In the spirit of my last post!

In the spirit of my last post, I thought I'd post a beautiful piece of poetry, penned by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, himself a man of faith (albeit a sceptical, decidedly oppositional faith). This is his legendary "Prometheus," describing the scorn of the titular character towards the kind of gods who would leave him in a world as barren and cruel as ours.

Shroud your heaven, Zeus,
With cloudy vapours,
And do as you will, like the boy
That beheads thistles,
With oak-trees and mountain-tops;
You must my Earth
Now abandon to me,
And my hut, which you did not build,
And my hearth,
Whose glow
You begrudge me.

I know of nothing poorer
Under the sun, than you, Gods!
You are barely nourished
By sacrificial offerings
And prayerful exhalations
Your Majesty
And would starve, were
Not children and beggars
Hopeful fools.

When I was a child,
And did not know the in or out,
I turned my wandering eyes toward
The sun, as if beyond it there were
An ear to hear my lament,
A heart like mine,
To take pity on the afflicted.

Who helped me
Against the Titans' mischief?
Who delivered me from Death,
From Slavery?
Did you not accomplish it all yourself,
Holy, burning Heart?
And glowed, young and good,
Deceived, your thanks for salvation
To the sleeping one above?

I should honour you? For what?
Have you softened the sufferings,
Ever, of the burdened?
Have you stilled the tears,
Ever, of the anguished?
Was I not forged as a Man
By almighty Time
And the eternal Fate,
My masters and yours?

Do you somehow imagine
I should hate life,
Flee to the desert,
Because not every
Flowering dream may bloom?

Here I sit, forming people
In my image;
A race, to be like me,
To suffer, to weep,
To enjoy and delight themselves,
And to mock you –
As I do!

Considerations on faith

I am an anti-theist. I believe religious faith, even in instances where it might provide a "good outcome" (such as religious consolation of grieving family), is essentially wrong in all cases. Even in the aforementioned example, I would argue that this consolation is morally wrong due its being based on a lie. THE lie. God, Yahweh, Allah, Vishnu, whatever the fuck Scientologists believe in etc.

This position relies on two sources for me; Kantian deontological morality and Nietzschean anti-theism. Kant argues that in a moral and just society, it is reason, not superstition, that is paramount. The very essence of our humanity, including our capacity for beauty, springs not from the edict of some absent creator but from our own magnificent rationality. Kant also argues that any truly moral position must be applied universally and not relatively. With this in mind, how can I morally justify to myself the notion of faiths which apply moral laws haphazardly and would have a divine creator who lives by a different set of commandments than he (and in too many cases it is a he) would have me live by? Thou shalt not kill? Try telling that to the people of Egypt, you spiteful bastard.

Nietzsche requires a little less explaining. Though I disagree with his assertion that there must be a new kind of morality specifically for the exceptional few, I do agree that faith traps us in certain moral ways of thinking instead of encouraging a dynamic and evolutionary morality. And I agree that a world which continues along the path offered by faith will find itself lost in a wilderness of nihilism, arguably already occuring in our increasing militarised society with its great decadence paid for with the suffering of others. If we are to achieve a sense of moral enlightenment, we must transcend the barriers placed on us by faith.

We must begin to view the world through eyes given clearer sight by science, rationality and the common bonds of human experience informed by material existence and not the machinations of some laissez-faire deity. We must finish the work begun in the enlightenment to rid the world of superstion borne of ignorance. The realisation of such a world may be painful as we sever ourselves from the comfortable and easy ways of thinking provided by faith. As Nietzsche, the great anti-theist himself, says of such a realisation in The Gay Science:

"God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. Yet his shadow still looms. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it?"

Will a world free from faith be morally perfect? No. Humans will still find excuses to harm each other; in the name of capitalism for example. But I would happily, with vigour, bet my very life that such a world would  morally better. And that is a thing worth weathering any storm for.