One hears, not infrequently, a remark to the effect that "one who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities." It came up this very evening, as we were preparing a sermon, and we wanted to ascertain the authentic form of the the phrase.
Turns out to be a loose translation of Voltaire. He admits that there are things a person may believe by faith, and then proposes that a wise person will not "make the sacrifice of reason in the conduct of our lives." At which point, he admits:
Il y a eu des gens qui ont dit autrefois : Vous croyez des choses incompréhensibles, contradictoires, impossibles, parce que nous vous l’avons ordonné ; faites donc des choses injustes parce que nous vous l’ordonnons. Ces gens-là raisonnaient à merveille.
Certainement qui est en droit de vous rendre absurde est en droit de vous rendre injuste. Si vous n’opposez point aux ordres de croire l’impossible l’intelligence que Dieu a mise dans votre esprit, vous ne devez point opposer aux ordres de malfaire la justice que Dieu a mise dans votre cœur. (Questions sur les Miracles, 11ieme Lettre)
In English, that is something to this effect.
"There have been people who thought otherwise [saying]: You believe incomprehensible, contradictory, impossible things, because we have commanded you believe them; so do unjust things because we command do you now." These people reason marvelously!
Certainly, whoever has the right to make you act absurdly has the right to make you act unjustly. If you do not oppose the command to believe the impossible with the intelligence God has placed in your mind, then you ought not to oppose the command to do evil with the sense of justice God has placed in your heart.
Walter Olson credits the more familiar phrasing, about absurdities and atrocities, to Norman Lewis Torrey in Les Philosophes (1961). I cannot find it there. In any case, the translation may be loose, but it is not wrong.
How did this figure in our sermon, preached on the Fourth of July in this semi-quincentenary year. Well, we were mixing up a number of images -- Zechariah calling the Judahites "prisoners of hope;" Paul escaping Damascus in a basket; Jesus promising that his "burden" of Tarah interpretation is "lighter" than that imposed upon their disciples by the Pharisees. There may have been something in there from Philippians, as well, about our true commonwealth.
Bit of a stewpot, to be honest. But that's not the point.
I was thinking about the peculiar role of religion in American history, and in America today. In particular, I was thinking about the strange phenomenon that these days calls itself "American Evangelicalism." The name is, of course, misleading; the people of whom I am thinking are far more deeply invested in law than in gospel, and the law in question is by no means always God's. In fact, "American Evangelicalis" often seem to use Christian language and imagery to tell an entirely different story, one more like an ethno-nationalist Gnosticism.
But they certainly do impose absurdities upon their followers, don't they? Has there ever been a time in American history when science -- the method and the results alike -- was held in such disrepute? Flat-earthers, anti-vaxxers, and their ilk are having a field day. Never mind the measles outbreak and the soldiers sidelined by flu. In place of observation, experiment, and hypothesis, the order of the day is to proceed based upon appeals to the leader's "gut," or to the undocumented (and unexpressed) will of "the American people." Neither of these is an effective antiseptic.
Those who have begun espousing the absurdities then commit, if not outright atrocities, acts of staggering folly -- Voltaire's choses injustes. These sycophants gut the senior military leadership, shrivel the diplomatic corps, abandon the combination of soft power and military alliances that were linchpins of American influence, and on and on. All the while, they punch downward, hard, often and publicly, at the most vulnerable people they can find -- Haitians, the transgendered, pregnant women, and black voters in the South.
Most surprising is that many of the people doing these things do them in service to a man who has publicly humiliated them, personally, along with their families. He insults their fathers and their wives, he calls them names in public, and yet they stand by, offering him and endless string of effusive compliments, as he violates the law over and over, sets criminals free in almost-certain exchange for cash, and starts an utterly pointless war with a major strategic adversary, which reveals American weakness and leaves us in a weaker tactical position afterward.
Obviously, these are difficult times for America, and especially for the ideals of the Founders. But they are especially difficult times for classical Christianity, of the sort represented by creeds and confessions, by ecumenical dialogues and collaboration on works of mercy. The Christianity represented by, say, the World Council of Churches scarcely registers with the politicians, the press or even its own members as a vital force in public affairs. Even Roman Catholicism, barring a scandal, a schism, or a creative misappropriation of its theology by the Vice President, gets shoved to the side in the public square.
In place of anything recognizable as historic Christianity, we get the Prosperity Gospel, the New Apostolic Reformation, and Trump-as-Jesus memes.
Perhaps I was mistaken, when I allowed that our leaders have not yet committed "atrocities." There are certainly some dead Iranian schoolchildren whose corpses argue against me. And although far less grave, I wonder whether history may not see the setting aside of Christianity and the lifting up of a vile pretender as an atrocity of its own kind.
