NORTHERN
DEPARTMENT OF POLITICAL
SCIENCE
Political Science 651 Fall 2008
Modernity and Religion
Office Hours: MTW 11-11:50
Class Meets M
Mr. Glenn Office: Zu 113
E-mail:gglenn@niu.edu Phone 3-1091
REQUIRED TEXTS
Three Texts are required of all students.
1) John Locke, A Letter
Concerning Toleration.
2) John Locke, The
Reasonableness of Christianity. These are available at both bookstores.
3) The additional required
readings listed below under “Approximate Schedule” are in a photocopied Reading
Packet available from the instructor.
4) In addition, all students
will write a 1500 word review of what they have learned from reading one of the following books. Vicki
Sullivan, Machiavelli’s Three
Please submit in writing (email is best)
which book you intend to review. Please do this by Monday September 8. The
reviews are due September 15 (for Sullivan) and October 6 (for Smith). We will
set aside some time on these dates for those who reviewed the same book to present
a joint oral discussion for the rest of us on what they learned.
Approximate Schedule
August 25 Introduction. Guiding question of the class:
what did the modern political philosophers think they were doing to, with and
about revealed religion? What is modernity? What is religion? Leo Strauss on
modernity and on reason and revelation.
September 1 No
class - university holiday. We will make up the missed class on December 8.
September 8 Students
are to notify professor by today in writing whether they intend to review
Sullivan or Smith.
September 8 Machiavelli, The Prince, Ch. V-VIII,
XIV-XVI, XXV-XXVI
September 15 Machiavelli,
The Discourses,
September 22 Hobbes,Leviathan, Ch. XII, XXXI-XXXIII.
September 29 Cooke,
Hobbes and Christianity, Ch. 1-2 (in reading packet)Hobbes and Christianity.
Spinoza, Theological Political
October 6 Leo Strauss, "Preface to the English Translation" of Spinoza's Critique of Religion.
Oral
Presentation on Smith’s book on Spinoza.
October 13 Locke, [First] Letter on Toleration
October 20 [First]
Letter on Toleration (cont.) Fourth Letter on Toleration,(entire).
October 27 Locke,
The Reasonableness of Christianity
November 3 Reasonableness(cont.)
November 10 Reasonableness(cont.)
November 17 Research Papers due.
Locke, Essay Concerning Human Understanding
(Selections)
November 24 TAKE HOME EXAM HANDED OUT. DUE December 8. Rousseau, The Social Contract, Ch.
VIII
December 1 Tocqueville,Democracy
in
December 8 (Monday) TAKE-HOME FINAL EXAM DUE. Make-up
class.
ATTENDANCE AND PARTICIPATION
Students are expected to come to each class having done the
readings for that day’s discussion and to be prepared both to be interrogated
and to raise questions about them.
WRITTEN AND ORAL PRESENTATION REQUIREMENTS
1. A research paper of 2500-3000 words is due Monday November
17. The exact topic of that paper is to
be agreed upon between the professor and student although a list of acceptable
topics follows. The purpose of the paper is to see how well you can lay out an
interpretive argument, based on some text we have read in class or which is on
Reserve, about a question or topic related to the subject matter of this class.
The paper should focus primarily on primary sources though at least some
references to secondary sources is appropriate. In some cases, a paper which
focuses on secondary sources is acceptable.
2. A
1500 word review of either the Sullivan or Smith books. The students who review
the same books will be expected to do a joint oral presentation on the book
upon our finishing the readings for that philosopher.
3. A take-home final examination. This will be handed out November
24 and is due at the scheduled exam time December 8. However, we will hold a
regular class May 4 to make up for the class we will missed September 1. I have
not scheduled any readings for that day on the assumption that we will be
behind.
GRADING AND INCOMPLETES
Except
as indicated above, incompletes are given only for unforeseeable events which
make impossible completion of the course work in timely fashion and especially
by the end of the semester. Students are responsible for informing the
professor of such events, and for securing his consent to an incomplete, as
promptly as possible.
An "A" grade in the class requires regular (daily)
evidence of having read and seen relationships among parts of the text; raising
questions about what the text seems to mean or whether what it seems to mean
makes sense, either in itself or in relation to the text's apparent meaning
elsewhere. It also helps to be able to
answer, both thoughtfully and to the point, questions put by the professor.
Comments not germane to the topic under discussion are discouraged.
An "A" in the class also requires that the book
review, research paper and final exam be written with clarity, economy, and
focus. Both the paper and the final examination must show understanding of the
material beyond the obvious. Showing how
the text sheds light on contemporary issues is important but should not get in
the way of first understanding the text in the manner intended by the author or
authors.
Course grades are based on both written assignments and quality
of oral participation in the seminar.
The following are recommended additional reading and will be put on reserve.
Studies on Leo Strauss’ understanding of
1) the relation of reason and revelation and 2) on what constitutes
“modernity.”
In
class, we will pay only brief attention to Strauss’ thought on the question of
reason and revelation. However, that thought is important for understanding the
context within which the professor understands the subject matter of this
class. Hence, some relevant essays of Strauss are included in the Reading
Packet mentioned above under Required Texts. Those essays could be profitably
read, but are not required readings for the course. These readings would be
suitable for papers.
Here
are some useful secondary readings on this topic which I have placed on
Reserve.
Peter Emberley and Barry
Cooper eds., Faith and Political Philosophy:
The Correspondence between Leo Strauss and Eric
Voegelin, 1934-1964 (1993). Voegelin was the major Christian political theorist trying to understand modernity during Strauss’ lifetime. The two
made common cause in trying to
resuscitate political philosophy against
the positivism and historicism which had come to dominate contemporary thought. This volume records their efforts to understand each other’s very
different enterprises. Their
differences centrally concerned “religion.”
Kenneth Hart Green, Jew
and Philosopher: The Return to Maimonides
in the Jewish Thought of Leo Strauss (1993).
David Novack ed., Leo
Strauss and Judaism:
Critically Revisited (1996).
Recommended studies on the topics central
to this class which are also on Reserve.
Modern
Political Philosophers and religion
I
have found the following books competent and helpful for understanding the
question central to this course: what were the early modern political
philosophers trying to do to, with and about revealed “religion.” In various ways, the studies all are
influenced by the view that modernity represents a fundamental break with, and
a rejection of, Christianity specifically and with revealed religion generally.
Whether they go further and suggest that the modernity they recommend can do
without Christianity or revealed religion is something we will try to
understand. I believe “a fundamental break with Christianity” means that
modernity is not some sort of secularized Christianity but a root and branch
rejection of it. This is in contrast to the Hancock and Walsh readings below.
Vicki Sullivan, Machiavelli’s
Three
Paul D. Cooke, Hobbes and
Christianity: Reassessing the Bible in
Leviathan(1996). The second half of Leviathan is political
theology, though of a new kind. It is systematically materialist. Everything
that is, is body. Hence whatever is not body, is not. So no spirits. Hence, God
is body, etc. In other words, from the perspective of traditional religion,
this is (implicitly at least) atheistic political theology. Today Hobbes’
political theology is rarely studied. But Cooke argues that Hobbes thought
theology of the kind he was proposing was needed in order to support the
political order he was establishing.
Steven B. Smith, Spinoza,
Liberalism, and the Question of Jewish
Identity (1997). Smith argues that Spinoza sought to remake
Judaism by emancipating it from its’ theological tradition and substituting
freedom, autonomy, religious toleration and a progressive philosophy of
history. To these ends, he used the language of modern natural right and social
contract to recommend liberal and democratic institutions. Judaism so reformed
appears to become a means to usher in liberal modernity.
Modernity
and Christianity
Ralph Hancock, Calvin and
the Foundations of Modern Politics (1989).
Argues that Calvin is a major founder of, and hence
that Christian religion has a place in, or is part of
“modernity.” Hancock opposes the view of the relation
of Christianity and modernity in the Sullivan, Cooke and Smith books. These
latter share Strauss’ view that modernity is not secularized Christianity.
Rather modernity is fundamentally a Hobbesian/Spinozistic project which
proposes solving the theological/political (and reason/revelation) problems by
at least implicit atheism.
David Walsh, The Growth of the Liberal Soul
(1997). “Liberal” is sometimes, as in this book, equated with “modernity.” Walsh’s
is a recent, intelligent attempt to give an overall account of the development
of liberal (i.e. modern) political philosophy from the point of view of its
effect on the soul. Walsh appreciates liberalism’s success in deepening our
appreciation of the value of the individual. He is influenced by Weber’s thesis
that modernity is secularized Christianity. Walsh questions whether liberalism
can preserve itself if it cuts itself off from that faith. This is a kind of
Catholic or Christian account of modernity in contrast to Strauss, Sullivan,
Cooke and Smith.
Readings/Topics
on Secularization
D. L. Munby, The Idea of a
Secular
of
a Secular Society and its Significance for Christians (London: Oxford University Press, 1963), pp. 9-35.
This is a
kind of 20th century intellectual history of the development of Asecular
society.@ It is striking for its’understanding of Asecular society@ which, for someone who thinks of secularism in
contrast to religion, is frankly odd (p. 14). One manifestation of that oddness
is that Nazi Germany is not understood to be a secular society. It is
apparently the case that, for Munby, secular is “liberal”. Hence,by definition,
illiberal states cannot be secular. From the point of view that “secular” means
a society or government not based on Biblical religion or on faith in the Biblical
God, Naziism or Stalinism would be “secular.” That is, from that point of view,
one would need to distinguish “liberal secularism” from “illiberal secularism”.
In contrast, Munby’s point of view that “secular” is by definition “liberal”
denies that distinction. Hence, Naziism or Stalinism is like belief in the
Biblical God. What that means, and why it is important, you will need to read
his article to see. While doing that, try to figure out what Munby=s key idea is
that there can be such a thing as Athe neutral society.@ And what are the 6 characteristics he sees of a
secular society?
Gilles Kepel, “Religions in a Confused World ,
Introduction to
The Revenge of God: The Resurgence of Islam,
Christianity and Judaism in the Modern World (Penn State University Press, 1994), pp. 1-12, and 191-203.
This is an
intellectual and political history of “the last quarter of the 20th
century” respecting “the relationship between religion and politics.” He argues
that at the end of WWII “it seemed that the realm of politics had finally
broken away from religion, the culmination of a process which the philosophers
of the Enlightenment are generally held to have been the main initiators.”
Subsequently however, he claims, that “a worldwide discrediting of modernism” has
led to a resurgence of Christianity, Islam and Judaism. His perspective sees
these religions as essentially the same as communism “the great atheist
messianic ideology of the twentieth century.” Is this a secular perspective or
a liberal perspective, or something else?
Mehtzad Boroujerdi, “Can Islam be Secularized”? From M.R.
Ghanoonparvar and Faridoun Farrokh eds., In
Transition: Essays on Culture and Identity in the Middle Eastern Society (Texas
A & M University Press, 1994), pp. 55-61.
Confronts
the dominant scholarly view that secularization/secularism has not happened and
will not happen in Islam. Makes an important distinction between secularism as
an idea and secularization as a social process.
Ronald Thiemann, “Public Religion in a Pluralistic
Democracy: A Proposal”. This chapter 6 of Religion in
Public Life: A Dilemma for Democracy (Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University
Press, 1996), pp 121-143.
This article
rarely if even speaks of secularism. Instead the language is “pluralistic Democracy”.
The question he addresses is whether religiously based arguments are legitimate
and hence to be permitted within a “pluralistic democracy”? This is the
question which Rawls put on the table and which Rawlsians continue to address.
Thiemann, like Rawls, presupposes liberalism of a certain kind, though he is
open to tolerating explicitly religious arguments of a certain kind. The
question is “of what kind”? To see the extent to which his argument presupposes
liberalism of a kind, ask yourself what would a Nazi or a Communist say about
whether religiously based arguments have a place in public policy.
John Kean, “The limits of secularism” The Times
Literary
Supplement,
An
historically informed argument that states “the belief that the modern world is
irreversibly destroying its religious foundations is a child of mid
nineteenth-century
TABLE OF CONTENTS
FOR READING PACKET “RELIGION AND MODERNITY”
FALL 2008
READING PACKET
SYLLABUS
1. MACHIAVELLI, THE PRINCE
(SELECTIONS) 1-18
2. MACHIAVELLI, THE
DISCOURSES (SELECTIONS) 19-27
3. HOBBES, LEVIATHAN
(SELECTIONS) 28-46
4. SPINOZA, THEOLOGICO-POLITICAL
TREATISE (SELECTIONS) 47-72
5. ROUSSEAU, THE SOCIAL
CONTRACT (SELECTIONS) 73-78
6. LOCKE, FOURTH LETTER ON
TOLERATION 79-92
7. JOHN TUCKER, AN
ELECTION SERMON (1771) 93-102
8. JAMES MADISON, “A MEMORIAL
AND REMONSTRANCE
AGAINST RELIGIOUS
ASSESSMENTS” (1785) 103-08
9. THOMAS JEFFERSON, NOTES
ON VIRGINIA & LETTERS 109-21
10. TOCQUEVILLE, DEMOCRACY
IN
11. HILAIL GILDIN, “DEJA JEW
ALL OVER AGAIN: DANNHAUSER
ON
LEO STRAUSS AND JUDAISM” (1997) 145-49
12. LEO STRAUSS, “PREFACE TO
SPINOZA’S CRITIQUE
OF RELIGION” (1962) 156-86
13. LEO STRAUSS, “PROGRESS OR
RETURN: THE CONTEMPORARY
CRISIS OF WESTERN CIVILIZATION” (1952,1982) 186-200
14. LEO STRAUSS, “THE MUTUAL
INFLUENCE OF THEOLOGY AND
PHILOSOPHY” (1954, 1979) 201-08
15. LEO STRAUSS, “
ONE
ENTITLED “THE BEGINNING OF THE BIBLE AND ITS
GREEK
COUNTERPARTS” AND THE OTHER ENTITLED
“ON
SOCRATES AND THE PROPHETS” (1967) 209-36
16. LEO STRAUSS, “ON THE
INTERPRETATION OF GENESIS”
(DELIVERED 1957, PUBLISHED 1981) 237-53
17. HARRY
18. THOMAS PANGLE, “THE
PLATONISM OF LEO STRAUSS:
A REPLY TO HARRY
19. HARRY
20. FR. JAMES LEHRBERGER, “A
TRUE AND ADEQUATE ACCOUNT
OF
THE WHOLE: LEO STRAUSS AND THOMAS AQUINAS ON
REASON AND REVELATION” (1990) 275-97
21. LOCKE, AN ESSAY
CONCERNING HUMAN UNDERSTANDING
(SELECTIONS) 298-332
22.
“CHARITY”,
“TOLERATION” AND “RELIGION”) 333-336
23. NIETZSCHE, TWILIGHT OF
THE IDOLS & THE GAY SCIENCE 337-338
24. PAUL COOKE, HOBBES AND
CHRISTIANITY, Preface,
Chs.
1 and 2 339-363