BOOK THREE
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THE VICTORY OF THE GOOD OVER THE EVIL PRINCIPLE,
AND THE FOUNDING OF A KINGDOM OF
GOD ON EARTH
The combat which every morally well-disposed man must sustain in
this life, under the leadership of the good principle, against the attacks of the
evil principle, can procure him, however much he exerts himself, no greater
advantage than freedom from the sovereignty of evil. To become free, "to
be freed from bondage under the law of sin, to live for righteousness"1--
this is the highest prize he can win. He continues to be exposed, none the
less, to the assaults of the evil principle; and in order to assert his freedom,
which is perpetually being attacked, he must ever remain armed for the fray.
Now man is in this perilous state through his own fault; hence he is
bound at the very least to strive with all his might to extricate himself from
it. But how? That is the question. When he looks around for the causes and
circumstances which expose him to this danger and keep him in it, he can
easily convince himself that he is subject to these not because of his own
gross nature, so far as he is here a separate individual, but because of
mankind to whom he is related and bound. It is not at the instigation of the
former that what should properly be called the passions, which cause such
havoc in his original good predisposition, are aroused. His needs are but
few and his frame of mind in providing for them is temperate and tranquil.
He is poor (or considers himself so) only in his anxiety lest other men
consider him poor and despise him on that account. Envy, the lust for
power, greed, and the malignant inclinations bound up with these, besiege
his nature, contented within itself, as soon as he is among men. And it is
not even necessary to assume that these are men sunk in evil and examples
to lead him astray; it suffices that they are at hand, that they surround him,
and that they are men, for them mutually to corrupt each other's
predispositions and make one another evil. If no means could be discovered
for the forming of an alliance uniquely designed as a
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protection against this evil and for the furtherance of goodness in man--of a
society, enduring, ever extending itself, aiming solely at the maintenance of
morality, and counteracting evil with united forces--this association with
others would keep man, however much, as a single individual, he may have
done to throw off the sovereignty of evil, incessantly in danger of falling
back under its dominion. As far as we can see, therefore, the sovereignty of
the good principle is attainable, so far as men can work toward it, only
through the establishment and spread of a society in accordance with, and
for the sake of, the laws of virtue, a society whose task and duty it is
rationally to impress these laws in all their scope upon the entire human
race. For only thus can we hope for a victory of the good over the evil
principle. In addition to prescribing laws to each individual, morally
legislative reason also unfurls a banner of virtue as a rallying point for all
who love the good, that they may gather beneath it and thus at the very start
gain the upper hand over the evil which is attacking them without rest.
A union of men under merely moral laws, patterned on the above
idea, may be called an ethical, and so far as these laws are public, an ethico-
civil (in contrast to a juridico-civil) society or an ethical commonwealth. It
can exist in the midst of a political commonwealth and may even be made up
of all its members; (indeed, unless it is based upon such a commonwealth it
can never be brought into existence by man). It has, however, a special and
unique principle of union (virtue), and hence a form and constitution, which
fundamentally distinguish it from the political commonwealth.
At the same time there is a certain analogy between them, regarded
as two commonwealths, in view of which the former may also be called an
ethical state, i.e., a kingdom of virtue (of the good principle). The idea of
such a state possesses a thoroughly well-grounded objective reality in
human reason (in man's duty to join such a state), even though,
subjectively, we can never hope that man's good will will lead mankind to
decide to work with unanimity towards this goal.
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DIVISION ONE
PHILOSOPHICAL ACCOUNT OF THE VICTORY OF THE
GOOD PRINCIPLE IN THE FOUNDING OF A
KINGDOM OF GOD ON EARTH
I. Concerning the Ethical State of Nature
A juridico-civil (political) state1 is the relation of men to each other
in which they all alike stand socially under public juridical laws (which are,
as a class, laws of coercion). An ethico-civil state1 is that in which they are
united under non-coercive laws, i.e., laws of virtue alone.
Now just as the rightful (but not therefore always righteous), i.e.,
the juridical, state of Nature is opposed to the first, the ethical state of
Nature is distinguished from the second. In both, each individual prescribes
the law for himself, and there is no external law to which he, along with all
others, recognizes himself to be subject. In both, each individual is his own
judge, and there exists no powerful public authority to determine with legal
power according to laws, what is each man's duty in every situation that
arises, and to bring about the universal performance of duty.
In an already existing political commonwealth all the political
citizens, as such, are in an ethical state of nature and are entitled to remain
therein; for it would be a contradiction (in adjecto) for the political
commonwealth to compel its citizens to enter into an ethical commonwealth,
since the very concept of the latter involves freedom from coercion. Every
political commonwealth may indeed wish to be possessed of a sovereignty,
according to laws of virtue, over the spirits [of its citizens]; for then, when
its methods of compulsion do not avail (for the human judge cannot
penetrate into the depths of other men) their dispositions to virtue would
bring about what was required. But woe to the legislator who wishes to
establish through force a polity directed to ethical ends! For in so doing he
would not merely achieve the very opposite of an ethical polity but also
undermine his political state and make it insecure. The citizen of the political
commonwealth remains therefore, so far as its legislative function is
concerned, completely free
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to enter with his fellow-citizens into an ethical union in addition [to the
political] or to remain in this kind of state of nature, as he may wish. Only
so far as an ethical commonwealth must rest on public laws and possess a
constitution based on these laws are those who freely pledge themselves to
enter into this ethical state bound, not indeed] to accept orders from the
political power as to how they shall or shall not fashion this ethical
constitution internally, but to agree to limitations, namely, to the condition
that this constitution shall contain nothing which contradicts the duty of its
members as citizens of the state--although when the ethical pledge is of the
genuine sort the political limitation need cause no anxiety.
Further, because the duties of virtue apply to the entire human race,
the concept of an ethical commonwealth is extended ideally to the whole of
mankind, and thereby distinguishes itself from the concept of a political
commonwealth. Hence even a large number of men united in that purpose
can be called not the ethical commonwealth itself but only a particular
society which strives towards harmony with all men (yes, finally with all
rational beings) in order to form an absolute ethical whole of which every
partial society is only a representation or schema; for each of these societies
in turn, in its relation to others of the same kind, can be represented as in the
ethical state of nature and subject to all the defects thereof. (This is precisely
the situation with separate political states which are not united through a
public international law.)
II. Man ought to leave his Ethical State of nature-in order to become
a Member of an Ethical COMMONWEALTH
Just as the juridical state of nature is one of war of every man against
every other, so too is the ethical state of nature one in which the good
principle, which resides in each man, is continually attacked by the evil
which is found in him and also in everyone else. Men (as was noted above)
mutually corrupt one another's moral predispositions; despite the good will
of each individual, yet, because they lack a principle which unites them,
they recede, through their dissensions, from the common goal of goodness
and, just as though they were instruments of evil, expose one another to the
risk of falling once again under the sovereignty of the evil principle. Again,
just as the state of a lawless external (brutish) freedom and independence
from coercive laws is a state of
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injustice and of war, each against each, which a man ought to leave in order
to enter into a politico-civil state*: so is the ethical state of nature one of
open conflict between principles of virtue and a state of inner immorality
which the natural man ought to bestir himself to leave as soon as possible.
Now here we have a duty which is sui generis, not of men toward
men, but of the human race toward itself. For the species of rational beings
is objectively, in the idea of reason, destined for a social goal, namely, the
promotion of the highest as a social good. But because the highest moral
good cannot be achieved merely by the exertions of the single individual
toward his own moral perfection, but requires rather a union of such
individuals into a whole toward the same goal--into a system of well-
disposed men, in which and through whose unity alone the highest moral
good can come to pass--the idea of such a whole, as a universal republic
based on laws of virtue, is an idea completely distinguished from all moral
laws (which concern what we know to lie in our own power); since it
involves working toward a whole regarding which we do not know
whether, as such, it lies in our power or not. Hence this duty is
distinguished from all others both in kind and in principle. We can already
foresee that this duty will require the presupposition of another idea,
namely, that of a higher moral Being through whose universal dispensation
the forces of separate individuals, insufficient in themselves, are united for a
common end.1 First of all, however, we must follow up the clue of that
moral need [for social union] and see whither this will lead us.
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III. The Concept of an Ethical Commonwealth is the Concept of a
PEOPLE OF GOD under Ethical Laws
If an ethical commonwealth is to come into being, all single
individuals must be subject to a public legislation, and all the laws which
bind them must be capable of being regarded as commands of a common
law-giver. Now if the commonwealth to be established is to be juridical, the
mass of people uniting itself into a whole would itself have to be the law
giver (of constitutional laws), because legislation proceeds from the
principle of limiting the freedom of each to those conditions under which it
can be consistent with the freedom of everyone else according to a common
law,* and because, as a result, the general will sets up an external legal
control. But if the commonwealth is to be ethical, the people, as a people,
cannot itself be regarded as the law-giver. For in such a commonwealth all
the laws are expressly designed to promote the morality of actions (which is
something inner, and hence cannot be subject to public human laws)
whereas, in contrast, these public laws--and this would go to constitute a
juridical commonwealth--are directed only toward the legality of actions,
which meets the eye, and not toward (inner) morality, which alone is in
question here. There must therefore be someone other than the populace
capable of being specified as the public law-giver for an ethical
commonwealth. And yet, ethical laws cannot be thought of as emanating
originally merely from the will of this superior being (as statutes, which,
had he not first commanded them, would perhaps not be binding), for then
they would not be ethical laws and the duty proper to them would not be the
free duty of virtue but the coercive duty of law. Hence only he can be
thought of as highest law-giver of an ethical commonwealth with respect to
whom all true duties, hence also the ethical,** must be represented as at the
same
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time his commands; he must therefore also be "one who knows the heart,"1
in order to see into the innermost parts of the disposition of each individual
and, as is necessary in every commonwealth, to bring it about that each
receives whatever his actions are worth. But this is the concept of God as
moral ruler of the world. Hence an ethical commonwealth can be thought of
only as a people under divine commands, i.e., as a people of God,2 and
indeed under laws of virtue.
We might indeed conceive of a people of God under statutory laws,
under such laws that obedience to them would concern not the morality but
merely the legality of acts. This would be a juridical commonwealth, of
which, indeed, God would be the lawgiver (hence the constitution of this
state would be theocratic); but men, as priests receiving His behests from
Him directly, would build up an aristocratic government. Such a
constitution, however, whose existence and form rest wholly on an
historical basis, cannot settle the problem of the morally-legislative reason,
the solution of which alone we are to effect; as an institution under politico-
civil laws, whose lawgiver, though God, is yet external, it will come under
review in the historical section. Here we have to do only with an institution
whose laws are purely inward--a republic under laws of virtue, i.e., a
people of God "zealous of good works."3
To such a people of God we can oppose the idea of a rabble of the
evil principle, the union of those who side with it for the propagation of
evil, and whose interest it is to prevent the realization of that other union--
although here again the principle which combats virtuous dispositions lies in
our very selves and is represented only figuratively as an external power.
IV. The Idea of a People of God can be Realized (through Human
Organization) only in the Form of a Church
The sublime, yet never wholly attainable, idea of an ethical
commonwealth dwindles markedly under men's hands. It becomes an
institution which, at best capable of representing only the pure
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form of such a commonwealth, is, by the conditions of sensuous human
nature, greatly circumscribed in its means for establishing such a whole.
How indeed can one expect something perfectly straight to be framed out of
such crooked wood?
To found a moral people of God is therefore a task whose
consummation can be looked for not from men but only from God Himself.
Yet man is not entitled on this account to be idle in this business and to let
Providence rule, as though each could apply himself exclusively to his own
private moral affairs and relinquish to a higher wisdom all the affairs of the
human race (as regards its moral destiny). Rather must man proceed as
though everything depended upon him; only on this condition dare he hope
that higher wisdom will grant the completion of his well-intentioned
endeavors.
The wish of all well-disposed people is, therefore, "that the kingdom
of God come, that His will be done on earth."1 But what preparations must
they now make that it shall come to pass?
An ethical commonwealth under divine moral legislation is a church which,
so far as it is not an object of possible experience, is called the church
invisible (a mere idea of the union of all the righteous under direct and moral
divine world-government, and idea serving all as the archetype of what is to
be established by men. The visible church is the actual union of men into a
whole which harmonizes with that ideal. So far as each separate society
maintains, under public laws, an order among its members (in the relation
of those who obey its laws to those who direct their obedience) the group,
united into a whole (the church), is a congregation under authorities, who
(called teachers or shepherds of souls) merely administer the affairs of the
invisible supreme head thereof. In this function they are all called servants
of the church,) just as, in the political commonwealth, the visible overlord
occasionally calls himself the highest servant of the state even though he
recognizes no single individual over him (and ordinarily not even the people
as a whole). The true (visible) church is that which exhibits the moral
kingdom of God on earth So far as it can be brought to pass by men. The
requirements upon, and hence the tokens of, the true church are the
following:
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1. Universality, and hence its numerical oneness; for which it must
possess this characteristic,1 that, although divided and at variance in
unessential opinions, it is none the less, with respect to its fundamental
intention, founded upon such basic principles as must necessarily lead to a
general unification in a single church (thus, no sectarian divisions).
2. Its nature (quality); i.e., purity, union under no motivating forces
other than moral ones (purified of the stupidity of superstition and the
madness of fanaticism).
3. Its relation under the principle of freedom; both the internal
relation of its members to one another, and the external relation of the
church to political power--both relations as in a republic (hence neither a
hierarchy, nor an illuminatism, which is a kind of democracy through
special inspiration, where the inspiration of one man can differ from that of
another, according to the whim of each).
4. Its modality, the unchangeableness of its constitution, yet with the
reservation that incidental regulations, concerning merely its administration,
may be changed according to time and circumstance; to this end, however, it
must already contain within itself a priori (in the idea of its purpose) settled
principles. (Thus [it operates] under primordial laws, once [for all] laid
down, as it were out of a book of laws, for guidance; not under arbitrary
symbols which, since they lack authenticity, are fortuitous, exposed to
contradiction, and changeable.)
An ethical commonwealth, then, in the form of a church, i.e., as a
mere representative of a city of God, really has, as regards its basic
principles, nothing resembling a political constitution. For its constitution is
neither monarchical (under a pope or patriarch), nor aristocratic (under
bishops and prelates), nor democratic (as of sectarian illuminati). It could
best of all be likened to that of a household (family) under a common,
though invisible, moral Father, whose holy Son, knowing His will and yet
standing in blood relation with all members of the household, takes His
place in making His will better known to them; these accordingly honor the
Father in him and so enter with one another into a voluntary, universal, and
enduring union of hearts.
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V. The Constitution of every Church Originates always in some
Historical (Revealed) Faith which we can Call Ecclesiastical Faith; and this
is best Founded on a Holy Scripture
Pure religious faith alone can found a universal church; for only
[such] rational faith can be believed in and shared by everyone, whereas an
historical faith, grounded solely on facts, can extend its influence no further
than tidings of it can reach, subject to circumstances of time and place and
dependent upon the capacity [of men] to judge the credibility of such
tidings. Yet, by reason of a peculiar weakness of human nature, pure faith
can never be relied on as much as it deserves, that is, a church cannot be
established on it alone.
Men are conscious of their inability to know supersensible things;
and although they allow all honor to be paid to faith in such things (as the
faith which must be universally convincing to them), they are yet not easily
convinced that steadfast diligence in morally good life-conduct is all that
God requires of men, to be subjects in His kingdom and well-pleasing to
Him. They cannot well think of their obligation except as an obligation to
some service or other which they must offer to God--wherein what matters
is not so much the inner moral worth of the actions as the fact that they are
offered to God--to the end that, however morally indifferent men may be in
themselves, they may at least please God through passive obedience. It does
not enter their heads that when they fulfil their duties to men (themselves
and others) they are, by these very acts, performing God's commands and
are therefore in all their actions and abstentions, so far as these concern
morality, perpetually in the service of God, and that it is absolutely
impossible to serve God more directly in any other way (since they can
affect and have an influence upon earthly beings alone, and not upon God).
Because each great worldly lord stands in special need of being honored by
his subjects and glorified through protestations of submissiveness, without
which he cannot expect from them as much compliance with his behests as
he requires to be able to rule them, and since, in addition, however gifted
with reason a man may be, he always finds an immediate satisfaction in
attestations of honor, we treat duty, so far as it is also a divine command, as
the prosecution of a transaction with God, not with man. Thus arises the
concept of a religion of divine worship instead of the concept of a religion
purely moral.
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Since all religion consists in this, that in all our duties we look upon
God as the lawgiver universally to be honored, the determining of religion,
so far as the conformity of our attitude with it is concerned, hinges upon
knowing how God wishes to be honored (and obeyed). Now a divine
legislative will commands either through laws in themselves merely
statutory or through purely moral laws. As to the latter, each individual can
know of himself, through his own reason, the will of God which lies at the
basis of his religion; for the concept of the Deity really arises solely from
consciousness of these laws and from the need of reason to postulate a
might which can procure for these laws, as their final end, all the results
conformable to them and possible in a world. The concept of a divine will,
determined according to pure moral laws alone, allows us to think of only
one religion which is purely moral, as it did of only one God. But if we
admit statutory laws of such a will and make religion consist of our
obedience to them, knowledge of such laws is possible not through our
own reason alone but only through revelation, which, be it given publicly or
to each individual in secret, would have to be an historical and not a pure
rational faith in order to be propagated among men by tradition or writ. And
even admitting divine statutory laws (laws which do not in themselves
appear to us as obligatory but can be known as such only when taken as the
revelation of God's will), pure moral legislation, through which the will of
God is primordially engraved in our hearts, is not only the ineluctable
condition of all true religion whatsoever but is also that which really
constitutes such religion; statutory religion can merely comprise the means
to its furtherance and spread.
If, then, the question: How does God wish to be honored? is to be
answered in a way universally valid for each man, regarded merely as man,
there can be no doubt that the legislation of His will ought to be solely
moral; for statutory legislation (which presupposes a revelation) can be
regarded merely as contingent and as something which never has applied or
can apply to every man, hence as not binding upon all men universally.
Thus, "not they who say Lord! Lord! but they who do the will of God,"1
they who seek to become well-pleasing to Him not by praising Him (or His
envoy, as a being of divine origin) according to revealed concepts
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which not every man can have, but by a good course of life, regarding
which everyone knows His will--these are they who offer Him the true
veneration which He desires.
But when we regard ourselves as obliged to behave not merely as
men but also as citizens in a divine state on earth, and to work for the
existence of such a union, under the name of a church, then the question:
How does God wish to be honored in a church (as a congregation of God)?
appears to be unanswerable by reason alone and to require statutory
legislation of which we become cognizant only through revelation, i.e., an
historical faith which, in contradistinction to pure religious faith, we can call
ecclesiastical faith.
For pure religious faith is concerned only with what constitutes the
essence1 of reverence for God, namely, obedience, ensuing from the moral
disposition, to all duties as His commands; a church, on the other hand, as
the union of many men with such dispositions into a moral commonwealth,
requires a public covenant,2 a certain ecclesiastical form dependent upon the
conditions of experience. This form is in itself contingent and manifold, and
therefore cannot be apprehended as duty without divine statutory laws. But
the determination of this form must not be regarded forthwith as the concern
of the divine Lawgiver; rather are we justified in assuming that it is the
divine will that we should ourselves carry into effect the rational idea of
such a commonwealth and that, although men may have tried many a type
of church with unhappy result, yet on no account should they cease to strive
after this goal, with new attempts if necessary, avoiding so far as possible
the mistakes of the earlier ones--inasmuch as this task, which is for them a
duty as well, is entirely committed to them alone. We therefore have no
reason straightway to take the laws constituting the basis and form of any
church as divine statutory laws; rather is it presumptuous to declare them to
be such, in order to save ourselves the trouble of still further improving the
church's form, and it is a usurpation of higher authority to seek, under
pretense of a divine commission, to lay a yoke upon the multitude by means
of ecclesiastical dogmas. Yet it would be as great self-conceit to deny
peremptorily that the way in which a church is organized may perhaps be a
special divine arrangement, if, so far as we can see, it is completely
harmonious with the moral religion--and if, in addition, we cannot
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conceive how it could have appeared all at once without the requisite
initiatory progress of the public in religious conceptions.
In the indecision over the problem of whether God or men
themselves should found a church, there is evidenced man's propensity to a
religion of divine worship (cultus) and--since such a religion rests upon
arbitrary precepts--to belief in divine statutory laws, on the assumption that
some divine legislation, not to be discovered through reason but calling for
revelation, must supplement the best life-conduct (conduct which man is
always free to adopt under the guidance of the pure moral religion). Herein
consideration is given to the veneration of the Highest Being directly (and
not by way of that obedience to His laws which is already prescribed to us
by reason). Thus it happens that men will regard neither union into a
church, nor agreement with respect to the form which it is to take, nor yet
public institutions, as in themselves necessary for the promotion of the
moral element in religion, but only, as they say, for the service of their
God, through ceremonies, confessions of faith in revealed laws, and
observance of the ordinances requisite to the form of the church (which is
itself, after all, only a means). All these observances are at bottom morally
indifferent actions; yet, just because they are to be performed merely for His
sake, they are held to be all the more pleasing to Him. In men's striving
towards an ethical commonwealth, ecclesiastical faith thus naturally
precedes pure religious faith; temples (buildings consecrated to the public
worship of God) were before churches (meeting-places for the instruction
and quickening of moral dispositions), priests (consecrated stewards of
pious rites) before divines (teachers of the purely moral religion); and for
the most part they still are first in the rank and value ascribed to them by the
great mass of people. Since, then, it remains true once for all that a statutory
ecclesiastical faith is associated with pure religious faith as its vehicle and as
the means of public union of men for its promotion, one must grant that the
preservation of pure religious faith unchanged, its propagation in the same
form everywhere, and even a respect for the revelation assumed therein, can
hardly be provided for adequately through tradition, but only through
scripture; which, again, as a revelation to contemporaries and posterity,
must itself be an object of esteem, for the necessities of men require this in
order that they may be sure of their duty in
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divine service. A holy book arouses the greatest respect even among those
(indeed, most of all among those) who do not read it, or at least those who
can form no coherent religious concept therefrom; and the most sophistical
reasoning avails nothing in the face of the decisive assertion, which beats
down every objection: Thus it is written. It is for this reason that the
passages in it which are to lay down an article of faith are called simply
texts.1 The appointed expositors of such a scripture are themselves, by
virtue of their occupation, like unto consecrated persons; and history proves
that it has never been possible to destroy a faith grounded in scripture, even
with the most devastating revolutions in the state, whereas the faith
established upon tradition and ancient public observances has promptly met
its downfall when the state was overthrown. How fortunate,* when such a
book, fallen into men's hands, contains, along with its statutes, or laws of
faith, the purest moral doctrine of religion in its completeness--a doctrine
which can be brought into perfect harmony with such statutes ([which
serve] as vehicles for its introduction). In this event, both because of the
end thereby to be attained and because of the difficulty of rendering
intelligible according to natural laws the origin of such enlightenment of the
human race as proceeds from it, such a book can command an esteem like
that accorded to revelation.
* * * * * * * * * * *
And now a few words touching this concept of a belief in revelation.
There is only one (true) religion; but there can be faiths of several
kinds. We can say further that even in the various churches, severed from
one another by reason of the diversity of their modes of belief, one and the
same true religion can yet be found.
It is therefore more fitting (as it is more customary in actual practice)
to say: This man is of this or that faith (Jewish, Mohammed, Christian,
Catholic, Lutheran), than: He is of this or that religion. The second
expression ought in justice never to be used in addressing the general public
(in catechisms and sermons), for it
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is too learned and unintelligible for them; indeed, the more modern
languages possess no word of equivalent meaning. The common man
always takes it to mean his ecclesiastical faith, which appeals to his senses,
whereas religion is hidden within and has to do with moral dispositions.
One does too great honor to most people by saying of them: They
profess this or that religion. For they know none and desire none--statutory
ecclesiastical faith is all that they understand by the word. The so-called
religious wars which have so often shaken the world and bespattered it with
blood, have never been anything but wrangles over ecclesiastical faith; and
the oppressed have complained not that they were hindered from adhering to
their religion (for no external power can do this) but that they were not
permitted publicly to observe their ecclesiastical faith.
Now when, as usually happens, a church proclaims itself to be the
one church universal (even though it is based upon faith in a special
revelation, which, being historical, can never be required of everyone), he
who refuses to acknowledge its (peculiar) ecclesiastical faith is called by it
an unbeliever and is hated wholeheartedly; he who diverges therefrom only
in part (in non-essentials) is called heterodox and is at least shunned as a
source of infection. But he who avows [allegiance to] this church and yet
diverges from it on essentials of its faith (namely, regarding the practices
connected with it), is called, especially if he spreads abroad his false belief,
a heretic,* and, as a rebel, such a man is held more culpable than a foreign
foe, is expelled from the church with an anathema (like that which the
Romans pronounced on him who crossed the
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Rubicon against the Senate's will) and is given over to all the gods of hell.
The exclusive correctness of belief in matters of ecclesiastical faith claimed
by the church's teachers or heads is called orthodoxy. This could be sub-
divided into despotic (brutal) or liberal orthodoxy.
If a church which claims that its ecclesiastical faith is universally
binding is called a catholic church, and if that which protests against such
claims on the part of others (even though oftentimes it would gladly advance
similar claims itself, if it could) is called a protestant church, an alert
observer will come upon many laudable examples of Protestant Catholics
and, on the other hand, still more examples, and offensive ones, of arch-
catholic Protestants: the first, men of a cast of mind (even though it is not
that of their church) leading to self-expansion; to which the second, with
their circumscribed cast of mind, stand in sharp contrast--not at all to their
own advantage.
VI. Ecclesiastical Faith Has Pure Religious Faith as its Highest
Interpreter
We have noted that a church dispenses with the most important mark
of truth, namely, a rightful claim to universality, when it bases itself upon a
revealed faith. For such a faith, being historical (even though it be far more
widely disseminated and more completely secured for remotest posterity
through the agency of scripture) can never be universally communicated so
as to produce conviction. Yet, because of the natural need and desire of all
men for something sensibly tenable, and for a confirmation of some sort
from experience of the highest concepts and grounds of reason (a need
which really must be taken into account when the universal dissemination of
a faith is contemplated), some historical ecclesiastical faith or other, usually
to be found at hand, must be utilized.
If such an empirical faith, which chance, it would seem, has tossed
into our hands, is to be united with the basis of a moral faith (be the first an
end or merely a means), an exposition of the revelation which has come into
our possession is required, that is, a thorough-going interpretation of it in a
sense agreeing with the universal practical rules of a religion of pure reason.
For the theoretical part of ecclesiastical faith cannot interest us morally if it
does not conduce to the performance of all human duties as divine
commands (that which constitutes the essence of all religion).
[101]
Frequently this interpretation may, in the light of the text (of the revelation),
appear forced--it may often really be forced; and yet if the text can possibly
support it, it must be preferred to a literal interpretation which either
contains nothing at all [helpful] to morality or else actually works counter to
moral incentives.
We shall find, too, that this has always been done with all types of
faith, old and new, some of them recorded in holy books, and that wise and
thoughtful teachers of the people kept on interpreting them until, gradually,
they brought them, as regards their essential content, into line with the
universal moral dogmas. The moral philosophers among the Greeks, and
later among the Romans, did exactly this with the fabulous accounts of the
gods. They were able in the end to interpret the grossest polytheism as mere
symbolic representation of the attributes of the single divine Being, and to
supply the various wicked actions [of the gods] and the wild yet lovely
fancies of the poets with a mystical meaning which made a popular faith
(which it would have been very inadvisable
[102]
to destroy, since atheism, still more dangerous to the state, might perhaps
have resulted) approach a moral doctrine intelligible to all men and wholly
salutary. The later Judaism, and even Christianity itself, consist of such
interpretations, often very forced, but in both instances for ends
unquestionably good and needful for all men. The Mohammedans (as
Reland1 shows) know very well how to ascribe a spiritual meaning to the
description of their paradise, which is dedicated to sensuality of every kind;
the Indians do exactly the same thing in the interpretation of their Vedas, at
least for the enlightened portion of their people.
That this can be done without ever and again offending greatly
against the literal meaning of the popular faith is due to the fact that, earlier
by far than this faith, the predisposition to the moral religion lay hidden in
human reason; and though its first rude manifestations took the form merely
of practices of divine worship, and for this very purpose gave rise to those
alleged revelations, yet these manifestations have infused even into the
myths, though unintentionally, something from the nature of their
supersensible origin. Nor can we charge such interpretations with
dishonesty, provided we are not disposed to assert that the meaning which
we ascribe to the symbols of the popular faith, even to the holy books, is
exactly as intended by them, but rather allow this question to be left
undecided and merely admit the possibility that their authors may be so
understood. For the final purpose even of reading these holy scriptures, or
of investigating their content, is to make men better; the historical element,
which contributes nothing to this end, is something which is in itself quite
indifferent, and we can do with it what we like. (Historical faith "is dead,
being alone";2 that is, of itself, regarded as a creed, it contains nothing, and
leads to nothing, which could have any moral value for us.)
Hence, even if a document is accepted as a divine revelation, the
highest criterion of its being of divine origin will be: "All scripture given by
inspiration of God is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for improvement,
etc.";3 and since this last, to wit, the moral improvement of men, constitutes
the real end of all religion of reason, it will comprise the highest principle of
all Scriptural exegesis.
[103]
This religion is "the Spirit of God, who guides us into all truth";1 and this it
is which in instructing us also animates us with basic principles for action,
and wholly subjects whatever scripture may contain for historical faith to the
rules and incentives of pure moral faith, which alone constitutes the element
of genuine religion in each ecclesiastical faith. All investigation and
interpretation of Scripture must from the start be based on a search for this
Spirit in it, and "eternal life can be found therein only so far as it [Scripture]
testifies of this principle."2
Now placed beside this Scriptural interpreter, but subordinated to
him, is another, namely, the Scriptural scholar. The authority of Scripture,
as the most worthy instrument, and at present the only instrument in the
most enlightened portion of the world, for the union of all men into one
church, constitutes the ecclesiastical faith, which, as the popular faith,
cannot be neglected, because no doctrine based on reason alone seems to the
people qualified to serve as an unchangeable norm. They demand divine
revelation, and hence also an historical certification of its authority through
the tracing back of its origin. Now human skill and wisdom cannot ascend
so far as heaven in order itself to inspect the credentials validating the
mission of the first Teacher. It must be content with evidence that can be
elicited, apart from the content, as to the way in which such a faith has been
introduced--that is, with human reports which must be searched out little by
little from very ancient times, and from languages now dead, for evaluation
as to their historical credibility. Hence Scriptural scholarship will [ever] be
required to maintain in authority a church founded upon Holy Scripture,
([though] not a religion, which, to be universal, must always be founded
upon reason alone), even though this scholarship settles no more than that
there is nothing in the origin of Scripture to render impossible its acceptance
as direct divine revelation; for this would suffice to provide security for
those who fancy that they find in this idea [of a revealed Scripture] special
fortification of their moral faith, and who therefore gladly accept it. Yet not
only the authentication of Holy Scripture, but its interpretation as well,
stands in need of scholarship, and for the same reason. For how are the
unlearned, who can read it only in translation,
[104]
to be certain of its meaning? Hence the expositor, in addition to being
familiar with the original tongue, must also be a master of extended
historical knowledge and criticism, in order that from the conditions,
customs, and opinions (the popular faith) of the times in question he may be
able to derive the means wherewith to enlighten the understanding of the
ecclesiastical commonwealth.
Rational religion and Scriptural learning are thus the properly
qualified interpreters and trustees of a sacred document. It is obvious that
they must on no account be hindered by the secular arm in the public use of
their judgments and discoveries in this field, or bound to certain dogmas;
for otherwise the laity would compel the clergy to concur in their opinion,
which, after all, they have acquired only from the clergy's instruction. So
long as the state takes care that there is no dearth of scholars and of men in
morally good repute who have authority in the entire church body and to
whose consciences the state entrusts this commission, it has done all that its
duty and capacity require. But to insist that the legislator should carry this
matter into the schools and concern himself with their quarrels (which, if
they are not proclaimed from the pulpit, leave the church-public quite
undisturbed)--such a burden the public cannot thrust upon him without
arrogance, for it is beneath his dignity.
A third claimant contests the office of interpreter, the man who needs
neither reason nor scholarship, but merely an inner feeling, to recognize the
true meaning of Scripture as well as its divine origin. Now we certainly
cannot deny that "he who follows its teachings and does what it commands
will surely find that it is of God,"1 and that the very impulse to good actions
and to uprightness in the conduct of life, which the man who reads
Scripture or hears it expounded must feel, cannot but convince him of its
divine nature; for this impulse is but the operation of the moral law which
fills man with fervent respect and hence deserves to be regarded as a divine
command. A knowledge of laws, and of their morality, can scarcely be
derived from any sort of feeling; still less can there be inferred or discovered
from a feeling certain evidence of a direct divine influence; for the same
effect can have more than one cause. In this case, however, the bare
morality of the law (and the doctrine), known through reason, is the source
[of the law's validity];
[105]
and even if this origin were no more than barely possible, duty demands
that it be thus construed unless we wish to open wide the gates to every
kind of fanaticism, and even cause the unequivocal moral feeling to lose its
dignity through affiliation with fantasy of every sort. Feeling is private to
every individual and cannot be demanded of others [even] when the law,
from which and according to which this feeling arises, is known in advance;
therefore one cannot urge it as a touchstone for the genuineness of a
revelation, for it teaches absolutely nothing, but is merely the way in which
the subject is affected as regards pleasure or displeasure--and on this basis
can be established no knowledge whatever.
There is therefore no norm of ecclesiastical faith other than
Scripture, and no expositor thereof other than pure religion of reason and
Scriptural scholarship (which deals with the historical aspect of that
religion). Of these, the first alone is authentic and valid for the whole world;
the second is merely doctrinal, having as its end the transformation of
ecclesiastical faith for a given people at a given time into a definite and
enduring system. Under this system, historical faith must finally become
mere faith in Scriptural scholars and their insight. This does not, indeed,
particularly redound to the honor of human nature; yet it is a situation which
can be corrected through public freedom of thought--and such freedom is
the more justified since only if scholars submit their interpretations to public
examination, while they themselves ever hope for and remain open and
receptive to better insight, can they count on the community's confidence in
their decisions.
VII. The Gradual Transition of Ecclesiastical Faith to the Exclusive
Sovereignty of Pure Religious Faith is the Coming of the Kingdom of God
The token of the true church is its universality; the sign of this, in
turn, is its necessity and its determinability in only one possible way.
Historical faith (which is based upon revelation, regarded as an experience)
has only particular validity, to wit, for those who have had access to the
historical record upon which this faith rests; and like all empirical
knowledge it carries with it the consciousness not that the object believed in
must be so and not otherwise, but merely that it is so; hence it involves as
well the consciousness of its contingency. Thus historical faith can become
an ecclesiastical faith (of which there can be several), whereas only
[106]
pure religious faith, which bases itself wholly upon reason, can be accepted
as necessary and therefore as the only one which signalizes the true church.
When, therefore, (in conformity with the unavoidable limitation of
human reason) an historical faith attaches itself to pure religion, as its
vehicle, but with the consciousness that it is only a vehicle, and when this
faith, having become ecclesiastical, embraces the principle of a continual
approach to pure religious faith, in order finally to be able to dispense with
the historical vehicle, a church thus characterized can at any time be called
the true church; but, since conflict over historical dogmas can never be
avoided, it can be spoken of only as the church militant, though with the
prospect of becoming finally the changeless and all-unifying church
triumphant! We call the faith of every individual who possesses moral
capacity (worthiness) for eternal happiness a saving faith. This also can be
but a single faith; amid all diversity of ecclesiastical faiths [or creeds] it is
discoverable in each of these in which, moving toward the goal of pure
religious faith, it is practical. The faith of a religion of divine worship, in
contrast, is a drudging and mercenary faith (fides mercenaria, servilis) and
cannot be regarded as saving because it is not moral. For a moral faith must
be free and based upon an ingenuous disposition of the heart (fides
ingenua). Ecclesiastical faith fancies it possible to become well-pleasing to
God through actions (of worship) which (though irksome) yet possess in
themselves no moral worth and hence are merely acts induced by fear or
hope--acts which an evil man also can perform. Moral faith, in contrast,
presupposes that a morally good disposition is requisite.
Saving faith involves two elements, upon which hope of salvation is
conditioned, the one having reference to what man himself cannot
accomplish, namely, undoing lawfully (before a divine judge) actions which
he has performed, the other to what he himself can and ought to do, that is,
leading a new life conformable to his duty. The first is the faith in an
atonement (reparation for his debt, redemption, reconciliation with God);
the second, the faith that we can become well-pleasing to God through a
good course of life in the future. Both conditions constitute but one faith
and necessarily belong together. Yet we can comprehend the necessity of
their union only by assuming that one can be derived from the other, that is,
either that the faith in the absolution from the debt
[107]
resting upon us will bring forth good life-conduct, or else that the genuine
and active disposition ever to pursue a good course of life will engender the
faith in such absolution according to the law of morally operating causes.
Here now appears a remarkable antinomy of human reason with itself,
whose solution, or, were this not possible, at least whose adjustment can
alone determine whether an historical (ecclesiastical) faith must always be
present as an essential element of saving faith, over and above pure
religious faith, or whether it is only a vehicle which finally--however distant
this future event may be--can pass over into pure religious faith.
l. If it is assumed that atonement has been made for the sins of
mankind, it is indeed conceivable that every sinner would gladly have it
applied to himself and that were it merely a matter of belief (which means no
more than an avowal that he wishes the atonement to be rendered for him
also), he would not for an instant suffer misgivings on this score.
However, it is quite impossible to see how a reasonable man, who knows
himself to merit punishment, can in all seriousness believe that he needs
only to credit the news of an atonement rendered for him, and to accept this
atonement utiliter (as the lawyers say), in order to regard his guilt as
annihilated,--indeed, so completely annihilated (to the very root) that good
life-conduct, for which he has hitherto not taken the least pains, will in the
future be the inevitable consequence of this faith and this acceptance of the
proffered favor. No thoughtful person can bring himself to believe this,
even though self-love often does transform the bare wish for a good, for
which man does nothing and can do nothing, into a hope, as though one's
object were to come of itself, elicited by mere longing. Such a persuasion
can be regarded as possible only if the individual regards this belief as itself
instilled in him by heaven and hence as something concerning which he
need render no further account to his reason. If he cannot think this, or if he
is still too sincere artificially to produce in himself such a confidence, as a
mere means of ingratiation, he can only, with all respect for such a
transcendent1 atonement, and with every wish that it be available for him
also, regard it as conditioned. That is, he must believe that he must first
improve his way of life, so far as improvement lies in his power, if he is to
have even the slightest ground for hope of such a higher gain. Wherefore,
[108]
since historical knowledge of the atonement belongs to ecclesiastical faith,
while the improved way of life, as a condition, belongs to pure moral faith,
the latter must take precedence over the former.
2. But if men are corrupt by nature, how can a man believe that by
himself, try as hard as he will, he can make himself a new man well-
pleasing to God, when--conscious of the transgressions of which up to the
present he has been guilty--he still stands in the power of the evil principle
and finds in himself no capacity adequate for future improvement? If he
cannot regard justice, which he has provoked against himself, as satisfied
through atonement by another,1 and cannot regard himself reborn, so to
speak, through this faith and so for the first time able to enter upon a new
course of life--and this would follow from his union with the good
principle--upon what is he to base his hope of becoming a man pleasing to
God? Thus faith in a merit not his own, whereby he is reconciled with God,
must precede every effort to good works. But this goes counter to the
previous proposition, [that good works must precede faith in divine
atonement]. This contradiction cannot be resolved through insight into the
causal determination of the freedom of a human being, i.e., into the causes
which bring it about that a man becomes good or bad; hence it cannot be
resolved theoretically, for it is a question wholly transcending the
speculative capacity of our reason. But practically, the question arises:
What, in the use of our free willw, comes first, (not physically2 but
morally)? Where shall we start, i.e., with a faith in what God has done on
our behalf, or with what we are to do to become worthy of God's assistance
(whatever this may be)? In answering this question we cannot hesitate in
deciding for the second alternative.
The acceptance of the first requisite for salvation, namely, faith in a
vicarious atonement, is in any case necessary only for the theoretical
concept; in no other way can we make comprehensible to ourselves such
absolution. In contrast, the necessity for the second principle is practical
and, indeed, purely moral. We can certainly hope to partake in the
appropriation of another's atoning merit, and so of salvation, only by
qualifying for it through our own efforts to fulfil every human duty--and
this obedience must be the effect of our own action and not, once again, of a
foreign
[109]
influence in the presence of which we are passive. For since the command
to do our duty is unconditioned, it is also necessary that man shall make it,
as maxim, the basis of his belief, that is to say that he shall begin with the
improvement of his life as the supreme condition under which alone a
saving faith can exist.
Ecclesiastical faith, being historical, rightly starts with the belief in
atonement; but since it merely constitutes the vehicle for pure religious faith
(in which lies the real end), the maxim of action, which in religious faith
(being practical) is the condition, must take the lead, and the maxim of
knowledge, or theoretical faith, must merely bring about the strengthening
and consummation of the maxim of action.
In this connection it might also be remarked that, according to the
ecclesiastical principle, the faith in a vicarious atonement would be imputed
to man as a duty, whereas faith in good life conduct, as being effected
through a higher agency, would be reckoned to him as of grace. According
to the other principle the order is reversed. For according to it the good
course of life, as the highest condition of grace, is unconditioned duty,
whereas atonement from on high1 is purely a matter of grace. Against the
first faith is charged (often not unjustly) the superstitious belief of divine
worship, which knows how to combine a blameworthy course of life with
religion; against the second, naturalistic unbelief, which unites with a course
of life, perhaps otherwise exemplary, indifference or even antagonism to all
revelation. This [latter attitude] would constitute cutting the knot (by means
of a practical maxim) instead of disentangling it (theoretically)--a procedure
which is after all permitted in religious questions. However, the theoretical
demand can be satisfied in the following manner.
The living faith in the archetype of humanity well-pleasing to God
(in the Son of God) is bound up, in itself, with a moral idea of reason so far
as this serves us not only as a guide-line but also as an incentive; hence it
matters not whether I start with it as a rational faith, or with the principle of
a good course of life. In contrast, the faith in the self-same archetype in its
[phenomenal appearance (faith in the God-Man), as an empirical (historical)
faith, is not interchangeable with the principle of the good course of life
(which must be wholly rational), and it would be quite a
[110]
different matter to wish to start with such a faith and to deduce the good
course of life from it. To this extent then, there would be a contradiction
between the two propositions above. And yet, in the appearance of the God-
Man [on earth], it is not that in him which strikes the senses and can be
known through experience, but rather the archetype, lying in our reason,
that we attribute to him (since, so far as his example can be known, he is
found to conform thereto), which is really the object of saving faith, and
such a faith does not differ from the principle of a course of life well-
pleasing to God.
Here, then, are not two principles which in themselves so differ that
to begin with the one, or the other, would be to enter upon opposing paths,
but only one and the same practical idea from which we take our start, this
idea representing the archetype now as found in God and proceeding from
Him, and now, as found in us, but in both instances as the gauge for our
course of life. The antinomy is therefore only apparent, since, through a
misunderstanding, it regards the self-same practical idea, taken merely in
different references, as two different principles. If one wished, however, to
make the historical faith in the reality of such an appearance, taking place in
the world on a single occasion, the condition of the only saving faith, there
would, indeed, be two quite different principles (the one empirical, the other
rational) regarding which a real conflict of maxims would arise--whether
one should begin with and start out from the one or the other This conflict
no reason would ever be able to resolve.
The proposition: We must believe that there was once a man (of
whom reason tells us nothing) who through his holiness and merit rendered
satisfaction both for himself (with reference to his duty) and for all others
(with their shortcomings, in the light of their duty), if we are to hope that
we ourselves, though in a good course of life, will be saved by virtue of
that faith alone--this proposition says something very different from the
following: With all our strength we must strive after the holy disposition of
a course of life well-pleasing to God, to be able to believe that the love
(already assured us through reason) of God toward man, so far as man does
endeavor with all his strength to do the will of God, will make good, in
consideration of an upright disposition, the deficiency of the deed, whatever
this deficiency may be. The first
[111]
belief is not in the power of everyone (even of the unlearned). History
testifies that in all forms of religion this conflict between two principles of
faith has existed; for all religions have involved expiation, on whatever
basis they put it, and the moral predisposition in each individual has not
failed, on its side, to let its claims be heard. Yet at all times the priests have
complained more than the moralists: the former (with summons to the
authorities to check the mischief) protesting loudly against the neglect of
divine worship, which was instituted to reconcile the people with heaven
and to ward off misfortune from the state; the latter complaining, on the
other hand, about the decline of morals, a decline which they zealously set
to the account of those means of absolution whereby the priests made it easy
for anyone to make his peace with the Deity over the grossest vices. In point
of fact, if an inexhaustible fund is already at hand for the payment of debts
incurred or still to be incurred, so that man has merely to reach out (and at
every claim which conscience makes one would be sure, first of all, to reach
out) in order to free himself of sin, while he can postpone resolving upon a
good course of life until he is first clear of those debts--if this were possible
it is not easy to conceive any other consequences of such a faith. Yet were
this faith to be portrayed as having so peculiar a power and so mystical (or
magical) an influence, that although merely historical, so far as we can see,
it is yet competent to better the whole man from the ground up (to make a
new man of him) if he yields himself to it and to the feelings bound up with
it, such a faith would have to be regarded as imparted and inspired directly
by heaven (together with, and in, the historical faith), and everything
connected even with the moral constitution of man would resolve itself into
an unconditioned decree of God: "He hath mercy on whom he will, and
whom he will he hardeneth,"1* which, taken according to the letter, is the
salto mortale of human reason.
[112]
Hence a necessary consequence of the physical and, at the same
time, the moral predisposition in us, the latter being the basis and the
interpreter of all religion, is that in the end religion will gradually be freed
from all empirical determining grounds and from all statutes which rest on
history and which through the agency of ecclesiastical faith provisionally
unite men for the requirements of the good; and thus at last the pure religion
of reason will rule over all, "so that God may be all in all."1 The
integuments within which the embryo first developed into a human being
must be laid aside when he is to come into the light of day. The leading-
string of holy tradition with its appendages of statutes and observances,
which in its time did good service, becomes bit by bit dispensable, yea,
finally, when man enters upon his adolescence, it becomes a fetter. While
he (the human race) "was a child he understood as a child"2 and managed to
combine a certain amount of erudition, and even a philosophy ministering to
the church, with the propositions which were bestowed on him without his
cooperation: "but when he becomes a man he puts away childish things."2
The humiliating distinction between laity and clergy disappears, and equality
arises from true freedom, yet without anarchy, because, though each obeys
the (non-statutory) law which he prescribes to himself, he must at the same
time regard this law as the will of a World-Ruler revealed to him through
reason, a will which by invisible means unites all under one common
government into one state--a state previously and inadequately represented
and prepared for by the visible church. All this is not to be expected from an
external revolution, because such an upheaval produces its effect
tempestuously and violently, an effect, quite dependent on circumstances.
Moreover whatever mistake has once been made in the establishment of a
new constitution, is regretfully retained
[113]
throughout hundreds of years, since it can no longer be changed or at least
only through a new (and at any time dangerous) revolution. The basis for
the transition to that new order of affairs must lie in the principle that the
pure religion of reason is a continually occurring divine (though not
empirical) revelation for all men. Once this basis has been grasped with
mature reflection, it is carried into effect, so far as this is destined to be a
human task, through gradually advancing reform. As for revolutions which
might hasten this progress, they rest in the hands of Providence and cannot
be ushered in according to plan without damage to freedom.
We have good reason to say, however, that "the kingdom of God is
come unto us"1 once the principle of the gradual transition of ecclesiastical
faith to the universal religion of reason, and so to a (divine) ethical state on
earth, has become general and has also gained somewhere a public
foothold, even though the actual establishment of this state is still infinitely
removed from us. For since this principle contains the basis for a continual
approach towards such a consummation, there lies in it (invisibly), as in a
seed which is self-developing and in due time self-fertilizing, the whole,
which one day is to illumine and to rule the world. But truth and goodness--
and in the natural predisposition of every man there lies a basis of insight
into these as well as a basis of heartfelt sympathy with them--do not fail to
communicate themselves far and wide once they have become public,
thanks to their natural affinity with the moral predisposition of rational
beings generally. The obstacles, arising from political and civil causes,
which may from time to time hinder their spread, serve rather to make all the
closer the union of men's spirits with the good (which never leaves their
thoughts after they have once cast their eyes upon it).*
* * * * * *
[114]
Such, therefore, is the activity of the good principle, unnoted by
human eyes but ever continuing--erecting for itself in the human race,
regarded as a commonwealth under laws of virtue, a power and kingdom
which sustains the victory over evil and, under its own dominion, assures
the world of an eternal peace.
[115]
DIVISION TWO
HISTORICAL ACCOUNT OF THE GRADUAL ESTABLISHMENT OF
THE SOVEREIGNTY OF THE GOOD PRINCIPLE ON EARTH
We can expect no universal history of religion (in the strictest
meaning of the word) among men on earth; for, since it is based upon pure
moral faith, it has no public status,1 and each man can become aware only
in and for himself of the advances which he has made in it. Hence it is only
of ecclesiastical faith that we can expect a universal historical account, in
which its varied and changing form is compared with the single,
unchanging, pure religious faith. At the point where the first of these
publicly recognizes its dependence upon the qualifying conditions of the
second and the necessity of conformity to them, the church universal
commences to fashion itself into an ethical state of God and to march toward
the consummation of this state under a steadfast principle which is one and
the same for all men and for all times. We can see in advance that this
history will be nothing but the narrative of the enduring conflict between the
faith of divine worship and the moral faith of religion, the first of which, as
historical faith, man is continually inclined to put foremost, while, on the
other hand, the second has never relinquished its claim to the priority to
which it is entitled as the only faith bettering the soul--a claim which it will
certainly, in the end, make good.
Now this historical account can have unity only if it is confined
wholly to that portion of the human race in which the predisposition to the
unity of the universal church is already approaching its [complete]
development, that is, when the problem of the difference between the faiths
of reason and of history has already been publicly propounded and its
solution made a matter of the greatest moral importance; for an historical
account merely of the dogmas of diverse peoples, whose faiths stand in no
connection with one another, can reveal no [such example of] church unity.
It cannot be taken as an instance of this unity that in one and the same
people a certain new faith once arose and distinguished itself by name from
the faith previously dominant, even though the latter afforded the occasional
causes of the new product. For there must exist a unity of principle if we are
to construe the succession of different types of belief following one another
as modifications of
[116]
one and the same church; and it is really with the history of this church that
we are now concerned.
So we can deal, under this heading, only with the history of that
church which contained within itself, from its first beginning, the seed and
the principles of the objective unity of the true and universal religious faith,
to which it is gradually brought nearer. And first of all it is evident that the
Jewish faith stands in no essential connection whatever, i.e., in no unity of
concepts, with this ecclesiastical faith whose history we wish to consider,
though the Jewish immediately preceded this (the Christian) church and
provided the physical occasion for its establishment.
The Jewish faith was, in its original form, a collection of mere
statutory laws upon which was established a political organization; for
whatever moral additions were then or later appended to it in no way
whatever belong to Judaism as such. Judaism is really not a religion at all
but merely a union of a number of people who, since they belonged to a
particular stock, formed themselves into a commonwealth under purely
political laws, and not into a church; nay, it was intended to be merely an
earthly state so that, were it possibly to be dismembered through adverse
circumstances, there would still remain to it (as part of its very essence) the
political faith in its eventual re-establishment (with the advent of the
Messiah). That this political organization has a theocracy as its basis
(visibly, an aristocracy of priests or leaders, who boast of instructions
imparted directly by God), and that therefore the name of God, who after all
is here merely an earthly regent making absolutely no claims upon, and no
appeals to, conscience, is respected--this does not make it a religious
organization. The proof that Judaism has not allowed its organization to
become religious is clear. First, all its commands are of the kind which a
political organization can insist upon and lay down as coercive laws, since
they relate merely to external acts; and although the Ten Commandments
are, to the eye of reason, valid as ethical commands even had they not been
given publicly, yet in that legislation they are not so prescribed as to induce
obedience by laying requirements upon the moral disposition (Christianity
later placed its main emphasis here); they are directed to absolutely nothing
but outer observance. From this it is also clear that, second, all the
consequences of fulfilling or transgressing these laws, all rewards or
punishments, are limited to those alone which can
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be allotted to all men in this world, and not even these [are distributed]
according to ethical concepts, since both rewards and punishments were to
reach a posterity which has taken no practical part in these deeds or
misdeeds. In a political organization this may indeed be a prudent device for
creating docility, but in an ethical organization it would be contrary to all
right. Furthermore, since no religion can be conceived of which involves no
belief in a future life, Judaism, which, when taken in its purity is seen to
lack this belief, is not a religious faith at all. This can be further supported
by the following remark. We can hardly question that the Jews, like other
peoples, even the most savage, ought [normally] to have had a belief in a
future life, and therefore in a heaven and a hell; for this belief automatically
obtrudes itself upon everyone by virtue of the universal moral
predisposition in human nature. Hence it certainly came about
intentionally that the law-giver of this people, even though he is represented
as God Himself, wished to pay not the slightest regard to the future life.
This shows that he must have wanted to found merely a political, not an
ethical commonwealth; and to talk, in a political state, of rewards and
punishments which cannot become apparent here in this life-would have
been, on that premise, a wholly inconsequential and unsuitable procedure.
And though, indeed, it cannot be doubted that the Jews may, subsequently,
and each for himself, have framed some sort of religious faith which was
mingled with the articles of their statutory belief, such religious faith has
never been part and parcel of the legislation of Judaism. Third, Judaism
fell so far short of constituting an era suited to the requirements of the
church universal, or of setting up this universal church itself during its time,
as actually to exclude from its communion the entire human race, on the
ground that it was a special people chosen by God for Himself--[an
exclusiveness] which showed enmity toward all other peoples and which,
therefore, evoked the enmity of all. In this connection, we should not rate
too highly the fact that this people set up, as universal Ruler of the world, a
one and only God who could be represented through no visible image. For
we find that the religious doctrines of most other peoples tended in the same
direction and that these made themselves suspected of polytheism only by
the veneration of certain mighty undergods subordinated to Him. For a
God who desires merely obedience to commands for which absolutely no
improved moral
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disposition is requisite is, after all, not really the moral Being the concept of
whom we need for a religion. Religion would be more likely to arise from a
belief in many mighty invisible beings of this order, provided a people
conceived of these as all agreeing, amid their "departmental" differences, to
bestow their good pleasure only upon the man who cherishes virtue with all
his heart--more likely, I say, than when faith is bestowed upon but one
Being, who, however, attaches prime importance to mechanical worship.
We cannot, therefore, do otherwise than begin general church
history, if it is to constitute a system, with the origin of Christianity, which,
completely forsaking the Judaism from which it sprang, and grounded upon
a wholly new principle, effected a thoroughgoing revolution in doctrines of
faith. The pains which teachers of Christianity take now, and may have
taken in the beginning, to join Judaism and Christianity with a connecting
strand by trying to have men regard the new faith as a mere continuation of
the old (which, they allege, contained in prefiguration all the events of the
new)--these efforts reveal most clearly that their problem is and was merely
the discovery of the most suitable means of introducing a purely moral
religion in place of the old worship, to which the people were all too well
habituated, without directly offending the people's prejudices. The
subsequent dispensing with the corporal sign which served wholly to
separate this people from others warrants the judgment that the new faith,
not bound to the statutes of the old, nor, indeed, to any statutes whatever,
was to comprise a religion valid for the world and not for one single people.
Thus Christianity arose suddenly, though not unprepared for, from
Judaism. The latter, however, was no longer patriarchal and unmixed,
standing solely upon its political constitution (for even this was by that time
sorely unsettled), but was already interfused, by reason of moral doctrines
gradually made public within it, with a religious faith--for this otherwise
ignorant people had been able to receive much foreign (Greek) wisdom.
This wisdom presumably had the further effect of enlightening Judaism
with concepts of virtue and, despite the pressing weight of its dogmatic
faith, of preparing it for revolution, the opportunity being afforded by the
diminished power of the priests, who had been subjugated to the rule of a
people1 which regarded all foreign popular beliefs
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with indifference. The Teacher of the Gospel announced himself to be an
ambassador from heaven. As one worthy of such a mission, he declared
that servile belief (taking the form of confessions and practices on days of
divine worship) is essentially vain and that moral faith, which alone renders
men holy "as their Father in Heaven is holy"1 and which proves its
genuineness by a good course of life, is the only saving faith. After he had
given, in his own person, through precept and suffering even to unmerited
yet meritorious death,* an example conforming to the archetype of a
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humanity alone pleasing to God, he is represented as returning to heaven,
whence he came. He left behind him, by word of mouth, his last will (as in
a testament); and, trusting in the power of the memory of his merit,
teaching, and example, he was able to say that "he (the ideal of humanity
well-pleasing to God) would still be with his disciples, even to the end of
the world."1 Were it a question of historical belief concerning the derivation
and the rank, possibly supermundane, of his person, this doctrine would
indeed stand in need of verification through miracles; although, as merely
belonging to moral soul-improving faith, it can dispense with all such
proofs of its truth. Hence, in a holy book miracles and mysteries find a
place; the manner of making these known, in turn, is also miraculous, and
demands a faith in history; which, finally, can be authenticated, and assured
as to meaning and import, only by scholarship.
Every faith which, as an historical faith, bases itself upon books,
needs for its security a learned public for whom it can be controlled, as it
were, by writers who lived in those times, who are not suspected of a
special agreement with the first disseminators of the faith, and with whom
our present-day scholarship is connected by a continuous tradition. The
pure faith of reason, in contrast, stands in need of no such documentary
authentication, but proves itself. Now at the time of the revolution in
question there was present among the people (the Romans), who ruled the
Jews and who had spread into their very domain, a learned public from
whom the history of the political events of that period has indeed been
handed down to us through an unbroken series of writers. And although the
Romans concerned themselves but little with the religious beliefs of their
non-Roman subjects, they were by no means incredulous of the miracles
alleged to have taken place publicly in their midst. Yet they made no
mention, as contemporaries, either of these miracles or of the revolution
which the miracles produced (in respect to religion) in the people under their
dominion, though the revolution had taken place quite as publicly. Only
later, after more than a generation, did they institute inquiries into the nature
of this change of faith which had
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remained unknown to them hitherto (but which had occurred not without
public commotion), but they did not inquire into the history of its first
beginning, in order to learn this history from its own records. So from this
period to the time when Christendom could furnish a learned public of its
own, its history is obscure and we remain ignorant of what effect the
teaching of Christianity had upon the morality of its adherents whether the
first Christians actually were morally improved men or just people of the
common run. At any rate, the history of Christendom, from the time that it
became a learned public itself, or at least part of the universal learned public,
has served in no way to recommend it on the score of the beneficent effect
which can justly be expected of a moral religion.
For history tells how the mystical fanaticism in the lives of hermits
and monks, and the glorification of the holiness of celibacy, rendered great
masses of people useless to the world; how alleged miracles accompanying
all this weighed down the people with heavy chains under a blind
superstitution; how, with a hierarchy forcing itself upon free men, the
dreadful voice of orthodoxy was raised, out of the mouths of
presumptuous, exclusively "called," Scriptural expositors, and divided the
Christian world into embittered parties over credal opinions on matters of
faith (upon which absolutely no general agreement can be reached without
appeal to pure reason as the expositor); how in the East, where the state
meddled in an absurd manner with the religious statutes of the priests and
with priestdom, instead of holding them within the narrow confines of a
teacher's status (out of which they are at all times inclined to pass over into
that of ruler)--how, I say, this state had finally to become, quite
inescapably, the prey of foreign enemies, who at last put an end to its
prevailing faith; how, in the West, where faith had erected its own throne,
independent of worldly power, the civil order together with the sciences
(which maintain this order) were thrown into confusion and rendered
impotent by a self-styled viceroy of God; how both Christian portions of the
world became overrun by barbarians, just as plants and animals, near death
from some disease, attract destructive insects to complete their dissolution;
how, in the West, the spiritual head ruled over and disciplined kings like
children by means of the magic wand of his threatened excommunication,
and incited them to depopulating foreign wars in another portion of the
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world (the Crusades), to the waging of war with one another, to the
rebellion of subjects against those in authority over them, and to
bloodthirsty hatred against their otherwise-minded colleagues in one and the
same universal Christendom so-called; how the root of this discord, which
even now is kept from violent outbreaks only through political interest, lies
hidden in the basic principle of a despotically commanding ecclesiastical
faith and still gives cause for dread of events like unto these--this history of
Christendom (which indeed could not eventuate otherwise if erected upon
an historical faith), when surveyed in a single glance, like a painting, might
well justify the exclamation: tantum religio potuit suadere malorum,1 did not
the fact still shine forth clearly from its founding that Christianity's first
intention was really no other than to introduce a pure religious faith, over
which no conflict of opinions can prevail; whereas that turmoil, through
which the human race was disrupted and is still set at odds, arises solely
from this, that what, by reason of an evil propensity of human nature, was
in the beginning to serve merely for the introduction of pure religious faith,
i.e., to win over for the new faith the nation habituated to the old historical
belief through its own prejudices, was in the sequel made the foundation of
a universal world-religion.
If now one asks, What period in the entire known history of the
church up to now is the best? I have no scruple in answering, the present.
And this, because, if the seed of the true religious faith, as it is now being
publicly sown in Christendom, though only by a few, is allowed more and
more to grow unhindered, we may look for a continuous approximation to
that church, eternally uniting all men, which constitutes the visible
representation (the schema) of an invisible kingdom of God on earth. For
reason has freed itself, in matters which by their nature ought to be moral
and soul-improving, from the weight of a faith forever dependent upon the
arbitrary willw of the expositors, and has among true reverers of religion in
all the lands of this portion of the world universally (though indeed not in all
places publicly) laid down the following principles. The first is the principle
of reasonable modesty in pronouncements regarding all that goes by the
name of revelation. For no one can deny the possibility that a scripture
which, in practical content, contains much that is godly, may (with respect
to what is historical in it) be regarded as a genuinely divine revelation.
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It is also possible that the union of men into one religion cannot feasibly be
brought about or made abiding without a holy book and an ecclesiastical
faith based upon it. Moreover, the contemporary state of human insight
being what it is, one can hardly expect a new revelation, ushered in with
new miracles. Hence the most intelligent and most reasonable thing to do is
from how on to use the book already at hand as the basis for ecclesiastical
instruction and not to lessen its value through useless or mischievous
attacks, yet meanwhile not forcing belief in it, as requisite to salvation, upon
any man. The second principle is this: that, since the sacred narrative, which
is employed solely on behalf of ecclesiastical faith, can have and, taken by
itself, ought to have absolutely no influence upon the adoption of moral
maxims, and since it is given to ecclesiastical faith only for the vivid
presentation of its true object (virtue striving toward holiness), it follows
that this narrative must at all times be taught and expounded in the interest of
morality; and yet (because the common man especially has an enduring
propensity within him to sink into passive* belief) it must be inculcated
painstakingly and repeatedly that true religion is to consist not in the
knowing or considering of what God does or has done for our salvation but
in what we must do to become worthy of it. This last can never be anything
but what possesses in itself undoubted and unconditional worth, what
therefore can alone make us well-pleasing to God, and of whose necessity
every man can become wholly certain without any Scriptural learning
whatever. Now it is the duty of rulers not to hinder these basic principles
from becoming public. On the contrary, very much is risked and a great
responsibility assumed by one who intrudes upon the process of divine
Providence and, for the sake of certain historical ecclesiastical doctrines
which at best have in their favor only a probability discoverable by scholars,
exposes to
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temptation* the consciences of the subjects through the offer, or denial, of
certain civil advantages otherwise open to all: all this, apart from the damage
done thereby to a freedom which in this case is holy, can scarcely produce
good citizens for the state. Who among those proffering themselves to
hinder such a free development of godly predispositions to the world's
highest good, or even proposing such a hindrance, would wish, after
thinking it over in communion with his conscience, to answer for all the evil
which might arise from such forcible encroachments, whereby the advance
in goodness intended by the Governor of the world, though it can never be
wholly destroyed through human might or human contrivance, may perhaps
be checked for a long time, yea, even turned into a retrogression!
As regards its guidance by Providence, the kingdom of heaven is
represented in this historical account not only as being brought ever nearer,
in an approach delayed at certain times yet never
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wholly interrupted, but also as arriving. When to this narrative is added (in
the Apocalypse) a prophecy (like those in the Sibylline books) of the
consummation of this great world-change, in the image of a visible kingdom
of God on earth (under the government of His representative and viceroy,
again descended to earth), and of the happiness which is to be enjoyed
under him in this world after the separation and expulsion of the rebels who
once again seek to withstand him, and also of the complete extirpation of
these rebels and their leader, and when, thus, the account closes with the
end of the world, all this may be interpreted as a symbolical representation
intended merely to enliven hope and courage and to increase our endeavors
to that end. The Teacher of the Gospel revealed to his disciples the kingdom
of God on earth only in its glorious, soul-elevating moral aspect, namely, in
terms of the value of citizenship in a divine state, and to this end he
informed them of what they had to do, not only to achieve it themselves but
to unite with all others of the same mind and, so far as possible, with the
entire human race. Concerning happiness, however, which constitutes the
other part of what man inevitably wishes, he told them in advance not to
count on it in their life on earth. Instead he bade them be prepared for the
greatest tribulations and sacrifices; yet he added (since man cannot be
expected, while he is alive, wholly to renounce what is physical in
happiness): "Rejoice and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in
heaven."1 The supplement, added to the history of the church, dealing with
man's future and final destiny, pictures men as ultimately triumphant, i.e.,
as crowned with happiness while still here on earth, after all obstacles have
been overcome. The separation of the good from the evil, which, during the
progress of the church toward its consummation, would not have conduced
to this end (since their mixture with one another was needed, partly to spur
the good on to virtue, partly to withdraw the bad from evil through the
others' example), is represented as following upon the completed
establishment of the divine state and as its last consequence; whereto is
added, as the final proof of the state's stability and might, its victory over all
external foes who are also regarded as forming a state (the state of hell).
With this all earthly life comes to an end, in that "the last enemy (of good
men), death, is
[126]
destroyed";1 and immortality commences for both parties, to the salvation
of one, the damnation of the other. The very form of a church is dissolved,
the viceroy becomes at one with man who is raised up to his level as a
citizen of heaven, and so God is all in all.*
This sketch of a history of after-ages, which themselves are not yet
history, presents a beautiful ideal of the moral world-epoch, brought about
by the introduction of true universal religion and in faith foreseen even to its
culmination--which we cannot conceive as a culmination in experience, but
can merely anticipate, i.e., prepare for, in continual progress and
approximation toward the highest good possible on earth (and in all of this
there is nothing mystical, but everything moves quite naturally in a moral
fashion). The appearance of the Antichrist, the milennium, and the news of
the proximity of the end of the world--all these can take on, before reason,
their right symbolic meaning; and to represent the last of these as an event
not to be seen in advance (like the end of life, be it far or near) admirably
expresses the necessity of standing ready at all times for the end and indeed
(if one attaches the intellectual meaning to this symbol) really to consider
ourselves always as chosen citizens of a divine (ethical) state. "When,
therefore, cometh the kingdom of God?"2 "The kingdom of God cometh
not in visible form. Neither shall they say, Lo here; or lo there! For, behold,
the kingdom of God is within you," (Luke XVII, 21-2).**
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GENERAL OBSERVATION
Investigation into the inner nature of all kinds of faith which concern
religion invariably encounters a mystery, i.e., something holy which may
indeed be known by each single individual but cannot be made known
publicly, that is, shared universally. Being something holy, it must be
moral, and so an object of reason, and it must be capable of being known
from within adequately for practical use, and yet, as something mysterious,
not for theoretical use, since in this case it would have to be capable of
being shared with everyone and made known publicly.
Belief in what we are yet to regard as a holy mystery can be looked
upon as divinely prompted or as a pure rational faith. Unless we are
impelled by the greatest need to adopt the first of these views, we shall
make it our maxim to abide by the second. Feelings are not knowledge and
so do not indicate [the presence of] a mystery; and since the latter is related
to reason, yet cannot be shared universally, each individual will have to
search for it (if ever there is such a thing) solely in his own reason.
It is impossible to settle, a priori and objectively, whether there are
such mysteries or not. We must therefore search directly in the inner, the
subjective, part of our moral predisposition to see whether any such thing is
to be found in us. Yet we shall not be entitled to number among the holy
mysteries the grounds of morality, which are inscrutable to us; for we can
thus classify only that which we can know but which is incapable of being
communicated publicly, whereas, though morality can indeed be
communicated publicly, its cause remains unknown to us. Thus freedom,
an attribute of which man becomes aware through the determinability of his
willw by the unconditioned moral law, is no mystery, because the
knowledge of it can be shared with everyone; but the ground, inscrutable to
us, of this attribute is a mystery because this ground is not given us as an
object of knowledge. Yet it is this very freedom which, when applied to the
final object of practical reason (the realization of the idea of the moral end),
alone leads us inevitably to holy mysteries.*
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The idea of the highest good, inseparably bound up with the purely
moral disposition, cannot be realized by man himself (not only in the matter
of the happiness pertaining thereto, but also in the matter of the union of
men necessary for the end in its entirety); yet he discovers within himself
the duty to work for this end. Hence he finds himself impelled to believe in
the cooperation or management of a moral Ruler of the world, by means of
which alone this goal can be reached. And now there opens up before him
the abyss of a mystery regarding what God may do [toward the realization
of this end], whether indeed anything in general, and if so, what in
particular should be ascribed to God. Meanwhile man knows concerning
each duty nothing but what he must himself do in order to be worthy of that
supplement, unknown, or at least incomprehensible, to him.
This idea of a moral Governor of the world is a task presented to our
practical reason. It concerns us not so much to know what God is in
Himself (His nature) as what He is for us as moral beings; although in order
to know the latter we must conceive and comprehend all the attributes of the
divine nature (for instance, the unchangeableness, omniscience,
omnipotence, etc. of such a Being) which, in their totality, are requisite to
the carrying out of
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the divine will in this regard. Apart from this context we can know nothing
about Him.
Now the universal true religious belief conformable to this
requirement of practical reason is belief in God (1) as the omnipotent
Creator of heaven and earth, i.e., morally as holy Legislator, (2) as
Preserver of the human race, its benevolent Ruler and moral Guardian, (3)
as Administrator of His own holy laws, i.e., as righteous Judge.
This belief really contains no mystery, because it merely expresses
the moral relation of God to the human race; it also presents itself
spontaneously to human reason everywhere and is therefore to be met with
in the religion of most civilized peoples.* It is present likewise in the
concept of a people regarded as a commonwealth, in which such a threefold
higher power (pouvoir) will always be descried, except that this
commonwealth is here represented as ethical: hence this threefold quality of
the moral Governor of the human race, which in a juridico-civil state must
of necessity be divided among three different departments [legislative,
executive, and judicial], can be thought of as combined in one and the same
Being.
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And since this faith which, on behalf of religion in general, has
cleansed the moral relation of men to the Supreme Being from harmful
anthropomorphism, and has harmonized it with the genuine morality of a
people of God, was first set forth in a particular (the Christian) body of
doctrine and only therein made public to the world, we can call the
promulgation of these doctrines a revelation of the faith which had hitherto
remained hidden from men through their own fault.
These doctrines assert, first, that we are to look upon the Supreme
Lawgiver as one who commands not mercifully or with forbearance
(indulgently) for men's weakness, or despotically and merely according to
His unlimited right; and we are to look upon His laws not as arbitrary and
as wholly unrelated to our concepts of morality, but as laws addressed to
man's holiness. Second, we must place His beneficence not in an
unconditioned good-will toward His creatures but in this, that He first looks
upon their moral character, through which they can be well-pleasing to
Him, and only then makes good their inability to fulfil this requirement of
themselves. Third, His justice cannot be represented as beneficent and
exorable (for this involves a contradiction); even less can it be represented
as dispensed by Him in his character of holy Lawgiver (before Whom no
man is righteous); rather, it must be thought of as beneficence which is
limited by being conditioned upon men's agreement with the holy law so far
as they, as sons of men, may be able to measure up to its requirement. In a
word, God wills to be served under three specifically different moral
aspects. The naming of the different (not physically, but morally different)
persons of one and the same Being expresses this not ineptly. This symbol
of faith gives expression also to the whole of
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pure moral religion which, without this differentiation, runs the risk of
degenerating into an anthropomorphic servile faith, by reason of men's
propensity to think of the Godhead as a human overlord (because in man's
government rulers usually do not separate these three qualities from one
another but often mix and interchange them).
But if this very faith (in a divine tri-unity) were to be regarded not
merely as a representation of a practical idea but as a faith which is to
describe what God is in Himself, it would be a mystery transcending all
human concepts, and hence a mystery of revelation, unsuited to man's
powers of comprehension; in this account, therefore, we can declare it to be
such. Faith in it, regarded as an extension of the theoretical knowledge of
the divine nature, would be merely the acknowledgment of a symbol of
ecclesiastical faith which is quite incomprehensible to men or which, if they
think they can understand it, would be anthropomorphic, and therefore
nothing whatever would be accomplished for moral betterment. Only that
which, in a practical context, can be thoroughly understood and
comprehended, but which, taken theologically (for the determining of the
nature of the object in itself), transcends all our concepts, is a mystery (in
one respect) and can yet (in another) be revealed. To this type belongs what
has just been mentioned; and this can be divided into three mysteries
revealed to us through our reason.
1. The mystery of the divine call (of men, as citizens, to an
ethical state). We can conceive of the universal unconditioned subjection of
men to the divine legislation only so far as we likewise regard ourselves as
God's creatures; just as God can be regarded as the ultimate source of all
natural laws only because He is the creator of natural objects. But it is
absolutely incomprehensible to our reason how beings can be created to a
free use of their powers; for according to the principle of causality we can
assign to a being, regarded as having been brought forth, no inner
ground for his actions other than that which the producing cause has placed
there, by which, then, (and so by an external cause) his every act would be
determined, and such a being would therefore not be free. So the legislation
which is divine and holy, and therefore concerns free beings only, cannot
through the insight of our reason be reconciled with the concept of the
creation of such beings; rather must one regard them even now as existing
free beings who
[134]
are determined not through their dependence upon nature by virtue of their
creation but through a purely moral necessitation possible according to laws
of freedom, i.e., a call to citizenship in a divine state. Thus the call to this
end is morally quite clear, while for speculation the possibility of such a
calling is an impenetrable mystery.
2. The mystery of atonement. Man, as we know him, is corrupt and
of himself not in the least suited to that holy law. And yet, if the goodness
of God has called him, as it were, into being, i.e., to exist in a particular
manner (as a member of the kingdom of Heaven), He must also have a
means of supplementing, out of the fullness of His own holiness, man's
lack of requisite qualifications therefor. But this contradicts spontaneity
(which is assumed in all the moral good or evil which a man can have
within himself), according to which such a good cannot come from another
but must arise from man himself, if it is to be imputable to him. Therefore,
so far as reason can see, no one can, by virtue of the superabundance of his
own good conduct and through his own merit, take another's place; or, if
such vicarious atonement is accepted, we would have to assume it only
from the moral point of view, since for ratiocination it is an unfathomable
mystery.
3. The mystery of election. Even if that vicarious atonement be
admitted as possible, still a morally-believing acceptance of it is a
determination of the will toward good that already presupposes in man a
disposition which is pleasing to God; yet man, by reason of his natural
depravity, cannot produce this within himself through his own efforts. But
that a heavenly grace should work in man and should accord this assistance
to one and not to another, and this not according to the merit of works but
by an unconditioned decree; and that one portion of our race should be
destined for salvation, the other for eternal reprobation--this again yields no
concept of a divine justice but must be referred to a wisdom whose rule is
for us an absolute mystery.
As to these mysteries, so far as they touch the moral life-history of
every man--how it happens that there is a moral good or evil at all in the
world, and (if the evil is present in all men and at all times) how out of evil
good could spring up and be established in any man whatever, or why,
when this occurs in some, others remain deprived thereof--of this God has
revealed to us nothing and can reveal nothing since we would not
understand
[135]
it. It is as though we wished to explain and to render comprehensible to
ourselves in terms of a man's freedom what happens to him; on this
question God has indeed revealed His will through the moral law in us, but
the causes due to which a free action on earth occurs or does not occur He
has left in that obscurity in which human investigation must leave whatever
(as an historical occurrence, though yet springing from freedom) ought to
be conceived of according to the laws of cause and effect. But all that we
need concerning the objective rule of our behavior is adequately revealed to
us (through reason and Scripture), and this revelation is at the same time
comprehensible to every man.
That, through the moral law, man is called to a good course of life;
that, through unquenchable respect for this law lying in him, he finds in
himself justification for confidence in this good spirit and for hope that,
however it may come about, he will be able to satisfy this spirit; finally,
that, comparing the last-named expectation with the stern command of the
law, he must continually test himself as though summoned to account
before a judge--reason, heart, and conscience all teach this and urge its
fulfilment. To demand that more than this be revealed to us is
presumptuous, and
[136]
were such a revelation to occur, it could not rightly be reckoned among
man's universal needs.
Although that great mystery, comprising in one formula all that we
have mentioned, can be made comprehensible to each man through his
reason as a practical and necessary religious idea, we can say that, in order
to become The moral basis of religion, and particularly of a public religion,
it was, at that time, first revealed when it was publicly taught and made the
symbol of a wholly new religious epoch. Ceremonial formulas are usually
couched in a language of their own, intended only for those who belong to a
particular union (a guild or society), a language at times mystical and not
understood by everyone, which properly (out of respect) ought to BC made
use of only for a ceremonial act (as, for instance, when some one is to be
initiated as a member of a society which is exclusive) But theca highest goal
of moral perfection of finite creatures--a goal to which man can never
completely attain--is love of the law.
The equivalent in religion of this idea would be an article of faith,
"God is love": in Him we can revere the loving One (whose love is that of
moral approbation of men so far as they measure up to His holy law) the
Father; in Him also, so far as He reveals Himself in His all-inclusive idea,
the archetype of humanity reared and beloved by Him, we can revere His
Son; and finally, so far as He makes this approbation dependent upon
men's agreement with the condition of that approving love, and so reveals
love as based upon wisdom, we can revere the Holy Ghost.* Not that we
[137]
should actually invoke Him in terms of this multiform personality (for to do
so would suggest a diversity of entities, whereas He is ever but single); but
we can call upon Him in the name of that object loved of Him, which He
Himself esteems above all else, with which to enter into moral union is
[our] desire and also [our] duty. Over and above this, the theoretical avowal
of faith in the
[138]
divine nature under this threefold character is part of what is merely the
classic formula of an ecclesiastical faith, to be used for the distinguishing of
this faith from other modes of belief deriving from historical sources. Few
men are in the position of being able to combine with this faith a concept [of
the Trinity] which is clear and definite (open to no misinterpretation); and its
exposition concerns, rather, teachers in their relation to one another (as
philosophical and scholarly expositors of a Holy Book), that they may agree
as to its interpretation, since not everything in it is suited to the common
capacity of comprehension, nor to the needs of the present, and since a bare
literal faith in it hurts rather than improves the truly religious disposition.
NOTES:
1 [85] [Cf. Romans Vl, 18: "Being then made free from sin, ye
became the servants of righteousness."]
1 [87] [Zustand, condition]
* [89] Hobbes' statement, status hominum naturalis est bellum
omnium in omnes, is correct except that it should read, est status belli, etc.
For even if one does not concede that actual hostilities are continually in
progress between men who do not stand under eternal and public laws, yet
the state (status iuridicus) is the same; i.e., the relationship in and through
which men are fitted for the acquisition and maintenance of rights--a state in
which each wants to be the judge of what shall be his rights against others,
but for which rights he has no security against others, and gives others no
security: each has only his private strength. This is a state of war in which
everyone must be perpetually armed against everyone else. Hobbes' second
statement, exeundum esse e statu naturali, follows from the first; for this
state is a continual infringement upon the rights of all others through man's
arrogant insistence on being the judge in his own affairs and giving other
men no security in their affairs save his own arbitrary willw.
1 [Wirkung]
* [90] This is the principle of all external rights.
** [90] As soon as anything is recognized as a duty, even if it
should be a duty imposed through the arbitrary willw of a human law-giver,
obedience to it is also a divine command. Of course one cannot call statutory
civil laws divine commands; yet, when they are just,1 obedience to them is
still a divine command. The saying: "We ought to obey God rather than
men,"2 signifies merely that when men command anything which in itself is
evil (directly opposed to the law of morality) we dare not, and ought not,
obey them. But conversely, when a politico-civil law, itself not immoral, is
opposed to what is held to be a divine statutory law, there are grounds for
[91]
regarding the latter as spurious, since it contradicts a plain duty and since
[the notion] that it is actually a divine command can never, by any empirical
token, be accredited adequately enough to allow an otherwise established
duty to be neglected on its account.
1 [90] [rechtmŠssig]
2 [90] [Cf. Acts V, 29]
1 [91] [Cf. Acts I, 24; XV, 8; Luke XVI, 15]
2 [91] [Cf. I Peter II, 10]
3 [Cf. Titus II, 14]
1 [92] [Cf. Matthew Vl, 10; Luke Xl, 2]
1 [93] [Anlage]
1 [95] [Matthew VII, ^I: "Not every one that saith unto me, Lord,
Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of
my Father which is in heaven."]
1 [96] [Materie]
2 [96] [Verpflichtung]
[97] Morally, this order ought to be reversed.
1 [98] [SprŸche]
* [98] An expression for everything wished for, or worthy of being
wished for, which we can neither foresee nor bring about through our own
endeavors according to the laws of experience; for which, therefore, if we
wish to name its source, we can offer none other than a gracious
Providence.
* [99] According to the Alphabetum Tibetanum of Georgius,1
Mongols call Tibet "Tangut-Chazar," or the land of the house-dwellers, to
distinguish its inhabitants from themselves as nomads living in the desert
under tents. From this has originated the name Chazars, and from this name
that of a Ketzer [= heretic], since the Mongols adhered to the Tibetan faith
(of the Lamas) which agrees with Manicheanism, perhaps even arose from
it, and spread it in Europe during their invasions; whence, too, for a long
time the names H¾retici and Manich¾i were synonymous in usage.2
1 [99] [AIphabetum Tibetanum missionum apostolicarum commodo
editum ... studio et labore Fr. Augustini Antonii Georgii eremitae
Augustinui, Romae, 1762.]
2 [99] ["This etymological explanation is certainly incorrect. In all
probability, Ketzer is related to Gazzari, the Lombardish word for Kathari =
kaqaroi. The Kathari (the "pure ones") were the most important heretical
sect with which the church in the Middle Ages (especially in the twelfth and
thirteenth centuries) had to deal. The Manichaean element in the movement
is unmistakable." (Note in Berlin Edition.)]
[101] As an illustration of this, take Psalm LIX, 11-16, where we
find a prayer for revenge which goes to terrifying extremes. Michaelis
(Moral, Part II, p. 202) approves of this prayer, and adds: "The Psalms are
inspired; if in them punishment is prayed for, it cannot be wrong, and we
must have no morality holier than the Bible." Restricting myself to this last
expression, I raise the question as to whether morality should be expounded
according to the Bible or whether the Bible should not rather be expounded
according to morality. Without considering how the passage in the New
Testament,1 "It was said to them of old times, etc.... But I say unto you,
Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, etc...," which is also
inspired, can agree with the other, I should try, as a first alternative, to
bring the New Testament passage into conformity with my own self-
subsistent moral principles (that perhaps the reference is here not to enemies
in the flesh but rather to invisible enemies which are symbolized by them
and are far more dangerous to us, namely, evil inclinations which we must
desire to bring wholly under foot). Or, if this cannot be managed, I shall
rather have it that this passage is not to be understood in a moral sense at all
but only as applying to the relation in which the Jews conceived themselves
to stand to God as their political regent. This latter interpretation applies to
still another passage in the Bible, where it is written: "Vengeance is mine. I
will repay, saith the Lord."2 This is commonly interpreted as a moral
warning against private revenge, though probably it merely refers to the
law, valid for every state, that satisfaction for injury shall be sought in the
courts of justice of the overlord, where the judge's permission to the
complainant to ask for a punishment as severe as he desires is not to be
taken as approval of the complainant's craving for revenge.
1 [101] [Cf. Matthew V, 21 ff., 44 ff.]
2 [101] [Cf. Romans XII, 19: Deuteronomy XXXII, 35]
1 [102] [Adrian Reland (1676-1718),a Dutch Orientalist, wrote De
religione mohammedica ibri duo, second edition, 1717; cf. II, xvii.]
2 [102] [Cf. James II, 17]
3 [102] [Cf. II Timothy III, 16]
1 [103] [Cf. John XVI, 13: "Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is
come, he will guide , you into all truth, etc."]
2 [103] [Cf. John V, 39: "Search the scriptures; for in them ye think
ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me."]
1 [104] [Cf. John VII, 17: "If any man will do his will, he shall
know of the doctrine, whether it be of God...."]
1 [107] [Ÿberschwenglich]
1 [108] [fremde]
2 [108] [i.e., not in time.]
1 [109] [hšhere]
[110] Which must base the existence of such a person on historical
evidence.
* [111] This can, indeed, be interpreted as follows. No one can say
with certainty why this man becomes good, that man evil (both
comparatively), because the predisposition to one of these characters or the
other often seems to be discoverable at birth, and because contingencies of
life as well, which no one can foresee, seem to tip the scale. No more can
one say what a man may develop into. In all this therefore we must entrust
judgment to the All-Seeing; but this is expressed in the text as though His
decree, pronounced upon men
[112]
before they were born, had prescribed to each the role which he was some
day to play. Prevision regarding the order of appearances is at the same time
predestination for a World-Creator, when, in this connection, He is
conceived of in terms of human senses.3 But in the supersensible order of
things, according to the laws of freedom, where time drops out, it is only an
all-seeing knowledge; and yet it is impossible to explain why one man
conducts himself in one way, and another according to opposite principles
and to harmonize [this knowledge of causes] with the freedom of the will.
1 [111] [Cf. Romans IX, 18]
1 [112] [Cf. I Corinthians XV, 28]
2 [112] [Cf. I Corinthians XlII, 11]
3 [112] [anthropopathisch]
* [113] Without either renouncing the service of ecclesiastical faith
or attacking it, one can recognize its useful influence as a vehicle and at the
same time deny to it, taken as the illusory duty of divine worship, all
influence upon the concept of genuine (that is, moral) religion. Thus, amid
the diversity of statutory forms of belief, a mutual compatibility of the
adherents to these forms can be established through the basic principles of
the one and only religion of reason, toward which the teachers of all such
dogmas and observances should direct their interpretations; until, in time,
by virtue of the true enlightenment (conformity to law, proceeding from
moral freedom) which has
[114]
now prevailed, the form of a debasing means of constraint can be
exchanged, by unanimous consent, for an ecclesiastical form which squares
with the dignity of a moral religion, to wit, the religion of a free faith. To
combine a unity of ecclesiastical belief with freedom in matters of faith is a
problem toward whose solution the idea of the objective unity of the religion
of reason continually urges us, through the moral interest which we take in
this religion; although, when we take human nature into account, there
appears small hope of bringing this to pass in a visible church. It is an idea
of reason which we cannot represent through any [sensuous] intuition
adequate to it, but which, as a practical regulative principle, does have
objective reality, enabling it to work toward this end, i.e. the unity of the
pure religion of reason. In this it is like the political idea of the rights of a
state so far as these are meant to relate to an international law which is
universal and possessed of power. Here experience bids us give over all
hope. A propensity seems to have been implanted (perhaps designedly) in
the human race causing every single state to strive if possible to subjugate
every other state and to erect a universal monarchy, but, when it has reached
a certain size, to break up, of its own accord, into smaller states. In like
manner every single church cherishes the proud pretension of becoming a
church universal; yet as soon as it has extended itself and commenced to
rule, a principle of dissolution and schism into different sects at once shows
itself.
[114] The premature and therefore (since it comes before men have
become morally better) the harmful fusion of states into one is chiefly
hindered--if we are permitted here to assume a design of Providence--
through two mightily effective causes, namely, difference of tongues, and
difference of religions.
1 [113] [Cf. Matthew XII, 28]
1 [115] [Zustand]
1 [118] [i.e., the Romans]
1 [119] [Cf. Matthew V, 48; also I Peter I, 16]
* [119] With which the public record of his life ends (a record
which, as public, might serve universally as an example for imitation). The
more secret records, added as a sequel, of his resurrection and ascension,
which took place before the eyes only of his intimates, cannot be used in the
interest of religion within the limits of reason alone without doing violence
to their historical valuation. (If one takes these events merely as ideas of
reason, they would signify the commencement of another life and entrance
into the seat of salvation, i.e., into the society of all the good.) This is so
not merely because this added sequel is an historical narrative (for the story
which precedes it is that also) but because, taken literally, it involves a
concept, i.e., of the materiality of all worldly beings, which is, indeed, very
well suited to man's mode of sensuous representation but which is most
burdensome to reason in its faith regarding the future. This concept involves
both the materialism of personality in men (psychological materialism),
which asserts that a personality can exist only as always conditioned by the
same body, as well as the materialism of necessary existence in a world, a
world which, according to this principle, must be spatial (cosmological
materialism). In contrast, the hypothesis of the spirituality of rational world-
beings asserts that the body can remain dead in the earth while the same
person is still alive, and that man, as a spirit (in his non-sensuous quality),
can reach the seat of the blessed without having to be transported to some
portion or other of the endless space which surrounds the earth (and which
is also called heaven). This hypothesis is more congenial to reason, not only
because of the impossibility of making comprehensible a matter which
thinks, but especially because of the contingency to which materialism
exposes our existence after death by claiming that such existence depends
solely upon the cohering of a certain lump of matter in a certain form, and
denying the possibility of thinking that a simple substance can persist based
upon its [own] nature. On the latter supposition (of spirituality) reason can
neither take an interest in dragging along, through eternity, a body which,
however purified, must yet (if the personality is to rest upon the body's
identity) consist of the self-same stuff which constitutes the basis of its
organization and for which, in life, it never achieved any great love; nor can
it render conceivable that this calcareous earth, of which the body is
composed, should be in heaven, i.e., in another region of the universe,
where presumably other
[120]
materials might constitute the condition of the existence and maintenance of
living beings.
1 [120] [Cf. Matthew XXVIII, 20]
1 [122] [Lucretius, De rerum natura, I, 101: "Such evil deeds could
religion prompt!"]
* [123] One of the causes of this propensity lies in the principle of
security; that the defects of a religion in which I am born and brought up,
instruction therein not having been chosen by me nor in any way altered
through my own ratiocination, are charged not to my account but to that of
my instructors or teachers publicly appointed for the task. This is also a
ground for our not easily giving our approval to a man's public change of
religion: although here, no doubt, there is another (and deeper) ground,
namely, that amid the uncertainty which every man feels within himself as
to which among the historical faiths is the right one, while the moral faith is
everywhere the same, it seems highly unnecessary to create a stir about the
matter.
* [124] When a government wishes to be regarded as not coercing
man's conscience because it merely prohibits the public utterance of his
religious opinions and hinders no one from thinking to himself in secrecy
whatever he sees fit, we usually jest about it and say that in this the
government grants no freedom at all, for it cannot in any case hinder
thinking. Yet what the greatest secular power cannot do, spiritual power
can--that is, forbid thought itself and really hinder it; it can even lay such a
compulsion--the prohibition even to think other than it prescribes--upon
those in temporal authority over it. For because of men's propensity to the
servile faith of divine worship, which they are automatically inclined not
only to endow with an importance greater than that of moral faith (wherein
man serves God truly through the performance of his duties) but also to
regard as unique and compensating for every other deficiency, it is always
easy for the custodians of orthodoxy, the shepherds of souls, to instil into
their flock a pious terror of the slightest swerving from certain dogmas
resting on history, and even of all investigation--a terror so great that they
do not trust themselves to allow a doubt concerning the doctrines forced
upon them to arise, even in their thoughts, for this would be tantamount to
lending an ear to the evil spirit. True, to become free from this compulsion
one needs but to will (which is not the case when the sovereign compels
public confessions); but it is precisely this willing against which a rule has
been interposed internally. Such forcing of conscience is indeed bad enough
(for it leads to inner hypocrisy); yet it is not as bad as the restriction of
external freedom of belief. For the inner compulsion must of itself gradually
disappear through the progress of moral insight and the consciousness of
one's own freedom, from which alone true respect for duty can arise,
whereas this external pressure hinders all spontaneous advances in the
ethical community of believers--which constitutes the being of the true
church--and subjects its form to purely political ordinances.
1 [125] [Cf. Matthew V, 12. Luther's translation reads belohnet
instead of Kant's vergolten]
1 [126] [Cf. I Corinthians, XV, 26]
* [126] This expression (if one sets aside what is mysterious, what
reaches out beyond the limits of all possible experience, and what belongs
merely to sacred history and so in no way applies to us practically) can be
taken to mean that historical faith, which, as ecclesiastical, stands in need of
a sacred book as a leading-string for men, but, for that very reason, hinders
the unity and universality of the church, will itself cease and pass over into a
pure religious faith equally obvious to the whole world. To this end we
ought even now to labor industriously, by way of continuously setting free
the pure religion from its present shell, which as yet cannot be spared.
[126] Not that it is to cease (for as a vehicle it may perhaps always
be useful and necessary) but that it be able to cease; whereby is indicated
merely the inner stability of the pure moral faith.
2 [126] [Cf. Luke XVII, 20-21: "And when he was demanded of the
Pharisees when the kingdom of God should come, he answered them and
said, the kingdom of God cometh not with observation. Neither shall, etc."]
** [127] Here a kingdom of God is represented not according to a
particular covenant (i.e., not Messianic) but moral (knowable through
unassisted reason). The former (regnum divinum pactitium) had to draw its
proofs from history; and there it is divided into the Messianic kingdom
according to the old and according to the new covenant. Now it is worthy of
notice that the followers of the former (the Jews) have continued to maintain
themselves as such, though scattered throughout the world; whereas the
faith of other religious fellowships has usually been fused with the faith of
the people among whom they have been scattered. This phenomenon strikes
many as so remarkable that they judge it to be impossible according to the
nature of things, but to be an extraordinary dispensation for a special divine
purpose. Yet a people which has a written religion (sacred books) never
fuses together in one faith with a people (like the Roman Empire, then the
entire civilized world) possessing no such books but only rites; instead,
sooner or later it makes proselytes. This is the reason why, after the
Babylonian captivity (following which, it seems, their sacred books were
for the first time read publicly), the Jews were no longer chargeable with
their propensity to run after strange gods; though the Alexandrian culture,
which must also have had an influence upon them, could have been
favorable to their giving this propensity a systematic form. Thus also the
Parsees, followers of the religion of Zoroaster, have kept their faith up to
the present despite their dispersion; for their dustoors1 possessed the
Zendavesta. These Hindus, on the other hand, who under the name of
gipsies are scattered far and wide, have not escaped a mixture with foreign
faiths, for they came from the dregs of the people (the Pariahs) who are
forbidden even to read in the sacred books of the Hindus. What the Jews
would not have achieved of themselves, the Christian and later the
Mohammedan religions brought about- especially the former; for these
religions presupposed the Jewish faith and the sacred books belonging to it
(even though Mohammedanism declares that these books have been
falsified). For the Jews could ever and again seek out their old documents
among the Christians (who had issued forth from them) whenever, in their
wanderings, the skill in reading these books, and so the desire to possess
them, was lost, as may often have happened, and when they merely retained
the memory of having formerly possessed them. Hence we find no Jews
outside the countries referred to, if we except the few on the coast of
Malabar and possibly a community in China (and of these the first could
have been in continual commercial relation with their co-religionists in
Arabia). Although it cannot be doubted that they spread throughout those
rich lands,2 yet, because of the lack of all kinship between their faith and
the types of belief found there, they came wholly to forget their own. To
base edifying remarks upon this preservation of the Jewish people, together
with their religion, under circumstances so disadvantageous to them, is very
hazardous, for both sides believe that they find in it [confirmation of] their
own opinions.
[128]
One man sees in the continuation of the people to which he belongs, and in
his ancient faith which remained unmixed despite the dispersion among
such diverse nations, the proof of a special beneficent Providence saving
this people for a future kingdom on earth; the other sees nothing but the
warning ruins of a disrupted state which set itself against the coming of the
kingdom of heaven --ruins, however, which a special Providence still
sustains, partly to preserve in memory the ancient prophecy of a Messiah
arising from this people, partly to offer, in this people, an example of
punitive justice [visited upon it] because it stiff-neckedly sought to create a
political and not a moral concept of the Messiah.
1 [127] [High priests]
2 [127] [i.e., lands not Christian or Mohammedan.]
* [129] Similarly, the cause of the universal gravity of all matter in
the world is unknown to us, so much so, indeed, that we can even see that
we shall never know it: for the very concept of gravity presupposes a
primary motive force
[130]
unconditionally inhering in it. Yet gravity is no mystery but can be made
public to all, for its law is adequately known. When Newton represents it as
similar to divine omnipresence in the [world of] appearance (omnipr¾sentia
ph¾nomenon), this is not an attempt to explain it (for the existence of God
in space involves a contradiction), but a sublime analogy which has regard
solely to the union of corporeal beings with a world-whole, an incorporeal
cause being here attributed to this union. The same result would follow
upon an attempt to comprehend the self-sufficing principle of the union of
rational beings in the world into an ethical state, and to explain this in terms
of that principle. All we know is the duty which draws us toward such a
union; the possibility of the achievement held in view when we obey that
duty lies wholly beyond the limits of our insight.
There are mysteries which are hidden things in nature (arcana), and
there can be mysteries (secrecies, secreta) in politics which ought not to be
known publicly; but both can, after all, become known to us, inasmuch as
they rest on empirical causes. There can be no mystery with respect to what
all men are in duty bound to know (i.e., what is moral); only with respect to
that which God alone can do and the performance of which exceeds our
capacity, and therefore our duty, can there be a genuine, that is, a holy
mystery (mysterium) of religion; and it may well be expedient for us merely
to know and understand that there is such a mystery, not to comprehend it.
* [131] In the sacred prophetic story of "the last things," the judge
of the world (really he who will separate out and take under his dominion,
as his own, those who belong to the kingdom of the good principle) is not
represented and spoken of as God but as the Son of Man. This seems to
indicate that humanity itself, knowing its limitation and its frailty, will
pronounce the sentence in this selection [of the good from the bad]--a
benevolence which yet does not offend against justice. In contrast, the
Judge of men, represented in His divinity (the Holy Ghost), i.e., as He
speaks to our conscience according to the holy law which we know, and in
terms of our own reckoning, can be thought of only as passing judgment
according to the rigor of the law. For we ourselves are wholly ignorant of
how much can be credited, in our behalf, to the account of our frailty, and
have moreover before our eyes nothing but our transgression, together with
the consciousness of our freedom, and the violation of duty for which we
are wholly to blame; hence we have no ground for assuming benevolence in
the judgment passed upon us.
[131] We cannot discover the cause for the agreement of so many
ancient peoples in this idea, unless it is that the idea is present universally in
human reason whenever man wants to conceive of civil government or (by
analogy therewith) of world government. The religion of Zoroaster had
these three divine persons, Ormazd, Mithra, and Ahriman; that of the
Hindus had Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva--but with this difference, that
Zoroastrians represent the third person as creator, not only of evil so far as
it is punishment, but even of moral evil for which man is punished, whereas
the Hindus represent
[132]
him as merely judging and punishing. The religion of Egypt had its Ptah,
Kneph, and Neith, of whom, so far as the obscurity of the earliest records
of this people allows of conjecture, the first was intended to represent spirit,
distinguished from matter, as World-Creator, the second, a principle of
sustaining and ruling benevolence, the third, wisdom setting limits to this
benevolence, i.e., justice. The Goths honored their Odin (father of all), their
Freya (also Freyer, beneficence), and Thor, the judging (punishing) god.
Even the Jews seem to have followed these ideas during the last period of
their hierarchical constitution. For in the complaint of the Pharisees that
Christ had called himself a Son of God, they seem to have attached no
special weight of blame to the doctrine that God had a son, but merely to
Christ's having wished to be this son of God.
[135] We commonly have no misgivings in requiring of novices in
religion a belief in mysteries; for the fact that we do not comprehend them,
i.e., that we cannot see into the possibility of their objective existence,1
could no more justify our refusal to accept them than it could justify our not
accepting, say, the procreative capacity of organisms, which likewise no
man comprehends yet which we cannot on that account refuse to admit,
even though it is and will remain a mystery to us. But we understand very
well what this expression means to convey and we have an empirical
concept of this capacity, together with the consciousness that it harbors no
contradiction. Now we can with justice require of every mystery offered for
belief that we understand what it is supposed to mean; and this does not
happen when we merely understand the words by which it is designated one
by one, i.e., attaching a meaning to each word--rather, these words, taken
together in one concept, must admit of another meaning and not, thus taken
in conjunction, frustrate all thought. It is unthinkable that God could allow
this knowledge to come to us through inspiration whenever we on our part
wish earnestly for it; for such knowledge cannot inhere in us at all because
our understanding is by nature unsuited to it.
[135] Hence we understand perfectly well what freedom is,
practically (when it is a question of duty), whereas we cannot without
contradiction even think of wishing to understand theoretically the causality
of freedom (or its nature).
1 [135] [Gegenstand]
* [136] This Spirit, in and through which the love of God, as the
Author of salvation (really our own responding love proportioned to His),
is combined with the fear of God as Lawgiver, i.e., the conditioned with the
condition, and which can therefore be represented as "issuing forth from
both,"1 not only "leads to all truth"2 (obedience to duty), but is also the real
Judge of men (at the bar of conscience). For judgment can be interpreted in
two ways, as concerning either merit and lack of merit, or guilt and absence
of guilt. God, regarded as love (in His son), judges men so far as merit is
attributable to them over and above their indebtedness, and here the verdict
is: worthy, or unworthy. He separates out as His own those to whom such
merit can still be accredited. Those who are left depart empty-handed. On
the other hand the sentence of the Judge in terms of justice3 (of the Judge
properly so called,
[137]
under the name of the Holy Ghost) upon those for whom no merit is
forthcoming, is guilty or not guilty, i.e., condemnation or acquittal. This
judging signifies first of all the separation of the deserving from the
undeserving, both parties competing for a prize (salvation). By desert is
here meant moral excellence, not in relation to the law (for in the eyes of the
law no balance of obedience to duty over and above our indebtedness can
accrue to us), but only in comparison with other men on the score of their
moral disposition. And worthiness always has a merely negative meaning
(not unworthiness), that is, the moral receptivity for such goodness.
Hence he who judges in the first capacity (as brabeuta1) pronounces
a judgment of choice between two persons (or parties) striving for the prize
(of salvation); while he who judges in the second capacity (the real judge)
passes sentence upon one and the same person before a court (conscience)
which declares the final verdict between the prosecution and the defense. If
now it is admitted that, though indeed all men are guilty of sin, some among
them may be able to achieve merit, then the verdict of Him who judges from
love becomes effective. In the absence of this judgment, only a verdict of
rejection could follow, whose inescapable consequence would be the
judgment of condemnation (since the man now falls into the hands of Him
who judges in righteousness). It is thus, in my opinion, that the apparently
contradictory passages, "The Son will come again to judge the quick and the
dead,"2 and, "God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world;
but that the world through him might be saved" (John III, 17), can be
reconciled, and they can agree with the other passage which reads, "He that
believeth not in him is condemned already" (John III, 18), namely, by the
Spirit, of whom it is said: "He will judge the world because of sin and
righteousness."3 Anxious solicitude over such distinctions in the domain of
bare reason, for whose sake they have really been instituted here, might
well be regarded as a useless and burdensome subtlety; and it would indeed
be such if it were directed to an inquiry into the divine nature. But since men
are ever prone, in matters of religion, to appeal, respecting their
transgressions, to divine benignity, though they cannot circumvent His
righteousness, and since a benign judge, as one and the same person, is a
contradiction in terms, it is very evident that, even from a practical point of
view, men's concepts on this subject must be very wavering and lacking in
internal coherence, and that the correction and precise determination of these
concepts is of great practical importance.
1 [136] ["As it is expressed in the Western (Augustinian) form of the
doctrine of the Trinity; whereas the Eastern form asserts the emanance of the
Holy Ghost from the Father alone. Cf. John XV, 26." (Note in the Berlin
Edition.)]
2 [136] [Cf. John XVI, 13]
3 [136] [Berechtigkeit]; where the context is theological, we have
usually translated this word as righteousness; otherwise, as justice.]
1 [137] [One who presided at public games and assigned the prizes.]
2 [137] [Cf. II Timothy IV, l]
3 [137] [Cf. John XVI, 8; "... he will reprove the world of sin and
of righteousness and of judgment."]