Justice
As a Christian Skeptic, I'm concerned about issues of Justice. I've recently audited an excellent on-line Harvard course on the subject.
I think Christianity calls us to do more than just follow the rules about how we treat each other. We are called to challenge the assumptions of our culture and to take a very broad view of what is the right way to behave. It follows that we should take a serious interest in what is right. We are surrounded by bad assumptions about Justice and the right way is not at all obvious.
To me, Jesus was remarkable in that he seemed to have an instinct for what made sense (although you might think this was more than instinct). For example, he rejected the moral value of following the rules and rituals of the Judaism of his time. He spoke to women in public and counted them as his friends. He spoke highly of the moral character of non-Jews. Most importantly, he urged his followers to start changing the world by changing their own attitudes and re-directing their own lives.
In the subject of justice and ethics, we have come a very long way since the time of Jesus. Writers of the New Testament would have needed to rely on the Greek Philosophers if they knew about them at all. Slavery was taken for granted as a natural state of nature. Modern democratic ideas, such as equality before the law, would have made little sense in that time (they have a very tenuous foothold even in our time).
My Skeptical side demands that I be prepared to weigh, test and discuss important issues. To cite just one example, I should have a position on the issue of abortion that can be defended on grounds other than religious dogma.
I found The Harvard course to be excellent preparation for Sandel's "Democracy's Discontent", a fascinating history of the conflicts that arise between reasonable people struggling to find principled approaches fundamental issues.
I don't think anybody could get through this book without completely re-thinking his or her assumptions about what is right. In my own case, I was struck by how much my own personal assumptions were largely a function of being born in a certain time and place. The policies I support and the reasons for them turn out to be uncomfortably a function of fashion. Even the issues I regard to be important and the principles I think would be useful to address them mostly seem to be younger than I am!
For example, the very idea of individual human rights is hard to find in American law before World War II. Why is that? How did that work?
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| Michael Sandel introduces philosophy to an online audience |
To me, Jesus was remarkable in that he seemed to have an instinct for what made sense (although you might think this was more than instinct). For example, he rejected the moral value of following the rules and rituals of the Judaism of his time. He spoke to women in public and counted them as his friends. He spoke highly of the moral character of non-Jews. Most importantly, he urged his followers to start changing the world by changing their own attitudes and re-directing their own lives.
In the subject of justice and ethics, we have come a very long way since the time of Jesus. Writers of the New Testament would have needed to rely on the Greek Philosophers if they knew about them at all. Slavery was taken for granted as a natural state of nature. Modern democratic ideas, such as equality before the law, would have made little sense in that time (they have a very tenuous foothold even in our time).
My Skeptical side demands that I be prepared to weigh, test and discuss important issues. To cite just one example, I should have a position on the issue of abortion that can be defended on grounds other than religious dogma.
 |
| Case Studies in Public Morality |
I don't think anybody could get through this book without completely re-thinking his or her assumptions about what is right. In my own case, I was struck by how much my own personal assumptions were largely a function of being born in a certain time and place. The policies I support and the reasons for them turn out to be uncomfortably a function of fashion. Even the issues I regard to be important and the principles I think would be useful to address them mostly seem to be younger than I am!
For example, the very idea of individual human rights is hard to find in American law before World War II. Why is that? How did that work?
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