. With the world becoming a global village these barriers will doubtlessly shift, even be bridged sometimes, but it is not probable that they will ever disappear. Despite the human condition of today, however, which we all know too well, the cornerstone of Levinas’ philosophy remains valid from the point of human education in general, and, more in particular, from the point of education in human relations. As such, his philosophy is indicative of a way to be followed, which is a way of hope that envisions building a society that stretches far beyond the realm of present experience. Without this hope, our eyes will not be open to see early signs of a dawn that may be granted. Although the rule, “Thou shalt do not murder,” is one of the commandments of the Decalogue, which is a basic element of the Jewish and Christian traditions, it does not by itself refer to any religion. The fact that the rule only refers

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to human beings and to the relations between them may be taken as an argument to propose it as a maxim valid for all human being, irrespective of their religious affiliations. Thus, in principle, the maxim may be acceptable globally as a moral basis, as a point of departure appropriate for formulating a global ethos. The same can perhaps be said, though not unrestrictedly because of possible cultural barriers, regarding the corner stone of Levinas’ philosophy, which concerns the face of the other human being that presents itself in the vis-à-vis of an encounter. For all that, Levinas points to the general emotion of shame, which, when aroused early in human life by the recognition that one has failed, digs out a bed in the character of the human being. It is this bed that makes a being – any being – receptive to a moral request. Thus, the presence of this bed stands for sensitivity; it enables the human being to receive the message in the face of an other human being and internalize it, that is, to integrate it in one’s character, the upshot of these lies is that the maxim, “Thou shalt do no murder,” may be considered an internal commandment on the condition that the sensitivity is there to accept and “assimilate” it. Internalizing a commandment, emotionally integrating it in one’s character, means that one is “converted,” so to speak, and subsequently prepared to obey. In fact, when converted, the being, the person acts because of his/her free will. If, in case of a failing sensitivity, the maxim in question would remain external, the commandment would have the quality of an obligation laid upon a human being by an authority who enforces his will upon the being that is to obey. However, a commandment that is not integrated and remains external is a mere duty to be performed, and the authority that imposed it will naturally change into a common tyrant. Obviously, a tyrant as such will not truly be accepted but stealthily resisted, which implied that, at first sight and seemingly, the will of the authority may still be carried into effect, whereas, in the end, the opposite of what was imposed will factually be furthered. In brief, granted that the commandment is all to the good, if the good which is intended and imposed yet remains an outward obligation, it will eventually turn into its opposite and, thus, manifest what is evil! The preceding lines lead to the conclusion that the concern of Levians’ philosophy is crucial indeed. Being aware of a wordless request, grasping and understanding what is not imposed but “only” asked, implies the readiness to receive that is “other.” It implies a breach, a break through of one’s common self-understanding, which in turn presupposes the presence of, what may be called, an existential opening. In other words, the human being, the person who receives what is “other,” embodies an existential overture, that is, manifests a specific opening and makes a new start. The new start made is that good intentions are stimulated to flourish and take the lead, whereas evil ones

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wither. The fact that a human being may be said to embody an existential overture constitutes an anthropological characteristic of the being. It implies that, if the being itself is considered to be a totality, a universe, the assertion to be added is that this totality or universe is not “complete,” and consequently, not closed in itself. Thus, the being is intrinsically relational. It is also called “eccentric,” which suggest a quasi-physical image, implying an existential core that is energetically open. What has been reached thus far is not dependent on the particular religious affiliation of any person concerned. Consequently, the maxim proposed above was rightly assumed to be (potentially) globally valid. This result may still be seen in a different light reflecting on the role of “awareness” in the process of the life of a human being. In the end, this leads to making the connection of the maxim to religion in general. A human being that is “aware” of the world is considered to be open to the world. The awareness in question does not of necessity imply that the human being is acting consciously, or planning to act consciously, for instance in order to know the world. For awareness means that the world manifests itself and, subsequently, that this manifestation is received by the attentive being. Thus, principally, what is manifested is not the result of whatever efforts that are made by the human being to reach the world, but it is the other way around: the world reaches the human being. In the manifestation, the world reveals what is commonly experienced as (its) “truth.” In addition to this common truth, for instance a particular scientific or everyday truth, the experience of truth also implies a moment of disclosure in which “Truth,” that is, a deep Truth written with a capital “T,” is revealed. Any common truth may be or become a vehicle that conveys (a) deep Truth in its quality of a profound insight into truth as such, an “inner light,” which manifests itself by transcending the reality, the “impact,” of the pertinent common truth. In this connection, as emphasized by the Dutch philosopher Otto Duintjer, the world as manifested to the knowing person is never “exhausted.” For new truths may appear, and so may new disclosures of deep Truth – which, however, is one and the same in an disclosure. Following the German philosopher Martin Heidegger, Duintjer qualifies deep Truth as the “intrinsic dignity” that “conditions” the manifestation of whatever common truth. In consequence of the preceding, it is asserted that the world is principally “whole,” which means that it extends across and beyond the restrictions inherent in the perception of a human being that is always caught in constraints. In fact, awareness, in its quality of a basic opening to the world, and the subsequent readiness to receive its manifestation and discern the disclosure of its inner light, presupposes a process in which the constraints that restrict one’s

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perception are deconstructed in principle. As a result the awareness is accordingly increased. Incidentally, at this point it need be stressed that deconstructing constraints does not necessarily lead to rejecting the ideology or to abandon the religion that (possibly) is at the basis of these constraints and nourish them. The adherence to any ideology or religion may still be continued, but the convictions in question, from which the constraints derive, become a matter of freedom, accepted by a free human being that has chosen to stick to these convictions. Besides, a total deconstruction of all constraints is impossible. For, even if the effects of the constraints that derive from whatever ideology or religion have been discerned and eliminated, one would still be left with the constraints that have spatial and temporal origins. Hence, if the world is perceived as whole, the meaning of this term “whole” cannot be trivial. The trivial meaning is transcended, because the “whole,” which is intended, is not something that equals the sum of the parts into which it can be subdivided. Perceiving the world as whole is tantamount to seeing its infinity in the limited, finite parts that are observed, one at a time. In short, it implies being aware of the infinite in the finite! This means that the infinite reveals itself in the finite, and openness for this revelation, which is a sensitivity to the disclosure of deep Truth, may be given the name “spirituality”; it is the basic source of (inner) peace. Duintjer holds that deep Truth in its quality of an inner light does not bear untruth. For untruth is always unmasked by it, “imperatively,” as it just does not stand against deep Truth. When Levians mentions the wordless message in the face of a human being, he points to the awareness of the face that manifests itself in the vis-à-vis of a confrontation, and uses the term “infinity” to describe its impression. The message thus manifested is the truth of the fundamental maxim “Thou shalt do no murder.” This truth, which goes counter to any untruth, conveys deep Truth. It is not dependent on any particular religion, but there is a clear dependence on religion in a wider sense, in so far as all true religion is considered to originate in spirituality; using classic words, true religion originates in “spirit and truth.” In the following paragraphs the anthropological result, obtained before this, will be compared with forms of belief that have characterized the Christian tradition ever since its early days. A central position in this tradition is taken by what has been transmitted concerning the person called Jesus Christ. Therefore, the fundamental criterion of being a Christian has always been “following Christ,” that is, laying his teachings and his life to one’s heart, and living accordingly. This criterion, which concerns one’s way of life and is concrete, may be supplemented by abstract considerations that are theological and philosophical. For, what first of all are the paths of life of those who confess to be Christians has also

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stimulated reflection, which in the course of time has crystallized into theological discourse. In this connection, from a “theoretical” point of view, a crucial part was played by the debates proceeding, during and following the Council of Chalcedon, a town in Asia Minor, in the year 451ce. The concern of these so-called Christological debates was the understanding of what were called the human and divine nature in Jesus Christ, who was believed to be one person, equally named “Son of Man” and “Son of G-d.” The conclusion of the debates was that there were two natures in the one personhood of Jesus Christ, which – in a cryptic wording that has become famous since that time – “did not mix or change and were not separable or divided.” In my opinion, these Christological debates crucially anticipated present day anthropology in so far as the latter attempts to reflect on the human individual as a being that is intrinsically relational. In order to make clear what is intended, it is necessary to go into some detail. Let us assume that the “human” in the Christological debates refers to what in everyday speech is considered the (naively) human, which, as we believe, one is principally to master. Let us assume moreover that the “divine” in the debates refers to what transcends our mastery and whatever other human ability, being principally out of reach, as was/is the (naively) divine in everyday understanding. In this metaphorical language, the connotation of the “human” is a realm of limited extension, although of cosmic dimensions, whereas the connotation of the “divine” must be considered to be truly infinite. As explained earlier in Levinas’ philosophy, the Other, that is, the other human being that is met in an encounter, is not part of a totality of entities, for it is a totality or universe itself. As further explained, the impression which the Other makes is appropriately characterized by the term “infinity.” Thus, “infinity,” the special term coined by Levinas to qualify the impression the Other makes in an encounter, must be compared to what in the Christological debates was called the “divine,” in particular with reference to the two natures that are to be distinguished in the (one!) personhood of Jesus Christ. Consequently, using today’s terminology, the conclusion of the Chalcedon debates was that the personhood of Jesus Christ must be qualified as intrinsically relational. Theologizing traditionally, the human being is considered to be an icon of Jesus Christ, corrupted though this icon – image – may be. Adopting another vernacular, this justifies the thesis that Jesus Christ is the prototype of the human being. It implies that, when responding to the Other that is met, the human being reacts, so to speak, by what presents itself as divine. This conclusion defines the locus of the maxim, “Thou shalt do no murder.” Besides, it follows that the fundamental criterion of being a Christian, “following Christ,” turns out to equal what is meant by the phrase “being in Christ,” a phrase that

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expresses, for instance, the core of the message of the apostle St. Paul, the wellknown missionary of the first century. Thus, the title “Towards a global ethos?” that precedes these notes on the philosophy of encounter brings us back to what has been held in Christianity since its early days. Hence, a Christian approach merges with what is found following a non-Christian, say, “naturalist,” approach. They are like the two sides of a coin that strengthen each other, though the substance of the coin escapes definition. However, the validity of the result is increased.

Chapter 7

On the Origin of Religious Discourse Francis Brassard The question I address in this article is the following: How is one to account for the origin of religious discourse, a discourse that assumes the existence of supernatural realities as opposed to a scientific discourse based on observable phenomena? The word “origin” is not to be taken in the sense of a specific point in time. As such, it is worth noting that the question became irrelevant within the field of religious studies because it was considered too speculative. However, if we mean by “origin” the reason for the persistence of religion today, then the question becomes quite relevant. For example, Sigmund Freud, whose analysis of religious behavior as phenomena to be traced to predominantly psychological causes has in part shaped our modern understanding of religion as a whole, assumed that there exists a sharp distinction between a religious or mythological mode of apprehending reality on the one hand and a scientific or rational one on the other. Based on the same presupposition, it has even been suggested that people are using different parts of the brain depending on whether they are dealing with statements about ordinary facts or religious beliefs.1 This division between these two ways of understanding and interacting with the world brings in part the question of the origin of religious discourse within the field of cognitive science and epistemology. Indeed, answers to such questions as “How does the brain structure, memorize, and integrate sense experiences from the environment?” or “What are the means of validation of knowledge?” may help us understand why a certain religious behavior came about and how it is still justified today in a world that is more and more dominated by a secular mode of thinking. If we contextualize these questions into an evolutionary framework, by asking for example, “Did we, as human species, evolve, cognitively and affectively speaking, from the time we were living in caves?” or “Is the passage from the Jus Talionis to the Golden Rule a mutation in religious thinking?” we may correlate the appearance of charismatic figures like the Buddha or the occurrence of specific events like the European Enlightenment of the 17th century with major paradigm shifts regarding the ways we apprehend reality and understand ourselves. Moreover, trying to identify the origin of religious discourse from the point of view of the phenomenology of the 1 Harris S, Kaplan JT, Curiel A, Bookheimer SY, Iacoboni M, et al. 2009.

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cognitive experience is also relevant in deciding, for example, whether there is such a thing as a spiritual experience. If we argue that so-called spiritual experiences are the products of exclusively human factors, be it physiological, psychological, or social, then any discourse assuming the existence of realities beyond the senses and reason as the causes of these experiences has ultimately no intrinsic value. As a student of religious studies, I learned that our study of religion had to be done as objectively as possible. We were told that we couldn’t be fully detached from our cultural and historical background. Our ways of looking at the world were always skewed by our presuppositions. By becoming aware of these presuppositions, however, we could get closer to, without ever attaining it, a point of perfect objectivity. What my teachers did not tell me at that time was that the very attempt to aim at a greater objectivity was in itself the product of a major presupposition, namely, that the act of understanding is independent from one’s motivation for understanding. It seems more plausible to argue that understanding is never independent from a need to act or to respond to a given situation. Freud, for example, wanted to explain the origin of religion because he believed that it would liberate man from the determinism of his deep impulses. Thus, before suggesting an explanation for the origin of religious discourse, I would like to present a brief survey of the major models formulated by my predecessors in order to identify the motivation that stood behind these models and their implications for one’s understanding of the nature of religious language. Indeed, whether one views religious language exclusively as symbolic or recognizes to it some degree of validity in its literality, will determine the model one is likely to privilege as an answer to the question of the origin of religious discourse.

The Survey

Let’s first look at the basic assumption of the naturalistic mode of inquiry. This approach is an attempt to bring the study of religion in the scientific, nonpartisan inquiry of religious phenomena with the aim of better understanding human nature. Religion becomes thus an object of inquiry that can be observed by a subject that tries to remain as much as possible apart from it. From this vintage point, all religious phenomena are equal, that is, one theoretically abstains from making any judgments as to their veracity and validity. If one decides that this distance towards all religious phenomena is, existentially speaking, the only legitimate one, then one is likely to be of the opinion, as a consequence of the logic of disengagement, that religion ultimately plays no

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part in achieving happiness or emancipation, that it may even have adverse effects on individuals and society. This is the extreme position adopted by some thinkers, most particularly, Feuerbach, Marx, and Freud. Less radical are positions admitting some function to religion as a means of organizing and structuring society. Here we find the analysis of Auguste Comte and Émile Durkheim. For them the question of whether religion is necessary for social order was answered in the affirmative. However, the question of what this religion should be was left open. At the other end of the spectrum we have thinkers who, although not so well known today, were quite influential in establishing the bases of the naturalistic mode of inquiry. In particular, I am thinking of Jean Bodin and Herbert of Cherbury. I considered them less radical just because they somehow retained the conviction that religion plays a role in the emancipation of man from a personal point of view, that is, the logic of disengagement was not carried to its extreme with regard to one’s personal religious aspirations and commitment. Although some of them gave a privileged status to the Judeo-Christian tradition in their analysis, they all challenged its exclusive right to account for the origin of religious discourse or more specifically, the right of Christian theology, be it Catholic or Protestant, to explain itself. This is, I would argue, the fundamental assumption of the naturalistic mode of inquiry: there exists a basis for judging religions that is to be found outside religious discourses. Let’s now look in more details at the answers suggested by the people just mentioned and the circumstances that led them to do so. If it is believed that the apologetic study of religion leads to forced conversion, religious persecution, etc., one aim of the naturalistic study of religion is precisely to counteract these actions. Undermining the exclusivity of any religion to explain themselves and the other religions as well is in effect an attempt at neutralizing their power over people. It is, therefore, not a coincidence that the first non-partisan scholars of religion were diplomats. Jean Bodin (1530– 96), for example, a Frenchman, was quite aware of the religious conflicts that tore his country during the 16th century. One can thus say that the nonpartisan study of religion found its first motivation in the need to establish a minimum of social harmony between people of different faiths. The 16th century was also marked by the discovery of the new worlds. Even if European intellectuals of the time must have been aware of the existence of other cultures and religions, it is plausible to think that the discovery of “primitive” cultures had quite an impact on them. However, this encounter with diversity was not necessarily understood as diversity in religious phenomena since not all intellectuals of the time were prompted to study religion. Michel de Montaigne (1533–92), for instance, used the travelers’ reports of the

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New World and the classical texts of ancient Rome and Greece to show the relativity of cultural norms and practices. His main concern was to establish the legitimacy of reason as a means of knowledge and asserting the truth. I  would say that Montaigne was addressing the problem of social violence from the point of view of the proper mental attitude to adopt when interacting with other people. He recognized that it was the passionate attachment to ideas that led to violence, not the idea itself. Although Montaigne did not formulate any theory about the origin of religion2 or why there are different religions in the world, his influence helped consolidate the attitude of detachment resulting from a prioritization of reason, an attitude that became crucial in the scientific study of religious phenomena. Let’s return to Jean Bodin who, contrary to Montaigne, was very much concerned about religion. Bodin was a young Carmelite monk in the 1540s who left the order but remained a professed catholic. The historical and cultural context he found himself in forced him to look for a new criterion for assessing religious claims that would serve as an arbiter in any religious conflict. He realized that he had to find this arbiter beyond the contradictory and rival claims of the established religious traditions. This search for this point of reference let him to postulate the existence of a true religion (vera religio). What is then this true religion beyond all religions? Bodin started with the idea that religions exist in two forms: inner, which is related to man’s individual realities and external, which deals with the role of religion in ordering public life. The true religion is to be found in the former. One might ask at this point, is the true religion just a theoretical notion, as all religions must have some form or another to be recognizable? Bodin did not believe so and offered the following equation as a way out of the problem: the oldest religion is the true religion. What he meant by “oldest” was the first moment God imparted religiosity into his creation, that is, when he created Adam, the first human being. In Bodin’s view, Adam is the best example of a man who longs for its creator with a pure and sincere heart. What is being introduced here is an innatist doctrine of the origin of religion. When God created man he endowed him with the desire for salvation and the ability to achieve it by his own efforts. Bodin is thus shifting his attention away from the form which is always a source of social conflicts - to the manner by which religion ought to be practiced. This shift as the basis for his definition of the true religion has an important implication for our understanding of the origin of religious discourse. What Bodin suggested is a form of religious relativism, where language is assumed to be always deficient to speak about religious 2 He was nevertheless fully aware of its devastating effects.

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r­ealities. In fact, based of his reinterpretation of the doctrine of the Fall, ­religious discourse, which is the product of religious institutions, is to be viewed as a departure from “the law of nature which contains the worship of one eternal God” (Preus 1996:14). Bodin was somehow fortunate to have his works ­published more than 200 years after his death because his views may have caused him serious problems back in the 16th century. At this point, it is interesting to note that Bodin may have faced the same problems as what the mystics, especially from the Judeo-Christian and Islamic traditions, encountered with regard to religious discourse. The conflict between individual and public expressions of faith always remained for them an unfortunate side effect of their quest for the true practice of religion. The source of this conflict is, as mentioned above, to be traced back to their decision to see religious language as incapable of grasping men’s religious realities. One may have decided otherwise. If, for example, instead of relating the origin of religion to a desire, one accepts the idea that God, through some kind of universal providence, provided every person with the capacity to judge for himself religious questions, one is likely to give some legitimacy to religious discourse as an instrument to express the answers to these questions. It is with this presupposition that Herbert of Cherbury (1583–1648), a diplomat and an adventurer, decided to look for the ultimate arbiter of religious conflicts. He was indeed convinced that the root cause of these conflicts lied in the attempts of each competing religious institutions to control religious discourse. With regard to religious discourse the situation is now quite different. The problem is no longer that the language expressing religious realities is deficient as a whole, but only some of its affirmations. Cherbury was therefore very much concerned with the question of criteria for truth, a question that is still relevant today when it comes to assessing the many voices coming from religious circles. The question of origin of religious discourse now moves away from an exclusively subjective reality like the desire for God to an objective assessment of what makes that discourse truly religious as opposed to something else like a claim to superiority, a justification for religious discrimination and violence, etc. This approach led him to eventually privilege reason over revelation as a means to identify what is true in all religions. For that position, Cherbury was named the father of deism, a philosophy that derives the existence and nature of God from reason and personal experience. Cherbury consequently believed that reason is the means to achieve consensus among believers and eventually suggested his Five Common Notions concerning Religion.3 Compared to Bodin, 3 The common notions of religion are, he holds, the following: “(1) that there is a supreme Deity; (2) that this Deity ought to be worshipped; (3) that virtue combined with piety is the

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Cherbury stands at the other end of the spectrum regarding the nature of religious language. Indeed, because, for him, consensus being prioritized, revelation or inner disposition in establishing the validity of language became secondary. Thus, we already have in the 16th century the foundations of the two main streams of the naturalistic study of religion: the first, starting with Bodin up to Sigmund Freud, is a view that focuses on the personal experience of man, thus challenging the validity of religious language to speak about any reality, and the second, from Cherbury to Durkheim, is a view that advocates the necessity of religious language to maintain social cohesion. In other words, for the first group of thinkers, religious discourse can never be taken literally whereas it should be for the latter group. To clarify what these two basic views mean for our understanding of the origin of religious discourse, I would like now to briefly look at the thoughts of Freud and Durkheim with some references to their predecessors.

The Psychological Cause

Thanks to the works of Sigmund Freud a major presupposition regarding the origin of religious discourse became fully articulated. The beginning of this systematization may be traced back to Bernard Fontenelle (1657–1757), a renowned French scholar who served as a secretary of the Paris Academy of Sciences for forty-three years. Contrary to Bodin, Fontenelle did not assume a supernatural cause, like the creation of a homo religiosus by God, as the origin of religion. Instead, he believed that it was related to how the human mind functions and evolved over time. The major implication of this view is that man is not endowed with a spiritual nature. The causes of his religious behavior are no longer internal or subjective, but rather external or objective in the sense that they are deterministic laws that can be identified through scientific inquiry. Fontenelle was also of the opinion that these laws could be found buried in the intricacies of religious and cultural myths, thus opening up a major field of inquiry for the naturalistic study of religions. It is therefore in his analysis of the origin of myths that we will find his answer to our question of the origin of religious discourse. Based on the idea of evolution of the human mind, Fontenelle assumed that the origin of myth, a special way of talking about reality, came from the fact

chief part of divine worship; (4) that men should repent of their sins and turn from them; (5) that reward and punishment follow from the goodness and justice of God, both in this life and after it.” Cited in Preus: 1996:28.

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that our ancestors were ignorant. Myths are thus the earliest forms of natural philosophy or science. Later, other variations on the theme of ignorance were advocated. For example, Giambattista Vico (1668–1744), an Italian humanist, said that our ancestors were like children who formulated the basis of religious discourse by simply exercising their natural curiosity, “the daughter of ignorance and the mother of knowledge” (Preus 1996:72). Myths were the products of their imagination thus assuming that our ancestors were apprehending reality in a poetical mode. David Hume, instead, attributed the origin of religious discourse to the emotion of anxiety and fear. He was closely followed by Edward Tylor who, with his notion of animism, argued that religion is ultimately rooted in emotions, passions, or feelings, and that its cognitive functions are secondary. From this point of view one can see that Freud, by saying that religion finds its source in our psychological impulses, was not really innovative in his assessment of the origin of religious discourse. His contribution came on account of defining these impulses as symptomatic of a problematic mental condition he called neurosis. With Freud, religious discourse is not only an infantile way of apprehending reality; it is also an obstacle preventing mankind from achieving maturity. There were many criticism raised against the assumption that the origin of religious discourse is related to the cognitive and affective predispositions of man. The first major one, which was fully articulated by Emile Durkheim, is that the explanation focuses too much on the individual and completely ignores the fact that individuals are members of a group with which they constantly interact. In other words, the answers suggested by the psychologists are based on the assumption that the view of reality, in the case of our ancestors, the myths they imagined, is primary. For the sociologists, however, social actions, that is, rituals are primary and religious discourse is its justification. For them, religious language has to be taken at its face value, because it is as such that it fulfills its role in organizing society. This criticism is, as it is well known, the foundation of the sociological and later the structuralist approaches to the study of religious phenomena. Before looking at its presuppositions, let’s consider other problems with the answers suggested by the psychologists. The psychological approach almost exclusively used myths as materials for the elaboration for their models. Myth is, however, not the only form of religious discourse. Indeed, we find texts that are legalistic in nature and others that are analytical of human behavior. Both require a high degree of rational thinking and sensitivity to worldly phenomena. Moreover, these texts survived side by side with the mythical ones. If the psychologists, with their idea of evolution of human thinking, want to argue in favor of a progressing development from an infantile or immature mode of thinking to a rational and mature one,

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they failed to give us the major phases of this development. Even if we assumed that, in the very remote past, our ancestors were apprehending reality in a poetical way, it is difficult to imagine how they would have survived against the real dangers of day-to-day existence. They must have developed rational, ­scientific-like ways of thinking to plan, for example, hunting strategies or develop agriculture. It is therefore more plausible to assume that religious discourse and scientific or rational discourse coexisted from quite early in the history of mankind and that they may not necessarily be viewed as part of a single continuum. Finally, the answers suggested by the psychologists are not really addressing the problem of religious discourse. If man, for example, out of fear, deified the forces of nature, what created the category “supernatural being” in the first place? What the psychologists are saying is only that, because our ancestors had some uncontrolled mental predispositions, they used these ideas about gods and spirits to regain some degree of control over themselves. They, however, do not say anything about the origin of these ideas.

The Socio-Anthropological Cause

I believe that at this point we may refine the question of origin of religious discourse: What human experience accounts for the creation of conceptual categories referring to supernatural realities? It seems to me that up to now, the sociologists provided the most probable answer to that question. Indeed, Emile Durkheim suggested that the origin of religious discourse is to be found in social necessities. As mentioned earlier, the ultimate function of religious discourse is to coordinate the actions of individuals belonging to a group. This basic assumption led Durkheim to look away from myths, as a subjective creation of the mind, to focus his attention on the notion of the totem, as an objective reality experienced by many individuals. It may be argued that the totem, being at the center of the religious cult of a group, is the embodiment of the finality of that group. It is what gives it its identity and maintains its cohesion over time. Anything disturbing or threatening its finality is considered taboo and ought to be censured. From the point of view of the members of the group, the notion finality has a lot in common with that of a transcendental reality: it is everywhere and nowhere at the same time. Everyone experiences or feels its “power” in his or her daily interactions with the other members of the group. Religious discourse is therefore the means to name this intangible but real finality and relate to it. What the sociologists are therefore suggesting is that the notion of “supernatural” reality, or even sacredness, which are the building blocks of religious discourse, may be traced back to a concrete human experience involving the other. These concepts may be viewed symbolically,

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for example, the idea of the Father in Heaven, but they regain they literality by their ability to fulfill the finality of the community that accepts it as real. In other words, religious language and the finality of a group are two aspects of the same dynamic and consequently, the origin of a religious discourse can historically be traced back to the origin of the community that created and supported it. The beauty of the sociological explanation as answer to the problem of origin of religious discourse, by introducing the notion of finality, will, however, reveal its weakness. If the forces that keep the group together are generative of religious language - and all languages for that matter - because it is assumed that these forces are deterministic, from the point of view of the individuals, how are we to account for conflicts within the group? Why is it that not every individual naturally or spontaneously aligns him- or herself to its finality? The existence of conflict allows us to presuppose that other finalities are at work within the group dynamic. When looking at primitive societies, as early sociologists and anthropologists of religion did, the fact that many finalities are intertwined to create a specific group dynamic may not be that obvious. But when considering modern history related to the relationship between politics and religion, the dichotomy becomes apparent. In Japan, for example, many founders of Buddhist schools like Dōgen, struggled to keep their spiritual tradition separated from the vested interests of the religio-political establishment. If religious discourse is exclusively defined by social necessities, it is difficult to imagine how such attempts at dissociating religion from politics would be possible. The sociological model, as a mono-causal model that seeks to explain everything by social causes, if we assume that a society is a system coordinating multiple competing finalities, is therefore not adequate. It is beyond the scope of this article to formulate a model that includes at least the psychological motivation of each individual, but suffice to say that the origin of religious discourse may be traced back to a finality other than the imperatives of social order.4 The example of Dōgen and many other founders of new religions or schools who appeared within an already existing religious culture brings us to our third major possible cause for the origin of religious discourse.

The Mystical Cause

This is the assumption that religious discourse finds its origin in some kind of spiritual or mystical experience. This experience can be triggered by something 4 The argument relates to the social explanation of the origin of religious discourse and not the ability of sociology to explain the interactions between religion and society.

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that is embedded in human nature, in which case we have an innatist doctrine like the one advocated by Bodin, or external to man like a revelation. In both instances it is assumed that the experience points to the existence of a transcendental reality that is beyond the observable world. Although the discourse about this reality is monopolized by religions, it is also possible to talk about it in a non-partisan way without reference to the concepts of these religions. Scholars like Rudolf Otto, William James, Aldous Huxley, Mircea Eliade, and more recently, Steven Katz and Robert Forman, all contributed to this special field of religious studies that tries to understand the nature and the structure of these mystical experiences. Among all the approaches to the naturalistic study of religion, the study of mysticism is probably the most experimental one because it can rely on sophisticated measuring instruments like encephalogram and fMRI5 to analyze mental states induced by these experiences. Despite the complexities of interpreting the results of such experimental analyses, the knowledge and models it suggests still rests on distinct presuppositions regarding the nature of religious language, presuppositions that can always be critically evaluated. Within the scholars of mysticism, two main schools of thoughts seem to prevail: 1.) the Perennialists who claim that all mystical experiences are similar and that they are triggered by a direct contact with what is believed to be a transcendental reality, and 2.) the Constructivists who affirm that mystical experiences are shaped by the culture of the experiencer. For the second group of scholars, if there is an ultimate reality, it is never experienced directly. In both cases, however, we are always dealing with the same issue with regard to religious language, namely, its ability to refer to religious or spiritual realities. Indeed, the Perennialists are likely to say that, because mystical experiences are beyond language, religious language is at worst always deficient, or at best, just a temporary means to bring about the mystical experience. The Constructivists, on the other hand, because they assume that language and mystical experience are intrinsically interrelated, say that, quoting Steven Katz (1983:41), “ontological structures inherent in language and judgment precreate the contours of experience…this structural matrix works to locate experience and the experiencer (the mystic) in a given socio-historic conceptual field whose problems and problematic he or she adopts and aims to solve.” In other words, the mystical experience always presents itself in the form of a solution to a problem that was first formulated and accepted by the experiencer. Coming back to the question of the origin of religious discourse, Katz’s answer has also the merit to provide an explanation for the motivation of the 5 Functional magnetic resonance imaging.

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people who committed themselves to a path of salvation. From this point of view, religious discourses came into existence because of their ability to solve a problem. What problem is it solving? In previous essays, I discussed the notion of religious problematic as a means to identify the fundamental existential problem addressed by a religious discourse (Brassard 2000; 2010). In the present article, I will, however, only focus on the human experience that proceeds that spiritual experience, an experience that, I believe, is a better candidate to account for the origin of religious discourse. Before that, however, I  would like to address some of the problems with the Perennialist view, a view that overemphasizes the importance of the mystical experience as the source of religious discourse. The Perennialist view may be divided into two categories. The first regroups those who somewhat naively assume that all spiritual traditions are saying the same thing but in different ways. Scholars of religions no longer take this view seriously as it denies, without real justification, the distinctiveness of each spiritual tradition. The view, however, is still popular in New Age circles and among all-inclusive gurus. The other version, advocated by Robert Forman, may be taken more seriously as it assumes the possibility of an experience he called the “pure consciousness event” or pce. Based on various accounts of spiritual experiences the author shows that the pce cannot be shaped by culture as it always reveals the limits of the culture of the experiencer. For example, if culture and language were to entirely shape the spiritual experience, why does it force the experiencer to resort to similes, invents new words and concepts, etc. to convey what was experienced? Is the notion of the pce then the origin of religious discourse? Forman’s notion of pce resembles in many points that of Quietism, a Christian mystic movement of the 17th century that advocated the importance of intellectual stillness and interior passivity. For the sake of this article let’s only consider the implications for the question of the origin of religious discourse. The major objection against having a pce as the source of religious of religious discourse is that such experiences cannot be used as a basis for a coherent discourse. In other words, as it is defined, the pce does not offer any anchor to which any critical theological or spiritual discourse can attach itself. We are in a situation where any statement is as good as another. In this context, even assuming an exclusively functional role to religious language, it is difficult to conceive how a spiritual path would structure itself. Another objection has to do with the nature of the experience itself. On what basis it is defined as a mystical experience? The character played by Matthew McConaughey, in the film “Contact” (Zemeckis 1997) tells Dr Arroway, played by Jodie Foster, that once he had an experience from which he was convinced that it was God.

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Maybe what he experienced was something else? The pce, in fact, only describes an emotional state, and depending on its intensity, it may qualify as a mystical experience or just a “feeling good” experience. The psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi proposed the notion of “flow” to designate a mental state of operation in which a person is fully immersed in what he or she is doing. Maybe the pce is just a form of flow experience? In other words, nothing in the experience leads us to assume the existence of a transcendental reality upon which religious discourse is based. A final objection is that the pce, as an experience disconnected from the world, precludes all possible ethical motivation and action. There is no difference between helping people and killing them as long as one is immersed in that experience. It is the absence of ethical dilemma that makes the actions of the Samurai and that of Arjuna in the Bhagavad-Gītā so controversial. It is like an empty affective or emotive bubble in which any cognitive content may be put in.6 Having looked at the psychological, the social, and mystical explanations for the origin of religious discourse, I would like to suggest a model that, without denying the validity of the data on which these previous models are based, reevaluates their significance. Briefly, I am going to argue that the psychological data, including the mystical ones, as we have no means to scientifically distinguish between them, and the social data are part of the conditions that brings about the human experience that accounts for the origin of religious discourse.

The Human Experience Giving Rise to the Existential or Religious Problem

I believe that it wouldn’t be too oversimplifying to say that an important motivation for the critique against religious discourses, especially since the Enlightenment, was based on the inability of these discourses to explain the world in a way that makes actions successful. From the point of view of finding ways to predict and eventually control the environment, that is, to survive, the critique is valid. However, I would argue that it is irrelevant to the human experience that gave rise to religious discourses. Religious discourse has nothing to 6 The only way to accept pce as the origin of religious discourses is to argue that these experiences are fully unpremeditated or gratuitous. There are many stories of saints and founders of religious movements that support that view. However, as will be seen later, these experiences may be unexpected and diverse, but the circumstances that preceded them seem to have a common denominator that can be objectively observed.

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do with the problem of survival. In fact, it stands at the very opposite. To understand my point, one has to assume something traditional evolutionary theorists, as far as I know, have not done yet, namely, to make a distinction between the notion of survival and that of adaptation. Indeed, to say that an organism adapts to the environment to survive, is confusing two contradictory processes. To adapt is possible only when an organism gives up survival. The experience that forces an organism to resort to this course of action is, I would argue, the origin of religious discourse. What exactly is this experience? The experience that triggers the adaptation of an organism is what has been called “inhibition of action.” The French biologist Henri Laborit especially has scientifically documented the notion of inhibition of action. The state of inhibition of action is a form of intense stress and as such it is very disruptive for an organism. It may even lead to its death if it is not adequately resolved. It is in fact a critical point: either death or adaptation. In both cases, the organism, in its existing structure, disappears in the sense that, even if it sacrifices, adds, or reorganizes just one element of its structure, it is de facto a new organism. The experience of inhibition of action is therefore a moment when no satisfying action to change the environment presents itself. It is in this sense that adaptation stands at the opposite of survival, as here it is assumed that an organism had the means to resolve a given problem. In other words, if survival is about maintaining the integrity of the structure of a subject in a changing environment, adaptation is the transformation of the subject in a given environment. Such transformation of the subject also brings about a redefinition of the relationship between the latter and its environment. This means that with a new subject a new environment is discovered or perhaps shall we say, created. Thus, the moment we have, in a given culture, two visions of the subject, one that presents it as problematic and the other as ideal, the bases for the formulation of a religious discourse are present. One of the best examples of an experience of inhibition of action in religious literature is probably the description of what happened to Arjuna just before the great battle of the Mahābhārata. Standing in the middle of the two armies, seeing his teachers, maternal uncles, teachers, etc., he said to Krishna: “Having seen this, my own people, Krishna, my limbs sink down, my mouth dries up, my body trembles, my hair stands on end, my bow falls from my hand, my skin burns, and I am unable to remain as I am, my mind seems to ramble” (Bhagavad Gītā I:28–30). Hearing this, Krishna reacts by expounding what is to become the Bhagavad-Gītā, one of the pillar texts of Hindu spirituality. What the reader of this text is led to understand is that, among other things, the traditional categories of good and evil are relative, that there is another way to

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look and experience the world. This new way, as revealed to Arjuna by Krishna, would not have been formulated had not it be for Arjuna’s existential crisis. In a less dramatic way we have the stories of Gautama Buddha and countless religious saints who reported their experiences of dissatisfaction with the world in which they lived. Similarly, one finds that an important part of most of the world spiritual literature is about deconstructing our day-to-day reality as an attempt to induce this sense of discontentment. In some traditions even, spiritual instruction does not start before the disciples show a total disenchantment with the world. From the perspective, such emotions as depression, revolt, doubt, etc. that are induced by religious practices are the signs that the disciple has reached the state of inhibition of action.7 Another example of inhibition of action in religious literature is that of the Israelites stuck between the Red Sea and the Egyptians. Here we find the same situation of crisis, but the result is an entirely different discourse about the nature of the subject and his relationship with the world. If the previous examples gave rise to religious discourses that belongs more to the mystical genre, especially on account of their shared presuppositions with regard to the negation of the phenomenological world - which amounts to a rejection of the validity of the discourse used to describe it -, the present discourse reaffirms the truthfulness of the relations between individuals and by the same process the validity of their realities and that of the world. In both cases, however, despite the irreconcilable differences regarding the nature of religious language, an experience of crisis or of limits was at the origin of their religious discourses. What comes out of this experience, which is in effect an event as it is never wished for, is, as hinted by Katz in his explanation of the mystical experience, a discourse that tries to reproduce that event as an invitation to relate to the other and the world in a transformed and more fulfilling way.8 7 In this regard, a professor of mine described the experience of satori that is produced by an intense reflection on a kôan. A kôan is like a riddle such as “Two hands clap and there is a sound. What is the sound of one hand clapping?” Thus: “At the extremity of his great doubt, there will come an interesting moment. This moment is hard to describe but on reflection afterward we might say that there comes a point when the monk realises that he himself and the way he is reacting to his inability to penetrate the kôan are themselves the activity of the kôan working within him. The kôan no longer appears as an inert object in the spotlight of consciousness but has become part of the searching movement of the illuminating spotlight itself. His seeking to penetrate the kôan, he realizes, is itself the action of the kôan that has invaded his consciousness. It has become part of the very consciousness that seeks to penetrate itself. He himself is the kôan. Realization of this is the response to the kôan.” (Hori: 1984, p. 30). 8 Pilgrimages to the sites where such events are believed to have occurred, festivals like the Passover in Judaism, or rituals like the Eucharist in Christianity, are all means to remember the importance of these events for the respective believers.

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The model I am suggesting as the explanation for the origin of religious discourse is therefore based on the assumption that the categorization of religious language, namely, symbolic and literal, so far used as the basis for the previous models, is not fully adequate if taken as absolute. Indeed, in order to induce the experience of inhibition of action, religious discourse, any discourse for that matter, has to be taken in its literality. Put differently, if the discourse we use to describe reality is not taken at its face value, it means that we already have found an escape route away from its contradictions or limitations. Consequently, the notion of symbolic language arises only when one’s has gone through the experience of inhibition of action. It is by looking back at the conditions that brought about this experience with an awareness of its solution that the language used to describe these conditions is viewed as symbolic. In other words, the distinction between literal and symbolic rests on an experience of transformation of the subject. One can also add that, if a religious discourse assumes that all discourses are symbolic, including itself, as it is the case for most mystical traditions, it rests on the presupposition that there exist a moment when no more transformation is possible. If, on the contrary, language is, in some cases, to be taken literally, for example, when dealing with divine revelation or dogmas, the underlying view that supports that affirmation presupposes that there is no limits to one’s transformative experiences. Conclusion One can now understand why the sociological, as well as the psychological explanations of the origin of religious discourse make sense: the presence of the other and the set up of one’s cognitive and affective mental structure are the conditions that bring about the experience of inhibition of action. It is, however, the experience itself that is the cause of the apparition of ideas, including so-called mystical experiences, which will be part of the religious discourse. Where do these ideas come from? They still come from the culture, but what now matters are not really the external forms of these ideas, but the ways they are reorganized and redefined. Such reorganization, like the solution that presents itself to a given problem, may be accepted or rejected. Once accepted, their validity can be tested through their ability to bring about and sustain a satisfying experience of the world. This satisfying experience may be described in terms of intimacy, that is, one’s knowledge of the world and in terms of autonomy or the ability to be free from its determinism. In other words, religious discourse is anchored in something that existentially feels real and relevant and as such can evolve depending on its ability to fulfill that need for greater intimacy and autonomy. The passage from a polytheistic religious

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worldview to a monotheistic one may be an example of such an evolution. From that point of view, religious discourse is not that different from scientific discourse. Could then the notion of inhibition of action as the origin of religious discourse and responsible for its evolution be the key for a possible reconciliation between religion and science, as it also did not evolve from old to new paradigms without its share of stress and conflicts?

Chapter 8

The Future of Faith, the Subaltern Scientia Lonergan and Aquinas Donald Devon III This chapter focuses on a key theme in Thomas Aquinas and in an important contemporary manifestation of this theme in a significant modern thinker indebted to Aquinas, namely, Bernard Lonergan. Specifically, I focus on how Lonergan’s notion of self-appropriation utilizes several themes that are indicative of Aquinas’ conception of faith as a subaltern scientia. By demonstrating how Lonergan’s notion of self-appropriation utilizes Aquinas’ conception of faith as subaltern scientia, it will become apparent the manner in which certain features of faith as subaltern scientia will be understood by future generations to come. Although there are many parallels between Lonergan’s notion of selfappropriation and Aquinas’ notion of faith as a subaltern scientia, there is one particular point of divergence that I will draw attention to since it could indicate a potential flaw, not only in the way Lonergan utilizes Aquinas, but in the Lonergarian notion of self-appropriation itself. This divergence concerns how the two methodologies are derived. Scientia is a system of knowing derived from the behavior of nature, whereas Lonergan’s notion of selfappropriation is drawn from the behavior of human cognition (Telkippe 2003:122). Since Lonergan (1971:6) uses human cognition as the model for his approach to knowledge, the question becomes whether Lonergan’s notion of self-appropriation can be subjected to the same self-enclosed criticism as the Hegelian dialectic.1 While this point of divergence will seem to create a great fissure between the two thinkers, and indicate a major flaw in Lonergan’s Thomistic paradigm, by drawing from an earlier Lonergarian interpretation of Aquinas’ notion of phantasam, and linking it to Lonergan’s heuristic understanding of human cognition, it will become apparent that Lonergan does have the means to avoid the implications of the Hegelian self-enclosed dialectic, and be consistent with

1 In Method in Theology, Lonergan (1971) observes that the Hegelian dialectic is a movement within a self-enclosed, complete system, and he wishes to avoid the same implications in his own method.

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2014 | doi 10.1163/9789004263147_010

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the Thomistic tradition in such a way that will inspire future generations of religious philosophers to come.

Faith as Subaltern Scientia

In the posterior analytics (Book I: Part 2), Aristotle depicted scientia as a means of demonstration that understood a particular subject matter from cause to effect. To understand an object in the manner of scientia, the premise of the demonstration would be analyzed in greater detail than the conclusion, and the object would be perceived as resulting from the means of its origin. Such a demonstration was carried out in order to perceive the object of inquiry in the same manner that nature perceived the object; from cause to effect. Since things come into being from cause to effect in the natural world, understanding an object by way of scientia would allow the practitioner of scientia to understand a given subject matter in a more authentic way. Scientia was different from the contemporary notion of science and scientific method. It was not simply a standard of knowing that an object of inquiry was to be dissected by and then measured against, it was a habitual cognitive practice implored to have a more natural understanding of a particular subject matter. In this way, scientia could be understood as a means of self-appropriation. The idea was that one would habituate one’s cognition to be consistent with the manner in which one demonstrated a particular subject matter; from cause to effect. If one were to train one’s cognition in the manner of scientia, it was believed that one would obtain a form of cognition parallel to the way in which nature perceives a particular subject matter, and was the reverse of the typical manner in which human beings perceive an object; from effect to cause. Understanding an object in such a way may have been consistent with the manner in which things come into being in the context of nature, but it was inconsistent with the manner in which human beings initially perceive an object. This is why, at the beginning of the text, Aristotle (1991: “Posterior Analytics,” Book I, Part 1) recommends that this form of demonstration be used regarding things that are already familiar. Since human beings typically encounter things from effect to cause, Aristotle’s (1991: “Posterior Analytics,” Book I, Part 3) notion of scientia also accounts for a reverse means of demonstration that understands an object of inquiry from effect to cause. Aristotle (1991: “Posterior Analytics,” Book I, Part 12) understood subaltern scientia as a means of demonstrative knowing that utilized the principles of a higher scientia to analyze an object of inquiry. A subaltern scientia does not

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analyze the principles of the higher scientia it utilizes. Instead, the principles of a higher scientia serve as the foundation that the subaltern scientia proceeds from in order to analyze a given subject matter. Aristotle gives optics as an example of a subaltern scientia (Ibid.). Optics utilizes the principles of geometry to analyze an object of inquiry, it does not, as the mathematician does, question the geometrical principles it proceeds from. Aquinas conceived of a means to integrate sacred doctrina with Aristotelian methodology. Aquinas utilized Aristotle’s notion of subaltern scientia to construct a conception of faith that would bridge the gap between philosophy and theology. Faith would utilize sacred doctrina as the principles of a higher scientia and analyze an object of inquiry based on the premise created by the higher scientia (Aquinas 1920: I:Q.1, A2). Essentially, when an enquirer studied a given subject matter, and could not understand the subject matter any further due to the limited capacity of the enquirer, the enquirer could utilize the principles of sacred doctrina to go beyond his or her limited scope, and gather information that his or her limited capacity would not have access to. The most prevalent example Aquinas (1920: I:Q.46, A2) utilizes to demonstrate his point is the question concerning the origin of the universe. Aquinas notes the controversy concerning Aristotle’s speculation that the universe had no origin, and scripture’s claim that it does. Since it is beyond human capacity to venture to the origin of the universe and determine if it had a beginning or it did not, there is no real way anyone can ever know the answer to the debate. However, if it is accepted that the information of sacred doctrina is communicated by something beyond human capacity, human beings can know that the universe had an origin, provided they accept scripture’s premise. There is a difference between faith as subaltern scientia and an ordinary subaltern scientia like optics. While a subaltern scienta like optics utilizes the same principles as the higher scientia of geometry, the subject matter of the higher and lower scientia is completely different. Faith as subaltern scientia studies the same subject matter as the higher scientia of sacred doctrina. The difference is that faith was considered a subaltern scientia on the basis that it utilized the principles of a higher being as the foundations for its knowing. So it is not that the subject matter of one is lower than the subject matter of the other, as is the case with optics and geometry. Instead, the scientia of sacred doctrina was thought to be the communication of God’s scientia to man, and faith was the means through which limited human capacity would understand the scientia of a higher being. To better understand how this worked, it is important to understand that scientia was not simply a methodology, but it was a means of appropriating cognition. In this sense, anything that has the capacity for cognition has a type

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of scientia. In Knowledge and Faith in Thomas Aquinas, John Jenkins (1997:65) uses the comparison of bat scientia to human scientia to illustrate faith’s subaltern nature in Aquinas’ thinking. Since a human’s capacity for cognition is greater than that of a bat, the scientia of a human being would be considered greater than the scientia of a bat given that the human is the higher being. If human scientia were to be somehow communicated to the bat, it would give the bat a greater capacity for understanding, but the bat still could not fully utilize human scientia due to its inferior capacity. While Aquinas acknowledges that there is still a great deal of room for error of interpretation, and that humans do not have the proper capacity to fully utilize God’s scientia, none the less, faith as subaltern scientia does give human beings the opportunity to participate in the scientia of a higher being as well as give them further insight into the nature of things beyond human capacity to know. Given that Aquinas works to the existence of God based on reason, but determines that rational demonstration can only conclude that God is, without the aid of something from beyond human capacity to communicate the higher-level information, man has no real knowledge of who or what God is.

Lonergan’s Notion of Self-Appropriation

Before observing the parallels between Aquinas and Lonergan, it will be important to give an account of Lonergan’s notion of self-appropriation. According to Lonergan (1980:ix), the point of his most prevalent work, Insight, is to promote the personal appropriation of one’s rational-self consciousness. Self-appropriation is to be understood as “firstly-advertence to oneself as experiencing, understanding, and judging-secondly- it is understanding oneself as experiencing, understanding, and judging, thirdly-it is affirming oneself experiencing, understanding, and judging” (Lonergan 1980:36). To obtain self appropriation in a properly Lonergarian sense, one has to become aware of one’s own cognitive activities, interpret correctly what occurs during cognition, and affirm that one’s own cognition is the process of experiencing understanding and judging. It is realizing that one has the capacity to reflect on one’s capacity to reflect, and using this capacity to observe one’s own cognitive process in a way that is most consistent with the process itself. Lonergan uses the term advertence to describe the phenomenon of experiencing one’s own experience. It indicates that human beings have a natural propensity towards observing their own mental activities, and that the process itself draws attention to itself. In what Lonergan (1980:36) calls “direct

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knowledge,” experiencing is the sensory data that is received through sense organs (such as; hearing, seeing, feeling), and accumulates into that which is reflected upon. Experience is basically the same for self-appropriation as it is for direct knowledge, with the difference being that self-appropriation is done on the subjective level (Lonergan 1980:38). In other words, experience, in the context of self-appropriation, is an internal process that deals with the mind’s constructs, whereas direct knowledge deals with an accumulation of external data received. After experiencing one’s own experience, one then understands one’s own understanding. Understanding is the process of interpreting the data of experience. Lonergan (1980:37) makes direct reference to the Aristotelian and Thomistic notion of phantasm to describe how the process works. It is, as was alluded to in the previous paragraph, the mind forming constructs to understand the material obtained through experience. In the case of self-appropriation, it is the mind dealing with the mediums it creates to understand how it creates these mediums. The process of understanding is the process of reconstructing data, whether it is the mind’s data or the data of sense perception, and forming it into a reasonable facsimile that allows cognition to affirm or deny the given subject matter. It is in the process of understanding that the phenomenon of error occurs. Lonergan (1980:138) paraphrases a de la Rouchefoucald witticism, “everyone complains about his memory, but no one complains about his judgment,” to indicate that error occurs in the process of making the judgment, not in the act of judgment itself. No one has a problem with the affirmation or denial of a given subject matter, only with the way the material representing the subject matter is being processed. Judgment maybe true or false, but this is a result of the ambiguity of interpretation, not the mind’s capacity to go from interpretation to affirmation. The final aspect of self-appropriation is judgment. Lonergan (1980:135) writes: The act of judgment is the act that adds assent to proposition, that changes a proposition from the expression of an object of thought, the expression of some bright idea that comes into one’s mind, into an object of affirmation…It is when one agrees, when one assents, that the proposition then becomes an object of affirmation. Judgment is the conclusion that is drawn from the accumulation of understanding. It is the fruit of understanding’s labor, and it is what transforms an object of thought into an affirmation. It is the end result of the mind forming

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and reflecting on phantasms, and then assenting to a conclusion that the subject matter is or is not as the information is understood to be. In the context of self-appropriation, judgment is that which affirms one’s own internal cognition. It affirms that the process of human cognition is the process of experiencing understanding and judging. Again, because selfappropriation is dealing with the inter-subjectivity of the human being, judgment, in the context of self-appropriation, is assenting to an affirmation that the activity in the mind is as it is understood to be. Although judgment itself is the result of a certain degree of inter-subjectivity, it is never an arbitrary act. The human being is perpetually compelled by circumstances to make some sort of judgment. In the act of driving, for example, judgment is what causes cognition to shift from assessing whether one should stop to the decision that a stop should be made prior to impact. The three elements of experience, understanding, and judgment accumulate into a structure of cognition that Lonergan (1978:450) describes as a heuristic dynamism that strives towards proportionate being. The term heuristic is defined as the process of using a model, or an aid, as a means of understanding a particular subject matter. It is essentially anything that assists the mind in knowing. It is the drawing of a triangle that allows one to understand the Pythagorean Theorem, or the clue that allows the detective to solve the murder mystery. The word has similar roots in ancient Greek as the term Eureka, and is understood by Lonergan (1978:3) in the same sense that the term Eureka is used in the famous story of Archimedes. In the story, Archimedes finds himself in a dilemma; the king wishes to determine if his recently acquired crown is made of gold, or a lesser medal. He sets Archimedes to the task of discovering whether the crown is authentic without damaging it. As he sits in the bathtub, he exclaims Eureka! Archimedes realizes that if he weighs the crown in water, and compares it to a lump of gold with the same mass, he can determine if the crown is authentic or not. It is in this moment that Archimedes has an insight. There is a tension within the mind to understand, and then there is a release of tension once the solution is found. The example indicates that insight is dependent on a medium to achieve judgment. For Archimedes, the insight can only occur as a result of the aid of the bath water. However, the heuristic medium does not necessarily have to be an external object that inspires the phenomenon of insight. Lonergan (1978:44, 45) uses the example of “x” in an algebraic equation to demonstrate his point. By allowing x to serve as the unknown, the mathematician can determine the nature of the unknown by understanding its relationship to the other variables within the context of the equation. In the same way that the mathematician

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allows something else to represent the unknown, human cognition attempts to infer the nature of something that it does not fully grasp by posting a model to represent it. The human intellect uses an image to represent something else, and then understands the image within the context of the subject matter’s circumstances to learn more about the subject matter. It is this phenomenon of integration that compels the human intellect to perpetually incorporate new information and understanding it in the context of a unity of data (Lonergan 1978:568). Lonergan understands two types of human knowing. There is scientific knowing, which seeks to understand things in and of themselves, and there is common sense knowing, which seeks to understand subject matter in relationship to the human being. Although there may be a focus on specialization in the context of scientific knowing, the human intellect still naturally strives to understand how this information relates to itself, and to the other information at its disposal. For the philosopher, self-appropriation is observing one’s own cognition, and developing a methodological approach towards knowledge based on the manner in which cognition is structured, as well as the manner in which cognition turns toward itself. In this case, philosophy should be understood as integration, and should develop an approach to knowledge that parallels the structure of human cognition itself. The question now becomes, what is the ultimate goal of this methodology, and can the ultimate goal be determined? The underlying force that drives the entire cogitative process of experience, understanding, and judging is the pure disinterested desire to know. Lonergan (1978:348) describes the pure disinterested desire to know as the prior and enveloping drive that carries cognitional process from sense and imagination to understanding, from understanding to judgment, from judgment to the complete context of correct judgments that is named knowledge. The desire to know, then, is simply the inquiring and critical spirit of man. The pure desire to know is what compels man to seek self-appropriation. It is the natural urge that causes man to reflect on his inward self and the relationship it has with the world around him. The very nature of the pure desire to know in the context of human cognition reveals the goal of all cognition. Lonergan (1978:350) indicates that being is the objective of the pure desire to know and that being is all that is known and all that remains to be known. In short, man desires to know, and being is that which man desires to know. All that human beings experience, understand and judge is either being or potential being. Since man, has a limited capacity to understand being, yet has

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an infinite desire to know, the implications of the pure desire to know, and man’s limited capacity to know, suggests that man’s ultimate goal is to understand being-in-and-of-itself.

Parallels in the Thomistic Tradition

From the description of the two different methodologies, it becomes apparent that there are several different parallels between the two systems. Lonergan’s description of the pure desire to know is very much in keeping with the Aristotelian and Thomistic traditions. That man seeks knowledge of things that are not necessarily useful or practical, such as in the case of philosophy or abstract mathematics, is a good indication that there is a certain unconditioned feature in man that underlies all of man’s cognitive functions. Since all instances of knowledge seeking are for the sake of being, Lonergan concludes, in a very Thomistic way, that the unconditioned striving of the pure desire to know coupled with the implications of how this striving functions in thealready-out-there-now, indicates that human beings are pre-conditioned to strive for being in and of itself. The finitude of man is another Thomistic feature Lonergan incorporates into his writings, and this feature goes hand in hand with the notion of the pure desire to know seeking being in and of itself. Lonergan understands that the desire to know is unrestricted, yet human beings themselves are very much restricted. Human beings come to this conclusion by asking questions that human beings do not have the answers to. Even if one retorts that not everyone wants to know everything, one does not come to an understanding that one does not want to know everything unless one first asks questions that cannot be answered, and comes to the conclusion that one does not know everything (Lonergan 1978:351). The desire to know is unrestricted in terms of the questions it can ask, but human capacity is very much restricted in terms of the means of answering those questions. Upon inspection of faith as subaltern scientia it becomes apparent that Aquinas was trying to find a way to integrate philosophy and religion. By seeing religion as a means of developing answers to philosophical questions that were beyond human capacity, and proceeding by means of Aristotelian methodology, Aquinas devised a way to incorporate two different fields of study that have historically had a tumultuous relationship. The purpose of integration for Aquinas (1955–1957: Book I Chap. 7) was the belief that the nature of truth had to be univocal. That ultimately philosophy and theology had to be on the same page when it came to the nature of their

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respective information. If both fields of study are ultimately trying to understand the same subject matter, than it is more beneficial to understand the nature of the subject matter to the best of human ability. The emphasis here is on the unity of knowledge, and what to do when the different fields of study inevitably come into contact with one another. Without a proper means of integration, knowledge of subject matter within different fields remains fragmented and limited. Lonergan (1980:126) notes that an over-determination of specializations within the scientific fields can hinder the development of self-appropriation. Without integration there is no unity of data. Without the unity of data, one fails to satisfy the natural disposition that accumulates into insight. A person may be a specialized scientist, but that scientist also has a need for other forms of knowing, such as common sense, to function in the world. Lonergan indicates that there is a natural propensity in human beings to acquire a unity of knowledge, and this unity of knowledge has a functional purpose regarding human interaction with his or her surroundings, or as Lonergan (1980:126) describes it, the-already-out-there-now.

Potential Fissure

It becomes apparent that there is a potential fissure in the manner and source from which the two different methodologies are derived. This could not only indicate a major flaw in the manner that Lonergan utilizes Aquinas; it could also indicate a potential flaw in the Lonergarian system itself. Scientia is ultimately a methodology that is derived through observation of natural behavior. It could be argued that Scientia overcomes the old Heideggerian critique of methodology, namely, that anytime a method is implored to understand a given subject matter, the parameters of the methodology will ultimately determine the characteristics of the subject matter it seeks to discover. Scientia overcomes this criticism precisely because it is not a methodology imposed by the knower onto the subject matter, but rather, it is a methodology imposed by the subject matter onto the knower. The methodology comes from an external source, and is received by the knower. It is not a construct of desire that contorts a particular subject matter to be in consistency with the nature of the desire. It is rather, the manner of which the subject matter is received by the knower. In An Introductory Guide to Insight, Terry Telkippe (2003:122) observes that Lonergan assumes the isomorphism of mind to universe without really

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qualifying it, and as such, leaves the reader of Insight with the pressing question of whether Lonergan has obtained a methodology to approach the universe, or just his own mind? It is important to note that Lonergan’s (1978:400, 383) approach never goes outside the confines of his own mind, and he himself raises the question of whether he has confused the objective with the subjective. If this is the case, and the isomorphism of mind to universe is inaccurate, and Lonergan never goes beyond his own mind, then one would have to assume that Lonergan’s notion is a self contained system that is subject to the same critique as Hegel’s dialectic. However, I believe that there is the means within the Lonergarian system to overcome this criticism, and it is Lonergan’s heuristic notion of human cognition. In order to understand Lonergan’s heuristic notion of human cognition in a way that can overcome the critique of excessive self-immanence, the heuristic notion has to be understood in the context of his interpretation of Aquinas’ conception of judgment and its relationship to phantasm. Lonergan (1997:76, 77) writes, Judgment, then, may be described as resulting remotely and, as it were, materially from developing insight, which unites distinct intelligibilities into single intelligibilities, but proximately and, as it were, formally from a reflective activity of reason…Again human knowledge has a twofold origin-an extrinsic origin in sensitive impressions, and an intrinsic origin in intellectual light in which virtually the whole of science is precontainted (De veritate, q. 10, a. 6 c. ad fin.) Hence the reflective activity whence judgment results is a return from the syntheses effected by developing insight to their sources in sense and intellectual light. Lonergan notes the materialistic origin of the intellectual activity is two-fold. The human intellect does not simply rely on its own images, but the sense impressions left by extrinsic objects. The two-fold origin of human knowledge accumulates into a phantasm within the human intellect. A phantasm is an amalgamation of sensory data and the mind’s own inter-subjective light. It is important to note that the phantasm is not the proper object of the intellect (Lonergan 1997:174, 175). Instead, the phantasm is the thing that brings the proper object of the intellect into light, and by abstracting from the individual phantasm, the intellect comes to understand the individuality of a thing in an inadequate way (Lonergan 1997:177, 178). This process explains how everything is perceived in an individual sort of way, but approximately enough that human beings can converse about the same object, and roughly understand it in the same way.

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By interpreting the heuristic aspect of cognition in this way, it becomes apparent that there is a solution to the problem of excess immanence. If the mind’s reliance on an extrinsic factor is necessary for the process of cognition, than the isomorphism that Lonergan understands between cognition and the principles of the universe lends itself to receive information from an external source. Even if Lonergan stays within the context of the mind alone, the mind is still integrated into the external world, and as such, will still reflect certain aspects of the universe from the manner in which it is oriented. Thus, it is not a self contained system, but a system that is integrated into the collective of systems that form the external world, and understands itself based on how it is informed by the manner in which it is integrated into that collective. While the practitioner of scientia may argue that Lonergan is using human cognition as the model for self-appropriation instead of natural cognition, Lonergan is still clearly starting from a natural given and devising a means of cognition that is consistent with that natural given. In this way, Lonergan preserves the Thomistic notion of self-appropriation by accepting a natural given, and devising a way to harmonize with that natural given. The practitioner of scientia would still have to introspectively reflect on the nature of his or her own cognition, in a Lonergarian sort of way, before he or she could attempt to structure cognition in a way that is more consistent with nature’s cognition. The question now becomes, how will Lonergan’s utilization of Thomistic principles influence the future of philosophy with regard religion? I believe that this will cause philosophers to look at Aquinas in a more introspective way. I believe that, even though Aquinas’ understanding of science is more or less obsolete with regard to the general sciences, there is still much to be learned in the field of cognitive psychology from Aquinas’ account, and I believe that Lonergarian self-appropriation will be the means to that learning. I believe that this utilization will make philosophers of religion realize that, through introspection of human cognition, there arises a need for a unity of data. Finally, I believe that it will inspire philosophers concerned with religious thought to look at religious practice and Thomistic natural theology, not as something that needs to be defended and preserved, but as an aid in the quest for a greater understanding of ourselves and the world around us. This does not just mean accepting religion as the higher field of study and subordinating philosophy under it. It means recognizing the human condition for what it is, and utilizing all of the resources at our disposal.

Chapter 9

Religion in the Trap of Globalization Mislav Kukoč Accelerated globalization has caused the growth of confessionally based supra-territorial communities. It has given stimulus to transnational religious bonding, particularly in such universalistic religions as Christianity and Islam. At the same time the contemporary rise of collective identities rooted in religion has often been in part a defensive response to globalization. Thus, religious revitalization has frequently been shaped into a kind of non-territorial cultural protectionism. Contemporary globalization has encouraged religious revivalism in several ways. On the one hand, many of these anti-rationalist strivings can be understood in part as defensive reactions against encroachments by global forces on established cultures. A number of revivalist movements have exploited global relations to advance their causes. Contemporary religious revivalism has revolted against modern secularism in the context of the clash of civilizations.

The Structuration of Globalization

The structure of the contemporary globalization consists of: 1.

The philosophy and economic theory of neoliberalism, which has generally prevailed as the reigning policy framework in economistic pattern of globalization, so it is undoubtedly accepted worldwide as “commonsense.” 2. The spread of rationalism and scientism as a dominant knowledge framework, starting with the Enlightenment, with the motto “knowledge is power” and the development of anthropocentrism and secularism. 3. The development of capitalism. 4. Technological innovations in communications and data processing, particularly the accelerated progress of Information Technologies. 5. Bureaucratic regulations of production and social life on the supraterritorial level. Concerning the relationship between religion and globalization, or more precisely, the relationship between the revealed religions and secular modernity, the most important are the first two elements of the globalization structure.

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The other three elements can without any problem correspond with all three religions. Liberalism Although there is significant theoretical difference between the philosophy of liberalism and the economic theory and practice of neo-liberal globalization or globalism, all revealed religions, and particularly religious hierarchies and elites have been always at least suspicious towards both liberal approaches. The philosophy of liberalism generally emphasizes a set of principles, including individual rights, extensive freedom of thought and speech, toleration and pluralism, limitations on the power of governments, the rule of law, the free exchange of ideas, equality of opportunity, a market economy, and a transparent system of government. However, different sorts of liberal philosophy may represent very different ideas, depending on the predominant role of one or another of the above-mentioned liberal principles. In that sense, we can distinguish between classical (or economic liberalism), cultural liberalism, political liberalism, social liberalism, (left and right) libertarianism etc. Libertarian proponents of neoliberal laissez-faire capitalism even argue that higher degrees of political and economic freedom in the form of democracy and capitalism in the developed world are ends in themselves and also produce higher levels of material wealth. They see globalization as the beneficial spread of liberty and capitalism. Apart from both classical or economic liberalism and libertarianism as neo-liberalism, within the philosophy of liberalism there are quite opposite streams of thought that compete with neoliberalism over the use of the term “liberal.” Cultural liberalism focuses on the rights of individuals pertaining to conscience and lifestyle, including such issues as sexual freedom, religious freedom, cognitive freedom, and protection from government intrusion into private life. Although cultural liberalism focuses on religious freedom as well, it is not welcome in any of the revealed religions. Why? If religious elites need religious freedom they need it only for themselves, not for others, with proselyte ideas to convert everybody to the only truly faith. Rationalism Besides the philosophy of liberalism, more precisely neo-liberalism, another element of the structuration of globalization is also rationalism. Globalization

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can be seen as the product of this secularist holy grail. The anthropocentrism of rationalism has directed our consciousness to the earthly world. This rationalist thought of the earth as the human home has provided a crucial mental orientation for globalization. As a general configuration of knowledge, rationalism has intensely advanced the spread of global thinking and, through it, promoted the broader trend of globalization. According to Scholte (2000:93), rationalism contains four features: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Rationalism is secularist: it classifies the world exclusively as a physical reality, without indication of any transcendent and divine forces; Rationalism is anthropocentric: it comprehends the world predominantly from the perspective of human interests and activities, thus, neglecting ecological, or bioethical reality; Rationalism is scientific: it understands facts and phenomena entirely as a single, unquestionable, empirical truth that can be explored and detected by scientific research methods; Rationalism is instrumental: its key purpose is to solve practical, instantaneous problems.

The basic characteristic of rationalism is its tendency to subordinate other truths, ideas, and different approaches to knowledge. In that sense, rationalism discharges aesthetics, emotions, sentiments, fantasy, visions, spirituality, mysticism, and above all religious faith as “irrationalities,” which allegedly do not contain any crucial truth. As such, rationalism has become a sort of a secular faith claiming that only science is capable of exploring and discovering the single, definite, objective truths about word phenomena. The instrumental purpose of techno-scientific rationality is conclusively to improve the potentials of human life in conquering hunger, misery, poverty, crime, violence, war, disease etc., and as a consequence to maximize the duration of human life, even to the level of immortality. On the other hand, secular, anthropocentric, scientific estimates have provided a knowledge framework for capitalist production and the modern trend of effectiveness. Rationalism was consolidated in the 18th century Enlightenment. Enlightenment philosophy, with its ambition to present itself as a single scientific thought, dismissed myth, faith, ­religion and other traditional ways of understanding as fraudulent and superstitious, being opposed to true knowledge. Consequently rationalism, as an associate of capitalism, has been carried, particularly through colonialism and imperialism, to all parts of the earth.

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Rationalist thinking and its structure of knowledge have supported the increase of supra-territoriality in a number of ways, becoming an ideal basis for the other causes of globalization. Modern technologies, particularly Information Technology, have developed from scientific thinking and an anthropocentric will to control nature and exploit it only as a material exclusively for the human world. At the same time, the rationalist anthropocentrism has focused our consciousness on the real, earthly world. In an anthropocentric view, the universe is seen not as the kingdom of gods, nor as a biosphere of interdependent living beings. Instead, the rationalist insight has focused on the earth as an exclusive human home, which has also provided an essential mental orientation for globalization. On the other hand, the scientific way of thinking is also supra-territorial: the “objective” scientific truths and methods are applicable anytime and anywhere in every corner of the world (Scholte 2000:91–95). Concerning the other, above-mentioned elements of the globalization structure, religions try to adopt the new conditions of globalization with more or less success.

Religion in the Age of Globalization

Globalization has caused the expansion of confessionally founded supraterritorial communities. This religious renaissance has grasped Baha’i, Buddhist, Christian, Hindu, Islamic, Judaic, Sikh and numerous New Age faiths. Some of this resurgence has had a revivalist disposition that confronts the previously mentioned predominant rationalist knowledge structure of globalization. Some contemporary examples of such religious revival have given an explicit priority to religious feelings instead of territorial state or nationality. It was the Ayatollah Khomeini who declared once that his homeland was Islam, not Iran (Simpson 1989:29, 30; Scholte 2000:177). On the other hand, accelerated globalization has stimulated supraterritorial religious connections, particularly in universalistic religions, such as Christianity and Islam. There are numerous examples of it, for example, the Pope, particularly the late John Paul II, traveled all over the World, airplanes have drawn hajjis to Mecca from every corner of the Muslim World, satellite broadcasts have enabled televangelists to preach global sermons, etc. At the same time, the growth and strengthening of religious collective identities has frequently been to some extent a defensive reaction to globalization, as well. In that sense, religious renewal has repeatedly developed into a sort of supra-territorial cultural protectionism. However, contemporary

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g­ lobalization has encouraged religious revivalism in a number of different ways. A number of religious inspired, anti-rationalist strivings can be understood as self-protective responses against globalization attacks on traditional cultures, on the one hand. On the other hand, however, many revivalist movements have exploited global relations and other instruments of globalization to advance their causes (Scholte 2000:187–189).

The “Clash of Civilizations”

Some theorists of globalization, for example, J.A. Scholte, noted the civilization paradigm as being marginal, as only one of numerous manifestations of globalization in the field of culture and religion (Scholt 2000:22–24, 176, 177). It is, however, possible to observe religious, cultural and inter-civilizational disputes in the broader context of the contemporary age of globalization with a number of coming changes. If we, however, have in mind globalism as an ideological and driving force of the widespread globalization than we can describe globalization, more precisely expressed as neo-liberal globalism, as such an instrument, even as the most efficient one, used by the West in order to maintain its superior position in the ongoing clash of civilization. The crucial point of the clash of civilizations’ paradigm is that the fundamental source of contemporary global conflict is not primarily ideological or economic, but cultural. The civilization factor is increasingly important in the globalized world, for various reasons. The most important of these reasons is – religion. Differences among civilizations are not only real; they are basic. They are founded in “history, language, culture, tradition, and, most important, ­religion.… They are far more fundamental than differences among political ideologies and political regimes” (Huntington 1996a:25). As a central element of civilization’s identity, religion is in the global process of revival. This revival is described as de-secularization, or the “unsecularization of the World” (Weigel 1991:27) that has, according to Huntington, pervaded every continent, every civilization, and virtually every country. Gilles Kepel (1994:2; Huntington 1996b:95, 96) has described this as “la Revanche de Dieu” (the Revenge of God) process. Pro-globalist social and intellectual elites generally assumed that economic and social modernization was leading to the withering away of religion as a significant element in human existence. Modernized secularists hailed the extent to which science, rationalism, and enlightenment were eliminating the superstitions, myths, irrationalities, and rituals that formed the core of existing religions. The emerging society would be tolerant, rational, pragmatic, progressive, humanistic, and secular.

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Economic and social modernization became global in scope, and at the same time a global revival of religion also occurred. Yet, this revival, la revanche de Dieu, has not pervaded the whole World but some non–Western civilizations. The West, particularly Europe, under the influence of liberalism and Enlightenment rationalism and secularism, has not generally accepted this sort of religious expansion, so revivalist anti-rationalism has been a minority tendency in European society, even in most Christian communities. On the other hand, there is a quite different situation with immigrant communities belonging to non-European civilizations and non-Christian confessions, particularly to Islam. A new religious approach has taken shape, aiming no longer at adapting to secular values but at recovering a sacred foundation for the organization of society – by changing society, if necessary. Expressed in a multitude of ways, this approach advocated moving on from a modernism and globalism that had failed, attributing its setbacks and dead ends to a separation from God. The aim was no longer to modernize Islam but to “Islamize modernity” (Kepel 1994:2; Huntington 1996b:96). There is a global explanation for this global religious resurgence. In times of rapid social change, the self must be redefined and new identities created. For people facing the need to determine “Who am I?” “Where do I belong?” religion provides compelling answers. All religions furnish people with a sense of identity and a direction in life. In this process people rediscover or create new historical identities. Whatever universalistic goals they may have, religions give people identity by positing a basic distinction between believers and nonbelievers, between a superior in-group and a different and/or inferior out-group. (Huntington 1996b:97; Al-Turabi 1992:52–55). The religious resurgence throughout the world is a reaction against secularism, moral relativism, and self-indulgence, as it is a reaffirmation of the values of order, discipline, work, mutual help, and human solidarity. The breakdown of order and of civil society has created vacuums that are filled by religious, often fundamentalist, groups. Samuel Huntington (1996b:96) particularly stressed that the ubiquity and relevance of religion has been dramatically evident in post-communist states: “Filling the vacuum left by the collapse of ideology religious revivals have swept through these countries from Albania to Vietnam.” There are some quite opposing insights concerning these issues. Investigating religious phenomenon in post-communist Albania, Denis Janz described contemporary Albanian society as almost completely atheistic and religionless (Janz 1995:787–799). German sociologist Johannes Weiss came to the same conclusion concerning the proces of secularization in the excommunist Eastern Germany (Weiss 1995:773–786). At the 27th German Sociological Congress in Halle an der Saale, in 1995, in the section for sociology

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of religion all scholars that researched the religious situation in Western and Eastern Europe discussed the same phenomenon of the ever increasing process of secularization and the weakening of religiousity after the collapse of Communism. And finally, despite the protests from the high ranks of the Christian hierarchies, the proposed European Union Constitution does not mention religion, i.e. Christianity as the spiritual and cultural basis of European identity. In the Western civilization, however, globalization with its crucial effects (rationalism, secularism, scientism, etc.) has replaced the resurgence of religion. Although numerous, brand new forms of New Age spirituality have spread across Europe, Gilles Kepel’s (1994:2) announcement of “the second evangelization of Europe” seems to be overestimated and unfounded.

The Role of Globalization in the Context of Civilization Diversity

All political ideologies of the twentieth century (liberalism, socialism, anarchism, corporatism, Marxism, communism, social democracy, conservatism, nationalism, fascism, and Christian democracy) are products of Western civilization. No other civilization has generated a significant political ideology. The West, however, has never generated a major religion. The great religions of the world – Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism, and Shinto – are all products of non-Western civilizations. It is obvious that culture and religion have become significant instruments of resistance to Western dominance used by non-Western civilizations, especially Islam, in order to abandon Western ideologies including the brand new one, i.e. neoliberal globalism. Consequentially, the movements for religious revival are anti-secular, antiuniversal, anti-globalist, and, except in their rare Christian manifestations, anti-Western. They also are opposed to relativism, egotism, and consumerism, but they do not reject modernization, science, and technology. They don’t accept Western ideologies: “Neither nationalism nor socialism produced development in the Islamic world, but religion was the motor of development” (Al-Turabi 1991:53; Huntington 1996b:100–101). Purified Islam is going to play a role in the contemporary era comparable to that of the Protestant ethic in the history of the West, as Max Weber theoretically proposed (Weber 2002). Much more than the ideology of neoliberal globalism, religion provides meaning and direction for the rising elites in modernizing societies. More than anything else, reaffirmation of Islam means the repudiation of European and American influence upon local communities, politics, and morality. In this sense, the

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revival of non-Western religions is the most powerful manifestation of antiWesternism in non-Western societies. In the present moment, the West tries to preserve its dominant world position through the instruments of globalization. Three issues involve such efforts of the West: 1.) to maintain its military superiority through policies of nonproliferation and counter-proliferation with respect to nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons, and the means to deliver them; 2.) to promote Western moral and political values as universal by pressing other societies to respect human rights as they are perceived in the West and to accept Western democracy; and 3.) to protect the cultural, social, and ethnic integrity of Western societies by restricting the number of non-Western immigrants or refugees. In all three spheres, the West has had difficulties in defending its interests against those of non-Western societies. First, non-Westerners do not see civil rights and democracy as universal human values but as distinctive Western values that have been used as the source of Western hegemony. Second, concerning these values, hypocrisy and double standards are the lasting characteristic of the Western behavior, such as, gaps between Western principles and Western action. This contradiction has been historically exemplified in the West’s promotion of democracy but not if it brings Islamic fundamentalists to power; in it’s preaching of nonproliferation for Iran but not for Israel; and its demands for human rights’ issues with Iran and North Korea but not with Saudi Arabia (Huntington 1996b:183–206). The level of violent conflict between Islam and Christianity over time has been influenced by demographic growth and decline, economic developments, technological change, and the intensity of religious commitment. A comparable mix of factors has increased the conflict between Islam and the West in the beginning of twenty-first century. First, Muslim population growth has generated large numbers of unemployed and disaffected young people who become recruits to Islamist causes and migrate to the West. Second, the Islamic resurgence has given Muslims renewed confidence in the distinctive character and worth of their civilization and values compared to those of the West. Third, the West’s simultaneous efforts to universalize its values and institutions, to maintain its military and economic superiority, and to intervene in conflicts in the Muslim world generate intense resentment among Muslims. Fourth, the collapse of communism removed a common enemy of the West and Islam and left each to be the perceived major threat to the other. And, finally, within both Muslim and Christian societies, tolerance for the other declined sharply, particularly in the beginning of the new millennium: first, after

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September 11, 2001 and recently even in liberal European societies, such as in The Netherlands, Belgium, and Switzerland.

The Relationship between the Three Revealed Religions and Secular Modernity

Secular modernity in the Western world has marginalized Christianity since the Enlightenment movement of 18th century. Absolute atheism, or at least agnosticism, prevailed in the predominantly Western Weltanschauung. Western secularism and atheism have developed since the Enlightenment period in three basic forms: 1.

2.

Political atheism is built on a comprehensively implemented Enlightenment critique of the official Church, the clergy and revealed religion as a priestly fraud, of being merely a means of stupefying and keeping the masses in obedience to the profane uneducated people. This type of atheism also comes from a privileged socio-political status of the Catholic church whose poor attitude towards accrued social-class inequalities seriously discredited faith in God. Particularly in France – in which the Church and clergy were becoming mainstays of the corrupted and repressive ancien régime – anticlerical and antireligious attitudes of the Enlightenment scholars assumed a distinctly political character. In this sense, Voltaire’s widely accepted slogan against the Church – “Ecraséz l’infame!” (“Crush the hussy!”) – found its logical continuation a few decades later in the Jacobin motto: “Priests on lanterns.” Thus, “for the first time in the history of the world atheism has become a political program,” which, in the period of Jacobin dictatorship, set atheistic reason as an anti-deity instead of the displaced Christian God, abolished the Christian Church, and introduced the revolutionary calendar, which begins with the year 1792 (Küng 1987:83). The Jacobin program of political atheism, based on the Enlightenment critique of religion and the Church, was short lived, but the same theoretical project of political atheism will be developed later in the work of Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Stalin with much more lasting implementation in the political practice of Bolshevik socialism. Humanistic atheism is reflected in the abolition of the religious basis of morality, which is no longer founded on God’s commandments, but on the utilitarian assumptions of the egotist, bourgeois individual. According to Lamettrie, Helvetius and Holbach, such atheistic “natural” morality

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based on human hedonistic needs should be implemented by planning education that is aligned with societal interests, which thus makes the assumption for the overall individual and social progress of men and women. Thus, the Enlightenment’s destruction of Christian morality paved the way for the future development of humanistic atheism in the work of Ludwig Feuerbach’s understanding of God as self-alienated humanity, as well as in Friedrich Nietzsche’s nihilism, expressed in his announcement of God’s death. Scientific atheism is founded in the Enlightenment, on the assumptions of Baruch de Spinoza’s philological-historical criticism of the Bible, on the one hand, and on the basis of Cartesian mathematical and mechanical natural science, on the other. On the other side, natural science discoveries of Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo and Newton paved the way for a new mechanistic-materialistic worldview that formed the foundation of enlightenment ontology and epistemology. This viewpoint increasingly assumed an atheistic character, which paralleled the scientific rebuttal of then undeniable theological dogmas. In this sense, the so-called “French Newton” Pierre Simon de Laplace, explaining in his Celestial Mechanics irregularities of the orbit of planets, declared God as an “unnecessary hypothesis” (Küng 1987:88). Consequently, scientific atheism was built up as a result of the confidence about the redundancy of God, without which everything could be explained in a rational and scientific manner, both the physical structure of the world, as well as of all aspects of the spiritual constitution of humanity. The same ideas were developed later in the dialectical materialism of Friedrich Engels and Vladimir Lenin on the one hand, and in neo-positivistic scientism and analytical philosophy of science, on the other.

Western Christianity has gone more and more awry in a clash with prevailing Western secularism. Secular modernity has also affected Judaism. Judaism is a Western religion as well as Christianity. Israel together with the large majority of the Jewish diaspora belongs to the Western culture and civilization. Jewish people in general belong to the most secularized people. Jewish leftoriented secularism has a long intellectual tradition, from Karl Marx to Sigmund Freud. On the other hand, Islam has resisted secular modernity. The reason for this is that there has been no Muslim enlightenment, and the secular and religious spheres have not yet separated. Therefore religion, such as Islam, still plays an extremely significant role in Muslim societies.

Chapter 10

Bahá’í Religion as a New Religious Movement? Branko Ančić

The Scientific Study of Bahá’í Faith as a New Religious Movement: Is it a Joke?

The term New Religious Movements often implies communities that have flourished after World War II, although some of them existed even in the 19th and at the beginning of twentieth century or much earlier (so-called old and new sects) (Melton 2007; Stark 1979; Bainbridge 1997; Barker 1997). Nevertheless, some of the New Religious Movements have their source in the cultures of the East but have arrived in these areas from the Western cultures and societies where open hostility towards them exists. It is important to notice that general conclusions and remarks about New Religious Movements must not be merely restated, but at the same time, differences (synchronic and diachronic) within the movements must not be neglected (Barker, 1997). With the historically existing presence of various religions, the religious landscape in Central and Eastern Europe has begun to pluralize with the increase of new types of religiosity and spirituality. If we paraphrase one of the most significant articles about the study of New Religious Movements, Eileen Barker’s (1995) “The Scientific Study of Religion? You Must be Joking?,” then the question in the title makes sense. The first question that we have to ask ourself is: is the Bahá’í religion a new religious movement? Some scholars would disagree and say that New Religious Movements appeared only after the Second World War. If we are taking post-World War II as the standard for the appearance of New Religious Movements, then we can easily exclude the Bahá’í faith, since it began in the 19th century. If we use a criterion that New Religious Movements are comprised of the first generation of believers then we are in the grey area concerning the Bahá’í religion, since in some countries Bahá’í believers are the first generation in their community (as in all ex-socialist states but also in some countries that were not). If we use self-perception as a criterion then we would have to say that Bahá’í is a world religion as is Christianity, Buddhism, Hinduism, Judaism and Islam. However, is this so?1 For example, in his theoretical analysis, Udo Schafer (1998) claims

1 For further dicussion see George D Chryssides: New Religious Movements – Some Problems of Definition (http://www.basr.ac.uk/diskus/diskus1-6/CHRYSSI2_2.TXT). © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2014 | doi 10.1163/9789004263147_012

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that we cannot state that the Bahá’í religion is a sect or a cult, but it should be described as a world religion. Since there is no firmly adjusted definition of New Religious Movements, we will not make a mistake by saying that researching the Bahá’í faith as a new religious movement is a good topic, especially if we are doing so in societies where this is a newly formed religious organization. What we can conclude from this is that defining New Religious Movements is not a joke and it is not easy. This criterion needs further reevaluation and by conducting research upon some of the new religions within the context of a specific society, we can possibly contribute to this necessary reevaluation. How do we approach this research? If we look at the various disciplinary perspectives then we can look at New Religious Movements as social and/or psychological aberrations, or as social or cultural organizations, or as genuine religious expressions, or as false religions (Saliba, J. 2007, in: Bromley, 2007). Generally speaking, this is the approach that psychology, sociology, cultural anthropology, religious studies and theology engage in when it comes to New Religious Movements. Why do we have an interest in New Religious Movements at all? Statistically they are quite marginal when we look at society as a whole but nevertheless they draw the attention of religious scholars. Lorne Dawson (Bromley 2007:215f.) states that the research in New Religious Movements in the last 30 years show that we can set the quest for the meaning of New Religious Movements in two interpretative contexts: first, is to observe New Religious Movements as social problems, and the second is to observe New Religious Movements as their answer and by it as an indicator of wider social changes. Therefore, Dawson tries to offer four interpretative frames that will give us a more progressive, optimistic and complex understanding of New Religious Movements. The first frame is to see New Religious Movements as “protests against modernity”; second, is to see New Religious Movements as “forums for modern social experimentation”; third, is to identify New Religious Movements as the “re-enchantment of the world,” and the fourth is to interpret New Religious Movements as a manifestation of the “dialectic of trust and risk.” To these four interpretative frames we can add the approach of James A. Beckford (2003) to recognize New Religious Movements as movement organizations (sociology of social movements) and therefore “benefit from the advances in general sociological theorizing.”

Historical Overview of the Bahá’í Faith

Development of Bahá’í faith started in the city Shiraz on southwestern part of Iran. In 1844, a young merchant Mirza Sayyid Ali Muhammad Shirazi

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(1819–1859) gathered a group of disciples and proclaimed himself to be Báb (“doors” to the Hidden Imam of Shi’a). There were eighteen disciples, all of them Shi’a Muslims, which Báb called “Letters of the Living.” Bab claimed that he would fulfill many Islamic prophecies and that the meaning of his existence and his main mission was the annunciation of “He whom God shall make manifest,” the prophet who will lead humankind to an era of peace and whose name will be Bahá’u’lláh. Soon afterward, the repression of the Bahá’í movement by the Iranian state began. In less then a year after Báb’s proclamation, a lawsuit was filed against one of Báb’s emissary. He had been convicted of heresy and apostasy and was sentenced to death. In 1848, its followers proclaimed the teaching of Báb to be a new religion. This provoked the Shah to send 6000 troops and cannon batteries against of 500 Babis, who had hidden near the Caspian in the shrine Shaykh Tabarsí. In May 1849, starved Bábis surrendered believing the given promise that they would remain alive but the Shah did not keep his promise and massacred them (Momen 2005). Prosecutions continued in the north and south of Iran and culminated in 1850 when the Iranian Prime Minister ordered the execution of imprisoned Báb to stop the spreading of Bahá’í. After Báb’s death, the movement fragmented. One group followed Mirza Yahya Nuri known as Sobh-e Azal (“Morning of Eternity”). This fragmentation caused the return of one part of Bábis into mainstream Shi’ism. Followers of Sobh-e Azal formed a religious group known as Azalis. It is estimated that this group is dying out (Berry 2004). In 1866, Mirza Husayn Ali Nuri, older half brother of Sobh-e Azal, had proclaimed himself Man-yuzhiruhu’llah – “He whom God shall make manifest,” the successor of Báb. According to Báb’s teaching, his successor would be Bahá’u’lláh (Glory of God). Bahá’u’lláh was pursued and exiled several times from Teheran to Baghdad, from Baghdad to Istanbul and finally stopped north of Haifa (nowadays Israel) where the Ottoman governor ordered Bahá’u’lláh’s imprisonment. During his prison time Bahá’u’lláh wrote over 15,000 texts among which is Kítab-i-Agdas (The Most Holy Book). Bahá’í’s believe that Bahá’u’lláh is the fulfilled expectancy of God’s annunciation for all religions in the world – that Bahá’u’lláh is the fifth incarnation of Buddha, the reincarnation of Krishna, the Messiah for Jews, and the returned Christ for Christians. Bahá’u’lláh’s successor was his son Abbas Effendi known as Abdu´l-Baha´. Abdu´l-Baha´ preached across Africa, Europe and North America and pro­ claimed  Bahá’u’lláh’s message of unity and social justice to church congregations, peace associations, syndicates, scholars, journalists, government officials.

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After Abdu´l-Baha´s death, his grandson Shoghi Effendi won a lawsuit in a British Court in 1922 and inherited the right of leadership of the Bahá’í religion. Afterwards Bahá’í established their world center in Haifa. Today, Bahá’í’s live and have their organizations in 221 countries all over the world. It is estimated that there are over 7 million followers of Bahá’í faith in over 1820 different ethnic groups (Barret et al., 2001).

Organizational Structure of Bahá’í Religion

After the death of Shoghi Effendi, Bahá’í’s spread all over the world and in accordance with his scriptures founded a central body – the Universal House of Justice. National administrative bodies from all over the world elected this body. The organizational structure of this religion depends on the system of local, national and international administration. The leading body is the Universal House of Justice that consists of 9 members. The National Spiritual Councils from all over the world elect members every 5 years. The Universal House of Justice, as the central body in the organizational structure, is located in Haifa, Israel. This body has the right to make decisions about the matters that are not embraced in the Holy Scriptures. Its authority derives from the Holy Scriptures and their authority is infallible and is the institutional founding of God’s kingdom (Marinović Bobinac and Marinović Jerolimov 2008). In 1868, the Universal House of Justice established the Continental Coun­ selors whose main goal was to enable the future performance of specific functions of preservation and expansion of action that the “Hand of the Cause of God” had. “Hand of the Cause of God” was a group of Bahá’í believers to whom this title was given from Bahá’u’lláh, Abdu´l-Baha´ or Shoghi Effendi. There were 50 of them in the history of the Bahá’í religion. The function of the Continental Counselors is to protect and promote the Bahá’í faith. There are 81 Counselors worldwide and they are appointed for 5 years in that body. Nine more Counselors are settled in Haifa in the International Teaching center of Bahá’í, which is the body that coordinates the Counselors worldwide (Esslemont 1998). The National Spiritual Assemblies is an administrative body composed of nine members elected every year in each country. Members have to be of full age, which means older than 21 years of age. Local Spiritual Assemblies are also administrative bodies composed of nine full aged members elected every year. The National Spiritual Assembly and the Local Spiritual Assembly are engaged in issues important for the development and well being of the community

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(either local or national). Members elected in these bodies are secretly chosen and do not campaign because they consider it to be a great honor to be chosen in these bodies. Bahá’í believes that this organizational system has its purpose. It is believed that this organizational structure of Bahá’í ensures real and permanent unity between people of different races, classes, interests, characteristics and inherited beliefs. This administrative structure by its significance presents a scientific approach to cooperation, and in its application provides a better and higher type of morality that encompasses the whole world (Esselmont 1998). In the Bahá’í religion there is no professional clergy. At the beginning of the development of the religion, there was a significant number of believers who were uneducated and because of that a professional clergy existed, but as the educational level of believers improved, the organizational structure changed and the professional clergy vanished.

Theological Teachings of Bahá’í Faith

The Bahá’í religion is a monotheistic religion. In the Bahá’í religion, it is believed that God from time to time sends his prophets and messengers to earth so that they can communicate with the human race. These prophets and messengers were Abraham, Krishna, Zoroaster, Buddha, Jesus and Muhammad. The last two that God send were Báb and Bahá’u’lláh. Each of these prophets and messengers revealed themselves in certain social, historical and cultural contexts. All of them continued the teachings of previous prophets for the purpose of inspiring people to “new spiritual heights and bringing moral and social teachings designed for a particular age” (Hunt, S.J. 2003:123). These beliefs express three fundamental principles that encompass the faith and ideology of the Bahá’í movement: unity of God, unity of faith and unity of mankind. The theological principle of unity of God refers to the transcendent God as the only God and as a creator and keeper of life in total. From this principle arises the central ideological concept of progressive revelation. From the Bahá’í vision of global unity, ensues the belief that all the world religions are just evolutionary cycles in God’s plan of unifying the world. Therefore, Bahá’í believes that the truths of all religion are the same but that the differences come out of social laws that are different because of historical needs for new moral and social codex so that mankind could be unified. From this principle comes the belief that God has created all humans and that the goal is to unify humans in one family. Bahá’í believes that this is the highest level of social evolution on earth.

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Social and Individual Issues in Bahá’í Religion

Bahá’í faith teaches that the first condition of social life is the ability of individuals to discern good from evil, truth from lie and to view the world in right proportions. Human selfishness is the main cause of social catastrophes and the biggest barrier for social progress. So the main goal for the Bahá’í believer is to sublimate one’s personal interests to the interests of humankind. Bahá’í’s believe that the political organizations have to correspond to the organizational structure of the Bahá’í community – governance through local, national and international organizations. Politicians must never rule violently and with oppression. They have to obey all laws strictly and the main goal of their governance has to be human security, welfare, wealth and peace. People who are governed have to live in accordance with the law and have to be loyal to righteous government. Political leaders have to be chosen only if they are suitable for that position and it must not be determined by their socioeconomic status (Esselmont 1998). Concerning economical issues, the Bahá’í faith teaches that the most important thing is to establish economical relationship between the wealthy classes and the needy classes in a way that wealth as well as poverty is restricted. The mechanism for the realization of this relation is the principle of financial subsidiarity in a way that all the incomes that are exceeding necessary costs must be subjected to taxes. One of most important instructions that Bahá’u’lláh gave is that people have to be useful through their work and that they must not spend their time in idleness and leisure. Abdu´l-Baha´ continuing Bahá’u’lláh teachings spoke about slavery. There should not be any slavery, meaning not just slavery concerning assets but as well as industrial slavery. It is important for workers and capitalists to establish dialogue and cooperation; otherwise it could lead to conflicts and wars (McElwee Miller 1974). In the Bahá’í religion, a great significance is given to relations between men and women. They have to have equal rights. Women have to benefit from the same rights and privileges, the same access to education and the same possibilities. The basis for this equal relation is universal education. They believe that when women gain adequate and equal participation in social action, great progress will occur in health, art, peace and respect for the life of the individual. For the Bahá’í religion, education is an important social condition, since it is believed that when universal education is achieved, paradise will occur on earth. Along with education, art is an exceptional aspect of social action and

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Bahá’í believes that people who are in pursuit of science and art are serving humankind and by that, serving to God. In the Bahá’í community, it is forbidden to consume alcohol and narcotics. All food can be consumed, although they believe that fruits and vegetables will be the only food that will be consumed in the future. The teachings of the Bahá’í faith promote a moderate way of living due to its ascetic tone. Marriage in the Bahá’í religion is monogamous and the wedding ceremony is simple – the bride and groom in the presence of two witnesses give their vows saying: “We will all, verily, abide by the will of God.” Divorce in the Bahá’í community is allowed, but with the knowledge of the Spiritual Assemblies in such a way that partners have to wait one year to test the possibility of saving the marriage. Because of the belief in the harmony of religion and science, the Bahá’í faith tremendously supports medicine and therefore emphasizes medicine as one of the noblest professions, but for them it is unacceptable to separate physical from spiritual. Illness has to be treated both physically and spiritually, although it is all in God’s hand. Regarding the issue of abortion, the Bahá’í religion is not strictly determined and there are no strict rules of forbiddance of abortion. They believe that the beginning of life is in the moment of conception and therefore the majority of Bahá’í’s would not do it (Kourosh and Hosoda 2007). According to Bahá’í law, people are allowed to donate organs, but it is important that the body is buried and not cremated. The body of the deceased must not be transferred more then one hour from the place of death. It has to be washed and wrapped up in silk or cotton and laid in a coffin made of crystal, rock or solid wood. The coffin with the body must be positioned towards the holiest place – Bahji near Akká in Israel (the place where Bahá’u’lláh died and where his body was buried) (Marinović Bobinac and Marinović Jerolimov 2008). The Bahá’í organization in the world cooperates with United Nations believing that the goal of the un is unifying the world. The Bahá’í Inter­ national Community as a non-governmental organization of members of Bahá’í faith has a consultative status with the un in the Economic and Social Council (ecosoc) and United Nations Children’s Fund (unesco). Over the years, the Bahá’í International Community established working relations with the World Health Organization (who), the United Nations Environment Program (unep), the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the United Nations Development Program (undp) and the United Nations Development Fund for Women (unifem) (http//www .un.org.).

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Bahá’í Faith Today

In the last five decades, the Bahá’í Faith has experienced major changes in its leadership, organization, demographic base, and distribution. The Bahá’í Faith is now a distinctive and independent religious movement and perceives itself as a new world religion. According to the Britannica Book of the Year and World Christian Encyclopedia, the Bahá’í Faith is the second most widely spread religion in the world, after Christianity. Concerning organizational change in Bahá’í Faith, the death of Shoghi Effendi in 1957 started the process of the routinization of charisma. After his death, “Hands of the Cause of God” gained leadership over the whole Bahá’í organization, which they held until 1963 when according to the plan of Shoghi Effendi, the Universal House of Justice was established. This period was most important for the Bahá’í faith because, as Peter Berger described,2 two fundamental transformations occurred in a relatively short period of time – a process of the routinization of charisma and process of the spreading Bahá’í religious movement from East to West (Smith 1998). After 1890, the expansion of Bahá’í began in America, Canada, Western Europe, Australia, New Zeeland and Japan. Although Bahá’í believers were small in numbers their process of organization and its further actions had significant influence on the Bahá’í religion. During the 1950s and the 1960s, the Bahá’í Faith expanded in the countries of the “Third World.” With this expansion, significant change in the social base of the religion occurred, especially when the expansion took place in India, South America, the Pacific and some parts of sub-Saharan Africa (Smith and Momen 1989). Watching as a whole, the Bahá’í Faith has rapidly increased. In the early 1950s it is estimated that there were around 200,000 Bahá’í believers in the world. By the end of the 1960s, there were around 1 million, and at the end of 1980s – 4.5 million believers. It is estimated today that there are 7 million Bahá’í believers in the world. In the beginning of the 1950s, 90% of all Bahá’í believers were Iranians, while today they make up less then 6% of Bahá’í population. In the West (Europe, North America, Australia and New Zeeland) Bahá’í has been present since the time of Abdu´l-Baha’ (1844–1921). We can 2 It is interesting and quite unknown that Peter Berger wrote his doctoral thesis: “From Sect to Church: A Sociological Interpretation of the Bahá’í Movement” in 1954. After it he had published, his work “Motif Messianique et Processus Social dans le Bahaisme” was a shorten and summarized version of his thesis. His third work “The Sociological study of Sectarianism” (1954) constitutes his work on Bahá’í (see: Smith 1998).

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say that the Bahá’í religion celebrates its 110th birthday in Europe, since the first community was established in 1898 in Paris. In Western Europe, where societies were stepping over the path of liberalism towards the conditions of post-Christian secularism, tolerance and openness for the New Religious Movements occurred. In continental Europe, the development of Bahá’í communities was halted by the Nazi persecution and with the establishment of the Communist bloc. Although the Bahá’í community in Germany succeeded to weakly build itself up again, in ex-communist countries this did not occur earlier than the end of the 1980s. Concerning former socialist states, the first Bahá’í community was established after the Second World War in Romania in 1990, in Cluj. Romania, along with Albania, is one of the countries where there is the highest number of Bahá’í believers (7000 in Romania and 13,000 in Albania) (Momen 1996). National Spiritual Assemblies were soon established in Romania (1991), Czechoslovakia (1991), Russia, Georgia and Armenia (1992), Albania (1992), the Baltic States (1992), Bulgaria (1992), Hungary (1992), Poland (1992), Ukraine, Belarus and Moldova (1992), and Slovenia (1994). In 1995, Belarus, Georgia and Armenia were selected separate nsa’s, followed by Moldova in 1996 and separate nsa’s in 1998 for Czech and Slovak Republic. If we look at the rate of the Bahá’í believers per million, then the highest rate is found in Albania (4029), Iceland (1345), Luxemburg (983), Portugal (605), Cyprus (529), Romania (308), Ireland (175) and Norway (173) (Fazel and Hassall 1998). In 1997, there were around 104,000 Bahá’í believers in Europe (Fazel and Hassall, 1998). One of the reasons for this growth in Europe is immigration. During the 1970s, another major persecution of the Bahá’í community started again in Iran.3 Many believers migrated to Europe and joined Bahá’í communities there. Nevertheless, we cannot state that this is the major or only reason of the growth of the Bahá’í Faith in Europe. After conducting a statistical analysis, Margit Warburg (1995) concluded that the recent growth of Bahá’í’s in Europe is “as much as the result of immigrations as it is of recruitment of new believers” (Warburg 1995, 2001). So we can ask: what attracts new believers to the Bahá’í faith in Europe? One of the possible explanations is its openness toward other cultures and religions, but also the democratic organizational structure that is quite a rare model of religious organization. In her analysis of Bahá’í believers in Denmark, Warburg claims that Danes are attracted to their cultural style, being “emancipated, independent, and idealistic” (Warburg 1999). 3 This especially took place after the Islamic Revolution in Iran in 1979.

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Bahá’í Faith in some Ex-Socialist Countries

The first time that the Bahá’í Faith was mentioned in Poland was in 1871 in the Polish magazine “Bluszcz,” and in 1915 was published one of the first books about the Bahá’í faith – “Paris Talks” by Abdu´l-Baha’. The first Polish Bahá’í believer was Lydia Zamenhof, daughter of Ludwig Zamenhof – founder of Esperanto. She had translated some of the books about the Bahá’í Faith into the Polish language. After the Second World War, the Bahá’í religion had disappeared as an organization; there were now only individual believers. After the collapse of the Berlin Wall, Bahá’í started to create local communities, first in Krakow and Warsaw. In 1992, the first National Spiritual Assembly was elected and Bahá’í Faith was officially registered as a religious organization. In Slovenia, two Bahá’í missionaries came in 1990 and initiated the process for the organization of the Bahá’í Faith. The first Local Spiritual Assembly was organized in Ljubljana in 1991 and then in Maribor in 1992. After this, communities developed in Koper, Kranj, Škofija Loka and in some other places. In 1992, a Bahá’í community was registered at the Slovenian Office for religious communities. Bahá’í’s in Slovenia often cooperate with the Bahá’í’s in Croatia. By 1998, Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro) did not have a National Spiritual Assembly. However, its first Local Spiritual Assembly was established in November 1990 in Belgrade, and up to now remains the only formal Bahá’í body there. One of the first connections between Ukraine and the Bahá’í Faith was within Ukraine’s history with Russia, but nevertheless there wasn’t any organization of Bahá’í Faith in Ukraine until 1977. This was not the first direct connection between Ukraine and the Bahá’í religion, since there was a Ukrainian Diaspora of Bahá’í believers organized in usa and Canada. In 1991, Ukraine, Moldova and Belarus formed a regional National Spiritual Assembly that lasted until 1995 when Belarus established a separate National Spiritual Assembly accompanied with forming of nsa in Moldova in 1996. It is estimated that there are around 1000 Bahá’í followers in Ukraine in 2007.

Bahá’í Community as a New Religious Movement in Croatia

Concerning the religious situation in Croatia during communism, besides the general negative attitude towards religions and churches, two periods can be differentiated. The first one was a period of secularization that lasted until the end of the 1970s and the beginning of the 1980s. The second period was the revitalization period from the 1980s until today. It is clear that this change was

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influenced by the collapse of communism (Zrinščak 2006). According to the empirical data from the end of the 1980s and the beginning of 1990s, the change of position of religious communities in society is traced to the significant increase of traditional religiosity (Aračić, Črpić, Nikodem 2003; Cifrić 2000; Črpić, Zrinščak 2005; Marinović Bobinac 2005; Marinović Jerolimov 1999, 2000, 2005). Although this increase is not present at the same level in all dimensions of religiosity its scope is documented between 30–40%. According to the Census in 2001, the confessional structure in Croatia was: 87.83% of Roman Catholic Church, 4.42% of Orthodox Church, 2.99% of agnostics and undeclared, 2.22% of not religious, 1.28% of Islamic Religious Community, 0.54% of Greek Orthodox Church, 0.14% of Jehovah´s Witness, 0.11% of other religions, 0.09% of other protestant churches, 0.08% of the Evangelical Church, 0.07% of the Adventist Church, 0.04% of the Baptist Church, 0.01% Jewish Religious Community, 0.01% Christ’s Pentecostal Church and 0.58% of unknown. Unlike the West, revitalization of religion in Croatia does not follow the trends of disengaging religion from the political society, processes of individualization, de-traditionalization and de-collectivization in decision-making and trend in the increase of religions a la carte, that is religious bricolage. In Croatia, the opposite trends exist: revitalization of religion (which is, widely said, occurring as re-aggregation around ecclesiastical institutions), re-traditionalization and re-totalisation (Vrcan 2001). Besides the general increase of traditional church religiosity, some researches pointed to young, urban and higher educated people as more open to the different forms of alternative religiosity (Črpić, Jukić 1998; Marinović Jerolimov 2006). In 1928, American journalist Martha Root4 came to Croatia and made a contact with one of the most famous political figures in Croatian political history – Stjepan Radić. This was the first time that Bahá’í religion was publicly mentioned in Croatia. During the 1970s there were some people who declared themselves to be Bahá’í’s, but the organized functioning of Bahá’í movement started in the 1990s. Missionaries from England and Italy came to Croatia to spread the Bahá’í faith. They started to gather people in Zagreb and Pula. In the beginning, the Bahá’í community was registered as a non-governmental organization. In 2002, the Croatian parliament enacted The Law of the legal position of religious communities. In accordance with that law, all religious communities that were registered as Non-Government Organizations (ngo’s) up to that date could register as a religious community and have all the rights proscribed by the law. In Croatia, there are 42 registered religious 4 Martha Louise Root (1872–1939) was traveling teacher of Bahá’í faith and posthumously named a “Hand of Cause” by Shoghi Effendi.

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communities. The Bahá’í community in Croatia is satisfied with The Law of the legal position of religious communities and did not have any legal problems during the process of registration. The fact that they had registered as an ngo helped them to determine their legal position as a religious community, although the law imposes the criterion of at least 500 members to register. If a Bahá’í community by any chance did not register as an ngo it would be impossible to gain legal position provided by the law. According to the Bahá’í census in 2006, there are approximately 150 followers (see Table  10.1). They are gathered in Zagreb, Rijeka, Pula, Pazin and Velika Gorica. The Bahá’í community in Croatia did not organize National Spiritual Assemblies, only Local Spiritual Assemblies in Zagreb and Pula. They assume that in the near future it will be possible to organize National Spiritual Assemblies. In comparison to other countries of former Yugoslavia, the Croatian Bahá’í community with its organization and actions has developed the most. Community financing is allowed only by voluntary contributions and the amounts of the contributions as well as contributors are not revealed. It is not acceptable to take any financial contributions outside of the community. The activities of the Bahá’í community in Croatia are primarily oriented towards the needs of the community. They have programs of religious education for children and adults, educate members to study the Holy Scriptures from other religions, have prayer meetings, spiritual courses for children and Table 10.1 Number of adherents of the Bahá’í religion in some Countries

Croatia Slovenia Bulgaria Czech. Republic Italy Slovakia Poland Romania Eastern Europe World

1990

2000

– 100 600 820 5000 400 450 1700 19,310 5,676,287

150* 297 657 950 5681 667 504 1843 21,811 7,111,661

* This data is from a census conducted by the Bahá’í organization in Croatia. Source: Countries (Barrett, D. et al. 2001)

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adults, public lectures and publishing. The Croatian Bahá’í community cooperates with other Bahá’í communities in other countries, especially in the region (organization of summer schools). They also cooperate with the Universal House of Justice when there are some new publishing projects. The Center of the Bahá’í community in Croatia is in Zagreb in one small house in which believers gather and practice their religion. They are satisfied with this house, although they do not have the possibility to organize public lectures in their center.

Chapter 11

Religious Freedom in Contemporary Croatian Society (From 1997 to 2008) Neven Duvnjak and Ivica Sokol The main goal of this paper is to give an overview of religious freedom in Republic of Croatia in the period between 1997 and 2008. During this time, three surveys were conducted among high ranked representatives of various religious communities (in 1997, 2003 and 2008). The special aim of these surveys was to see the position of religious communities after the new “Law on legal position of religious communities” (2002) had been passed in Croatian Parliament. Religion, and in particular the Catholic Church, had an important role in maintaining the separate cultural and political identity of Croats. After losing its independence at the beginning of twelfth century, Croatia became a part of Kingdom of Hungary (so-called personal union of Croatia and Hungary). Other parts of Croatian territory were under Venetian Republic and Byzantine Empire rule. The Ottoman invasion was of particular importance because almost 400 years of Croatian history were marked by the wars with the Ottoman Empire who occupied much of present territory. In this case, differences in faith became very important because the enemy was someone with different religious and cultural backgrounds. Identification and dis­ tinction based on religious identity is still present in the territory of former Yugoslavia. It was especially vivid during the Homeland War in Croatia (1991–1995). After the First World War and the collapse of the Austrian-Hungarian Empire in 1918, Croatia became a part of the new state, the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, which was renamed to the Kingdom of Yugoslavia in 1929. And again the differences between nationalities overlapped with the religious differences: religion became the main marker of someone’s identity. It is important to say that Kingdom of Yugoslavia attempted to regulate the position of the Catholic Church by the Concordat with the Holy See. Finally, the Concordat was signed in 1935, but because of strong opposition from the Serbian Orthodox Church it was never approved in Parliament. During the communist period, religion was treated as an unprogressive social phenomenon and a strictly private matter. In other words, the Church was not allowed to function in the public sphere, but only inside its own © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2014 | doi 10.1163/9789004263147_013

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province. In 1966 the Yugoslav Government signed the Agreement with the Holy See and the position of Catholic Church slightly improved. However, a basic hostility between Church and State never changed. During that period, the Church was the only social institution that was not controlled by the State and Party. Various social acts of the Church gained political attributes, so the Church was the only organized opposition in communist Yugoslavia. We now analyze some aspects of theYugoslav society that are important for understanding the processes of transition and democratization that occurred in 1990s, after the fall of communism. This society was pre-modern, nondemocratic and, above all, based on traditional values. The best sociological expression of Yugoslav society was the notion of collectivism. Collective values were ranked much higher than those of individualism. The decomposition of collectivism was a necessary condition for social change, but this would jeopardize the leading role of the Communist Party. It is clear that such kind of modernization was not allowed by the communist regime. Under communist rule, there were some kind of semi-modernization processes that existed in the society, but they were hostile toward individual entrepreneurship. According to sociologist J. Županov (2002), collective values are transcendental or quasi-transcendental and individual values are pragmatic. In that time, another name for any Yugoslav company was “kolektiv.” Thus, a company had to be some kind of “collective value,” but not an act of individual will or effort. Županov (2002:63) goes further and even says that the famous selfmanagement model of the economy in Yugoslavia was primarily the defense of Tito’s charisma against Stalin’s attack. It is true that there were strong secularization processes during the communist period, but all these processes did not contribute to the democratization and modernization of Yugoslav society. When he speaks about problems of transition after the fall of communism, sociologist V. Pusić says that Croatia did not possess one strong social segment to initiate a transitional impulse. Unlike Croatia, Poland had “Solidarnosc” with its political elite, Hungary had reformed communists with political and economic vision and Czechoslovakia developed a civil society able for social action (Pusić 1992:13–30). For Catholic believers in Croatia, the situation in the context of modernization was not any better. The best argument for this thesis was the acceptance of Vatican Council II, which according to the “Aufbruch Project,” had only a weak acceptance among great majority of Croatian clergy. Just after the Council, modern and progressive parts of the Catholic Church in Croatia tried to implement various Council ideas. The most active were Jesuits who organized the publishing of Council documents and various discussions between believers and Marxists, ecumenism and tolerance. They saw the Council as a

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chance of modernization and “aggiornamento.” However, the mentality of the majority of Croatian clergy and Church officials remained close to traditional teaching and values. They saw the Council and its reforms as a danger to Church unity in the hostile communist surrounding (Mate-Toth & Mikluščak 2001:36). Instead of bringing modernization, the Catholic Church in Croatia was a great producer of symbolic meanings and models for construction of identity and national sovereignty. These models were perceived as anti-­ communist forces, challenging Marxist ideology. It is important to emphasize that the Church paid little attention to problems such as work ethics or economic activities, showing much more interest in political issues (Mach 1997:67, 68). There is an exception specific to Croatia: when the Church spoke about economic problems, it was mainly expressed by comparing successful Western economies (especially using case of Germany)1 with the ineffective situation in the Communist world. In addition, another Croatian characteristic, as well as in the whole of Eastern Europe, was the close connection with Popes, especially with Polish Pope John Paul II. This closeness was a kind of protection and a space of freedom, which especially became prominent after Pope Woytila said: “There is no more Church of Silence because now it speaks with my voice” (Bernstein, Politi 1996:184). The basic aim of this introduction is to illustrate the situation during the Communist era, and to say explicitly that Croatian society was not well prepared for the complex process of transition from a communist to a modern democratic and capitalist society.

First Post-Communist Decade

Following the first democratic elections and the constitution of a multi-party parliament, “The Constitution of the Republic of Croatia” (1990) was produced to regulate in quite a new way questions of religious life and activity of religious communities as well as the question of liberty of religions. Regulations of the Constitution are in accordance with the highest international legal standards existing in other European democratic countries, and in accordance with Article 18 of the “General Declaration on Human Rights” of the United Nations. Article 40 of the Croatian Constitution explicitly speaks about freedom of religious beliefs: “Freedom of conscience and beliefs is guaranteed as well as 1 Croatia has long economic ties with Germany and almost 300,000 Croatian guest-workers (so called “gastarbeiters”) worked in Western Germany from the early 1960s until the present day.

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free public right of faith or other conviction.” Furthermore article 41 speaks of equality of all religious communities, their relationship with the State, and freedom of actions and protection by the State: “All religious communities are equal in front of Law and independent of the State. Religious communities are legally entitled to perform their services in public, to open schools, colleges, other establishments, social and charitable institutions and to administer them and for such activities they obtain full protection and help from the State.” The Catholic Church welcomed the political changes in 1990 and was accepted as the most important symbol of the anti-communist victory. Great understanding was expressed between the Church and the new political elite who embraced the Church and often used it as a symbol for various political and social acts (Zrinščak 1999). Other religious communities also welcomed the fall of the communism regime but because of their minority status they remained socially marginalized. The position of the Serbian Orthodox Church was completely different and even problematic because it stood as an inimical symbol of Serbs in Croatia and also of the Serbian regime in Serbia (Zrinščak 1999). It was the period when churches and monasteries were often the main target of enemies and when the Catholic Church became the victim who shared its martyrdom with its own people. From the 1990s, Croatia entered into the mentioned process of transition and faced the serious social consequences: widening inequality, unemployment, and poverty. Yet, worst of all was that Croatia experienced a terrible war (1991–1995) resulting in many dead and wounded people, occupied and destroyed territories, a great number of refugees and various post-war traumas. The war caused serious social consequences: it was a period with great social distance against people with different national, religious and cultural backgrounds or different political and even lifestyle orientations. The level of general trust in key institutions (Government, Parliament, Political Parties, Administration of Justice, etc.) was significantly low. Only the Catholic Church and the Croatian Army earned a high level of trust from the respondents. During those years, the strength of social integration around the Catholic Church in Croatia was clearly visible, as it was throughout the entire history. Hence, as was to be expected, just after the war the Republic of Croatia signed Agreements with the Holy See. Four Agreements were signed: three in the 1996 and fourth in 1998.2 (Eterović 1997:181–186). 2 The Agreements were: 1. On Legal Questions; 2. On Spiritual Care in Military and Police Forces; 3. On Co-operation in the Field of Education and Culture; 4. On Economic Issues.

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The Results of the First Survey among the High-Ranking Representatives of Religious Communities in Croatia (1997)

In the previous part of this chapter, we have given references to the position of religious freedom in Croatia starting with 1990 when the first democratic elections were held and when the Constitution was created. In order to make these details as actual as possible and in order to get a better view of the position of religious freedom in Croatia in that period, a survey was carried out among the representatives of 11 religious communities active in Croatia. We chose a representative sample that included representatives of a great number of registered Christian Churches in Croatia, and representatives of the Islamic and Jewish communities.3 From a total of 11 questionnaires mailed, 10 were valid, while only one was returned unfilled, with an explanation that a particular religious community was solving its own problems only in direct contact with authorities. Now we can ask a crucial question: what does the constitutional stipulation “Equal before Law” really mean for religious communities in Croatia? To get this and other answers, we consulted the results of a survey from 1997. • The largest number of the persons surveyed was partially satisfied with conditions of religious freedom in Croatia in the late 1990s (7), while a smaller part (3) was satisfied completely. It is important to emphasize that no one replied of having been completely unsatisfied with the state of religious liberties in Croatia. • On the other hand, most of persons surveyed (6) disagreed with the statement that the Croatian authorities have equal relations with all registered religious communities. The majority of them (9) were of the opinion that the Catholic Church was in a much better and privileged position than the others. • As far as the new Law on religious communities was concerned, an opinion prevailed that such a Law is unnecessary (6 replies) and this opinion referred to the conclusion that a model of relation between Church and State defined by P. Mojzes as pluralistic liberty is very close to the representatives of “smaller” religious communities in Croatia: “In such a state, religious organizations and 3 To obtain reliable replies as possible, a decision was made for an anonymous survey. Questionnaires were mailed to the addresses of particular representatives of Churches and Religious Communities surveyed and were returned in the same way to the survey organizer. Ten questions were to be replied to by the persons polled, the ones who were the closest connected to religious freedom in Croatia of today.

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the government are truly separated with no intention on the part of either to dictate or mix into the domain of other” (Mojzes 1996:268). However, if the Law on religious communities happens to be brought, then the respondents agree and require that all religious communities, irrespective of their number and influence in society, should equally participate in bringing it out (9 replies out of 11). Furthermore, most of the representatives of religious communities are only partly satisfied with their presence in the mass media and estimate that the position seems better in the press and radio broadcasts, but are quite unsatisfied with their presence on tv (6 replies). Such standpoints are not surprising at all, since tv is the most powerful medium watched by numerous populations. So it was to be expected that the responders could be unsatisfied with their presence and treatment just on tv. Most of them (6) declared that there were cases in previous years when negative articles and discussions appeared about their religious community in the mass media, but did not suppose such occurrences were too frequent. Public religious education: the majority of religious officials (8) are against confessional religious education in elementary schools; a fact that speaks in favour of re-examining the decision of the Government. They rather proposed improvement of the existing model or making up quite a new one. In that time it could be expected that any important change would hardly occur in that field. There were two reasons: first, the fact that a large number of pupils attend school catechism organized by the Catholic Church and second, due to the mentioned agreement between Croatia and the Holy See, in which Croatia is under obligation to guarantee the teaching of Catholic catechism in all public elementary and secondary schools. As far as the arrival of foreign missionaries or adherents of different religious communities and movements are involved, most of respondents (7) have shown tolerance and believe that the freedom of preaching should not be limited. Only a small number (2) think that the law should regulate missionary activity. In other words, the preaching of religious beliefs should be regulated. The greatest problems that religious communities have been faced with in Croatia in the end of the last century are the ones connected with the purchase, building or adaptation of objects required for regular work with believers (5 replies). This is partly a reflection of the complex economic situation in Croatia at the time but also partly of the unfinished legal regulations in that field. Discontent was also felt within organizing confessional religious education in public schools (2 replies) and it seems this is one of the crucial questions as far as religious freedom in Croatia is involved.

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In our opinion, it would be useful for the representatives of Government and religious communities to reconsider all aspects of school religious education and thus reach the most suitable solution. Estimating replies obtained by the survey, a standpoint prevails that it would be better to organize religious education by religious communities alone in their own premises. • It was the question of humanitarian aid that was also emphasized in the survey (2 replies). Although this problem was not analysed in detail, there were cases that in the course of the war in Croatia there were organizations that received and distributed humanitarian aid and were given preferential treatment by the Government over the others.

Situation in the Third Millennium

It was evident that the Catholic Church in Croatia is in a much better position than other religious communities, especially after signing the Agreements between the Government and Holy See. Also, these Agreements provoked debate among scholars and some of them even said that the Agreements were against the principle of the separation of Church and State. Namely, some intellectuals noticed that the language of Agreements, particularly sections treating family and marriage issues, was more similar to the Canonic Law than to the Croatian law tradition (Zrinščak 1999). In the beginning of 2000, a left wing coalition won the parliamentary elections, when hdz (Croatian Democratic Community) lost power after 10 years’ rule. The left wing coalition wanted to introduce higher democratic standards and one of their goals was to improve the position of all religious communities. The whole situation was more complex when we have in mind that the old communist “Law on Legal Status of Religious Communities” from 1978 was still valid. It was the reason why the Government expressed interest for drafting the new Law on religious communities. Finally, the Law that recognizes the legal public entity and guarantees the liberal public action of religious communities was passed in the Croatian Parliament in 2002. In other words, the Government recognized the religious communities, filed as autonomous social organizations, largely free from legal or administrative regulations. It also clearly states that religious communities are free to decide about all questions concerning internal organizations. This was a big step forward when we bear in mind the tradition of legal regulation of all social fields in Croatia during the communist era.

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The Law also states that the Government can sign Agreements with religious communities, to regulate all additional questions. There were some complaints to the Law restrictions mainly by smaller religious communities: for example, why must a religious community have no less than 500 members to be registered? Another complaint was why religious communities must be registered at least for 5 years as a civil association? That was a condition for them to be enlisted in the official state evidence of religious communities.4 After the Law had passed in Parliament, the Croatian Government signed particular Agreements with major religious communities in Croatia at the end of 2002 and in the first half of 2003. These Agreements have brought some positive results. For example, there were no obstacles for the establishment of “Islamic High School” and “Faculty of Islamic Studies” in Zagreb (capitol of Croatia). In this context it is useful to quote Mufti Šefko Omerbašić:5 “The Islam community and Muslims in Croatia can be satisfied with their legal status in Republic of Croatia. Without exaggerating we can conclude that the Croatian model of solution of status and position of Muslims is one of the best, if not the best in Europe. In my opinion, but on the basis of my own observations, the States of the European Union will need the experiences from this area for the solution of Muslim question.”6 Also, in September 2006, the Jewish community opened an Elementary school “Lauder-Hugo Kon” although they did not sign the Agreement with Government because of problems of restitution of the property taken by the force during World War II by the pro-fascist regime in Croatia from 1941–1945.

The Results of the Second Survey among the High-Ranking Representatives of Religious Communities in Croatia (2003)

In 2003 we made another survey to see possible changes after the 1997 survey. This time we received 13 valid responses from religious leaders: • The majority of them (8) answered that they were satisfied with the general position of religious liberties in Croatia. Among those who were not 4 According to the Croatian Law of Associations. 5 Mufti Š. Omerbašić is a leader of Islam Community in the Republic of Croatia. 6 These words were said in March 27, 2004 during the conference “Shaping the mentality of Croatian society and Accession to European Union” organized by Ministry for European Integration and wcrp and in the presence of Dr M. Weninger, the Policy Advisor to the President of European Commission for Dialogue with Churches and Religious Communities.

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satisfied (5), 3 of them stressed that they did not like to be publicly called “the sects”: that was the main reason for their negative response. Concerning Government relations to religious communities, the majority (10 out of 13) of respondents answered once more that the Catholic Church is in a privileged position. Satisfaction with the new Law on Religious Communities: 8 representatives were satisfied and 5 were not. Those who were not satisfied said that the Law is not good for smaller religious communities. Here, we must remember that in the 1997 survey 6 out of 10 respondents answered that no Law was necessary (only 3 answered that Law is desirable). Acceptance of the Law shows the positive tendency and improving relation between religious communities and the State in Croatia. When answering the question about the effects of the new Law in the near future, 6 respondents think that the situation will be better, 5 answered that the situation will remain the same, and only 2 of them expressed the opinion that the situation will be worse. This is also an indicator of the positive tendencies in Croatian society, and it also shows the slight rise of trust in the State (institutions). In the second survey we again asked the question about the appearance of religious communities in the Croatian mass media. Satisfaction with the appearance in mass media is as follows: only 4 representatives were completely satisfied, 7 were not satisfied and 2 did not give an answer. We can explain this with greater freedom in Croatian media space and especially with the fact that popular commercial tv stations pay little attention to the everyday activities of religious communities. Public tv station hrt (Croatian Radio Television) mainly covers the religious activities of traditional religious communities. Religious issues come into the focus of broader interest when some “scandal” in a religious field occurs (for example, pedophilia, money fraud, prejudices about activities of smaller religious communities, etc.). Question about troubles in everyday work: those without troubles were 6 respondents, 4 had troubles and 3 faced only little problems. It is important to emphasize the fact that almost all said that they had no problems with Government, but only with local authorities. In the 1997 survey, 10 respondents said that they had troubles in everyday work. Thus, comparing the situation in 1997 and 2003, we can notice the improvement in the field of religious freedom in Croatia. Confessional religious education in public elementary and secondary schools: answers are interesting because only 4 representatives think that it is a good solution and 9 think the present solution is not good. It is obvious

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that smaller religious communities do not accept the Croatian model of religious education for two main reasons: the lack of teachers and lack of pupils.7

The Results of Third Survey among the High-Ranking Representatives of Religious Communities in Croatia (2008)

In 2008, we made third survey and we received 15 valid responses, the most of all surveys: • There is general satisfaction with religious freedom in Croatia: out of 15 respondents, 9 were satisfied with the general situation. It is important to emphasize that all 6 who were not satisfied had not yet signed the Agreement with the Government. All of them were smaller religious communities. Here, it is visible that Croatia shares the problem that is present in the whole of Europe where smaller and new religions also face similar problems in everyday activities and the regulations of their relations with authorities on various levels. • Concerning satisfaction with the Law from 2002, results show that 8 representatives are satisfied, 5 not satisfied and 2 did not give an answer. It is interesting that the answers are almost the same as from the previous survey, which means that in the period from 2005 till 2008 there was not any significant changes: neither for good, nor bad. • Expected effects of the Law in the near future: here we have 10 respondents who think that the Law will improve conditions of religious freedom in Croatia, while 5 of them are little bit pessimistic and they think that the situation will remain the same. Here, we clearly see that the optimistic view on the development of religious liberties in the near future prevails. • The fourth question was about the relation between the Government and religious communities: again the majority of the representatives (11 out of  15) see the Catholic Church as the privileged religious community in Croatia. The very similar answers were registered in two previous surveys. That is expected because of the strength and great influence of Catholic Church in Croatia throughout history. Yet, we are of the opinion that such a position should not threaten any other religious communities that legally exist in Croatia. 7 According to Croatian regulations it is necessary to have seven pupils in one school to organize class for religious teaching.

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• After five years we again asked religious representatives about troubles with authorities in their everyday activities. Out of 15 respondents, 10 had no troubles and 5 have some. All five religious communities who are facing troubles are smaller communities and they are generally not satisfied with their position in Croatia. According to the surveys’ results it is obvious that they are not well integrated into Croatian society. The fact that they have not yet signed the Agreement with the Government is an additional obstacle for them. • Answers about problems with mass media show that 6 representatives are satisfied with their media treatment and 9 are not satisfied. Looking at the numbers proportionally, the situation is almost the same as in the 2003 survey (see data above). Also, the explanations that we gave for the previous survey are still valid. • Confessional religious education: only 6 leaders answered that it is good solution (less than half) while 9 of them still think that Croatia must find a better model of religious education in public schools.

Concluding Remarks

We shall now separate the main characteristics of religious freedom in Croatia from 1990 till 2008: • The constitutional and legal solutions regulating the questions of activities of religious communities in Croatia are in our opinion good and are at the same level with the existing ones in most of the developed Western democracies. Freedom of religious beliefs and equality of religious communities according to the Constitution and Law are guaranteed by such solutions that are also a solid basis for the settlement of problems and misunderstandings appearing in the area of religious liberties. • Most misunderstandings regarding religious freedom come out of the specific position and role that the Catholic Church has in Croatian society, as well as out of the fact that the Catholic Church is the most numerous and most influential religious community in Croatia. It was learned by these surveys that the representatives of other religious communities think that the Catholic Church is enjoying privileges from the authorities on account of the other religious communities. • Some religious communities in their activities have special troubles, which could be emphasized thanks to the analysis of events starting with 1991 until now and to the results of surveys carried out. The main troubles are:

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problems concerning religious education in schools, presence of religious communities in mass media and a way of writing and speaking about them, questions concerning purchase, and building or adaptation of objects for religious service. • Speaking generally, we are of the opinion that the position of religious liberties in Croatia today is generally good, and that the existing problems and misunderstandings could be settled by dialogue between the representatives of the Government and the representatives of religious communities (especially smaller ones). In that process, various non-governmental organizations dealing with the human rights and religious freedom, such as, “Association for religious liberties in the Republic of Croatia” and “World Conference on Religion and Peace-Croatian chapter” are also of great consideration. • It is evident that religious freedom is getting better. In Croatia there is one great community (the Catholic Church) and a number of historically established communities. However, the problem is with the acceptance of small and new religious communities. The Croatian problem is also the problem of the whole of Europe. Here, it is useful to quote J. Richardson (1996): “Even a cursory review of the reaction of the most Western European societies toward new religions reveals considerable animosity toward the new groups, coupled with efforts to exert control over them.” And now, after more than 20 years of transition, we can claim that Croatia has entered the phase of pluralism. It does not only mean that in Croatia several different religious communities live together. It is more important that the religious situation in Croatia can be theoretically explained in terms of pluralism and pluralization. As Peter Berger (1992:37) says “By pluralism I mean more or less what the term means in ordinary usage – the co-existence with a measure of civic peace of different groups in one society.” In Croatia the process of modernization is also very visible. It is a continuing and progressive process and this process only deepens pluralizing effects. In accordance with Berger’s explanations, we think that what happens in Croatia can be partly recognized as “cognitive contamination,” the case when different lifestyles values and beliefs begin to mingle. The worldviews, which until now were taken for granted, are opened to pervasive relativism (Berger 1992:38, 39). In facing these new conditions religions, especially older ones, are forced to react. They can use some kind of “cognitive retrenchment:” offensive or defensive ones (Berger 1992:41). However, in our opinion there is a third option: they start a mutual dia­ logue  because they feel that they are stronger when facing the challenges of

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secularization together. So we have a dialogue, but this kind of dialogue occurs above all on the level of religious leaders and high-ranking officials. In the end, it is necessary to make some remarks about the strongest and oldest religious community – the Catholic Church in Croatia. It is no longer possible for it to maintain its highly disciplined internal unity. The consequence is a more pluralistic and democratic environment within the Church. In the spirit of Vatican Council II, dialogue with secular powers is inevitable and indispensable (Hornby-Smith 1997:147). In that way, the Church can be more autonomous, taking part in the building of civil society.

Chapter 12

Religiosity and Attitudes towards Sexuality and Marriage in Croatia Dinka Marinović Jerolimov In the second half of the twentieth century, the perception of human sexuality has considerably changed. Marital, family, and sexual relationships have become more liberalized. Feminist movements, gay rights movements and their struggle for the legalization of homosexual marriages, increased divorce rate, second marriage after a divorce, experimenting with cohabitation, development and usage of contraceptives, early entering into sexual relationships, increased tolerance to different lifestyles etc., all this has affected the change of the “picture” of sexuality and of the attitudes and values related to this important aspect of human life. In the Croatian historical and socio-cultural context (with a dominant Catholic majority), attitudes towards sexuality and marriage are partially under the influence of liberal, modern values as well as legal solutions and policies belonging to former socialist times, and partially under the influence of traditional Christian values that have been increasingly promoted in the post-socialist period when higher democratisation of society occurred. What is also important within this context is to see how the Catholic Church has been and is confronting these changes and their consequences.1 Namely, after the change of the social system at the beginning of the 1990s, in Croatia, as in many other post-socialist countries, the position and role of religion and the church in society has changed and their total social importance and public role have increased. Their presence has considerably increased in the public media and in the educational system as well. Especially important id the role of the Catholic Church as the dominant religion. Although, as it can be seen from the research carried out in the 1970s and 1980s, besides Slovenia,

1 There are numerous encyclicals and documents in which the attitudes of the Church on these issues can be found: e.g. Arcanum divinae sapientiae (1880), Casti Connubii (1930), Humanae vitae (1968), Persona humana (1975), Evangelium vitae (1995), Odgojne smjernice o ljudskoj ljubavi. Obrisi spolnog odgoja (1983), Ljudska spolnost: istina i značenje. Odgojne smjernice u obitelji (1995), Dar života. Naputak o poštivanju ljudskog života u nastanku I o dostojanstvu rađanja. Odgovori na neka aktualna pitanja (1987) etc. (Seling 2001, Baloban, Črpić 2000).

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2014 | doi 10.1163/9789004263147_014

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religiosity in Croatia has spread more than in other parts of former Yugoslavia, and in completely new social circumstances its sharp growth manifested in all of its key dimensions. The findings of various research from the 1990s confirmed a high degree of declared religiosity.2 The latest research carried out at the beginning of the twenty-first century shows that we can speak of the stabilization of the believers’ structure3 that equally demonstrated the studies of the adult and young population. This research determined a high degree of religiosity (especially within dimensions of confessional and religious identification and some crucial church beliefs) but it was not equal in all its dimensions (Boneta 2000; Cifrić 2000; Črpić & Kušar 1998; Črpić & Valković 2000; Goja 2000; Mandarić, 2000; Marinović Jerolimov 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002; Zrinščak, Črpić & Kušar 2000; Vrcan 2001). When the ritual dimension is concerned, especially consequential ones, religiosity is less present. Although more religious individuals accept traditional values to a higher degree (Baloban, Črpić 1998; Labus 2000, 2005), in the case of consequential religiosity referring to the impact of religiosity in everyday life that has been researched at a level of different viewpoints of people, we can observe significant presence of liberal, modern values (Marinović Jelolimov 2002; Črpić, Zrinščak 2005). Deviation from the values of traditional religious morality can especially be seen in relation to the attitudes on sexuality and marriage (Baloban, Črpić 1998, 2000, 2000a; Marinović Jerolimov 2002) as well as abortion (Goldberger 2005). However, although religiosity in Croatia presents a shared cultural template belonging not only to the religious, but also less religious and nonreligious parts of the population, analysis has shown that besides the processes of revitalisation, desecularisation and deprivatisation, at the individual level there are indications of the parallel existence of opposite processes. It is manifested in the dissolution of dogmatic systems, parallel adoption of alternative extra-church beliefs by a certain part of believers, the gap between the level of believing and religious practice, as well as in respondents’ attitudes that move away from the moral norms of the church. 2 “Društvena struktura i kvaliteta života u razdoblju tranzicije,” 1996 (Institute for Social Research in Zagreb), “Aufbruch” part covering Croatia, 1997 (Research team under the supervision of P. Aračić), “Vjera i moral u Hrvatskoj,” 1997/1998 (University of Zagreb, Catholic Faculty of Theology), “Religijske i društvene vrijednosti u hrvatskom društvu,” 1999 (Institute for Social Research in Zagreb), “Europsko istraživanje vrednota,” 1999 (University of Zagreb, Catholic Faculty of Theology), and “Društvene i religijske promjene u Hrvatskoj,” 2004 (Institute for Social Research in Zagreb). 3 The data obtained from the research European Value Survey (2000) and International Social Survey Programme (2008).

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A European study of values in 1999 demonstrates where Croatia stands within the European context regarding the issues related to the areas of individual morality.4 According to the results, the respondents from WestEuropean countries showed a higher level of permissiveness (in the sense of personal choice) than those in the transitional countries. It was determined that the respondents from Catholic countries (with more than 70% Catholics), Croatia included, showed considerably lower levels of permissiveness in relation to individual morality than the respondents from other European countries that participated in the research. This level placed Croatia closer to the East European countries with the lowest level of permissiveness, as opposed to the highest levels determined in the North European countries (Baloban, Črpić 2005). On the other hand, the results of the international research Aufbruch reveal the fact that in Croatia some issues regarding sexuality (to have/not to have sexual relationships before marriage, not to use artificial contraceptive methods – pills, condoms) have been recognized by the respondents as something “the least substantially Christian which a modern Christian believer should stick to in order to consider her/himself a Christian.” This was determined within the population in general and among religious practitioners as well (Aračić, Nikodem 2003:75–76). Having in mind the above findings, the aim of this paper is to determine the attitudes of the population in Croatia towards some substantial questions related to the area of sexuality and marriage, respectively, to which extent the population (dominantly Catholic) is in conformity with the norms of traditional church morality. The data was analysed with regard to the expressed level of religiosity and the occurrence of participation in the religious practice in order to determine which parts of population adhere more to traditional and which to modern values. The following hypotheses have been put forward: H1: Religious respondents move away from the church norms with regard to the attitudes towards marriage and sexuality. H2: Regular participation in religious practices is a predictor of a higher adherence to the church moral norms.

4 In this research the index of individual morality was constructed from the variables related to the attitudes towards divorce, abortion, homosexuality, euthanasia, and casual sex (Baloban, Črpić 2005:238).

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Methodological Notes

This paper deals with analysing the data from the research “Social and religious change in Croatia” which was carried out by the Institute for Social Research in Zagreb in 2004 on the representative sample of adult population of Croatia (N = 2220) in 154 towns. The subject matter of the analysis is the attitudes towards sexuality and marriage expressed by means of statements (indicators) about the usage of contraceptives, sexual relationships before marriage, divorce, cohabitation, having children outside wedlock, legalisation of prostitution, love affair with a married person, homosexual marriages, sexual relationship with a person of the same sex and the statement that woman should be a virgin when she marries. The respondents expressed the level of permissiveness of the quoted statements on the basis of following offered answers: 1.) completely unacceptable, 2.) mainly unacceptable, 3.) I am neutral 4.) mainly acceptable and 5.) completely acceptable, which we comprised into three categories: unacceptable, I am neutral, acceptable. As an indicator of religiosity, a scale of religious self-identification was used which consisted of six evaluative statements: 1.) convinced believers who accept everything that their religions teaches, 2.) religious, although not accepting all that is taught by their religion, 3.) thinking a lot about it but they are not sure if they believe or not, 4.) indifferent towards religion, 5.) nonreligious who have nothing against religion, 6.) non-religious who disapprove of religion. A question about frequency of Mass attendances (never, only on religious holidays, monthly, weekly, daily) was used as an indicator of religious practice. Variables set for statistical processing in the SPSS programme have been analysed by means of univariate (frequencies, percentages, arithmetic mean) and bivariate (analysis of variance) methods. Statistical significance was calculated at the level p