Natural Law and Theology

Natural Law and Theology

 A Classical Perspective 

By Juan Antonio Widow 

Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez de Viña del Mar (Chile) 

Taken from: Cuestiones Fundamentales de Derecho Natural

Universidad Autónoma de Guadalajara, Publisher

Translated from the Spanish by Roberto Hope

This essay is the paper presented by the author at the III Jornadas Hispánicas de Derecho Natural, held in Guadalajara, México on November 26-28, 2008.

1. Revelation and Nature

It is clear that natural law is not a proper object of the faith. Its condition of being natural is itself proof that we are not dealing with a revealed dogma, to which one can only access with the supernatural aid of theological faith. The truths related to natural law are not imposed on assent in the same way as, for instance, the truths of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ our Lord or of the forgiveness of sins are imposed. Which would lead us to hold that the topic of natural law is not a properly theological subject. To this exclusion should be arrived if it is considered that the foundation of theology is what God has revealed; that is, what constitutes the object of the faith, and that theological knowledge would have to confine itself to the formal and express contents of Revelation.

However, the matter is not that simple. It is not that Divine Revelation makes present to us a particular set of truths for us to believe, and that our knowledge, founded upon the faith, should confine itself strictly to that set of truths, without transcending their particularity. It is not a knowledge which should resolve itself only in the personal salvation of he who upholds it. While it is true that Revelation indicates what someone should do to save his soul and that, besides, God, through the Church, gives him the efficacious means for achieving that end, faith in Divine Revelation does not mainly consist of this; that is, it does not reduce itself to presenting particular solutions to solve particular problems.

Theological faith is knowledge. While being it knowledge of certain truths, these, as far as they are truths, are in essential communication with all other truths. If intellectual knowledge were to confine itself to recording the fact or the mere singular act, it would not be properly knowledge, it would be a frustrated kind of knowledge, like someone standing at the door without intending to go in. It would be a knowledge which, because of its sensitive nature, would inevitably degenerate into sentiment or into a strictly subjective phenomenon. Understanding attains its complete form when it opens itself to the universality of its object. This also applies to the knowledge of the faith. and not only to natural reason. In the object of the faith, the Divine Revelation, all truth is implicitly present. To make it explicit is the purpose of theology.

Intellectual knowledge is then, in itself, universal; that is, the perfection to which it naturally tends is to know everything to the extent possible. From its object are not excluded, consequently, any specific realities. However, there is an order in the intellectual knowledge which corresponds to its own essence. There are things the intelligibility of which is dependent on others; for which reason, what is pertinent is that knowledge have, as its main purpose, that which is the source of intelligibility for everything else. For the philosopher, these are the first causes: he is guided to his discovery by the principles of natural reason. In contrast, for the believer, placed in the same attitude of searching for perfect knowledge, that source is also the first causes but already identified with the God of Revelation. It is the faith the one that delivers the key. And in this way, if wisdom, the principles of which are those of natural reason, is the end and perfection of man, by an analogous and higher reason, it is also that knowledge of which the faith is the principle, in which what philosophy knows is known, accepting its concepts, its language, and its argumentations, but introducing itself in the divine intimacy of the first cause, as it is revealed by God Himself. Philosophy, in its principal form, which is metaphysics, and theology are the maximally universal sciences: they know everything in its principle. There is nothing, consequently, which can be excluded from this, which Thomas Aquinas calls the sacred doctrine. In his Summa theologiae, for example, he points out what are the means to mitigate sadness, and he mentions, among others, sleep and bathing; well, this is, materialiter, good psychological perception, but formaliter, is theology, since it touches the topic in what relates to the order by which man, redeemed creature, is disposed with respect to his Creator and Redeemer. 

2. The theological perspective's contribution to natural law.

Thus, both the notion and the reality of natural law have been studied, dealt with and taught by ancient theologians, not as a marginal question, object of some accidental impulse of curiosity as could have been the study of the crab's digestive system or that of the formulas of alchemy. In spite of this, as said before, we would not be able to reject these as entirely foreign topics, since the inquirer in metaphysics considers everything, even the fly that tickles his nose, inasmuch as it is a being, and the theologian also considers that fly inasmuch as it is a creature of God. This could be considered a justification, perhaps, for lovers of persnickety, which, this notwithstanding does not take truth away from what we have said. There will always be some difference between the study of the crab's digestion and of that which is naturally just in man's conduct; this difference lies in the transcendence and universality of the latter topic as compared to the former. It must be presumed, certainly, what is common to both, which is their partaking in the mystery of being. At least the latter and not the former is normally included as part of that set of topics which are covered in a work of universa theologia.

In this manner, then, it can be understood that there have been notable theologians which engaged themselves in the problems related to natural law and that they have addressed them not for reason of them being particular problems, but to the extent that they are part of that whole which is the object of theological sapience. As a source of authority, it behooves us to keep in mind the names of theologians who have dealt with the theoretical and practical problems of natural law: suffice it to mention Thomas Aquinas, Francisco de Vitoria, and Domingo Soto. Thomas, in whom we mainly put our attention in the course of this presentation, deals with questions referring to natural law in works of theology and with theological intention.

Theology has as its formal object, according to what the term expresses, God's being itself, and to that object, human understanding has access through faith; that is, by means of a supernatural assent to what God reveals. However, through Revelation, we know only some, not all, universal truths. They are those, the knowledge of which is necessary for men's eternal salvation. It is not necessary indeed, for the salvation of souls, that God reveal, for instance, the reason for a physical law or of what consists the difference, in essence, between angels and archangels. Now, it has been seen that divine truth is the source and principle of all truth. All truth can, for the same reason, be known inasmuch as it partakes of that source or principle, since, inasmuch as it is truth, it is participation in divine truth. This is why, its knowledge, while not formally of faith, can be a theological knowledge if its truth is recognized as divine truth to the extent it is participated by the creature. This may perhaps be not of immediate interest to homo viator, for whom what is most important are the truths which refer to eternal salvation, but it is to him to the extent he aspires to wisdom; that is, inasmuch as he is a theologian.

But it is necessary to be more precise. Among the truths that can be known through natural reason, it is in philosophical truths where a greater closeness exists to the truths of the faith, due to their universality and to the fact that their object is the first causes, which is to say, the divine truths themselves, even though they are not philosophically known as divine. The existence of a Revelation, though limited to the truths necessary for salvation, shows that divine truth can be revealed and that in such condition, in that of revealable divine truth, all truth is comprised. The divinely revealable and intelligible characters are merged into a single one. Thus, Thomas writes that "what is covered by the diverse philosophical sciences, the sacred doctrine, which is one, can consider under a single reason, that is, of being divinely revealable, so that the sacred doctrine be like an impression of the divine science, which, being one and simple, extends to everything" (Saint Thomas accustoms to say in two lines — sometimes uncomfortably to us, his disciples — and with perfect clarity, what one has tried to explain laboredly and awkwardly in several pages.)

Every revelation, as it is obvious, is ordered to the knowledge of those to whom it is revealed, it is a making known. If the communications medium is not knowable to the intended recipient of the revelation, then the latter simply does not exist. Faith is knowledge and as such resides in man's intelligence: there it is supernaturally infused in such a way that said intelligence is elevated and in that manner accesses the Truth, the knowledge of which exceeds man's natural capability. In no respect does the faith nullify or overwhelm natural intelligence; on the contrary, it is the created intelligence the one which is elevated to the knowledge of the increated Truth. Human intelligence attains its perfection this way, that is, supernaturally, but in accordance with its proper order or in accordance with its nature: it is its perfection as intelligence what is thusly achieved, which is to say, as far as it can attain its proper object, the knowledge of being.

Divine Revelation, consequently, to be revelation, it necessarily has to be given to men in human language; its object, divine truth, cannot manifest itself to us if not by means of notions, judgments, and analogies which are expressed by means of the same language of everyday communication, of the sciences and of philosophy; that is, by means of the language, the only natural bridge between the intelligence of humans which can penetrate the truth of things. If man cannot comprehend what is communicated to him, there is no revelation. Which certainly, as pertains to divine Revelation, it does not exclude mystery, since to comprehend is not the same as to understand. It must be insisted upon, that what is made known to the believer, he understands. An act of faith is an act of understanding since theological virtue is the supernatural partaking in the knowledge through which God is known.

The divine science, which is infused in man by grace, has an infinite reach inasmuch as it is divine, but inasmuch as it is partaken, it necessarily has its limits. If we pay attention to the most incomprehensible doctrines of Christian dogma, we can note that their incomprehensibility makes itself manifest to us precisely in the measure that we understand what understandable is in them. It is not casual that notions so deeply linked to philosophy, such as essence, nature, substance, hypostasis, person, will, etcetera, should have been developed and required in the history of thought precisely inasmuch as they can explain what understood can be of the trinitarian dogma or that of the Incarnation of the Word. It is necessary to understand what these terms mean, to penetrate the mystery. Without this understanding, the mystery is not manifested as a mystery. 

Cardinal Siri, when he was archbishop of Genoa in 1961, published a famous pastoral letter in which he taught that "the terms of language and of thought used in Revelation reflect an objective human philosophy and establish a value relationship in the former, since, if Revelation were to lack such value, it would not be able to serve to express divine things validly. In sum, the use of expressive terms in Revelation presumes a relationship between these, with their own value, and human thought, also with its own value. If it were not that way, if the terms used in Revelation were not to lead to an objective and true knowledge of divine things (even when only in an analogous sense), then God would have not revealed anything, Revelation would have not existed, we would not have attended but to the presentation of an interesting cartoon film without any consistency."

The object of the faith, consequently, is in itself perfectly intelligible, even when it not be perfectly quoad nos. That of faith is in us a knowledge secundum non visum, which is to say, necessarily obscure: it is the assenting to that which someone else, God, knows and reveals. We do not apprehend its object directly, we see it, Saint Paul says, "as in a mirror and in an enigma." But this object is intelligible, and not with any particular intelligibility since it always remits to the source of all intelligibility. This is why the certainty of this knowledge, in spite of the limitation the faith suffers regarding the way of knowing, indirect and obscure, is greater and more perfect than that of any evidence in the order of natural reason.

Because of this, theology, inasmuch as it is the science of divine truth, possesses, as we have seen, the universality which corresponds to the divine science; all truth is divine in its source or origin. This means that all knowledge of natural reason is eminently theological, and it can be converted to formally theological if it is considered under the light of divine truth. For this reason, theology is the perfection of natural or human sciences, since it knows the same as these but by virtue of a different formal motivating object or intellectual light, which allows it to know the natural realities more deeply, given that it knows them in their more proper being, inasmuch as they partake in God's being.

On the other hand, it is also necessary to take into account that some truths of the natural order are reaffirmed by divine Revelation. Those truths, without prejudice to their natural cognoscibility and to their being the object of common sciences, are also revealed. The reason why God reveals to men what they already know or can know is the imbecillitas (weakness, frailty) of human intellect. Revelation of these truths reaffirms a certainty which man's intelligence already has in a natural way, but which, due to his inveterate pusillanimity, he can become separated from them, or doubt them, or not know how to apply them to the practical order, or simply refuse to recognize them. Thus, the precepts of the Decalogue, for example, are all a matter of natural law, but their revelation to Moses on Mount Sinai give them a degree of certainty and a power which they lacked as mere precepts of the natural order. The situation to which man's imbecillitas can lead is pointed out very expressively by Saint Paul at the beginning of his letter to the Romans: "And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God handed them over to their undiscerning mind to do what is improper. They are filled with every form of wickedness, evil, greed, and malice; full of envy, murder, rivalry, treachery, and spite. They are gossips and scandalmongers and they hate God. They are insolent, haughty, boastful, ingenious in their wickedness, and rebellious toward their parents, they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless." This is a collection of epithets which provides a schematic exposition of the consequences of original sin.

There are, accordingly, three features of theology which are essential to it and which have to be taken into account in discussing its relationship with natural law. These are: the kind of language it uses, the universality of its object, and its certainty. In the first place, the language of theology cannot be other than that of philosophy, and not of just any so-called philosophical thought, but that of the philosophy of being, the philosophy of things, of what can be contemplated by intelligence; it is the language proper of human understanding. In the second place, the universality of its object is, precisely, the one expressed in such language: that object is not some particular message, some fact, or sign, or some kerygma, but the essences: that of God in the first place and then of those that can be or are participated in by the creatures. The universal is what is intelligible, and in this way, theology is connected with all human knowledge; for instance, with law, and with the philosophy of law. Universality is that which corresponds to what it is, the object of contemplation. And certainty is that which derives from the act of faith, which it has inasmuch as it is a participation in the certainty which is proper of the divine science itself. Even when it is a certainty in the knowledge of the principles ― the dogmas of faith ― and not of its conclusions, these receive, though in a derivative form, some of that supernatural light thanks to its union with the light of reason. In this fecund light is theology conceived.

Natural law has been expressly reaffirmed in many of its determinations, by Revelation, which has undoubtedly given to it, in the course of the history of Christendom, a recognition and a power that explain its practical validity for centuries. That validity has had as its efficient cause the fear of God. But besides, natural law has been a permanent object of study, in a way such that its reflexive knowledge has allowed to build up criteria and discover its applicability to new fields and circumstances. Now, such study has been developed to the extent that the topics of natural law have been accepted to be an inseparable part of wisdom, or of contemplation of the truth; that is, of the philosophy which has become fecund as theology.

3. The decadence of reason and its negative influence on natural law.

The same way as the theological perspective has given vitality to the study and the practical validity of natural law, its decadence has also influenced negatively on it. To the certainty which faith gives to understanding has followed a doubt, which initially has not been expressed as such, nor has it, probably, been conscious, but which has been manifested as a lack of confidence in intelligence itself in that it is a means of reaching theological conclusions. Following this is a change in the notion of faith itself and with it a reduction of its object to a strictly personal and private sphere. With this, what keeps calling itself theology is transferred to a field proper of autonomous subjectivity, that of sentiment or of personal enlightenment, in which faith ceases to be knowledge to transform itself into purely subjective security about the salvation of self.

All this, obviously, has decisive repercussions in what continues to be called natural law. The disappearance of faith in the order of intelligence of what is real, leads to seek a replacement for the certainty which it used to contribute, and it is thought to be found, for instance, in mathematical axioms. The disappearance of the universal essences, of human nature in its universal reality, gives rise to the inevitable individualism proper of the primacy of the purely subjective rights.

It is necessary, then, to note now, even if with the brevity demanded by this presentation, what has been the itinerary traveled by theology or by what has kept this name, and in what manner it has caused a change in the definition of natural law itself. The degradation of theology due to the reduction of its object to the singular events of a supposedly supernatural kind has its origin in the nominalism which, spreading through the schools of theology in universities since the middle of the fourteenth century, took root in the minds of many pious and well-instructed men. Among them were Peter D'Ailly and Gabriel Biel, men of universally recognized authority, on which works Martin Luther based himself for his lectures in Erfurt and in Wittenberg.

According to the principle that "what is real is only the singular," what is universal is reduced to the purely logical framework which our intelligence erects in the act of understanding. What is real is thus limited to that which the senses perceive and which the intellect would know by means of some intuition, the similarity of which with the sensitive perception induces to uphold its identification. William of Ockham himself, father of nominalism, claims: "the singular which is primarily perceived by the senses ― he writes ― is the same, and under the same reason, as what the intellect firstly understands in an intuitive way (...) Consequently ― he insists ― that same thing which is firstly perceived by the senses will be understood by the intellect and under the same reason." What intuition contributes ― the only properly cognoscitive act of the intellect — is organized by the mind by means of logical relationships of universality which lack all foundation or actual correlations.

This way, the great speculative theology suffers a noticeable detriment, and so, what is known as scholastic theology of the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries is, as it appears in Erasmus' Folly, the subtle play of multiple distinctions and abstractions which are processed in an intellect from which all kinds of contemplative activity has been amputated. 

Luther declares to belong to "Ockham's faction." Although sometimes he tones down this adhesion with references to Saint Augustine, it is clear that nominalism and its exclusion of the reality of the universal, marks his conception of the faith and of what could be understood as a theology. Reason cannot take part in the knowledge of what God reveals, since judging on that would be the same as making a judgment on God; it also lacks any faculty to determine what are the duties of a Christian. Reason is "blind, deaf, foolish, impious, and sacrilegious." Consequently, the relation of man with God cannot take place by means of knowledge; and what Luther calls faith does not correspond to theological faith nor can it be expressed in human language for that reason. What he understands by faith is an act of confidence, or rather, of internal security about the salvific result of the action which God carries out in an absolutely arbitrary manner on each of the elected.

Neither the faith nor the theology so conceived by the monk of Wittenberg can substantiate a natural law. This is ratified by the radical exclusion of works ― that is, of moral conduct ― as regards causes or conditions for salvation. If works are not determined by their moral character, then any norm of conduct lacks, because of this, its reason of being. When Luther explains what he understands by liberty for the Christian, he says that this consists of the complete independence from laws or precepts, including the commandments of the Decalogue. Any intent of justification of man which seeks its cause in objective moral or juridical justifications is not only rejected by doctor Martin but also branded as blasphemy. From Lutheran thinking, the notion of nature is not absent, but even making abstraction of the absolute uselessness of works, it is impossible that such nature, as it is conceived, and due to the intrinsic state of corruption in which original sin has left it, should constitute itself in a norm in some way. "For although God did not make sin, ― he writes ― yet He does not cease to form and multiply that nature, which from the Spirit being withdrawn, is vitiated by sin, just as if an artisan were to make statues out of rotten wood." Saint Paul, when he enumerated the vices which are the product of original sin, was referring to the fallen nature, but one which conserves its integrity and can, because of that, be redeemed and restored in its perfection; this is not the irremediably rotten nature to which Luther refers.

With Luther, each one's subjectivity gets consecrated as the source of determination of what is morally good or just: "these two formulas ― he writes in De servo arbitrio ― are true: 'good and just works do not ever make a man good and just, but a good and just man makes good works'. 'Bad works do not make a man wicked but a wicked man does bad works' which means that a person must always be first good and just before carrying out any good deed, and the good deeds will follow and come from a just and good person." With this, a primacy  ― a subjectivity which imposes itself ― of power over reason is established, of force over what is objectively just. The invectives hurled by the reformer against the "murderous hordes" of German peasants and his call to the noblemen to crush them, is a concrete example of the outcome which can reach such primacy of power over reason.

It is known that Calvin does not modify the main theses of Luther; as him, he holds that salvation is through the faith and not through the works, that there is no free will in man, that predestination to hell or to Beatitude is an irrevocable divine predetermination, that the works of the elected are necessarily good and those of the ones destined for reprobation are necessarily bad, and so forth. In contrast to Calvin, in Lutheranism one could still find, nevertheless, some spirit of piety; this disappears in the reformer from Geneva, in whom the community or assembly of the elected is put ahead of personal piety. Apart from that, as could be seen in the organization which the reformer gave to Genevan society, there is for him no difference between such assembly of the saints or of the elected and civil society. To belong to such assembly gives persons security in their condition of elected, since there is an external confirmation of the condition of elected on the part of the rest. The society or church of the saints needs, as does any society, visible and concrete links, without which it cannot subsist. As all rites or liturgical actions have been excluded from the reformed religion, such links are certain common forms of morality, which are to be signified to the rest by means of conventional words, gestures, dress, etcetera, which, in the absence of other sacred signs acquire, however, the necessary character. In such manner, by means of the observance of such conventional forms, the saint acquires the conviction of his own salvation.

God, for the Calvinists, is a severe being, arbitrary, terrible, implacable. There can be no law that can have as its foundation God's arbitrariness. "(He) has decreed once and for all ― he writes ― in his eternal and immutable counsel, those He has willed to take for salvation and those he has willed to send to perdition." Before this terrible distance from God is man, whose nature is radically corrupted and who cannot even aspire, not even by grace, to an intimate union with God, partaking of divine life, as is taught by Catholic theology. "Children themselves ― Calvin does not skimp on ways to inspire the horror proper of predestination ― are included in this condemnation (...) Their nature is a seed of sin; for which reason it cannot be other than repugnant and abominable to God."

God's presence among the elected would seem to contradict that insurmountable distance of man from God, or at least that it remedies or mitigates it. Not so, however, it is not that God makes Himself present in the elected and sanctifies him by communicating His own life to him. God does not reveal Himself to man nor does He make Himself be loved by man. What makes itself present in the elected is his sole character of elected, but it is not God. Knowing himself to be elected is certainly a determining psychological factor which will stamp its own character on the saints and on the assembly which congregates them. In this interior conviction, which is the self reaffirmation of being saved, all personal relation of man with God is comprised. "God not only offers salvation ― writes Calvin ― but He also assigns such certitude, that the effect of the offering cannot be left in suspense or in doubt."

Human destinies are thus resolved at the same time in the remoteness of a God which does not know compassion for human misery, and in the immediate closeness of a subjectivity in which the presence of the divine cannot be distinguished from an interior state marked by the conviction of having been saved (reprobates are uncapable of any true conviction.) Because of this, that double cause is reduced to a single one, to the one which is immediate and subjective, to which the divine character is granted after it has acted. The determining factor is always that interior state of the subject, state which is reinforced and reaffirmed as it is manifested externally and coincides with those of the rest in the same exterior forms, the which would be the unequivocal signs of the sanctity of the members of the assembly,

For Calvinism, and for the postures that have derived from it, law is solely what the will of the elected determine to be such. This power of the elected is more defined than in Luther, for whom it was identified simply with the subjectivity of the Christian. In contrast, in Calvinism, such power is that of the assembly, in which it is exercised of course over its members, in the form of a collective will superior to the particular wills. This idea of the collective will ― or general or sovereign, as it will be called afterwards ― autonomous and free, has been the archetype of the ideologies upon which modern revolutions have been inspired.

In the social philosophy which developed, mainly in England, in the seventeenth century, the presence of a secularized Calvinism is clear. Clarification: the secularized qualifier is redundant, since, as we have seen, Calvinism in itself consists in the secularization of some of the most outstanding ideas of the Reformation. The multiple sects which have derived from Calvinism share, as a common trait, the constitution of an assembly of their members, the saints or elected, that is the exemplary form of the civil society. This assembly, the covenant, its sanctity guaranteed by the divine election, and presided by the eldest or of greatest dignity of the members, the presbiter, possesses a collective will which always represents in a trustworthy way the individual wills of the members. It is that will, that of the assenbly of saints, the one which rules the life of the community. There is no transcendent norm, not of the eternal law, not of natural law, not of reason. There being no transcendent norm, there being no naturally just, the principle of conduct has to be necessarily immanent, since it does not leave nor is it possible to leave the closed sphere of a subjectivity which extends itself collectively, It is not surprising that, in the absence of a theology in the proper sense of the term, geometry should appear as an exemplary cause in the determination of the law. To it resort, and with this purpose, Grotius and Hobbes.

There is a character in whose thought and in whose works, the currents that stem from nominalism and from the Reformation, secularized by Calvinism, are concentrated. We refer to John Locke. In him, a skepticism, natural consequence of these currents, elevated to the category of dogma and principle of morality, can be found. In his Letter Concerning Toleration, his explanation of the significance of such dogma can be found. It says "toleration is the chief characteristic mark of the true church. Whatever profession of faith we make, ― he adds ― to whatever outward worship we conform, if we are not fully satisfied in our own mind that the one is true and the other well pleasing unto God, such profession and such practice, far from being any furtherance, are indeed great obstacles to our salvation."

Tolerance constituted in principle cannot be applied, by the way, to those who are intolerant; that is, cohabitation with any creed or religion can be admitted on condition that it does not claim to be the only true one: this is why Locke rejects the possibility of admitting the Catholic Church in this cohabitation of religions. The matter is that he who professes a religion may believe that it is the only true one as long as he believes it only for himself. If he tries to have others share in his belief because his religion is the only true one, he is committing the worst of sins, which is that of intolerance. Truth is only for oneself. The practical and theoretical consequences of a complete subjectivism are evidenced here quite clearly. Thus, it turns out that tolerance is the object of the faith, which can also be expressed by saying that the faith is valid on condition that it has no object; in other words, there is no truth which one has to believe in just because it is true. In connection with the accusation of intolerance made of Catholics, Locke writes that: "These accusations would cease very soon if the law of tolerance would be framed so that it would require all churches to proclaim that tolerance is the foundation of their own liberty, and to teach that liberty of conscience is a natural right of man."

Here we have, in the words of Locke himself, the enunciation of the principle which all subsequent currents that accept the liberal qualifier for themselves draw from: liberty does not consist of free will — the existence of which would have to be denied — but of the absolute independence of man with respect to any principle transcending his sujectivity and in the name of which some  type of obedience could be demanded of him; this is the liberty of conscience which supposes — as can be seen already in Luther — that something is good and true because I judge it to be so, that is, because to me it is good and true but not because in itself it is so. If tolerance is the proper object of the faith — and only in that sense could the faith be considered to be common — it is because the faith in divine Revelation and in theology no longer exists. And if natural law boils down to liberty of conscience, it is also because it no longer exists.

Libidocracia Americana

Libidocracia Americana

Por John Lyon

Tomado de New Oxford Review

Traducido del inglés por Roberto Hope

John Lyon ha desempeñado puestos académicos y administrativos en diversas universidades, incluyendo Notre Dame, Ball State, Kentucky State y St. Mary´s (Minnesota). Más recientemente ha sido profesor de literatura e historia en una academia clásica en Wisconsin. También ha sido agricultor, cultivando moras, flores, verduras y manzanas, y ha operado un puesto en el mercado campesino de Bayfield County, en Wisconsin.

"Lo primero que llama la atención cuando se observa [el mundo democrático moderno] es una innumerable multitud de hombres, todos iguales y parecidos, tratando incesantemente de obtener los placeres baladís y mezquinos con los que hartan sus vidas... Por encima de esta casta de hombres está un poder inmenso y tutelar que se arroga él sólo la tarea de procurarles su gratificación y de cuidar su destino. Ese poder es absoluto, minucioso, regular, providente y leve."  — Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracia en América

Nosotros, el pueblo de los Estados Unidos de América, somos una nación concebida en libertad y nacida en parricidio. No debe ser sorpresa, pues, que desde un inicio, nunca hayamos sido de una misma opinión. Somos internamente contenciosos, y en política exterior, indecisos. En religión hemos sido siempre antagónicos, nuestras divisiones sectarias y entre denominaciones protestantes se añaden a las tensiones de clase y económicas, y se suplementan con rivalidades regionales, y todo ello está impregnado de divisiones raciales.

Nosotros  — hasta el referente del pronombre plural es incierto. ¿Qué o quiénes somos nosotros? ¿Hijos de una idea, concebidos de manera harto maculada en libertad así como regicida? ¿Los elegidos de Dios en nuestra ciudad asentada sobre un monte? ¿Una función conglomerada, predeciblemente accidental de la geografía? ¿Miembros auto-elegidos de la más grande unión expoliadora del mundo? ¿El miserable desecho de extrañas y atestadas tierras? Somos un pueblo dispar, de todas formas oscilando siempre entre una transigencia confinada dentro de límites de principios asumidos pero no enteramente examinados, y una guerra civil. Nos hemos mantenido unidos por algún tiempo por una clase sociopolítica hegemónica con una periferia semi-permeable, cuyas funciones aristócratas han sido las de evitar un fratricidio organizado,

El derecho divino de los reyes se esfumó en el mundo de habla inglesa entre los años 1640s y 1780s, y con él se fue, en este país, toda jerarquía y orden heredable. Cuando matamos a nuestro padre el rey (1776-1783) y luego nos rehusamos a reemplazarlo con un sucesor de significancia siquiera simbólica, nos asentamos en nuestra paz regicida cual una banda de hermanos, nominalmente iguales ante la ley y en cuanto a derechos. (Ése era el caso aun cuando, por ejemplo, el documento que nos constituyó especificaba que algunos hermanos eran equivalentes en sólo tres quintas partes a los demás hermanos.)  Ningún individuo, familia o clase podía reclamar apodícticamente un "derecho a gobernar," habiendo el Dios de la revelación muerto públicamente junto con la mano derecha de la monarquía. A pesar, o además de la inmensamente importante herencia del derecho consuetudinario inglés, aquellos derechos civiles que teníamos habrían ahora de derivarse "de la naturaleza y del dios de la naturaleza", generalidades que habrían de probar ser no menos abstractas y maleables que aquéllas de la divinidad que anteriormente otorgaba derechos a los reyes.

Aun cuando este paso hacia la igualdad democrática pudiera haber sido políticamente necesario, dada la lógica de los tiempos, fue también el primer paso hacia el totalitarismo democrático: dividir a la naturaleza como algo independiente de Dios, hacer de Dios una función, un derivado de aquélla, hacer de la creencia en la divinidad un asunto privado, de la creencia en la naturaleza un asunto público. La creencia pública en la naturaleza va también a desvanecerse gradualmente, pues la cancha de juego en las democracias no es pareja, se inclina para abajo y hacia la izquierda, y es ahí donde tiene lugar toda acción significativa en ausencia de fuertes medidas de la derecha que se opongan a ello.

Nuestro estilo bipolar nacional, un tipo de esquizofrenia perturbadora, evolucionó en la presencia de un orden civil racional  en gran medida derivado de un deísmo, impuesto sobre un orden social básicamente basado en principios cristianos tradicionales. Durante los primeros 70 años de su existencia, nuestra nación evitó temporalmente las consecuencias más serias de esta bipolaridad, dirigiendo mucha de su energía a someter la mayor parte del continente, Con cierta ironía, sin embargo, fue en el curso de esta expansión geográfica que las placas tectónicas, siempre en movimiento, de nuestra estructura política, erupcionaron. No habiendo probado ser nosotros capaces de mantener la tranquilidad social basada en el orden fraternal de las cosas, supuestamente deducidos "de la naturaleza y del dios de la naturaleza" nos enfrascamos en nuestra fratricida guerra civil.

Observando nuestra joven nación, Alexis de Tocqueville, en Democracia en América (1835), observó que "los hombres no pueden estar sin una creencia dogmática" y que "de todos los tipos de creencia dogmática, el más duradero me parece que es la creencia dogmática en asuntos de religión; y eso es una inferencia clara, aún desde una consideración no más elevada que los intereses de este mundo." La creencia dogmática en asuntos de religión nos estaba fallando — o nosotros a ella — aun antes de la colonización de Norte América. Se desgajó en mayores facciones ya cuando nos hubimos establecido, gracias a luchas internas dentro de las diversas denominaciones protestantes, a la creciente auto-asertividad de la filosofía de la Ilustración y a los problemas morales y políticos que se presentaban al tratar de hacer compatibles la libertad y la igualdad. Todo orden de cosas divinamente revelado era ridiculizado patentemente por la fisión de las denominaciones protestantes. Tocqueville vio las consecuencias de esto y el futuro fracaso inminente de la naturaleza y del dios de la naturaleza. "Cuando se destruye la religión de un pueblo," escribió él "la duda invade las potencias superiores del intelecto, y medio paraliza a todas las demás." Y, consecuentemente, habiendo fallado para 1861 toda estabilidad política basada en una creencia religiosa revelada, o religión "natural" dogmática, procedimos a despedazarnos.

El resultado de esto fue una reordenación de las prioridades políticas. A fin de mitigar la tensión creada al fraccionar matemáticamente a la humanidad, re-creamos un orden político en el cual la desigualdad pasó de esa distinción insidiosa a otra, todos los derechos individuales ya se hicieron iguales, pero en el campo político, todos los derechos corporativos subsidiarios fueron devaluados, Los derechos federales se hicieron más iguales que los de los otros — específicamente los de los estados.

Habiendo fallado la creencia dogmática en la naturaleza y en el dios de la naturaleza, el Gran Leviatán, ese dios mortal, entró al quite. Naturalmente. "Un estado democrático de la sociedad, semejante a aquél de los americanos, podría ofrecer facilidades singulares para el establecimiento del despotismo," observó Tocqueville. A pesar de los motivos religiosos de los abolicionistas, de los escritores del himno del Ejército de la Unión, de la perspicacia y la estrategia de un notable presidente, y de la erradicación de la esclavitud, eludimos encarar nuestros dilemas políticos una vez más, pasando nuevamente a una era de explotación del continente, esta vez una "Edad Dorada"

Dorada — enormes ganancias habrían de obtenerse de la explotación de la naturaleza, facilitadas no tanto por la naturaleza y el dios de la naturaleza, sino por una ética utilitaria/pragmática erigida sobre una filosofía legal positivista. Pero ni la "utilidad" ni "lo que funciona" son un concepto unívoco, y el positivismo puede ser negado. Cada uno significa una vez esto, otra vez aquéllo, cada interpretación legitimada por la fuerza de un gobierno nacional cada vez más grande, en nombre de la única entidad civil que aún quedaba, la colectividad abstracta de individuos anónimos, La naturaleza y el dios de la naturaleza murieron o se suicidaron. Prosperamos en nuestro avance hacia el oeste.

El Gran Dios Pan había muerto, pero la mayor y menos imaginativa abstracción de todas seguía viviendo: "el Pueblo," que podía ser contado cuando contaba, Cada voto contaba tanto como cualquier otro, hubiera sido éste depositado por "Pap" de Huckleberry Finn o por un ciudadano sobrio y concienzudo.

Pero Pan tiene una manera de cambiar las formas inesperadamente, hasta de resucitar, y así fue que un estudiante bastante anónimo se paró en los escalones del edificio de administración de la Universidad de Berkeley, sosteniendo una pancarta con sólo cuatro letras que denotaba en inglés el ayuntamiento sexual infructífero pero forzado. Connotativamente, proponía la práctica general de esta actividad carente de objetivos en todo el universo, pues el universo era en sí mismo estéril de todo propósito o, por lo menos, así se le consideraba comúnmente y, sin embargo, era consentidor de los placeres pasajeros. La creencia dogmática en el imperio de la ley predicado en la divinidad o en la naturaleza había probado ser insolvente; el pragmatismo, irónicamente, inviable. Pues ya que ni la utilidad, ni el pragmatismo, ni el positivismo, por sí solos, seriados o juntos, habían probado ser capaces de establecer una jerarquía duradera de maximizar el placer y minimizar el dolor para la mayoría, la mayoría estaba por tomar el placer en sus propias manos, en una mezcla de libertarianismo nominalista y de programación social estatista.

América había entrado en la era de la revista cómica Mad y adoptado el lema de Alfred E. Newman, "What, me worry?" ("¿Qué, yo preocuparme?") Transferimos nuestra responsabilidad moral a la ciencia y a la tecnología (que habían estado haciendo por ya algún tiempo y bastante agresivamente con la naturaleza esa misma actividad que en inglés se indica mediante cuatro letras), cada una de ellas operando cada vez más como una agencia del gobierno federal; y pasamos a una posición Nietzscheana más allá del bien y del mal. Practicar esa actividad de las cuatro letras era usualmente placentera, mucho más que el juego de pushpin o que la poesía (las alternativas indiscriminadas que señalaba Jeremy Bentham), y, ya que la actividad no tenía consecuencias, permitía toda clase de uniones carnales, convirtiéndose así en  una actividad "sin víctimas" — a menos que uno u otro miembro de la pareja pensara lo contrario antes (o después) del hecho.

Habíamos recorrido la división tripartita de la historia que hace Augusto Comte, pasando por la etapa teológica, la metafísica y la positiva, llegando a una negación de todas las etapas, y el final del misterio, si no de la historia. La monarquía de derecho divino, el republicanismo de derecho natural y la democracia de derecho popular, habiendo cada uno de ellos fallado, nos volcamos inevitablemente hacia la libidocracia colectiva. Ya que, como lo han observado numerosos comentaristas con relación a la democracia, no hay santuario cuando "el pueblo" está contra usted, no se diga una seguridad política de mantener una postura social impopular, llegamos a sufrir una carga de políticos serviles políticamente "pero personalmente opuestos a  ..." La religión, en vez de ser aquéllo que mantiene a la gente unida, se retiró para volverse una cuestión de gustos  — y todos sabemos que ”de gustibus non est disputandum” (de gustos no hay por qué disputar). La ética, en vez de ser un código de comportamiento social predicado en la naturaleza humana común, se trocó en un precipitado de revelaciones privadas gnósticas de lo que sea mejor (o sea lo más placentero) para mí, filtrado a través de estadísticas y del azar, negociado y canjeado por un croupier federal, imparcial, por supuesto. El cuerpo político se disuelve en sus miembros individuales, y hasta el Gran Leviatán debe hacerse pasar como el ejecutor solamente del mayor bien individual para el mayor número. "En las comunidades democráticas," observaba Tocqueville "cada ciudadano está ocupado individualmente en la contemplación de un objeto muy endeble, en específico, de él mismo."

Esta es una catástrofe moral y política, como muchos lo han señalado. El Papa San Juan Pablo II, en Evangelium Vitae (1995), temía que si, como resultado de un oscurecimiento trágico de la conciencia colectiva, triunfara una actitud de escepticismo, poniendo en duda aun los principios fundamentales de la ley moral, el sistema democrático mismo sería sacudido hasta sus cimientos, y pasaría a ser un mero mecanismo para regular intereses distintos y opuestos, sobre una base puramente empírica" (N° 70).

Como Pan, el mismo dios mortal pareció estar pereciendo en la cúspide de su poderío. Pero todo era apariencias, Leviatán parece resurgir inevitablemente. Las monarquías de derecho divino, las monarquías constitucionales, las repúblicas democráticas — todas ellas pasan, con todo y sus interpretaciones letradas. Sólo las técnicas numéricas avanzan. Sólo aquéllo que pueda ser contado cuenta, y lo que cuenta realmente es quién hace el conteo. Solo la materia tiene importancia, La justicia se troca en un algoritmo. Todo el orden tradicional se lanza por la borda en nombre de una infalible (aun cuando ignorante), invencible (aun cuando apasionadamente encadenada) mayoría, expresada numéricamente, contada por actuarios federales, en nombre del fatuo principio del juez Anthony Kennedy del "dulce misterio de la vida." Hemos tocado fondo y empezado a cavar.

Las espantosas consecuencias del triunfo de la igualdad, aun cuando se le califica de "providencial," nos han llegado ya, como lo temía Tocqueville. A pesar de su aceptación de la igualdad como algo ineludible, escribió, "Mantengo que es una máxima impía y detestable que, hablando políticamente, la gente tenga derecho de hacer cualquier cosa... Los derechos de todo pueblo están circunscritos, por lo tanto, dentro de los límites de lo que es justo"

"Algunos no han temido aseverar." seguía diciendo, "que un pueblo nunca puede brincarse las trancas de la justicia y la razón en esos asuntos que le son peculiarmente propios, y que, consecuentemente, puede otorgársele un poder completo a la mayoría, por la cual está representado. Pero éste es el lenguaje de un esclavo." Concluía esta sección con la vigorosa afirmación: "El poder de hacer todo lo que se quiera, que yo debería negar a uno de mis iguales, jamás concedería a un número mayor de ellos, cualquiera que éste sea."

Vox populi, vox diaboli.

Más adelante en su clarividente análisis del futuro de la democracia igualitaria, este de lo más observador católico Normando concluía con cierta trepidación, "Por mi parte, dudo que el hombre pueda jamás soportar al mismo tiempo una completa independencia religiosa y una libertad política completa. Y me inclino a pensar que, si es corto de fe, habrá de quedar sometido, y si ha de ser libre, tendrá que creer."

Prescindiendo del ineludible, si no exclusivo, significado público de hombre en la admonición de Tocqueville, hemos reducido la fe a una función privada, donde rápidamente pasa a ser una cuestión de gusto individual y de conventículos sectarios políticamente irrelevantes. Aquéllos que han sido intimidados a creer que esta postura esquizoide refleja su oposición a la discriminación, están en realidad opuestos indiscriminadamente a todo orden público basado en creencias, sea creencia basada en la revelación, o en la naturaleza, o en cualquier otra cosa más allá del conteo de números. Son carentes de fe en la política y consecuentemente están sometidos, están libres como individuos pero creen en nada más sustancial que su creencia carente de objetivo. Las creencias dejan de tener una función pública y se desmenuzan en millones de dispensas idiosincrásicas, ninguna de las cuales tiene una práctica pública significativa, cada una de las cuales puede ser manipulada en contra de las otras por el Gran Leviatán, a fin de "asegurar la tranquilidad doméstica."

La relevancia pública de la creencia religiosa, sin embargo, como lo vio Tocqueville, es necesaria para cualquier orden de tranquilidad doméstica que no sea un orden totalitario. A la larga, la mayoría de los individuos llegarán a considerar que mantener su creencia personal resulta intolerable (como Dostoyevsky lo señaló una generación, o algo así, más tarde, en su parábola "El Gran Inquisidor") y se alegrará de turnar esa función al estado-como-iglesia. De ahí la escuela pública, que proporciona el dogma declarado y la disciplina aprobada a los hijos de los no creyentes.

Tocqueville advirtió que "las ideas generales con respecto a Dios y a la naturaleza humana son ... las ideas que, por encima de todas las demás, resultan ser más aptas para ser removidas de la acción habitual del juicio privado, y en las cuales hay más que ganar y menos que perder reconociéndose un principio de autoridad". La actual lucha política en los Estados Unidos es entre un totalitarismo de estado cada vez mayor y un orden político limitado. La cuestión principal es: ¿quién debe tener la última palabra acerca de la naturaleza de la naturaleza y, en particular, de la naturaleza del hombre? ¿acerca de las "ideas generales con respecto a Dios y a la naturaleza humana"?. La escuela pública es el seminario civil del estado omnicompetente; la Iglesia, por otra parte, es la facilitadora de un gobierno limitado por factores extra-políticos, "Dos son los que son..." en la antigua fórmula del Papa Gelasio. Es bueno estar "a dos" en el mundo el poder, pues, como dice la clásica observación de Lord Acton: "El poder tiende a corromper y el poder absoluto corrompe de manera absoluta"

Sin embargo, seguimos  avanzando, hacia abajo y hacia la Izquierda totalitaria. Comentando sobre la tendencia a la centralización y el despotismo de los gobiernos democráticos, Tocqueville escribió que "ningún soberano que jamás haya vivido en épocas pasadas ha sido tan absoluto como para haberse encargado de administrar con su propia acción, y sin la ayuda de poderes intermedios, todas las partes de un gran imperio: ninguno jamás intentó someter a todos sus súbditos a una estricta conformidad de reglamentación, o tutelar y dirigir personalmente a cada miembro de la comunidad. La noción de una empresa tal nunca se le ocurrió a la mente humana."

Eso era hasta que llegó Obama, y el adiestramiento de bacinica ordenado federalmente

El proceso proto-totalitario de discriminar a nombre de la anti-discriminación continúa bajo el eje de humo de la igualdad. "Creo," escribió Tocqueville, "que es más fácil establecer un gobierno despótico absoluto en un pueblo en el cual las condiciones de la sociedad son iguales, que en cualquier otro, y creo que si tal gobierno se estableciera por una vez en ese pueblo, no sólo habría de oprimir a los hombres, sino que con el tiempo arrancaría de cada uno de ellos varias de las más elevadas cualidades humanas. El despotismo, por lo tanto, me parece que debe ser particularmente temido en tiempos democráticos." Pues "en épocas de igualdad, cada hombre naturalmente tiene que valerse por sí solo."

En términos políticos clásicos, aquél que se vale por sí sólo es un "idiota". Se doma a los idiotas de la misma manera como se doma a los animales silvestres, desde su infancia. De ahí, nuevamente, las escuelas públicas manejadas por el estado.

La fe o la creencia restringida privadamente en, o a, uno mismo, o a su camarilla, tiene descriptores más exactos que el del lema de la "libertad religiosa": orgullo, autoestima, egoísmo, narcisismo, arrogancia. El punto de la distinción y conjunción que hace Tocqueville pudiera ser muy distinto del de nuestros incompetentes políticos, opuestos personalmente pero acquiescentes públicamente a cuestiones divisivas propuestas y apoyadas por aquellos auto-nombrados progresistas cuyo "progreso" conduce inevitablemente a Campo Siberia (por usar una figura tomada de la tira cómica Pogo de Walt Kelly). Cuando la fe se restringe a asuntos"personales", se vuelve socialmente retrógrada y políticamente irrelevante, posesión de los idiotas civiles.

Tocqueville hablaba del hombre, la criatura pública, no de cualquier posible individuo, o conventículo de individuos, a los cuales el orden público permitiera darse el gusto de llevar a cabo diversas formas de insensateces gnósticas reveladas privadamente, o de disfrutar de fantasías sexuales incitadas libidinosamente. Aquéllos que se "oponen personalmente" pero que públicamente se conforman con los ataques a cuestiones básicas como la estructura y la función de la sexualidad humana, o con quienes tratan de hacer distinciones insostenibles entre la naturaleza del hombre y la persona humana en los dos puntos extremos de la vida (haciendo eco directamente de los argumentos que se esgrimían en pro de la esclavitud hace 170 años), dejan el comportamiento ético a ser definido por el mejor postor. Este estilo esquizoide, sin embargo, como quiera que se haya arraigado en la experiencia Americana, aumenta nuestra disensión, laiciza los en una época semi-encantados lugares públicos, y las grandes interpretaciones tradicionales de lo que es ser humano se trocan en irrelevancias públicas. "Libre de creer" se troca en una "licencia de andar holgazaneando y perdiendo el tiempo", siempre y cuando a lo que conduzca no obstruya seriamente el camino a Campo Siberia, donde habrá barracas para perder el tiempo, facilitado con soma y ejercicios maltusianos.[*]

Parece no haber forma de eludir el hecho de que el ser "públicamente aquiescente" implica complicidad privada, cualesquiera que sean los límites morales de esa complicidad. ¿Dónde radica la lealtad final del hombre?¿al hombre y su naturaleza como son realmente,  o al estado y su naturaleza como se experimenta? ¿a uno mismo o a una acción pública con un propósito que trasciende a uno mismo y al estado? ¿y quién establece los propósitos? ¿qué puede el estado proporcionarnos más allá del Proceso Bokanovsky, soma, ejercicios maltusianos y trabajo interminable? Todos seremos trabajadores, incluyendo las "trabajadoras sexuales"  — en un paraíso de los trabajadores. Sin embargo, para ahora ya debiera usted saber que Arbeit macht nicht frei (el trabajo no te hace libre), y que Bokanovsky y Soma por lo menos tienen como su básica postura por defecto lebens unwürdig lebens (vida que no merece la vida). Malthus es ya otra cuestión.

¿Es aún concebible ya no más pensar, y mucho menos decir, “Dies homini non desideravi” ("No he deseado el día del hombre, " Jer. 17:16)? Sería absurdo esperar que el estado proponga esto. Quizás, sin embargo, si no se mantiene esta actitud por la sociedad, nos encontramos ya en una democracia totalitaria, cuya "tranquilidad doméstica" pueda ser esporádicamente desafiada sólo mediante llamamientos partisanos a las barricadas.

[*] De la novela distópica Un Mundo Feliz, de Aldous Huxley: soma es una droga utilizada para mantener a los ciudadanos en paz; el Proceso Bokanovsky es uno de clonación de humanos, utilizando óvulos fertilizados in vitro; los ejercicios maltusianos estaban diseñados para evitar la concepción (N del T)