Part 5 (1/2)
This has arisen from several reasons. To begin with, it tends to narrow religion, which is concerned with life, to the realm of ideas, and to tie down religion by connecting it with a thought-system of a particular age. Further, the necessary mechanical routine, and the appointment of special persons to carry out this routine, tends to elevate the routine and these special persons to a far higher place than they should occupy.
Again, spiritual things have been dragged into the service of personal ambition, and bound up with human interests. The most serious danger, however, is that religion, from being an inward matter, tends to become externalised.
Despite this, an organised Church cannot be dispensed with, and Eucken points out what changes are necessary to make the Church effective. One important point he makes clear, namely, that as the Church must speak to all, and every day, and not only to spiritually distinguished souls, and in moments of elevated feeling, then the teaching of the Church will always lag behind religion itself, and must be considered as an inadequate expression of it.
It is necessary that there should be no coercion with regard to men's att.i.tude towards the Church, and men should be free to join this or that Church, or no Church at all.
Then there must be more freedom, movement, and individuality within the Church. What the Church holds as a final result of the experience of life cannot be expected as the confession of all, especially of the young. ”How can every man and every child feel what such a mightily contrasted nature as Luther's with all its convulsive experiences felt?”
Then the Church must not so much teach this or that doctrine as point to the Spiritual Life, set forth the conditions of its development, and be the representative of the higher world. Thus, and thus only, Eucken thinks that the Church can fulfil its proper function, and avoid being a danger to religion.
Eucken's _appreciation of Christianity_ is sincere. Viewing it from the standpoint of the Spiritual Life, he finds that it fulfils the conditions that religion should fulfil. It is based on freedom, and on the presence of the Divine in humanity, even to the extent of a complete union between them. The ideal of the Christian life is a personal life of pure inwardness, and of an ethical character. He speaks of the ”flow of inner life by means of which Christianity far surpa.s.ses all other religions,” and of the ”unfathomable depth and immeasurable hope which are contained in the Christian faith.”
In Christianity the life of Christ has a value transcending all time, and is a standard by which to judge all other lives. There is, too, in Christianity a complete transformation or break, which must take place before any progress or development can take place.
”There is no need of a breach with Christianity; it can be to us what a historical religion pre-eminently is meant to be--a sure pathway to truth, an awakener of immediate and intimate life, a vivid representation and realisation of an Eternal Order which all the changes of time cannot possess or destroy.”
At the same time, there are changes necessary in the form of Christianity, if it is to answer to the demands of the age, and be the Absolute Religion. It must be shorn of temporary accretions, and must cast aside the ideas of any one particular age which have now been superseded. No longer can it retain the primitive view of nature and the world which formerly obtained, no longer must it take up a somewhat negative and pa.s.sive att.i.tude, but, realising that religion is a matter of the whole life, must energetically work itself out through all departments of life. It must remedy wrong, not merely endure it. It must proceed from a narrow and subjective point of view to a cosmic one, without at the same time losing sight of the fact that religion is an inward and personal matter. It must take account to the full of the value of man as man, and of the possibilities latent in him, and take account of his own activity in his salvation.
The Christian ideal of life must be a more joyous one, of greater spiritual power, and the idea of redemption must not stop short at redemption from evil, but must progress to a restoration to free and self-determining activity. Since an absolute religion is based on the spiritual life, the form in which it is clothed must not be too rigid--life cannot be bound within a rigid creed. With its form modified in this way, Eucken considers that Christianity may well be the Absolute Religion, and that not only we can be, but we _must_ be Christians if life is to have for us the highest meaning and value.
CHAPTER IX
CONCLUSION: CRITICISM AND APPRECIATION
We have attempted to enunciate the special problem with which Eucken deals, and to follow him in his masterly criticisms of the solutions that have been offered, in his further search for the reality in life, in his arguments and statement of the philosophy of the spiritual life, and finally in his profound and able investigation into the eternal truth that is to be found in religion. In doing so, we have only been able in a few cases to suggest points of criticism, and sometimes to emphasise the special merits of the work. It was necessary to choose between making a critical examination of a few points, and setting forth in outline his philosophy as a whole. It was felt that it would be more profitable for the average reader if the latter course were adopted.
Thousands who have heard the name of Eucken and have read frequent references to him are asking, ”What has Eucken really to say?” and we have attempted to give a systematic, if brief, answer to the question.
Having done this it will be well to mention some of the main points of criticism that have been made, and to call attention again to some of the remarkable aspects of the contributions he has made to philosophy and religion.
Several critics complain of the obscurity of his writings, of his loose use of terms, and of his tendency to use freely such indefinite and abstruse terms as ”The Whole,” ”The All,” &c., and of his tendency to repeat himself. Of course, if he is guilty of these faults, and he certainly is to some extent, they are merely faults of style, and do not necessarily affect the truth or otherwise of his opinions. In the matter of clarity he is very variable; occasional sentences are brilliantly clear, others present considerable difficulty to the practised student.
His more popular works, however, are much clearer and easier to understand than the two standard treatises on _The Truth of Religion_ and _Life's Basis and Life's Ideal_. His tendency to repet.i.tion is by no means an unmixed evil, for even when he appears to be repeating himself, he is very often in reality expressing new shades of meaning, which help towards the better understanding of the first statements.
The slight looseness in the use of terms, and a certain inexactness of expression that is sometimes apparent, must of course not be exaggerated; it is by no means serious enough to invalidate his main argument. It gives an opportunity for a great deal of superficial criticism on the part of unsympathetic writers, which, however, can do little harm to Eucken's position. One has to remember that it is difficult to combine the fervour of a prophet with pedantic exactness, and that an inspired and profound philosopher cannot be expected to spend much time over verbal niceties.
Of course one would prefer absolute clarity and exactness, but we must guard against allowing the absence of these things to prejudice us against the profound truths of a philosophical position, which are not vitally affected by that absence.
Frequent criticism is directed towards the incompleteness of Eucken's philosophy. He does not introduce his philosophy with a systematic discussion of the great epistemological and ontological problems.
Philosophers have often introduced their work in this way, and it has been customary to expect an introduction of the kind. To do so, however, would be quite out of keeping with Eucken's activistic position, as it would necessarily involve much intellectual speculation, and he does not believe that the problem of life can be solved by such speculation. It is unfortunate that he has so little to say concerning the world of matter. Beyond insisting upon the superiority of the spiritual life, which he calls the ”substantial,” over matter, which he calls the merely ”existential,” he tells us very little about the material world. Rightly or wrongly, thinkers are deeply interested in the merely existential, in the periphery of life, in the material world, but for the solution of this problem Eucken contributes little or nothing. His sole concern is the spiritual world, and although we should like an elaboration of his views on the mere periphery of life, we must not let the fact that he does not give it, lead us to undervalue his real contributions. Another serious incompleteness lies in the fact that he pays little attention to the psychological implications of his theories. Until he does this, his philosophy cannot be regarded as complete. Eucken, however, would be the last to claim that his solution is a finished or final one; he is content if his work is a substantial contribution to the final solution.
Objection has been taken to the fact that he starts upon his task with a definite bias in a certain direction. He candidly admits from the outset that his aim is to find a meaning for life, and in doing this he of course tacitly a.s.sumes that life has a deep and profound meaning. Strict scientists aver that the investigator must set out without prejudice, to examine the phenomena he observes; and Eucken's initial bias may form a fatal stumbling-block to the acceptance of his philosophy by these, or indeed, by any who are not disposed to accept this fundamental position.