On the Supremacy of Christian Dogma

While the age of secularism is obviously breathing its last sigh, the inertia of western atheism gives it enough cultural sway that religious philosophy still feels the burden to make a case for its own validity, against the still-dominant preconception that the supernatural is a mirage and that only rationalism (or, alternatively, a form of

While the age of secularism is obviously breathing its last sigh, the inertia of western atheism gives it enough cultural sway that religious philosophy still feels the burden to make a case for its own validity, against the still-dominant preconception that the supernatural is a mirage and that only ‘rationalism’ (or, alternatively, a form of ‘critique’ which is suspicious of even rationalism) is able to make a serious claim to metaphysical traction.

The case is however easy to make, and this was actually accomplished by Kant over two hundred years ago, even if his message was incorrectly interpreted by his own various followers. The message is simply this: any coherent rationalist philosophy must admit, by the force of its own axioms, the inability of any type of philosophy, whether rationalist or another modality, to make sense of the fundamental problem of human existence. Additionally, philosophy does not have the power to disqualify approaches to this problem other than philosophy. It is worth stressing that it is philosophy itself which demarcates its own limits, and therefore also indicates the realm outside its own where divine revelation may enter.

Here’s a short demonstration: to begin, philosophy has no choice but to admit the reality of both the finite and the infinite. Every human being is aware of a drive to ‘have it all’ (infinite) and yet finds this drive unsatisfied (finite). This situation, at least initially, is experienced as unfortunate.

The various schools of philosophy always arrive at contradiction in their attempts to explain this situation and thereby set a task to meaningfully solve it. There are only a limited number of strategies. One option is to attempt to demonstrate the illusory nature of either the finite (idealism), or otherwise the infinite (materialism), and thereby explain away the problem. Let’s call this approach Gnosticism, for reasons I’ll explain later. These contrary attempts, which can be respectively identified with Parmenides and Heraclitus, always fall short due to their inability to explain the existence of the illusion they claim to have identified, or of illusion as such, as something ‘opposed’ to reality. In the very distinction between illusion and reality, the distinction between finite and infinite is accidentally reintroduced (illusion falls short of reality).

The other possible approach, which we will call Paganism, accepts the failure of Gnosticism and the reality of both the infinite and the finite. Paganism’s strategy in explaining away the human condition is to claim that the finite and infinite are both real, but that this can be justified by the fact that one of the two is in need of the other. Maybe, the explanation goes, the infinite created the finite so that it could go through an experience needed to fully realize itself, or because it was lonely (objective idealism). But this justification arrives at contradiction, because it renders the infinite lacking in some way, and therefore finite. And if, on the contrary, the infinite only exists because of the finite’s need for it, perhaps as a goal to aspire to, this renders the former contingent (transcendental empiricism), thus once again no longer infinite. This explanation thus also arrives at contradiction, this one actually not meaningfully different from Gnosticism. While these are ancient ideas, their highest modern incarnations are respectively the efforts of Hegel and Deleuze.

All secular philosophical positions fall into the category of either Paganism or Gnosticism, no matter how refined, academic, radical, cryptic, or practical (Pick your thinker, Hegel, Deleuze, Lacan, Russell, Whitehead, Land, Brandom, Derrida). To claim that the problem of the human condition is ‘because of language’ , ‘because of evolution’, ‘because of social injustice’, ‘because of our generation’s cultural decadence’ or simply ‘is the price of human freedom’ is simply to say: the contradiction we experience is there because of a contradiction. It is no explanation at all. Christianity has a term for this: the cross.

Yet this discussion seems to lead us inevitably to a thesis, derived from philosophy rather than theology or revelation, which is a fundamentally Abrahamic dogma: the infinite (God) has absolutely no need for the finite (the World). This is the jumping off point from the shores of reason into the seas whose depths are impenetrable to the concept.

If this is the case, that there is no ‘need’ for the finite at all, then the manifest existence of the world can only have been due to a free, contingent act of God, which could just as well not have happened.

And it also follows that if this God is capable of a free, contingent act, it is a God who has something enough like personhood that he is able to communicate to his creation through scripture and revelation. To be clear: the only point being made here is that it is impossible to both be a rationalist and maintain the view that divine revelation is intrinsically impossible. Whether it can be shown that divine revelation’s possibility is ever actualized is a different question.

To begin to answer this question, let us consider the three dogmas that distinguish Orthodox Christianity from all variants of Gnosticism and Paganism, whether in secular guises, those of other religious faiths or or heretical sects of Christianity itself: The Eternal Trinity, the Incarnation of Jesus, and the Humanity of Mary

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