Christianity Compatible with Capitalism?

[Guyau]

On February 2nd, Yaron Brook and Jennifer Roback Morse will debate the question “Is Christianity Compatible with Capitalism?”

The event will be held at Stanford University, Building 320, Room 105. It will begin at 7:30pm. It is free and open to the public. Between these two, Brook and Morse, expect serious intellectual engagement.

$

[Selene]

On February 2nd, Yaron Brook and Jennifer Roback Morse will debate the question "Is Christianity Compatible with Capitalism?"

The event will be held at Stanford University, Building 320, Room 105. It will begin at 7:30pm. It is free and open to the public. Between these two, Brook and Morse, expect serious intellectual engagement.

$

Stephen:

Any chance of C-span coverage?

Adam

[Guyau]

No, this will be the good old-fashioned situation of being for the people able to be in the room. No show stuff or animosity, just sincere reason.

[anonrobt]

No, this will be the good old-fashioned situation of being for the people able to be in the room. No show stuff or animosity, just sincere reason.

sincere reason, with Christianity??

[Selene]

No, this will be the good old-fashioned situation of being for the people able to be in the room. No show stuff or animosity, just sincere reason.

sincere reason, with Christianity??

Yes.

I have had more sincere reasoned arguments with Christians than with "O"bjectivists my friend.

Adam

[BaalChatzaf]

If Judaism is compatible with Capitalism, why can't Christianity be compatible with Capitalism?

Ba'al Chatzaf

[John Day]

If Judaism is compatible with Capitalism, why can't Christianity be compatible with Capitalism?

Because Christian teachings very specifically reject materialism. A very famous example from the Gospels:

Mark 10:17-24 (New International Version)

The Rich Young Man

17As Jesus started on his way, a man ran up to him and fell on his knees before him. "Good teacher," he asked, "what must I do to inherit eternal life?"

18"Why do you call me good?" Jesus answered. "No one is good—except God alone. 19You know the commandments: 'Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not give false testimony, do not defraud, honor your father and mother.'[a]"

20"Teacher," he declared, "all these I have kept since I was a boy."

21Jesus looked at him and loved him. "One thing you lack," he said. "Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me."

22At this the man's face fell. He went away sad, because he had great wealth.

23Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, "How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God!"

24The disciples were amazed at his words. But Jesus said again, "Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God!

"No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money." - Matthew 6:24

Now, there are writers who called themselves Christian who wrote favorably of capitalism, Max Weber being a famous example. Weber's views came out the Protestant Reformation, which did a great deal to create an individualistic, materialist version of Christianity that did tremendous good for the Western world. In its origins, however, Christianity is a collectivist, anti-capitalist philosophy.

[syrakusos]

... ] will debate the question “Is Christianity Compatible with Capitalism?”

The event will be held at Stanford University, Building 320, Room 105. It will begin at 7:30pm. It is free and open to the public. Between these two, Brook and Morse, expect serious intellectual engagement.

Must be what caused the earthquake...

If Judaism is compatible with Capitalism, why can't Christianity be compatible with Capitalism?

Judaism can be compatible with anything. I was having a one-on-one committee meeting with another Board member for our food co-op and I said, "All that counts is the big picture, the details are unimportant..." And he said, "You believe that because you are a Christian." I was startled. And he said, "Let me explain..." His father was a Marxist, an old-style Moscow Red, but dialectic materialism did not prevent the family from doing all the things at the appropriate meals for the respective holidays. He said, "It is not what a Jew believes, but what a Jew does." He said that Judaism is not so much a religion, as it is the customs of a people. He pointed out that Christians, Muslims and Buddhists all have missionaries. There are no Jewish missionaries. The other religions want to save (or improve) individuals, but Judaism is about holding the people together.

On another note, in Surely You're Joking.... Feynman tells of the time he stayed at a yeshiva on his return to NYC for a conference and the guys wanted to know from him if electricity is fire. What it came down to was they hired a Christian to run the elevator for them on the sabbath. Feynman waded in: How can you justify hiring someone to do something that is immoral for you, but not for him? .... Feynman said that he should have known better. "I grew up in this culture and I knew these guys. There was no way I could win." It is all about argument. The commentaries.

Judaism is compatible with anything you want it to be compatible with, even Christianity. When we lived in Albuquerque, there was a congregation of Messianic Jews.... not just one or two freethinkers, but enough to form a synagogue with a nice building...

Last point: As supportive as I am of the plight of the Palestinians, when my anti-Zionist comrades get noisy, I point out that the Knesset seats an anti-Zionist communist party that represents Arab interests against the state. Often, one of its representatives is a woman. You show me an Arab or Muslim state with an pro-Zionist party seating a woman.

Just to say... if you are clever, you can justify anything... at least in your own mind...

Edited January 11, 2010 by Michael E. Marotta

[BaalChatzaf]

Just to say... if you are clever, you can justify anything...

Clever = behaving intelligently = surviving both as a people and individually.

And not so much justification, as practical reconciliation. Jews have lived in the Diaspora for a long time and had to learn to live with their Gentile neighbors. It is a practical matter and often a matter of survival. No devout Jew is going to justify a wrong thing, in the sense of proving it is really right.

Even the Mistress, Ayn Rand, made exceptions for emergencies, yes?

Ba'al Chatzaf

[syrakusos]

Now, there are writers who called themselves Christian who wrote favorably of capitalism, Max Weber being a famous example. Weber's views came out the Protestant Reformation, which did a great deal to create an individualistic, materialist version of Christianity that did tremendous good for the Western world. In its origins, however, Christianity is a collectivist, anti-capitalist philosophy.

Weber was a bit more nuanced than that. I have that book in two editions, the original English translation by Talcott Parsons and the dreaded Roxbury edition. I just read a nice essay about how Weber, in classic German style, wrote a three-phase explanation. Phase 1 was Luther, Calvin, et al.. Phase 2 was Benjamin Franklin. Phase 3 is the modern world. He showed that (not how: that) each phase changed into the next. The evidence is that in America of the previous generation, the Catholics were the ones who exhibited the culture of capitalism. Bank of America was founded as Bank of Italy for immigrant in San Francisco. Here in Detroit, the Catholic bishops and congregations agreed that education must be affordable, so that children will always have better opportunities than their parents. It was these people who first left the city for the suburbs, being upwardly mobile from arrival through blue collar to white collar lifestyles.

Just to say, you can live well according to any philosophy, as did some under Soviet Communism, but I agree that capitalism at root is incompatible with Christianity at root.

[syrakusos]

No devout Jew is going to justify a wrong thing, in the sense of proving it is really right.

Even the Mistress, Ayn Rand, made exceptions for emergencies, yes?

Ba'al Chatzaf

You won't get an argument from me!

Edited January 11, 2010 by Michael E. Marotta

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Not just emergencies.

There's the "L" word.

"Love is exception-making."--Ayn Rand.

Michael

[Christopher]

Stephen, do we need to signup for this or is it open to walk-ins?

As for relationship between Christianity and Objectivism, depends how you pin Christianity. If Christianity is merely the gross teachings as can be conceptually understood by the human mind, then of course it is incompatible. Nobody can walk on water.

If instead you define Christianity as Joseph Campbell (among others) has - that Christian teachings are symbolic representations of internal phenomena, then I believe Christianity can be made compatible with Objectivism. Universally-available phenomenological experiences have objective validity with strict referencing to the logical process of verification.

Of course, this latter view of Christianity is theoretically compatible (and identical) with all spiritual practices, making Christianity per se indistinct. So if we differentiate Christianity as the use of the specific hermeneutical symbols describing spirituality, then again Christianity loses its objectivity. Spirit is real, symbolic descriptions of spirit are subjective.

[Guyau]

It is just a walk-in type of event. Check here for any possible change in the schedule.

Christopher, if I were a Christian, I would certainly dislike Joseph Campbell’s definition. The Christians of our congregation from my childhood and youth would have said as here. I was delighted that John Day brought forth the texts in #7.

This debate will be not be focused on the compatibility of Christianity with Objectivism, but on the compatibility of Christianity and Capitalism. Compatibility, I notice, is not a strictly transitive relation. That A were compatible with P and B were compatible with P would not strictly imply that A is compatible with B. That is, incompatibility of A with B would not suffice to show that if one is compatible with P the other cannot also be compatible with P. At any rate, the focus here will be on whether A is compatible with P.

Here is one little scribble by Rand, in a personal letter in 1946, concerning a conflict within Christianity between individualism (inviolate sanctity of soul) and the way for salvation of the soul. It is just one angle she had on Christianity. But from it I would see conflict with one of her propositions: that every individual is an end in himself or herself. She later took that proposition to entail (i) individual autonomy, the phenomenon to be protected by legal recognition of the concept of individual rights, and (ii) goodness of pursuing one’s self-interest. If it can be made out that proper individual rights include rights to private property and that capitalism is the system resulting from autonomous individuals working and trading private property in concern for their self-interest, then one has a justification for capitalism resting on the proposition that every individual is an end in himself. Supposing that is a sound proposition, that the case for capitalism made on that basis is sound, and that any case for capitalism must necessarily include that basis-proposition, then showing that Christianity is incompatible with that basis would be a showing that Christianity is incompatible with capitalism.

Sounds like you may really enjoy this Feb 2 event.

[Brant Gaede]

If Judaism is compatible with Capitalism, why can't Christianity be compatible with Capitalism?

Because Christian teachings very specifically reject materialism. A very famous example from the Gospels:

Mark 10:17-24 (New International Version)

The Rich Young Man

17As Jesus started on his way, a man ran up to him and fell on his knees before him. "Good teacher," he asked, "what must I do to inherit eternal life?"

18"Why do you call me good?" Jesus answered. "No one is good—except God alone. 19You know the commandments: 'Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not give false testimony, do not defraud, honor your father and mother.'[a]"

20"Teacher," he declared, "all these I have kept since I was a boy."

21Jesus looked at him and loved him. "One thing you lack," he said. "Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me."

22At this the man's face fell. He went away sad, because he had great wealth.

23Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, "How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God!"

24The disciples were amazed at his words. But Jesus said again, "Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God!

"No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money." - Matthew 6:24

Now, there are writers who called themselves Christian who wrote favorably of capitalism, Max Weber being a famous example. Weber's views came out the Protestant Reformation, which did a great deal to create an individualistic, materialist version of Christianity that did tremendous good for the Western world. In its origins, however, Christianity is a collectivist, anti-capitalist philosophy.

Not quite. Human moral equality before God is the practical basis of individualism in society. The King bows down. The serf does too. For the same reason. God doesn't differentiate on that level. The Supreme Being is an expression of human psychological genius. God has no metaphysical reality, it's all epistemological. However, the dumb and ignorant don't know the difference or simply the that of that. I talk to God all the time, but I know I'm talking to myself, not the jerk in the Old Testament.

--Brant

[Guyau]

Book Essay: The Strange World of Ayn Rand

Henrik R. Clausen (2009)

This is one of those reviews of a book pertaining to Rand’s philosophy that has the happy result of the reviewer turning to engagement of Rand’s ideas straight-on for himself (cf.). Mr. Clausen touches on the topic of the coming debate, writing:

“Other thorny issues are [Rand’s] fierce atheism, possibly influenced by her Jewish upbringing in Orthodox Russia far from thrifty Protestants. She simply doesn't ‘get’ the civilizational influence of Christianity, nor its importance in the formative years of Capitalism, 12th century Italy and 17th century Netherlands. There is . . . her refusal to acknowledge the value of tradition.”

This is a flurry of the circumstantial ad hominem fallacy. There is the suggestion that were Rand to have had around in her community of birth and youth people who practiced certain virtues, such as industriousness and saving, which were encouraged in some Protestant sects, then since those virtues are favorable to capitalism, Rand could have affirmed the existence of God. It is false that those virtues were not the order of the day in Rand’s community, but that is not the big problem. The problem is: leaving without address the arguments a person has given for a certain view they hold and instead just saying “well, if you had grown up in different circumstances, you wouldn’t think that way.” The second sentence, too, is an ad hominem, both circumstantial and mildly abusive. Saying that someone “simply doesn’t ‘get’ the . . .” is to insinuate that they are psychologically constituted such that they are not able to understand the rational case made to support certain conclusions (or perhaps the “get” is suggesting that more than rational comprehension is required for assent to those conclusions).

Mr. Clausen insinuates, but fails to support, the contention that Christianity is compatible with capitalism. He does point to some historical episodes that inquiring minds will mark for possible learning bearing on the question.

“Ayn Rand was not a Conservative, by any reasonable understanding of the word.” Correct.

Edited January 16, 2010 by Stephen Boydstun

[Christopher]

It is just a walk-in type of event. Check here for any possible change in the schedule.

Christopher, if I were a Christian, I would certainly dislike Joseph Campbell’s definition. The Christians of our congregation from my childhood and youth would have said as here. I was delighted that John Day brought forth the texts in #7.

This debate will be not be focused on the compatibility of Christianity with Objectivism, but on the compatibility of Christianity and Capitalism. Compatibility, I notice, is not a strictly transitive relation. That A were compatible with P and B were compatible with P would not strictly imply that A is compatible with B. That is, incompatibility of A with B would not suffice to show that if one is compatible with P the other cannot also be compatible with P. At any rate, the focus here will be on whether A is compatible with P.

Here is one little scribble by Rand, in a personal letter in 1946, concerning a conflict within Christianity between individualism (inviolate sanctity of soul) and the way for salvation of the soul. It is just one angle she had on Christianity. But from it I would see conflict with one of her propositions: that every individual is an end in himself or herself. She later took that proposition to entail (i) individual autonomy, the phenomenon to be protected by legal recognition of the concept of individual rights, and (ii) goodness of pursuing one’s self-interest. If it can be made out that proper individual rights include rights to private property and that capitalism is the system resulting from autonomous individuals working and trading private property in concern for their self-interest, then one has a justification for capitalism resting on the proposition that every individual is an end in himself. Supposing that is a sound proposition, that the case for capitalism made on that basis is sound, and that any case for capitalism must necessarily include that basis-proposition, then showing that Christianity is incompatible with that basis would be a showing that Christianity is incompatible with capitalism.

Sounds like you may really enjoy this Feb 2 event.

Hi Stephen,

Thanks for the links, and the details of the event.

[Steve Gagne]

If Judaism is compatible with Capitalism, why can't Christianity be compatible with Capitalism?

Because Christian teachings very specifically reject materialism. A very famous example from the Gospels:

Mark 10:17-24 (New International Version)

The Rich Young Man

17As Jesus started on his way, a man ran up to him and fell on his knees before him. "Good teacher," he asked, "what must I do to inherit eternal life?"

18"Why do you call me good?" Jesus answered. "No one is good—except God alone. 19You know the commandments: 'Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not give false testimony, do not defraud, honor your father and mother.'[a]"

20"Teacher," he declared, "all these I have kept since I was a boy."

21Jesus looked at him and loved him. "One thing you lack," he said. "Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me."

22At this the man's face fell. He went away sad, because he had great wealth.

23Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, "How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God!"

24The disciples were amazed at his words. But Jesus said again, "Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God!

"No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money." - Matthew 6:24 [Note: Also Luke 16:13]

Now, there are writers who called themselves Christian who wrote favorably of capitalism, Max Weber being a famous example. Weber's views came out the Protestant Reformation, which did a great deal to create an individualistic, materialist version of Christianity that did tremendous good for the Western world. In its origins, however, Christianity is a collectivist, anti-capitalist philosophy.

Christianity does not, as a matter of principle, "reject materialism" per se, but "transience" (as opposed to "the eternal"). [Note: or the "instance" as opposed to the "universal".]

As far as your Bible quote goes: man, that NIV is such a crummy translation. (Not many out there much better, though.) A more complete quote of that scene might read

...And as he was setting out on his journey, a man ran up and knelt before him, and asked him, "Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?" And Jesus said to him, "Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. You know the commandments: 'Do not kill, Do not commit adultery, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Do not defraud, Honor your father and mother.'"

And he said to him, "Teacher, all these I have observed from my youth." And Jesus looking upon him loved him, and said to him, "You lack one thing; go, sell what you have, and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me."

At that saying his countenance fell, and he went away sorrowful; for he had great possessions.

And Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, "How hard it will be for those who have riches to enter the kingdom of God!" And the disciples were amazed at his words. But Jesus said to them again, "Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to go through the Eye of the Needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God."

And they were exceedingly astonished, and said to him, "Then who can be saved?" Jesus looked at them and said, "With men it is impossible, but not with God; for all things are possible with God."

Peter began to say to him, "Lo, we have left everything and followed you." Jesus said, "Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life . (Mk.10:17-30)

You see, there is not only a claim made on the disciples' devotions, but also a direct appeal to their own inherent greed, much in the sense of a quid pro quo, i.e., a trade. But there are conditions. One of which is they recognize that they must approach it in an attitude of prayer, i.e., on their knees, much as does a camel which must pass through "The Eye of the Needle", the then-current colloquial name of a particularly low-clearance gate in the north wall of Jerusalem. But note that the passage begins by stating the man fell to his knees -- he already inherently "knew" and "did" what was "required", but never even realized it. Sad and painful.

"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, killing the prophets and stoning those who are sent to you! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not!" (Matt.23:37)

Further, I suppose you've never heard of the hermeneutics of divine irony. Look at Luke 16: "Make friends by means of unrighteous Mammon, so that, when it fails, you may be welcomed into their eternal habitations...They have Moses and the prophets -- let them listen to them. If they will not listen to Moses and the prophets, they will not believe, even if one should rise from the dead." Then consider that the poor rich dude who was told to give everything away was looking for the wrong thing. He was looking for a materialistic action of transient ritual obligation like unto the hypocritical Pharasites, instead of the permanent spiritual value of eliminating hypocrisy, so Jesus gave him the (ahem) "appropriate" answer. As is recorded elsewhere

Jesus said: Know what is before thy face, and what is hidden from thee shall be revealed unto thee; for there is nothing hidden which shall not be made manifest. His disciples asked him and said unto him: Wilt thou that we fast? And how shall we pray? Shall we give alms? And what rules shall we observe in eating?

Jesus said: Do not lie; and that which you hate, do not do. For all things are revealed before heaven. For there is nothing hidden which shall not be manifest, and there is nothing covered which shall remain without being uncovered...If you fast, you will beget a sin for yourselves; and if you pray, you will be condemned; and if you give alms, you will do an evil to your spirits. And if you go into any land and travel in its regions, if they receive you, eat what they set before you. Heal the sick among them. For that which goes into your mouth will not defile you, but that which comes forth from your mouth, that is what will defile you.

Jesus said to them: When you make...the inside as the outside, and the outside as the inside, and what is above to be below...then shall you enter the kingdom...If those who lead you say unto you: Behold, the Kingdom is in heaven, then the birds of the heaven will enter before you. If they say unto you: It is in the sea, then the fish will enter before you. But the Kingdom is within you, and without you. When you know yourselves, then shall you be known, and you shall know that you are the sons of the living Father. But if ye do not know yourselves, then you are in poverty, and you are that poverty...He who knows the All but fails to know himself lacks everything. (Tho.5-6,14,22b,3,67)

For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? (Mk.8:36)

Although presented as revelation, much of the wisdom in these passages can be derived by one's own independent thinking, and its artistic forms can be used to summarize -- IOW revelation does not need rational explanation per se, although one's understanding of it does. But to dispute over the words rather than the thoughts is pretty foolish.

So to answer Bob's concern, no, Christianity is not directly incompatible with Capitalism (though many people's applications of each can be).

Edited January 19, 2010 by Steve Gagne

[Guyau]

.

Christopher attended the debate. His report is here.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Robert Campbell has posted links here to a copy of a Rand letter of 1943, recently sold on ebay for $5000, a letter in which Rand discusses (on pages 2 and 3) religious ideas and individualism.

Based on that [1943] letter, it's reasonable to say that the Ayn Rand of those years (38 years old?) would probably have been very friendly to Glenn Beck and what he is doing. . . .

That is not probable.

Here is some further history of Rand's thinking about Christianity and religion more generally.

From Objectivism Reference Center, the following excerpt is from a letter to Sylvia Austin dated July 9, 1946, in Letters of Ayn Rand, p. 287.

There is a great, basic contradiction in the teachings of Jesus. Jesus was one of the first great teachers to proclaim the basic principle of individualism -- the inviolate sanctity of man's soul, and the salvation of one's soul as one's first concern and highest goal; this means -- one's ego and the integrity of one's ego. But when it came to the next question, a code of ethics to observe for the salvation of one's soul -- (this means: what must one do in actual practice in order to save one's soul?) -- Jesus (or perhaps His interpreters) gave men a code of altruism, that is, a code which told them that in order to save one's soul, one must love or help or live for others. This means, the subordination of one's soul (or ego) to the wishes, desires or needs of others, which means the subordination of one's soul to the souls of others.

This is a contradiction that cannot be resolved. This is why men have never succeeded in applying Christianity in practice, while they have preached it in theory for two thousand years. The reason of their failure was not men's natural depravity or hypocrisy, which is the superficial (and vicious) explanation usually given. The reason is that a contradiction cannot be made to work. That is why the history of Christianity has been a continuous civil war -- both literally (between sects and nations), and spiritually (within each man's soul).

From my writings:

1936

. . .

In We the Living, Rand has Kira and Andrei converse on atheism. They each easily say they do not believe in God. Kira goes on to say belief in God means lack of belief in life. Furthermore, “God—whatever anyone chooses to call God—is one’s highest conception of the highest possible. And whoever places his highest conception above his own possibility thinks very little of himself and his life. It’s a rare gift, you know, to feel reverence for your own life and to want the best, the greatest, the highest possible, here, now, for your very own” (WL 107). At the root of their selves, Kira and Andrei share belief in life.

In this atheist perspective, Rand had some in common with Nietzsche. “The Christian idea of God – . . . is one of the most corrupt conceptions of God the world has ever seen . . . . God having degenerated into a contradiction of life instead of its transfiguration and eternal yes! God as declared aversion to life, to nature, to the will to life! God as every slander against the ‘here and now’ . . .” (AC 18).

. . .

1943

. . .

We have seen that Kira counter poses belief in God to belief in life. Similarly, Roark counter poses belief in God to love of the earth (PK III 45). This much Rand coincides with Nietzsche. “My brothers, remain faithful to the earth and do not believe those who speak of extraterrestrial hopes! . . . / They are despisers of life . . . .” (Z I “Zarathustra’s Prologue” 3).

. . .

1943

. . .

Hopton Stoddard tells Roark the Temple of the Human Spirit shall be to “‘the human spirit as the creator and the conqueror of the ideal. The great life-giving force of the universe. . . . What I want in the building is your spirit. Your spirit, Mr. Roark’” (ET X 340).

Henry Cameron had said to Roark: “‘May God bless you—or whoever it is alone to see the best, the highest possible to human hearts’” (PK XI 137). Roark is one who pursues the best in his creations. He needs others of a certain character in order to create his buildings. He needs men of independent judgment, of honesty, of courage—men of integrity (PK XIII 166). For his buildings, Roark tracks down the best sculptor, one who is capable of showing in sculpture what men could and should be. Rand 1943 takes seeking the best, the highest, as a law of healthy, selfish life (ET XI 349). This law she calls a first law, this law to seek the best (ET XI 352; cf. Summa Theologica XIII Q94 A2).

. . .

At sixteen Toohey let go of religion and turned to socialism. Instead of God and the nobility of suffering, he talked about the masses. He preached love of the masses and profound self-sacrifice for them. He argued “that religion bred selfishness; because . . . religion over-emphasized the importance of the individual spirit; religion preached nothing but a single concern—the salvation of one’s own soul” (ET IX 319).

In a personal letter in 1946,* Rand related her idea of Jesus as proclaiming “the basic principle of individualism—the inviolate sanctity of man’s soul, and the salvation of one’s soul as one’s first concern and highest goal; this means—one’s ego and the integrity of one’s ego.” One great corruption of that individualism in Jesus’ teachings comes with the code of ethics put forth as the means of saving one’s soul: “One must love or help or live for others.” Who put forth this second doctrine? “Jesus (or His interpreters).”

One of the first books Rand bought after coming to America was Nietzsche’s The Anti-Christ. Within this work, Nietzsche sets down differences he sees between the exemplar to be read from the life of Jesus and morality proclaimed by institutional Christianity. One difference is Christianity’s exaggeration of the amount of pity needed in the world. “Christianity is called the religion of pity. [cf.] . . . Pity makes suffering into something infectious; sometimes it can even cause a total loss of life and of vital energy wildly disproportionate to the magnitude of the cause (—the case of the Nazarene). . . . Pity wins people over to nothingness! You do not say ‘nothingness’: instead you say ‘the beyond’; or ‘God’; or . . .” (AC 7; further, 17, 18, 26, 32, 33, 39–43).

There are several views of Nietzsche expressed in this work that Rand maintained in The Fountainhead, while leaving aside other Nietzchean doctrines, such as those I have replaced with ellipses points in the preceding quotation. Rand’s sensitivity to the possibility of incongruity between Jesus’ life and teachings, on the one hand, and Christianity, on the other, may have been taken home from The Anti-Christ. The particular doctrines in conflict in Rand’s eye, stated paragraph before last, are not among those in Nietzsche’s eye in Anti-Christ, but there is a prelude to the particular opponent-doctrines Rand stresses in Daybreak (132).

Notwithstanding Toohey’s omitting talk of God, his socialist sayings are generally warmly familiar to the religious. Hopton Stoddard found everything Toohey preached “in line with God’s law: charity, sacrifice, help to the poor” (ET X 335). Toohey continued to preach the blessedness of belief over understanding, belief over thought (ET X 388; GW VI 507; HR XIV 692). Mysticism and dialectical materialism, Toohey says, “are two superficially varied manifestations of the same thing. Of the same intention” (HR VI 600). Toohey is speaking for Rand when speaking of the continuity of religion and socialism. This idea was big with Nietzsche. “Who do I hate most among the rabble today? The socialist rabble . . . . The anarchist and the Christian are descended from the same lineage . . . . / Christians are perfectly identical with anarchists: their only goal, their only instinct is to destroy” (AC 57–58; see also D 132; Z IV “The Last Supper” 16; BGE 202).

Notice that Rand does not take religion to be uniformly against thought. Like Leibniz before her, Rand is pleased with the story and idea of humans being created in the image of God, specifically, in their capability for reason. “‘Man’s first frown is the first touch of God on his forehead. The touch of thought’” (HR XIV 693). Though he would not say it publicly, Toohey in no way intends to carry that value forward: “‘We’ll have neither God nor thought’” (ibid.).

. . .

1943/1957

. . .

[Rand] expresses the radiant aspect of religion in what Toohey tells Stoddard to tell Roark in order to persuade Roark to build the Temple of the Human Spirit. She again expresses that radiant aspect in Dominique’s testimony at the court case over the temple. Dark aspects of religion are also not neglected in Fountainhead. The testimonies of Toohey and Keating at the trial express them, and the link between religion and socialism is remarked in several places in the novel.

In Atlas Shrugged . . . Rand tells the religionist: “Whenever you committed the evil of refusing to think and to see, of exempting from the absolute of reality some one small wish of yours, whenever you chose to say: Let me withdraw from the judgment of reason . . . the existence of God, let me have my one irrational whim and I will be a man of reason about all else—that was the act of subverting your consciousness, the act of corrupting your mind” (1037).

Rand was not opposed to feelings. She was not against the idea of the human soul, provided it is thought of as naturally part of one’s living body and mortal as one’s body. In Fountainhead she has dialogue between Keating and his wife Dominique in which soul is given the expressly nonreligious meaning: that in one that is one’s genuine person—not only one’s body—one’s will and meaning, that in one which independently thinks, values, decides, and feels (GW II 454–55; cf. 1957, 1057).

In Fountainhead religion that entails belief in the supernatural is taken to be false. It is not presented, however, as something needing to be abandoned for the sake of human independence and freedom. It is not expressly taken as subversive of those good things. That changes in Atlas, wherein all religion holding forth the supernatural is openly opposed as inimical to human life and freedom. There religion is proclaimed to be mysticism. I agree. (See also Peikoff 1991, 183–84; Underhill 1925.)

In Fountainhead the classification mysticism had not been given directly to the Judeo-Christian belief in God. It was given to religion of the ancient Egyptians. It was maintained that such mysticism and atheistic dialectical materialism were only “‘superficially varied manifestations of the same thing’” (HR VI 600). Earlier in the novel, Rand had Toohey iterate and reiterate that the central moral teachings of Jesus and socialism were like peas in a pod. Rand had made clear that belief in God was mistaken and partly at odds with human life and achievement on earth (PK III 45). She had stopped short of pronouncing belief in God mystical.

Early in Galt’s radio speech in Atlas, Rand attacks as mystical the common belief that there is a supernatural power called God, who issues moral commands based on whim, and to whom one must dedicate one’s life (1011). There are no ghosts in heaven (1012). There is no “mystic God with some incomprehensible design” (1025).

1957

Rand introduces her most fundamental axiom on page 1015 of Atlas Shrugged (hb). That is the assertion existence exists. As she introduces the axiom, she says that the moral code that she is overturning and replacing attempts to escape the axiom existence exists. She has already said that the code she means to overturn comes in a variety based on dictates of a supernatural being known as God (1011-12). One of the purposes of Rand's axiom existence exists is to foreclose the possibility of the existence of God.

In her later essay "The Metaphysical v. The Man-Made" (1973), she tells us that her axiom "existence exists" means that the universe exists independently of consciousness (24) and that the universe as a whole "cannot be created or annihilated, that it cannot come into or go out of existence" (25). She says that her fundamental axiom invalidates the question "If there is no God, who created the universe?"

Immediately after introducing he axiom existence exists in AS, Rand introduces axioms concerning consciousness, which are corollaries of grasping the statement existence exists. These are "that something exists which one perceives and that one exists possessing consciousness, consciousness being the faculty of perceiving that which exists" (1015). This characterization of consciousness and self-consciousness rules out the possibility of God as a mind existing before the existence of anything else. "A consciousness conscious of nothing but itself is a contradiction in terms: before it could identify itself as consciousness, it had to be conscious of something" (1015). . . .

Readers here know that Rand articulated another axiom: "To exist is to be something, as distinguished from the nothing of non-existence, it is to be an entity of a specific nature made of specific attributes. Centuries ago, the man who was---no matter what his errors---the greatest of your philosophers, has stated the formula defining the concept of existence and the rule of all knowledge: A is A. A thing is itself. You have never grasped the meaning of his statement. I am here to complete it: Existence is Identity, Consciousness is Identification" (1016).

. . .

With her full complement of axioms on the table, Rand puts them to the purpose of refuting the method of faith and revelation (1018, 1035-36) . . . .

. . .

Oh, I almost forgot another purpose to which Rand put her axiom of identity. She used it to bar the "negative way" of approaching God (1035). In Christianity that was an approach going back to Pseudo-Dionysius (c. 500).

. . .

Edited September 6, 2011 by Stephen Boydstun

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

I have some opinions on the Christianity versus capitalism debate,

I am more concerned with how a person's character reflects on his views about individualism and individual rights than I am with the mysticism thing. If his way of doing Christianity allows for leaving me in peace, what do I care about the rest? That's his business. Anyway, I think the Bible is a wonderful book on human nature, stories, anecdotal history, a charming portrait of ancient customs, etc.

I am surprised that I don't see two Christian issues discussed within an Objectivist context (and please correct me if I missed them)--both of which I find a huge turn-off. And I have been turned off to them for decades. I don't see how they can be ignored when people try to reconcile Christianity with Objectivism (and/or capitalism).

1. The only way a Christian can save his soul is by declaring faith in Jesus as the Son of God. Why? Just because Jesus said so and people wrote about it decades later. Anything else? Hello? Anyone or anything else out there? Nope. That's all you get to chew on. In other words, we not only have to accept hearsay as fact--it is presented as the most important fact and epistemological decision in our existence. We supposedly go to hell if we get it wrong.

I can't buy it.

If there is a God and He gave me a rational mind, I can't conceive of him torturing me for eternity just because I refuse to deny and betray His very gift.

But capitalism-wise, so long as this leaves reason alone for the rest of existence, I have no issue with it when other people go that route. I have a real problem resonating with this on a personal level, so when they have tried to save me, it has gotten weird at times. I see they do it, but I feel nothing inside myself when I see it. (The forgiveness part of the ritual is beautiful and brings me to tears, though. I'm beginning to believe this blubbering when forgiveness and similar things are on the table is a problem with reformed addicts, but that's another story.)

2. This next is far, far more serious to me. The story of Jesus sanctions the government as a proper agency for torturing its citizens to death in public--even the Son of God. For as much as I try to ignore this, I can't. The government that killed Jesus is simply treated as a proper authority for doing this crap.

How could that ever fit with capitalism--other than the perverted form called crony capitalism?

I will never accept this view of government. I used to say that had I lived during Jesus's time, I probably would have been nailed to a cross right beside Him because I would have tried to get Him down one way or another--even as I did not believe in His claims.

(This attitude has gotten me in trouble with governments and authorities more than once over my life. And as a continuation of this line of thinking, I have always had a problem with using an official instrument of torture by the government as a symbol of some kind of human salvation. Think modern-day, but not as deadly. Could anyone imagine preaching salvation under a sculpture of a waterboard contraption?)

But even with these reservations, I am glad Glenn Beck put together the Black Robe Brigade and has encouraged them to look at individualism versus collectivism, including individual salvation versus collective salvation, in their own churches. So I think it is not only a tactical error to demonize Christianity as a whole, politically it's a waste of time. Beck's approach is far, far more effective.

Look how this culture is changing. This isn't happening in a vacuum. Middle America people are hearing about it week after week when they go the place where they reflect on good and evil.

So long as freedom of religion is a fundamental value among certain Christians as part of their religion, and individual rights are treated as part of their religion, I hold that, to this extent, their views are in perfect harmony with Objectivism and capitalism. There is disagreement on other issues, but not those.

For such Christians, this is as far as my political interest in their Christianity goes. (I admit to a cultural interest and now that I am studying storytelling, some of that stuff simply blows me away, but that is outside the scope here.) May such Christians live long, prosper, enjoy good health, pray to their heart's content and be happy. I have no quarrel with them or their beliefs and I am proud to call them my neighbors--my neighbors in freedom and a capitalist society.

As to the collectivist Christians, I think it is far more effective to discredit their collectivism than their Christianity. If that happens, why should any capitalist--Objectivist, libertarian or otherwise--give two hoots about the religious stuff?

Michael

[Rich Engle]

Well, the shitty ones in both camps have a lot in common. And that is the grease that makes it go, no?

They could BBQ together, and share things. Very special things. Definitely, there is an intersect here.

It depends what you mean by an Xstian. You mean those real good entrepreneur ones? Mega-Churches?

Ah, if they sign up, they will provide an Emissary. A Soul-Reaper.

Actually, that's not right; more like a portfolio-reaper.

Either way, don't fuck with the real Christian Big Boys--they will suck out your eyeballs, and you will wake up the next morning, blind, yet somehow still feeling good about it.

Sounds like a perfect Conference of the Shitheads.

"Serious Intellectual Engagement." Oh my, oh my. I hope the Continental Breakfast doesn't give them the Screaming Shits<tm>.

rde

Just wear bad suits, and keep on doin'!

Edited September 6, 2011 by Rich Engle

[Brant Gaede]

Is capitalism compatible with individual rights? Is Christianity? If yes, then why not with each other?

--Brant

[Rich Engle]

Is capitalism compatible with individual rights? Is Christianity? If yes, then why not with each other?

--Brant

Exactly.

Like this is a Major Question. Heavens. Are they down to just drawing stuff out of a cup? Next up: (Actually, I had a lot of jokes for this but thinking about it just got me sickers . . .OK, OK, how about, um, "Do We Still Exist, Even Knowing That Most People Don't Know We Do? A! A! A=A!) The Typewriter Told Me To<---see upcoming novel.

Breakout Seminars:

1. Ayn Rand Had Nice Legs, And I'll Tell You Why (Jim Bakker)

2. Dentures: Why Aristotle approved, even though George Washington didn't yet invent them (Peikoff)

3. I Live Out West and I'm still Ugly as Shit (Hsieh)

4. Bob Campbell: You don't want to stay here long; at least those of you who are conscious--I have a detonator and a parachute.

I hope this happens, I really do:

And I hope they go for the low hanging fruit.

rde

I'm Not Bitter: I Just Do Good Schtick

Edited September 6, 2011 by Rich Engle

[Guyau]

Rand on Christianity and on Religion in General before the 1943 Letter

(and after) – A, B, C, D, E

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

From Rand’s 1943 letter to Rev. Dudley:

I believe that my statement {in Fountainhead} of man’s proper morality does not contradict any religious belief, if that belief includes faith in man’s free will. My morality is based on man’s nature, on the fundamental attribute of his nature which distinguishes him from the animals – his rational faculty. Since man is a rational being, his morality must be individualistic, for the mind is an attribute of the individual . . . . (2)

Rand on Free Will and Rationality before the 1943 Letter

(and after)

From my writings:

1943

Zarathustra lightens the load by stopping the climb, having the little monster off his shoulder, and spelling out what is the deep abyss drawing down his spirit: The present moment, and every present moment, is connected to an infinite past and an infinite future. Whatever occurs now must have occurred before in such an infinite past and must occur again in such an infinite future. Over and over, it goes (Z II “On the Vision and the Riddle” 2). “The knot of causes in which I am entangled recurs—it will create me again! I myself belong to the causes of the eternal recurrence. / I will return . . . not to a new life or a better life or a similar life: / —I will return to this same and selfsame life, in what is greatest as well as what is smallest . . . . / . . . / to once again teach the eternal recurrence of all things” (Z III “The Convalescent” 1).

. . .

The ringed determinism binding the human will is a very hard one in Nietzsche’s understanding. “If ever a breath came to me of creative breath and of heavenly necessity that forces even accident to dance astral rounds: / If ever I laughed with the laugh of creative lightning that follows rumbling but obediently the long thunder of the deed: / . . . / Oh how then could I not lust for eternity and for the mystical ring of rings—the ring of recurrence! / . . . / For I love you, oh eternity!” (Z III “The Other Dance Song” 3; see also I “On the Three Metamorphoses;” II “On Redemption.”) Nietzsche, loving life and the world, reaches yet for joy even with all the pain and heavy chains of necessity (Z IV “The Sleepwalker’s Song” 8–10; cf. BGE 9).

. . .

It is likely Rand had always rejected the Marxist doctrine of economic determinism (Milgram 2004, 12; Ridpath 2004, 91). “The mode of production of material life determines the general character of the social, political, and spiritual processes of life. It is not the consciousness of men that determines their existence, but their social existence determines their consciousness” (Marx 1897 [1859]). In Fountainhead, Rand gave to Toohey the proclamation “there was no such thing as free will, since men’s creative impulses were determined, as all else, by the economic structure of the epoch in which they lived” (PK VI 77). To the villains, too, goes proclamation of the type of determinism accepted by Nietzsche. Toohey says “‘we are merely the creatures of our chemical metabolism and of the economic factors of our background . . . . There are, of course, apparent exceptions. Merely apparent. When circumstances delude us into thinking that free action is indicated’” (HR VII 615).

A writer in Toohey’s circle writes a novel whose point is that there is no such thing as free will (GW I 421). A distinguished critic in Toohey’s circle remarks “‘talent is only a glandular accident” (GW VI 503). Nietzsche, of course, would not make small of the creative individual. He would elevate in spite of the chains of determinism.

1943 / 1957

The virtues of the creator in Fountainhead are: independence, creative achievement, loyalty to reason, and integrity, which includes courage (737–40). . . . The choice of independence or dependence “rests upon the alternative of life or death” (739–40). “The code of the creator is built on the needs of the reasoning mind which allows man to survive” (740).

Within the virtues of the extraordinary creator (such as Howard Roark) are the virtues of good people in general. Rand continues: “Degrees of ability vary, but the basic principle remains the same: the degree of a man’s independence, initiative, and personal love for his work determines his talent as a worker and his worth as a man” (740). For every good individual, honesty, courage, and basing one’s self-respect on “personal standards of personal achievement” are virtues (658). For every human being, to suspend one’s faculty of independent judgment is to suspend consciousness, and “to stop consciousness is to stop life” (659).

. . .

When we turn from Fountainhead to Atlas, we find Rand’s ethical thought fully developed. Seven moral virtues are articulated, for all individuals: rationality, independence, integrity, honesty, justice, productiveness, and pride. Here the virtues are argued not only upon a characterization of the kind of individual who makes human existence possible—the individual self-sufficient, self-motivated, self-generated—but upon a characterization of all life preceding and supporting rational, volitional life: organism-life as “a process of self-sustaining and self-generated action” (AS 1013).

1938 / 1943 / 1957

In the manuscript for Anthem (1938), Rand has the protagonist Equality 7-2521 reflect: “I will, for I know my desires, and I am free in that which I desire” (quoted in Milgram 2005, 19). He is not thinking simply that he is presently free from the coercive orders of other men. He is saying that man’s will is free by nature. To be directed by one’s own will is the natural state of human beings. In the 1938 edition, Equality writes: “My will, which chooses, and orders, and creates. My will, the master which knows no masters. My will, the liberator and conqueror. My will, which is the thin flame, still and holy, in the shrine of my body, my body which is but the shrine of my will. Many words have been granted me, and some are wise, and some are false, but only three are holy: ‘I will it’” (quoted in Mayhew 2005b, 40).

Early Rand held to considerable freedom of the will, contrary Marx and Nietzsche. The will for Rand is spirit. Human will, joy, and thought are of the inner self, which is spirit. If the will were only drives of the body, it would not be free or sacred. This sense of sacredness does not entail belief in the supernatural nor opposition to reason, which is itself part of the holy self.

We have seen that in The Fountainhead, too, deterministic materialist reduction of human life is rejected by Rand (PK VI 77; HR VII 615; HR X 649). Deeper than the bones, for man, is his soul (GW III 471). Roark says to Wynand “‘we live in our minds, and existence is the attempt to bring that life into physical reality, to state it in gesture and form’” (HR II 558). All living creatures have a life source, which is their constitutional idea. Failure of organism integrity, compromise of its life source, is death (PK XV 205). Similarly, to set against the central constitutional idea particular to one’s self is a failure of an integrity that may be called moral integrity (ibid.). A person of integrity is self-motivated, a self-sufficient spirit (HR XI 660). Life itself for man requires human consciousness, which is independent judgment (HR XI 659). Life itself for man requires creators (HR XVIII 737). The vision, strength, and courage of a creator comes “from his own spirit” (ibid.). Human creators are “a first cause, a fount of energy, a life force . . .” (ibid.).

For all individuals, not only extraordinary creators, seeking the best, loving one’s work, and choosing independence is seeking, loving, and choosing life—one’s own life—against death (ET XI 349; HR XVIII 739–40). In her fully developed ethical system of Atlas Shrugged, the choice of life or death remains implicit in one’s choices for virtues such as integrity, productiveness, and independence.

In Fountainhead loyalty to reason had been a virtue alongside virtues such as integrity and independence. In Atlas loyalty to truth in all things by reason, which is termed rationality, is the premier virtue. And the choice to think becomes the life-or-death choice underlying all the life-or-death virtues of Rand’s full system: rationality, independence, integrity, honesty, justice, productiveness, and pride (see also Wright 2009, 258–62, 265–70). “That which you call your soul or spirit is your consciousness, and that which you call ‘free will’ is your mind’s freedom to think or not, the only will you have, your only freedom, the choice that controls all the choices you make and determines your life and character” (AS 1017).

Edited September 10, 2011 by Stephen Boydstun

[Reidy]

Brant Gaede asks rhetorcially

Is capitalism compatible with individual rights? Is Christianity? If yes, then why not with each other?

This doesn't follow, since logical compatibility is not a transitive relation; A is compatible with B and B is compatible with C do not together entail A is compatible with C.

Some examples might be:

- Beth's only car is a Toyota.

- Beth's only car is a 4-door sedan.

- Beth's only car is a Hyundai.

- Rectangle A is 8" x 2".

- Rectangle A is 16 square inches in area.

- Rectangle A is 4" by 4".

Edited September 10, 2011 by Reidy