“It is customary to blame secular science and anti-religious philosophy for the eclipse of religion in modern society. It would be more honest to blame religion for its own defeats. Religion declined not because it was refuted, but because it became irrelevant, dull, oppressive, insipid. When faith is completely replaced by creed, worship by discipline, love by habit; when the crisis of today is ignored because of the splendor of the past; when faith becomes an heirloom rather than a living fountain; when religion speaks only in the name of authority rather than with the voice of compassion–its message becomes meaningless.”
― Abraham Joshua Heschel, God in Search of Man: A Philosophy of Judaism
Hmm, up to a point, Lord Copper.
The general intention and gist seem honourable and clear to the well-intentioned orthodox thinking reader, but there are also points which at least bear a superficial resemblance to the classic slanders of the enemies of religion: an over-simplifying and demeaning polarization with regard to creed, discipline, habit, the goods of tradition, authority. All of them are actually good things, but here they are opposed to other good things in such a way that a reader could be led to conclude that they are supposed to be bad.
And in any case, does the vague abstraction “religion” as he uses it here have any real meaning at all? It would make more sense if he spoke of “some religious people”.
Taken as it is, without context which could attenuate the polarizing tendency of this passage, and without commentary, this passage itself seems tendentious, negative and meaningless, which I think is doing an injustice to its author and his theological thought (though I am not an expert, but resorted to a quick glance at Wikipedia!).
Compassion to me is meaningless compared with tradition. Compassion cannot tell right from wrong, and often leads people down the path of short term pleasure to long term destruction. Unless you have tradition as a guide, unless you know the reason behind the taboo, compassion becomes destructive.
Spoken like a true Pharisee, Ted. In my experience, too much compassion is rarely the problem.
The Rabbi spoke of when “faith is completely replaced by creed, worship by discipline, love by habit”; he did not deny the necessity of any of these things.
And this was spoken long before the time when Christianity was undermined by scandals of every sort, the prosperity “gospel” of modern pentecostalism, and the identification of religious conservatism with the politics of torture, war, and nationalism.
It seems to me that the world is sick of “religion”, especially the Christian variety, and I can hardly bleme it…
A good example of too much compassion is the sin of abortion where one individual is killed for the material wealth of another.
Heschel’s statement certainly has some truth in it, but I have to agree with Ben that it suffers from vagueness and a tendency to overgeneralize. It reduces a complex subject that historians are by no means agreed upon to a few causes. I don’t doubt that the reasons Heschel postulates were frequently at work, but I’d hesitate to say they were necessarily the only causes or always the most important.
Also, I think you’re sometimes too hard on poor Ted. Compassion, simply regarded as a feeling, can lead to evils, e.g., to facilitating an abortion because you feel sorry for the plight of the woman. Compassion, like all human acts, has to be informed by thinking, otherwise it can lead to wrongdoing. Perhaps it depends on what one means by “compassion.” I think Ted was just using the word in its ordinary and often misunderstood meaning.
“Poor Ted” has a way of overstating things in a way that has no nuance and drives me crazy. Sorry if I overreact.
It does seem to me that contemporary Christians are much more in danger of a deficit of compassion than a surplus…
Nuance drives me nuts too. Nuance is second cousin to lying from my point of view, and like all lies, does nobody any good.
Ted, please, think about what you said. Reality is not always black or white, and our judgments should reflect reality. When things are clear, then, yes, our judgments should be clear. When things are complex, then often we have to make nuanced judgments about them. Are you a Catholic? Have you ever read St. Thomas Aquinas? He was one of the greatest nuancers of all time, and rightly so, for he tried to respect reality in what he wrote.
YOUR reality may not be black and white, but all of the worst mistakes in my life came from thinking there were shades of grey because nobody had bothered to tell me when things were wrong.
My reality is black and white. Anything less just leads to heartbreak and rage.
I’m not sure that one can generalize when speaking of “contemporary Christians.” But if you mean the high-profile conservative Evangelicals and Catholics – yes, I agree with you.
I speak of much more than that; of polls of Catholics showing a high level of support for the death penalty, of how popular Santorum was among “orthodox” Catholics, of the general tendency among Christians of every stripe to ignore Christ’s clear teaching on love of enemies.
Yes, those are good points.
One, of course, does not want to take the “heart” out of religion, which is what Rabbi Herschel is addressing. But when belief becomes mushy and meaningless, when worship becomes celebration of self and/or a rationale for one’s political beliefs, and when love is distorted into loving the sin as well as the sinner…what then?
This is not something confined to liberal Christians, mind you. The Left tries to reconcile Christ and Marx; the Right does likewise with Rand. Everywhere you seem to find a “morally therapeutic Deism” which affirms the individual in his OKness. The Episcopalians celebrate abortion and the gay lifestyle as good things and preach social justice while abandoning the inner city; the well-dressed prosperity gospel preachers of TBN ask for more and more money from their less than well-off viewers…
And then there’s me. I don’t pray enough…I don’t act like a Christian much of the time…I believe, but am reminded by St. James that so do the demons…I have become formulaic…I must change before I can expect others to do the same…and remember that it’s both/and rather than either/or…ancient wisdom can address today’s issues…faith is not to be treated like the talent buried in the field, made worthless by disuse….and compassion with authority, like Francis of Assisi, Teresa of Calcutta, and Dorothy Day…
Sorry if I ramble…just thinking “aloud”, so to speak…
@Ted “My reality is black and white. Anything less just leads to heartbreak and rage.”
So….we’re not talking about reality anymore?
I actually find that reality is almost always binary. There is Truth and there is Not-Truth. ALL of the so called “shades of grey” come from Original Sin, that is, Not-Truth.
Whenever you get involved in Not-Truth, and mistake it for Truth, it *WILL* cause heartbreak and rage. The ONLY thing that can mitigate this is the forgiveness of Jesus Christ- who forgives your mistake straying into Not-Truth and who teaches Objective Truth.
Denial of Objective Truth is Blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, and is thus, the one unforgivable sin.
Thus yes, have compassion. Forgive. But do not call not-truth truth, do not call evil good, to do it.
Of course, I am autistic. And thus by YOUR standards, and the standards of neurotypical bigots, insane.