HTR(10): Vulnerability, commitment, tradition

This is an expansion of both the last post, and the question of how other faiths can be understood. I want to make three distinct points, and then indicate the way in which they work together in this project.

Christianity is, I believe, uniquely vulnerable in one particular way: if it were shown that Jesus had not in fact been crucified, then Christianity would fail. It is not impossible that such a thing could happen, eg a discovery of a text describing a deceit (perhaps from Herculaneum); or the discovery of an ossuary clearly marked with Jesus' identity, but giving a death from old age; or perhaps in some other way. I'm not aware of another principal religious faith that is open to disproof from historical research in this way. I'm going to spend a lot of time on this as this year develops but for now it is enough to say that if Jesus did not die on the cross then all the symbolisms and meanings associated with the cross fall away as illusion, and so does salvation for 'by his wounds we are healed'. If Jesus did not die on the cross then some of his teachings might last, but Jesus is then just another in the long line of rabbinic teachers, more or less insightful. He is not the Son of God. This, of course, is why it matters that the Koran denies the crucifixion.

Which brings me to my second point. There is a widespread perspective in the Modern West to the effect that religions are much the same. Sometimes this flows from a particular belief, eg in the perennial philosophy, at other times it flows from a general distancing from all religious claims (they are all as bad as each other), at other times it is a peculiarly Western idea, ie the idea that there is a perspective from which the different religions can be judged (which the enlightened Westerner has attained, of course) and which is more or less explicitly atheist. This latter form is intimately bound up with Modern philosophical presuppositions, what is sometimes called 'the view from nowhere'. It was popular in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries philosophically, and became culturally influential as a result. However, whilst many in the culture still act as if this perspective is a sophisticated truth, not many philosophers would give it credence today. In order to understand the world, we have to stand somewhere. In order to climb the mountain, one has to choose a path. The important thing, the wise thing, is to recognise this.

My final point is: how can one discern between the different paths? Much of this is a given – we start to walk from where we are, with the tools that we have been given, with the language and metaphysics that we have inherited from our ancestors. These givens are much more fundamental than Modern society realises; a large part of our current chaos and confusion comes from people attempting to choose, and to justify choices, at the same time as wishing to 'respectably and intellectually' distance themselves from Christianity. It is like someone beginning to walk up the mountain and refusing to use the walking boots on their feet – and also refusing to take them off, for they claim 'I'm not wearing any boots!' For me the substantial answer to the question of how to judge between different traditions is to enable dialogue between them (and of course, one cannot engage in the dialogue unless one has walked some way up the mountain) in order to bring out contradictions or insufficiencies from within a tradition itself. The perspective I come from is one associated with MacIntyre (especially this book, that I need to re-read – if I do I'll write this up in more detail).

What this all means for my discussion of Islam is simply to insist that it is intellectually coherent to criticise one religious point of view from another point of view, and that this is not a simplistic 'my way is all true and your way is all false'. No, there is a vulnerability associated with the conversation, alongside the genuine commitment. In the end I expect to be arguing that the tradition of Islam, whilst containing much that is good (Sufism!), is inherently vulnerable to the way of violence – and that this is true both intellectually/theologically, but also true as a matter of historical fact.

I could be wrong... but there is no way of finding that out except through conversation.