Posted on 12/30/2002 11:02:27 PM PST by JohnHuang2
No issue has a greater influence on determining your social and political views than whether you view human nature as basically good or not.
In 20 years as a radio talk-show host, I have dialogued with thousands of people, of both sexes and from virtually every religious, ethnic and national background. Very early on, I realized that perhaps the major reason for political and other disagreements I had with callers was that they believed people are basically good, and I did not. I believe that we are born with tendencies toward both good and evil. Yes, babies are born innocent, but not good.
Why is this issue so important?
First, if you believe people are born good, you will attribute evil to forces outside the individual. That is why, for example, our secular humanistic culture so often attributes evil to poverty. Washington Sen. Patty Murray, former President Jimmy Carter and millions of other Westerners believe that the cause of Islamic terror is poverty. They really believe that people who strap bombs to their bodies to blow up families in pizzerias in Israel, plant bombs at a nightclub in Bali, slit stewardesses' throats and ram airplanes filled with innocent Americans into office buildings do so because they lack sufficient incomes.
Something in these people cannot accept the fact that many people have evil values and choose evil for reasons having nothing to do with their economic situation. The Carters and Murrays of the West – representatives of that huge group of naive Westerners identified by the once proud title "liberal" – do not understand that no amount of money will dissuade those who believe that God wants them to rule the world and murder all those they deem infidels.
Second, if you believe people are born good, you will not stress character development when you raise children. You will have schools teach young people how to use condoms, how to avoid first and secondhand tobacco smoke, how to recycle and how to prevent rainforests from disappearing. You will teach them how to struggle against the evils of society – its sexism, its racism, its classism and its homophobia. But you will not teach them that the primary struggle they have to wage to make a better world is against their own nature.
I attended Jewish religious schools (yeshivas) until the age of 18, and aside from being taught that moral rules come from God rather than from personal or world opinion, this was the greatest difference between my education and those who attended public and private secular schools. They learned that their greatest struggles were with society, and I learned that the greatest struggle was with me, and my natural inclinations to laziness, insatiable appetites and self-centeredness.
Third, if you believe that people are basically good, God and religion are morally unnecessary, even harmful. Why would basically good people need a God or religion to provide moral standards? Therefore, the crowd that believes in innate human goodness tends to either be secular or to reduce God and religion to social workers, providers of compassion rather than of moral standards and moral judgments.
Fourth, if you believe people are basically good, you, of course, believe that you are good – and therefore those who disagree with you must be bad, not merely wrong. You also believe that the more power that you and those you agree with have, the better the society will be. That is why such people are so committed to powerful government and to powerful judges. On the other hand, those of us who believe that people are not basically good do not want power concentrated in any one group, and are therefore profoundly suspicious of big government, big labor, big corporations and even big religious institutions. As Lord Acton said long ago, "Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." Lord Acton did not believe people are basically good.
No great body of wisdom, East or West, ever posited that people were basically good. This naive and dangerous notion originated in modern secular Western thought, probably with Jean Jacques Rousseau, the Frenchman who gave us the notion of pre-modern man as a noble savage.
He was half right. Savage, yes, noble, no.
If the West does not soon reject Rousseau and humanism and begin to recognize evil, judge it and confront it, it will find itself incapable of fighting savages who are not noble.
As for my opinion buying a latte, I'm glad that I could be of service to you.
Your service to me will be that you address subsequent posts to someone else.
I'm not trying to be argumentive. My being right, or anyone who took issue with you, is not nearly so important as clarity on this subject. Thus, Do you really feel that what you wrote here comports well with this thematically related assesment of the human condition?
First, if you believe people are born good, you will attribute evil to forces outside the individual.
Not necessarily, and I certainly don't see how this follows. Good people take their eyues off the ball all the time and get seduced by the pursuit of worldly effects, whereas the pursuit of the Kingdom, which reflects in our experience as Truth, Love, and cause and effect, is the real ballgame.
Some people get so attracted to power, money, or some other worldly good that it replaces God, violting the First Commandment. This is a product not of their nature, not of outside forces, but of their choices. The good news is that at every moment, you get to choose atgain and make a change if needed. Unfortunately, power and money can be addictive for some people, just as alcohol is.
Washington Sen. Patty Murray, former President Jimmy Carter and millions of other Westerners believe that the cause of Islamic terror is poverty. They really believe that people who strap bombs to their bodies to blow up families in pizzerias in Israel, plant bombs at a nightclub in Bali, slit stewardesses' throats and ram airplanes filled with innocent Americans into office buildings do so because they lack sufficient incomes.
Do they really believe this, or is it simply conveient for them to try to make others believe it?
no amount of money will dissuade those who believe that God wants them to rule the world and murder all those they deem infidels.
True. But I'm not sure that bin Laden really believes this either. He's just a hater who has taken religion as a cloak for his hatred, just as liberals try to dress up their hate as "compassion."
Second, if you believe people are born good, you will not stress character development when you raise children.
Again, not necessarily true. The good in the child still has to be developed and nurtured to keep the child strong, which is the best way to keep the child from being distracted by worldly good instead of the Higher Good.
But you will not teach them that the primary struggle they have to wage to make a better world is against their own nature.
No, it's the ongoing effort to refeal the truth of their nature in the face of a world that too often encourages all of us to take the easy choice.
Third, if you believe that people are basically good, God and religion are morally unnecessary, even harmful.
Now this is a downright silly statement. To believe that the nature of man is good is to believe that it reflects the goodness of God, because God is Omnipresent and thus is within us all. God is all in all. God is all there is. There is no spot where God is not. Thus, we are expressions of God.
Why would basically good people need a God or religion to provide moral standards?
A good question if you are a believer in duality and separation. I think it can well be argued that that God is too small. Does a God who would condemn 80% of His creation to eternal damnation make any sense?
Therefore, the crowd that believes in innate human goodness tends to either be secular or to reduce God and religion to social workers, providers of compassion rather than of moral standards and moral judgments.
Tends to be, but it's not logically required, yet that is what Prager argues above.
If the goodness of man comes from being part of God (as a drop of water is to the ocean), then one of the ways to put the Kingdom of God first is through individual choice, which implies individual responsibility.
Fourth, if you believe people are basically good, you, of course, believe that you are good -- and therefore those who disagree with you must be bad, not merely wrong.
Huh? If you believe that people are intrinsically good, then you must believe that those who disagree with you are bad? Doesn't anyone see the logical contradiction there? I thought Prager was smarter than that.
Now, some people on the left especially are so seduced by the false god of power over others that they are willing to do harm to others to maintain their own power. I would say that is true of most of the liberal leadership. They have no intention of helping; that would put them out of work. But I don't think it's true of most liberals (the "regular people" Sen. Edwards pays lip service to.) I think they simply work on feeling instead of giving issues much thought and the liberal leaders are able to take advantage of that emotive way of looking at things. That is why they have dumbed down education; to encourage emoting instead of thinking.
You also believe that the more power that you and those you agree with have, the better the society will be. That is why such people are so committed to powerful government and to powerful judges.
Again, it's amazing how Prager seems to think he knows what other people think. This does not necessarily follow logically. Good people often have disagreements about things. We need to have an agency with power to resolve these disputes. But because people have free will and often make inappropriate choices, it is a very bad idea to give yourself and/or your friends any power you wouldn't want others to have. Individual responsibility is the key here, and powerful government undermines individual responsibility.
If the West does not soon reject Rousseau and humanism and begin to recognize evil, judge it and confront it, it will find itself incapable of fighting savages who are not noble.
"In the modern world, the task of the humanist is to remind man of his spiritual reality." -- Irving Babbitt (one of Russell Kirk's mentors, BTW.)
As is the case throughout this essay, this does not follow logically from the premises. It is simply asserted. Why couldn't people believe in the basic goodness of all men and still fight those who misuse their free will to cause havoc and harm others? Isn't that what good people should do?
A disppointing lapse from Prager's usual clarity.
"The good news is that at every moment, you get to choose again and make a change if needed."
That might depend on the severity of the sin. Is God like a valet to you?
I think we all agree, whatever the "natural state" of mankind is, it is NOT "good".
I agree; as far as babies, yes, crying is the only way to show what they want/need...no other communication...and, yes, if left to continue to do so (crying or other forms of getting what he/she wants when communication becomes possible), it's a small step to "evil." By my example about the evidence of "badness within already," I do not mean to say that crying is evidence of bad.....but look at some babies (not many, but some) when they are hungry or are uncomfortable....some barely cry, much less show a temper. It's the temper part I was referring to. My oldest would display this if a hat was placed upon her head (it was actually quite funny when we had to for her Christening....oh boy, the adults couldn't believe her. Dr. Jekyl and little Hide....at only 3 months old). I think we had to end up taking it off, period. She was NOT going to wear a bonnet. By contrast, my youngest would hardly ever cry and when she did, rarely showed a temper.
Now, if purely goodness were in us from the beginning (which I don't believe) and we "learned" to be bad, why then do we have these "temper" problems with some kids which never go away unless it's learned to be controlled somehow, whether by training as a child or later as an adult because society forces it upon the individual for various reasons (i.e., anger management classes)?
Don't take any of my comments as in disagreement with you...I agree with everything you've said....just thought I'd bring up the baby thing, since we can see the beginnings of the problem in our natures even then.
Why would you, or anyone else for that matter, care about my opinion if yours rises no further than to say "You're wrong" or to use label-think such as "pagan"? My response to this sort of non-argument will always be "back at you" or "go elsewhere".
As to substance, if you believe that people are fundamentally evil, that is what you will see. The problem with this belief is that the evidence does not support your case. If evil were not the exception, there would be only Saddam Husseins. Your life experience and mine belie the idea that evil rules, and if it does not rule, why should it be considered fundamental to human nature? At the ideational level, why do we all so respect those who exhibit strength of character such as honor, courage and selflessness? And please don't deny that we do. If evil were predominant or in some way fundamental, would it not be the other way around? I would argue that see good as fundamental is realistic and in accord with the evidence, not pie-in-the-sky or self-deception.
Beyond this, I would argue that evil is a choice we may make because were it not so, Free Will would not truly be free and we could not learn from it, which I would maintain is the reason for Free Will. If Free Will were not operative, we would all be living in a cold, dead, deterministic, pointless Universe. The Materialists end up there and the fruits of this thinking are everywhere to be seen in the culture today. Now all of this is pretty broad-ranging but you can see that there is more than a little thought contained in my position that evil is not fundamental and that Prager is thus wrong in this instance.
They are inherently fallen and, thus, inherently evil.
Were it not for the Christ whom you quote, it would not be possible for people to ever be anything else.
Shalom.
Anne Frank was attempting to build her foundation upon the goodness of men and it was a false foundation.
Build your foundation on the goodness of G-d. That is a sure foundation and it will not consist of "confusion, misery, and death."
Shalom.
This is an anecdotal question but I am really interested in the answer.
Have you personally ever met a child who would naturally think of others, give, share, and help when helping would be difficult? I'm not talking about a 14 year old child but a 2 year old child who did all this on his/her own without any outside guidance.
Shalom.
However, you are correct that it is not original to Christ. Christ was summing the Old Testament Law, which has been around for about 5000 years.
Do not be surprised that a G-dly concept is well known throughout the earth. All men are decendants of men who knew their creator.
Shalom.
Most people lack the imagination to concieve of a society completely devoid of religious principles.
However, "The Lord of The Flies" managed to capture it pretty well.
Shalom.
While we are splitting hairs:
G-d created man "very good." Man is fallen, but the reason "fallen" is a problem is because it causes men to be evil, twisted, improper, perverse, whatever word you want to use. The results are that every imagination of man is evil continually (Genesis 6:5). True, this was a resultant state not a created state, but it is still our state without the influence of G-d in our lives and the regeneration of the Holy Spirit.
The difficulty is that evil men can accomplish good things also. But their hearts are still evil until regenerated by the Holy Spirit.
Shalom.
I could not disagree more. Nobility is a far more powerful motive force once a man can embrace it.
A lot of "good" can be accomplished as an ancillary result of a man being selfish. But a lot more can be accomplshed when a man is truly being noble. Even earlier capitalists understood this. They made wealth, yes, but their primary motivation was to help others with the products they produced and with the wealth they generated. Capitalism is failing us now because the concept of "the business of business is to improve lives" has changed to "the business of business is to make money."
Shalom.
Is your response meant to trash can the whole essay or is it disagreeing with parts of it?
And here I thought I was being crystal clear as to the correct view. I disagree with the thrust of the article as reflected in its title. I think that by-and-large Prager does have and has had some very worthwhile things to say, which is why my initial comment was qualified by "sometimes".
I'm a big Prager fan. I believe that he's right here in that goodness can only be earned, that evil emanates only from the human mind and that it must be named, confronted and fought.
You seemed to be obfuscating to me. I don't feel I have, but if I misunderstood you in some way, then I apologize.
I harbor no animosity toward you, but confess a real interest in and hence passion for the subject.
Everything GOOD then, to you and yours.
Happy New Year!
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