Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Joan of Bark · 08-27-2008, 02:12 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by No Robots

It is very difficult for idealists, as Christ was, to communicate ideas to the masses, preoccupied as they are with material existence. As Hyman Gerson Elenow puts it:

Like other treasures, then, ideals cannot be gotten nor held without a certain cost. The idealist must be ready to pay the price of his ideals, and usually it means facing the opposition and misunderstanding of his fellowmen. There is hardly an idealist who has not been forced to endure the antagonism of the world, and particularly the unhappiness of being misunderstood by it. Had the world understood its idealists, and had it sought to put into effect their teachings and visions, it would be different than it is. But the world has hardly ever really grasped what its ideal teachers meant to convey and to accomplish. This has formed the tragedy of idealists. Sooner or later it is the fate of every idealist to realize the distance between himself and the world, the difficulty of making himself understood, and the remote chance of his words and visions finding fulfillment. --Hyman Gerson Elenow / A Jewish view of Jesus, p. 85.

Christ uses parables, or more properly, meshalim, as the most effective means of communicating his ideals. He knew full well, though, that most of his hearers would fail to grasp his meaning, so he lives in hope of reaching at least some few. Fortunately, among all the dross written about Christ, there are some gold nuggets that really can help us attain to his thought. Elenow's book, for example, is a great place to start.

I still don't get it. If He had spoken more plainly -- that is, without parables --He would have been understood by more listeners. Okay, so He won't reach them all, but He'd reach a helluvalot more than He did with His arcane stories.
(Unless you accept storytime's explanation).

No Robots · 08-27-2008, 08:36 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilosopherJay

According to wikipedia, the quote is from the Viereck interview

Hi PhilosopherJay:

I think you are using an old version of Wikipedia, because the current article for

Albert Einstein does not have any of Einstein's comments on Christ. They are present in some mirror sites.

Here is the quotation we are discussing:

What humanity owes to personalities like Buddha, Moses, and Jesus ranks for me higher than all the achievements of the enquiring and constructive mind.

Only the old version of the Wikipedia article traces this quotation to the Viereck interview (1929). Every other source dates it to 1937. What would settle this definitely is to look at the whole Viereck interview in the Saturday Evening Post 26 October 1929, p. 17. Unfortunately, the digital archive to which I have access only goes back to 1931.

In any case, there are ample quotations from Einstein outside the Viereck interview that confirm his abiding interest in Christ. What is more, we have an independent confirmation in Brian (p. 277-278) of the accuracy of Viereck's reporting. Beyond that, it seems somewhat dubious to question the accuracy of Viereck's reporting solely on the basis of his Nazi sympathies. Hell, if we were to dismiss reporters' work solely because their politics disgust us, whom would we ever believe?

No Robots · 08-27-2008, 08:47 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Joan of Bark

I still don't get it. If He had spoken more plainly -- that is, without parables --He would have been understood by more listeners. Okay, so He won't reach them all, but He'd reach a helluvalot more than He did with His arcane stories.
(Unless you accept storytime's explanation).

Well, that's like saying that Shakespeare would be a lot more understandable if he had used modern English. The point is that people exist within a linguistic matrix that governs the form of their literary activity. Christ only had access to the mystical/prophetic idiom of his literary context. We have to accept this and imbue ourselves with the spirit of this context if we hope to extract his meaning. The content of his thought was difficult enough even for people who were part of the same literary matrix as himself. How much more difficult is it for us, at so far a remove, to enter into the spirit of his thought? That is why we need the help of tools that help make that ancient thought-realm accessible to our own thought-realm.

bacht · 08-27-2008, 08:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by No Robots

Quote:

Originally Posted by Joan of Bark

I still don't get it. If He had spoken more plainly -- that is, without parables --He would have been understood by more listeners. Okay, so He won't reach them all, but He'd reach a helluvalot more than He did with His arcane stories.
(Unless you accept storytime's explanation).

Well, that's like saying that Shakespeare would be a lot more understandable if he had used modern English. The point is that people exist within a linguistic matrix that governs the form of their literary activity. Christ only had access to the mystical/prophetic idiom of his literary context. We have to accept this and imbue ourselves with the spirit of this context if we hope to extract his meaning. The content of his thought was difficult enough even for people who were part of the same literary matrix as himself. How much more difficult is it for us, at so far a remove, to enter into the spirit of his thought? That is why we need the help of tools that help make that ancient thought-realm accessible to our own thought-realm.

My impression is that the person of Christ was the message, rather than anything he said - what original or unusual teachings did he really have?

No Robots · 08-27-2008, 09:07 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bacht

My impression is that the person of Christ was the message, rather than anything he said - what original or unusual teachings did he really have?

Quite right. But personality and originality are one and the same, as Enelow makes clear:

In his own way Jesus did what the Prophets had done: he gave a fresh interpretation of the laws governing the spiritual life, a fresh message concerning the meaning and the purpose of religion, a new illumination of the sense and the object of the old law and of the old prophetic utterances. Here lay his genius and originality. Moreover, he sought to teach his hearers and disciples the need of gaining, each for himself, such a fresh and personal appreciation of religion. Even in this very important matter Jesus did not profess to say anything that had never been said before: he could not have professed it in view of what he had read in Jeremiah and the Psalms. But he did try to teach these essential truths and central beauties of the religious life in his own way, and through his own experience, and by means of his own personal life. And where ever we find true personality, we have originality. Supreme personality is greatest originality.--A Jewish View of Jesus by Hyman Gerson Enelow, p. 17-18.

bacht · 08-27-2008, 09:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by No Robots

Quote:

Originally Posted by bacht

My impression is that the person of Christ was the message, rather than anything he said - what original or unusual teachings did he really have?

Quite right. But personality and originality are one and the same, as Enelow makes clear:

In his own way Jesus did what the Prophets had done: he gave a fresh interpretation of the laws governing the spiritual life, a fresh message concerning the meaning and the purpose of religion, a new illumination of the sense and the object of the old law and of the old prophetic utterances. Here lay his genius and originality. Moreover, he sought to teach his hearers and disciples the need of gaining, each for himself, such a fresh and personal appreciation of religion. Even in this very important matter Jesus did not profess to say anything that had never been said before: he could not have professed it in view of what he had read in Jeremiah and the Psalms. But he did try to teach these essential truths and central beauties of the religious life in his own way, and through his own experience, and by means of his own personal life. And where ever we find true personality, we have originality. Supreme personality is greatest originality.--A Jewish View of Jesus by Hyman Gerson Enelow, p. 17-18.

So this makes Jesus a prophet par excellence, living the most righteous possible life according to the Mosaic tradition? Certainly there are echos of Elijah and Elisha in the Gospels, and maybe some Cynic ideas from Q. But this picture conflicts with the early high Christology of the epistles, unless we dismiss those somehow.

No Robots · 08-27-2008, 09:34 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bacht

So this makes Jesus a prophet par excellence, living the most righteous possible life according to the Mosaic tradition?

Precisely, except you must bear in mind the distinction between traditionalism, which is the ossified Mosaism of the priests and rabbis, and the living mystical reality of the prophets.

Quote:

Certainly there are echos of Elijah and Elisha in the Gospels, and maybe some Cynic ideas from Q. But this picture conflicts with the early high Christology of the epistles, unless we dismiss those somehow.

The High Christology is part of the earliest layers of the Gospels, as Gerhardsson explains:

The synoptic tradition was transmitted and written down in the context of a Church which did not believe Jesus to be a mere earthly teacher. It believed him to be the Messiah: Christ, the Son of Man, the Servant of the Lord, the Son of God, the Lord — to mention only a few of the messianic epithets. This high Christology cannot be disconnected from the impression made by Jesus on his disciples, and furthermore it must have some original connection with Jesus' own view of his work, of his position, and of himself. The opinion expressed by so many scholars, that the Christology of the NT is essentially a creation of the young Church, is an intelligent thesis, but historically most improbable.--Memory and Manuscript / Birger Gerhardsson, p. 325

Christ's self-perception encompasses the whole prophetic/mystical stream of Judaism, including the High Christology of the Messiah.

PhilosopherJay · 08-27-2008, 09:55 AM

Hi No Robots,

Yes, seeing the Saturday Post Article would be nice. Also, I think we need to look at the confirmation in Brian's book to see how strong a confirmation it is. Unfortunately, I wouldn't have time this week to do that, but hopefully I'll have a chance next week.

If Einstein had said similar things in other interviews, then the question of the legitimacy of what he said in this interview would not arise. However, some aspects of Einstein's views seem to be unique to the Viereck article. His categorical acceptance of the existence of Christ, the accuracy of Christs' words that he attributes to the Bible ("His personality pulsates in every word") and his regard for religious knowledge above scientific knowledge seem to be unique to this interview.

Ordinarily, I do not take into consideration the political sympathies of a reporter in an interview situation. However, in this case, Viereck was no ordinary reporter. but a man with a unique and extraordinary personality and history, including being arrested in 1941 and convicted of Nazi propaganda.

Glen Yerdon and John Hawkins have this to say about him in their book: The "Nazi Hydra in America:" (http://www.spiritone.com/~gdy52150/1930sp5.html)

Quote:

Viereck was the highest-ranking Nazi agent arrested during the war and had been arrested as a German agent during WWI. Viereck was a V-agent or "Vertauensleute" (confidential agent) for the Abwehr. Following the war, another of the Abwehr’s V-agents exposed was William Rhodes Davis, the Texas oil man.100 Very little is known about Viereck and the network of V-agents as the Nazis destroyed their most of their files. Most known V-agents appeared engaged in spreading propaganda.

Neil Johnson gives a very interesting assessment of Viereck (http://www.lib.uiowa.edu/spec-coll/Bai/johnson2.htm)

Quote:

Freud was impressed with Viereck's understanding of psychoanalysis and considered him a very capable interpreter of the subject. [26] Viereck also gained the confidence of Albert Einstein, who believed his interviewer to be almost "Jewish" in his capacity for tolerance. [27] In 1928 Viereck collaborated with a Jewish writer, Paul Eldridge, in authoring the first of three books based on the amorous adventures of the legendary Wandering Jew who was blessed -- or cursed -- with eternal youth. [28]

In view of these affiliations, it comes as something of a shock to find Viereck serving as a publicist or propagandist for Nazi Germany after Hitler's rise to power. Except for Nazi anti-Semitism, which he mildly criticized and rationalized as peripheral to the movement, he sympathized with what he believed was the Nazi Party's rightful objective of restoring Germany to a place of honor and equality of power among the great nations of the world. [29] He considered Hitler to be a genius, if somewhat neurotic in regard to the Jews. [30] In 1933 he helped edit a pro-Nazi publication of the German tourist bureau in this country. Through articles in Liberty magazine he predicted some of Hitler's moves, including the annexation of the Sudetenland. [31] In the late 1930's he became the highest-paid American publicist for the German cause by accepting lucrative offers to serve as a correspondent for a Munich newspaper and as an editor with the German Library of Information in New York City. He advised officials in the German Foreign Office, particularly Hans Dieckhoff, who was German ambassador to this country in the mid-1930's, and the German consul in New York City, on the state of American public opinion and the mood of Congress regarding Germany and the European situation. He cultivated friendships with certain isolationist Congressmen, especially Hamilton Fish, Jr., of New York and Ernest Lundeen of Minnesota, who were anti British and sympathetic to Germany. [32] Of course, in the meantime, most of his Jewish friends repudiated him.

The shock is perhaps mitigated or better comprehended by realizing that Viereck had long thought of himself as America's foremost interpreter of Germany, a role that he began taking seriously about 1908. He also had a special feeling of kinship with the exiled Kaiser, who always remained a strong German nationalist. An aesthete mixed up in politics, Viereck was actually out of his element. He rationalized that while America was his wife (his chosen mate), Germany was like a mother and one does not criticize even an errant mother in public. [33] He also thought the Nazi revolution to be relatively bloodless, and the persecution of Jews and other minorities to be a regrettable but perhaps an inevitable and minor injustice in an "imperfect world." [34] The reawakening of Germany's national pride and its lusty display of spirit -- such as at the annual Party Day at Nuremberg -- seemed to arouse in him the sensual moods implicit in his early poems. It generated a kind of narcissistic pleasure, in which he could readily admit, as the Freudians bad claimed, that under strong pressures and appeals to feelings, reason becomes a ready tool of the emotions. Another irony in this situation was the fact that Peter, Viereck's elder son, pubfished in 1941 an analysis of Nazism that damned it as an outgrowth of irrational, romantic myths of the German past which mythicized Aryan paganism and the virtues of German blood and soil. [35] Father and son stood at opposite ideological or philosophical poles.

From this we can see how the religious point of view Viereck has Einstein express in his article supports Viereck's position. Viereck was a fierce German nationalist, but not an anti-Semite. Promoting Einstein as an example of German superiority was important to him. At the same time, promoting him as a modern enlightened German rather than a Jew would also be important for Viereck, who supported the nationalist goals of the Nazis, but not their anti-Semitism. By having Einstein praise Jesus and other religious figures, Viereck has Einstein seem like a good tolerant, deeply spiritual, Hegelian idealist German, praising all religions equally for revealing spiritual truths. He might have been born a Jew, but now he is an enlightened pantheist.

Since Viereck is translating Einstein's interview responses from German into English, one has to wonder how much of the thoughts are Einstein's and how much are Viereck's. How much is Viereck shaping the original material to produce the image of Einstein, the Great German Scientist and Humanitarian, that he wants his audience to see.

Warmly,

Philosopher Jay

Quote:

Originally Posted by No Robots

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilosopherJay

According to wikipedia, the quote is from the Viereck interview

Hi PhilosopherJay:

I think you are using an old version of Wikipedia, because the current article for

Albert Einstein does not have any of Einstein's comments on Christ. They are present in some mirror sites.

Here is the quotation we are discussing:

What humanity owes to personalities like Buddha, Moses, and Jesus ranks for me higher than all the achievements of the enquiring and constructive mind.

Only the old version of the Wikipedia article traces this quotation to the Viereck interview (1929). Every other source dates it to 1937. What would settle this definitely is to look at the whole Viereck interview in the Saturday Evening Post 26 October 1929, p. 17. Unfortunately, the digital archive to which I have access only goes back to 1931.

In any case, there are ample quotations from Einstein outside the Viereck interview that confirm his abiding interest in Christ. What is more, we have an independent confirmation in Brian (p. 277-278) of the accuracy of Viereck's reporting. Beyond that, it seems somewhat dubious to question the accuracy of Viereck's reporting solely on the basis of his Nazi sympathies. Hell, if we were to dismiss reporters' work solely because their politics disgust us, who would we ever believe?

No Robots · 08-27-2008, 10:03 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilosopherJay

Also, I think we need to look at the confirmation in Brian's book to see how strong a confirmation it is. Unfortunately, I wouldn't have time this week to do that, but hopefully I'll have a chance next week.

You can read the relevant passage in Brian at Amazon. Just go to the Amazon page, and do a search-in-book on "pulsates". That will bring you to the relevant passage on page 278.

Quote:

If Einstein had said similar things in other interviews, then the question of the legitimacy of what he said in this interview would not arise. However, some aspects of Einstein's views seem to be unique to the Viereck article. His categorical acceptance of the existence of Christ, the accuracy of Christs' words that he attributes to the Bible ("His personality pulsates in every word") and his regard for religious knowledge above scientific knowledge seem to be unique to this interview.

I don't know how you can say this when I have provided several quotations from outside the Viereck interview which show that Einstein held Christ in high regard, and certainly never questioned his existence.

aa5874 · 08-27-2008, 12:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by No Robots

I don't know how you can say this when I have provided several quotations from outside the Viereck interview which show that Einstein held Christ in high regard, and certainly never questioned his existence.

This is quite unusual when so many Christians, if not all, at sometime, do question the existence of Christ.

Even you I would imagine. Mother Theresa did.

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