Most Popular Choices
Share on Facebook 20 Printer Friendly Page More Sharing
OpEdNews Op Eds    H3'ed 3/2/09

Last Rites for the United States, and Himself

By       (Page 2 of 2 pages) Become a premium member to see this article and all articles as one long page.   1 comment
Message Walter Uhler
Become a Fan
  (18 fans)

In his book, Slavery and Freedom, Berdyaev defined objectivized knowledge as "the most 'objective' in the sense of verified truth." Thus, "the most objectivized knowledge is mathematical. It is the most universally binding and it is the concern of the whole of civilized mankind. But it is the most remote of all from human existence, from knowledge of the meaning and value of human existence."

Before Mr. Lukacs, it was Berdyaev (following Kierkegaard and Dostoevsky) who asserted the primacy of the conscious subject over the created object. But, unlike Mr. Lukacs, Berdyaev also explained how the conscious subject often enslaves himself by falling "into the power of the exteriorization" - the objectivized knowledge -- he has created.

(It was Dostoevsky's famously rebellious "Underground man," who boldly asserted man's freedom, when he observed: "Consciousness…is infinitely higher than two times two.")

Finally, Mr. Lukacs' epistemological grand truth must be faulted for failing to subject his own Christian faith to the same "crucible of doubt" (as Dostoyevsky called it) that he employs to attack the claims made by science.

Crucible of doubt? Yes. Consider the work of Harold Bloom who asserts, in his book, Jesus and Yahweh: "There is not a sentence concerning Jesus in the entire New Testament composed by anyone who ever had met the unwilling King of the Jews, unless (and it is unlikely) the General Epistle of James truly is by James his brother, rather than one of James's followers."

Crucible of doubt? Yes. Consider the story of the "virgin birth" found in Matthew and Luke. According to biblical scholar, Paula Fredriksen, "The tradition that Jesus' mother was a virgin…draws on a prophecy available only in the Greek version of Isaiah 7:14: In the original Hebrew, the word that stands behind the Septuagint's parthenos, "virgin," is aalmah, "young girl." [Paula Fredriksen, Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews, p. 27].

Crucible of doubt? Yes. Consider the world's foremost New Testament scholar, the late Thomas Metzger, who examined virtually all of the New Testament witnesses (sources) and tells us that "the last twelve verses of Mark (xvi. 9-20) are lacking in the two earliest parchment codices." Thus, he concluded, "Mark was not responsible for the composition of the last twelve verses of the generally current form of the Gospel." Yet, it is those twelve verses that tell us about the risen Jesus first appearing to Mary Magdalene and, subsequently, to the eleven - to whom he said "go into the world and preach the gospel to every creature."

Crucible of doubt? Yes. Consider the exceptional work of America's foremost Jesus historian, John Dominic Crossan. Writing in his book, The Birth of Christianity, Crossan informs us that that it was not at all unusual in the Greco-Roman world for humans to believe that a holy spirit or god could join with a human to produce offspring. Thus, back then, the story of the Holy Spirit and Mary had nothing on The Aeneid (the epic story in which the union of the Trojan, Anchises, with the goddess Aphrodite results in the birth of Aeneas), or the birth of the historical figure, Augustus, whose mother, Atia, supposedly was impregnated by Apollo. (Does anyone, today, actually believe that Apollo impregnated Atia?)

Concerning Jesus' resurrection, Crossan notes that, even today, it's not all uncommon for those grieving a recent death to feel an "intuitive, sometimes overwhelming 'presence' or 'spirit' of the lost person." Thus, when one considers the fact that people crucified around Jerusalem were rarely buried in private tombs - because "it was actually nonburial that made being crucified alive one of the three supreme penalties of Roman punishment" -- there's good reason to question pseudo-Mark's claim that Mary Magdalene saw an empty tomb and was the first to see the risen Jesus. (Crossan even goes so far as to assert that Mark "created" the story of Jesus' burial by Joseph of Arimathea.)

Crucible of doubt? Yes. New Testament scholar Bart Ehrman, writing in Lost Christianities, notes the following contradictions within the Gospels: "Did Jesus die during the afternoon before the Passover meal was eaten, as in John (see 19:14), or during the morning afterwards, as in Mark (see 14:12, 22; 15:25)? Did Joseph and Mary flee to Egypt after Jesus' birth as in Matthew (2:13-23), or did they return to Nazareth as in Luke (2:39)? Was Jairus's daughter sick and dying when he came to ask Jesus for help as in Mark (6:23, 25), or had she already died, as in Matthew (9:18)? After Jesus' resurrection, did the disciples stay in Jerusalem until he had ascended into heaven, as in Luke (24:1 - 52), or did they straightaway go to Galilee, as in Matthew (28:1 - 20)?"

If Mr. Lukacs is aware of such evidence, it hasn't prevented him from asserting that "the coming of Christ to earth may have been the central event of the universe: that the most consequential event in the entire universe occurred here, on this earth two thousand years ago."

Yet, beyond his failure to subject his Christian faith to the crucible of doubt he employs against the claims of science, Mr. Lukacs also knows that he is vulnerable to being hoisted by his own "grand truth" petard -- which is why he feebly asserts: "But God is more than our invention. And to those who think that God is nothing but our invention my question is: Why? What makes human being s want such an invention? Is it not that a spark of God may exist within us?"

Such flaws in Last Rites render it a disappointing valedictory from such an erudite and accomplished gentleman.

· * http://www.walter-c-uhler.com/Reviews/bush_america.html

· ** http://www.walter-c-uhler.com/Reviews/conscience.html

 

Next Page  1  |  2

(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).

Rate It | View Ratings

Walter Uhler Social Media Pages: Facebook page url on login Profile not filled in       Twitter page url on login Profile not filled in       Linkedin page url on login Profile not filled in       Instagram page url on login Profile not filled in

Walter C. Uhler is an independent scholar and freelance writer whose work has been published in numerous publications, including The Nation, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, the Journal of Military History, the Moscow Times and the San (more...)
 
Go To Commenting
The views expressed herein are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of this website or its editors.
Writers Guidelines

 
Contact AuthorContact Author Contact EditorContact Editor Author PageView Authors' Articles
Support OpEdNews

OpEdNews depends upon can't survive without your help.

If you value this article and the work of OpEdNews, please either Donate or Purchase a premium membership.

STAY IN THE KNOW
If you've enjoyed this, sign up for our daily or weekly newsletter to get lots of great progressive content.
Daily Weekly     OpEd News Newsletter
Name
Email
   (Opens new browser window)
 

Most Popular Articles by this Author:     (View All Most Popular Articles by this Author)

The Grand Jury Report: Part two of "What did Joe Paterno know and when did he know it?"

Three False Assertions by the Grand Jury turned the Press and Public against Joe Paterno and Penn State

New, Previously Suppressed Grand Jury Testimony and Joe Paterno: Part four of "What did Joe Paterno know and when...

What did Joe Paterno know and when did he know it? Part One

Incompetent Journalists at the Philadelphia Inquirer Slandered Joe Paterno

Hitting Penn State's Board of Trustees Where it Hurts

To View Comments or Join the Conversation:

Tell A Friend