The Christian Worldview

 

Note: All posts are interconnected, so you are requested to read the previous posts before reading this post. 

Plato’s philosophy, like Socrates, was not easy to digest for many of their times. Even Plato’s students considered some of his concepts too ‘idealistic.’ However, he profoundly influenced the early fathers of the Church and, through that, the Christian Worldview. At that time, the western world was imbued with the Christian Worldview that dominated the world for over millennia. Plotinus, one of the most influential philosophers in ancient times after Plato and Aristotle, founder of Neoplatonism, A philosophical and religious system developed by the followers of Plotinus in the 3rd century A.D., and one of the Neo-Platonists[1], gave a new height to Plato’s thought through his rationality and reasoning. After that, a number of Plato’s doctrines, e.g., his doctrine of two worlds – the ultimate reality of the Universe is not the world of senses which we perceive, but the spirit, were easily and readily accepted in Christian theology largely by way of St. Paul, Origen and St. Augustine. Accordingly, at that time, the real purpose was considered as ‘salvation’ rather than achieving materialistic things.

During the entire span of the Middle ages, the philosophy widespread propagated by Christianity was certainly anti-materialistic. It is not to say that, during the Middle Ages, Western society was a biblical utopia, but there was a profound influence of Christianity and its worldview of salvation. Initially, Jewish adopted Christianity. Paul, one of the most influential philosophers in antiquity after Plato and Aristotle, was considered the then ‘father of the Church’, can be credited to spread Christianity by traveling all over Rome. In the beginning, conservative Romans rejected Christianity, considering it a threat to their religious system because they believed that the emperor protected society.

On the contrary, the Christians believed that only God protected everyone and everything. Consequently, they refused to worship the then emperor. As a result, Romans started punishing them brutally. Roman brandished Christians as heretics, and they had to face persecution and even death for defying the ‘state God.’ Many were tortured brutally and even torn to pieces by wild animals. But, the Christians faced persecution with such confidence that the people forcibly began to think that their religion must be true. Another reason for the acceptance of Christianity was its teaching promised a better life (salvation) after death which the Roman religion could never ensure. Slowly their numbers increased. In the fourth century A.D., Christianity became the state religion of the Rome Empire when the then Roman emperor Constantine embraced it. The corruption, civil wars, etc., lured the Barbarian tribes into attacking, which weakened the Rome Empire and strengthened Christianity. The Christian monasteries – especially those started by St. Benedict- made a deep impression on the minds of the barbarians, for they could see for themselves that man could really have a blissful life after renouncing all worldly pleasures. Gradually, the Barbarians ‘softened’, and even their leaders were attracted to Christianity. Consequently, during the early middle ages, the goodwill between the rulers and the Church deepened to such an extent that the Church acquired an almost independent status governing the spiritual life quite at par with the political state which governed the secular life.

Thus, it would not be wrong to say that the Christianity worldview during the Middle Ages prevailed in the Western world for over a millennium. However, various internal confrontations within Christianity with increased wealth and power shook people’s faith in Christianity. But, the succession of intellectual shifts, solidified during the 14th and 15th centuries, are considered the main reasons for the demise of this worldview. For example, the revival of Aristotelian, followers of Aristotle or his teaching, work in the twelfth century, primarily based on deductive logic and an inductive analytic method, attracted medieval thinkers to question some of the practices of the Church; One of the earliest thinkers, Peter Abelard, set down one hundred and fifty-eight propositions in his book Sic et non (translated as ‘Yes’ and ‘No’) through which he brought out the contradictory nature of the church doctrine. He always focused on advocating the supremacy of reason over faith: “A doctrine is believed, not because God has said it, but because we are convinced by reason that it is so”. A number of logical developments happened during the 15th  – 16th century. That era is known as the Renaissance. The next post briefly describes the development during Renaissance.

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Socratic-Platonic Thought

 

Note: All posts are interconnected, so you are requested to read the previous posts before reading this post. 

In the last post, we discussed the pre-Socrates period, where the philosophers explored wholeness and its parts with their roles. The section discusses Socratic-Platonic thoughts focusing on individual virtues, happiness, right knowledge, etc., instead of the Universe and its constituents.

Socrates, a Greek sage and philosopher of the fifth century B.C. from Athens, was the herald of a silent revolt against the living highly based on material possessions and imbued with power and wealth along with inhumanity. The below statement given by Mumford can help us visualize the materialistic life of that period:

“The ruling classes constantly were enervated by the surfeit of goods and pleasures they had so ruthlessly monopolized for themselves. They had lapsed, too may of these insolent rulers and their agents, from a human to a distinctly simian level; like the apes, they snatched food for themselves instead of sharing it with the froup; like them too, the more powerful claimed more than their share of women: like them again, they were in a constant state of nettled aggression toward possible rivals. In short, they had alienated themselves from their distinctly human potentialities….”

 During such an era, Socrates challenged all the vanities and pomps of a materialistic worldview through his simple life and powerful teachings. He was very much concerned with the question of virtues viz. justice, piety, moderation, etc., culminating in human happiness. He believed that happiness depends not on external objects and luxurious life but on knowingly acting rightly. To achieve a good life, he believed people should focus on moral virtue rather than pursuing material wealth because virtue that consists of the right knowing always leads to the right actions. However, he did not indicate how one could obtain that virtue. According to him, one can achieve righteousness by questioning one’s moral beliefs. That’s why he was also known as a moral philosopher of that time. In his trial speech, he tries to explain the substance of his mission (Graham, 2016):

“Men of Athens, I appreciate and love you, but I will obey the god rather than you, and as long as I draw breath and have the ability, I will not stop philosophising and exhorting you and appealing to any one of you I happen to meet, saying what I always say, “Good sir, since you are an Athenian, a citizen of the greatest city and the one most renowned for wisdom and power, aren’t you ashamed of yourself for devoting yourself to maximising your wealth, your reputation, and your rank, while you show no interest at all in how to improve your wisdom, your honesty, and the state of your soul.”

 The philosophy of ‘right knowledge,’ propagated by Socrates, can be understood by the writings of his students, especially Plato. He concluded that ‘right knowledge’  free from all possibilities of errors of perception and judgment could not be achieved through senses because our senses are transient, continually changing and subject to decay and death. Thus, sensual perceptions are not enough to conclude this world objectively.

 The idea of ‘Good’, wisdom etc. belong to the super-sensible world (in contrast to objects which constitute the sensible world), and in Plato’s own words;

“…. in the world of knowledge, the idea of good seen, is also inferred to be the world of knowledge, the idea of good seen, is also inferred to be the Universal author of all things beautiful and right… the immediate source of reason and truth.. and that this is the power upon which he who would act rationally either in public or private life must have his eye fixed”.

In Plato’s philosophy, we thus find a consummation of Socratic teachings. Socrates taught that true happiness – the perfect realisation of one’s ‘being’ -  needs right action, which demands ‘right knowledge.’ This knowledge could dawn only with a clear understanding of the idea of ‘Good’, and Plato indicated that ‘divine contemplation’ of the super-sensible world would reveal the idea of ‘Good.’ The perfection of man thus necessitated a knowledge of super-sensible realities. Accordingly, in his Academy too, Plato emphasized ‘enlightening’ his students, creating a love of knowledge and wisdom rather than imparting any special skill.

  We thus find that Platonic philosophy is a complete antithesis of the materialistic worldview. Like Socrates, he mocked all attempts at finding happiness in the ‘sensible world’. He considered people who thought to become happy only from sensual pleasures as prisoners of an underground cave where one can never see anything else other than the shadows on the wall of their cave, and they assume the shadows as realities. It implies that people searching for happiness only in the domain of their sensual pleasures are unaware of their virtue and realities. True happiness lies in coming out of this ‘prison house’ of the ‘world of sight’ and willfully undertaking the prisoners’ journey out of the cave. He believed this was the real purpose of truly human life.

Thus, being practical moral philosophers, Socrates and Plato much focused on individual virtues that culminate in human happiness. They condemned happiness and values derived only from senses and advocated that ‘right knowledge’, which could not be possible with temporary senses, is required to get the virtues. Hence, the Socratic-Platonic thought was the antithesis of the materialistic worldview prevailing in the modern worldview.

 After briefly understanding Socratic-Platonic thoughts, we can now move towards ‘The Christian Worldview,’ which dominated the western world for over millennia.

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Worldviews of the Pre-Socrates Philosophers

 

Note: All posts are interconnected, so you are requested to read the previous posts before reading this post.   

The last post discussed the materialistic worldview - full of inherent contradictions and dilemmas. If you have not gone through it yet, read the previous post before reading this section, as all posts are interconnected. It is important to note here that the materialistic worldview that has influenced the globe and is being adopted worldwide, irrespective of the religion, cast, creed and even geographical area, did not even exist before the fourth century B.C. In fact, interestingly, it was quite the opposite those days. The then philosophers are known as Pre-Socrates Philosophers. It will be an exciting journey to learn about their worldviews because many of us, especially those who are born in the modern era full of materialistic happiness, may not be able to think of worldviews other than the materialistic. This section unfolds the worldviews of the Pre-Socrates Philosophers, which were not materialistic at all.

Thales, Anaximander and Anaximenes, who lived in Miletus city in Greek in the sixth century B.C., are considered the ancestors of philosophies in western civilization. They were curious to know about the Universe and its fundamental substances. Therefore, questions like who created the Universe, how does the Universe work? etc., were at their priority. They tried to understand the Universe from the point of view of inherent natural laws rather than any God’s action or supreme power. So, they are often called ‘naturalists’ or ‘cosmologists’.

They observed two fundamental characteristics of reality: first, everything in the world is changing with time: second, any single thing that exists is different than anything else that exists, has existed and will ever exist. They concluded that a single and permanent substance underlying all the dynamic changes occurring in the perceptible world retains its unity and fundamental identity, termed as ‘Arche’. The Milesians saw the Arche as a physical or bodily material, as opposed to the concept of an immaterial soul or pure intellect. However, at the same time, this underlying essence was regarded as alive and endowed with spirit, and it was deemed divine and imbued with intelligence. Each Milesian offered a different view about what the Arche is made of. For example, Thales proposed that Arche is made of water, which implies water is an underlying substance of everything. Empedocles (fifth century B.C.) claimed that the combination of four elements (earth, water, air, and fire (or light) is the root cause of all the manifestation in the material world. Anaximander believed Arche not to be any material substance because of its limited nature. So, he called Arche as ‘Aperion’ -something is absent of limitations or limitless- which implies all-pervading. Anaximenes proposed Arche as ‘Air’. From an atomistic perspective,         Democritus, half a century after Empedocles, visualized the material world as composed of atoms of various shapes and sizes. He believed that all the observable dynamic properties are the combinations of atoms inside the objects. Epicurus, who extended the teaching of Democritus, restated the atomic perspective and said that whatever exists results from the recombination of atoms.

There was another view about the Universe based on the analogy of ‘Microcosm’ and ‘Macrocosm’. For earlier Greek philosophers, the world was a kosmos- ultimately ordered and harmonious structure which implies that each unit of this world is in harmony placed purposefully with other parts, and the characteristics of the whole Universe reflect on its parts. Microcosm and macrocosm are two components of an ancient Greek philosophical theory that describes humans and their role in the Universe. These early thinkers considered the individual human being as a small world (mikros kosmos ), whose composition and structure matched that of the Universe, or big world (makros kosmos, or megas kosmos ). This can be understood from Philebus and Timaeus, where Plato argues that humans and the Universe both have a fundamental body and a rational soul. The human soul must derive from the Universe’s soul, just as the human body does from the Universe’s body. As a result, the cosmos is not only a well-ordered system but also an intelligent creature.

The above discussion implies that the earlier Greek philosophers used to think of inherent unity, the interconnectedness of various parts of the Universe, the proper role of various substances, orderliness and purposeful integration of all substances. They were more interested to know the inherent underlying natural laws of which the whole world is a manifestation. This kind of worldview prevailed during the pre-Socrates period when philosophers used to explore wholeness and its parts with their roles. 

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Prevailing Worldview and its Impacts

 

Note: All posts are interconnected, so you are requested to read the previous posts before reading this post. 

Materialistic Worldview (A worldview of crises)

A materialistic worldview is a worldview where a human being is considered the only body, happiness is seen as sensual pleasures, Nature is seen only as a resource to gratify sensual pleasures and relationships are recognized only if there is a materialistic gain. This worldview has dominantly influenced the modern era. But since all the sensory interactions are inherently transient in Nature, this can never lead to sustainable happiness. In an attempt to make it perpetual, continuous effort is made to maximize and perpetuate happiness through this mode by trying to evolve and indulge in more and more pleasurable material interactions of newer kinds. This naturally gives rise to ever-increasing `consumerism' or the tendency towards unlimited material needs. It is also responsible for the widespread modern ethos for profit maximization and increasing accumulation of enjoyable goods and services. The fallacy inherent in this perception can easily be recognized as, on the one hand, it directly leads to exploitation of the natural environment, in an uncontrolled manner, as well as other human beings leading to strife, disparities, violence and continuous environmental degradation; on the other hand, it is also responsible for engendering restlessness, tension, insecurity, fear, psychological problems and other incongruities within the human beings. Therefore, it proves counter-productive on all fronts. Any effort carried out under this worldview to perpetuate happiness, in fact, results in increasing misery on all fronts.

Further, under the influence of such a perception of happiness, efforts to ensure prosperity (which essentially implies the feeling of adequacy in fulfillment of our material needs) manifest in the form of triggering more and more accumulation of enjoyable goods and services. And yet one keeps feeling `deprived' and wanting more and more because inherently no amount of material accumulation can make happiness sustainable. Such a propensity has also been called human greed - ever wanting more and more and as Mahatma Gandhi proclaimed;

 `Earth provides enough to satisfy every man's need but not for every man's greed'

  Inherent Dilemmas in the Materialistic Worldview

 The materialistic worldview is full of inherent dilemmas. The dilemmas are as follows:

 Undefined Growth:

The worldview motivates one to grow (in materialistic terms) more and more. However, the term 'Growth' is not defined yet and has a very vague meaning. That's why people make their own definition of growth. There is no line defined when we can say there is now enough growth and no need to move further. Everyone is following undefined growth, which ultimately culminates in dissatisfaction and unhappiness in an individual.

 The dichotomy in removing poverty with undefined prosperity line

The poverty line is generally established but not the prosperity line, which is primarily defined as the acquisition of increasing wealth. Such ill-defined affluence has widened the divide between affluence and poverty, both worldwide and inside countries, and poverty will continue to exist on the planet. Thus, all wholeheartedly efforts on poverty eradication result in marginal impacts. It can be understood through the following example: the difference in per capita income between the North and South tripled from $5,700 in 1960 to $15,000 in 1993. The richest 20% of the world’s people now own 85% of their wealth, while the poorest 20% (who account for 80% of the total world population) own just 1.4% .

 The Hesitation in Adopting Sustainable Consumption (SC)

The following reasons, in the form of hesitations, have been identified while adopting sustainable consumption; 

(i)             With the prevalent notion of the growth in society, if we consume less, it is seen as “low quality of living standard” (Living high quality/status of life means higher consumption). Thus, it results in a hesitation to live in a nature-friendly manner for sustainability.    

(ii)           It becomes a challenge for an individual, who has grown up with the materialistic worldview, to break one’s habits based on materialistic taste, the social pressure of standard of life, high consumption, etc.  

 It is interesting to note that modern development keeps following undefined and ever-increasing growth promoting tendencies for higher consumption, while we talk about sustainable consumption.

    In the present state of society, it is apparent that people are so much indulged in seeking sensory happiness primarily from materialistic things. Subsequently, the prevalent propensity to maximize sense gratification is now believed to be a perfectly ‘normal’ propensity and culminated in the belief that happiness lies only in sensual pleasures. The materialistic worldview is now so entrenched in society that it is now even difficult to visualize any alternative. 

    Though, the worldview in Ancient Greek (before the fourth century B.C.) was quite the opposite of the modern worldview, which gradually changed and culminated in the materialistic worldview. The next post primarily discusses the changes in worldviews during the medieval ages.

About Worldview

About Worldview

Each one of us sees the world according to one's perspective. That's why we see Existence, Nature, ourselves, relationships with others, happiness and prosperity differently. One may see Existence/Nature from a purely scientific perspective; the other may see this world from a spiritual perspective; some may see it from an economic perspective. In fact, many times, you have been noticing conflicting views in people about the same object or the same event. For example, our attitude towards Nature depends upon our perspective and we act accordingly. A person with an economic perspective may think of using Nature as a source to earn money; a person with a scientific perspective may think of physical-chemical laws working in Nature; a person with a spiritual perspective may think about the purpose of Nature. Now these three persons sitting together may conflict while talking about Nature.

Our perspectives are actually responsible for our happiness or unhappiness. For example, people may have different views about a falling leaf from a tree. One may conclude that the tree has left the leaf as its work is over. Similarly, the world will leave me one day. Therefore, there is no need to think about the world; self-enjoyment is the only way to live. Another one may conclude that the leaf has got mixed into the soil. In the same manner, one day, I will also be a part of the soil and no relationship will continue with me in the future. Therefore, there is no need to attach to anyone and self-centric living is the only way to live a life. Another one, observing the same event, may conclude that the leaf was participating in the tree's growth till it was with the tree. Having separated from the tree, now it is participating in the soil. Therefore, one should continuously ensure participation with everyone (either living or non-living) in every place. Thus, our conclusions based on our perceptions make us happy/unhappy.

Worldview is the way of seeing and interpreting the world. The worldview of a particular time is the view regarding the ultimate realities of existence. It refers to the perception which has a dominant influence on people in any particular era and affects policy-making, planning, etc. It does not imply that such a view is held by each and every individual, which definitely differs at any point in time.

Needless to emphasize, our worldview affects all aspects of our life, namely lifestyles, behavior, economic activities, social set-up, technological systems, etc. 

In any particular era, a worldview may be based on an understanding of Existential realities or assumptions about realities. If a worldview is based on existential realities which are actually universal, it creates a conducive environment where people can live harmoniously and happily; otherwise, it creates a conflicting environment. In other words, we may say that if there is a conflicting environment in any particular era where people are fighting, dominating, or thinking of exploiting for their short-term benefits, the worldview is not based on the understanding of Existential realities. In fact, the worldview is based on some wrong assumptions about the realities.

 "A WORLDVIEW BASED ON THE EXISTENTIAL REALITIES CREATES A HARMONIOUS LIFESTYLE FOR PEOPLE"