How religious is modern democracy? Religious ideals in hellenist archetype (Agamben, 66)
Many conservatives claim that democracy is based on Judaeo-Christian ethics. Obviously, they’re aspects that clearly contradict. The blasphemy laws opposing the right to freedom of speech is one such example.
Even if these rights were not the exact calibre as modern formations they were the basis for the democratic bedrock. The flow of hellenistic writings made their way into renaissance Europe. Finding a home in Italy and then in France. The humanism of the renaissance paraded on these works. Incorporating platonic ideals into society. The cultural shift was desirable in the inclusion of such nuance. For so long, the religious authorities had held sway over the group and now they were halted, impeded by the new human-centred ideas. Harking back to the proto-humanist movements in the sixth century at the onset of Western democracy. Institutional fervour was to be expended. Democracies sprouted in the Italian peninsula and capitalism began subsequently. A new ideal for a new age. The new world was revolutionary against the backdrop of feudalistic oppression. The technological advancements. The great mathematicians and inventors hailed from Italy. So profound and so important for the radical shift to modernity. The ancient books were seminal in altering the playing field.
Trade was the core of the shift. Italy positioned between the west and the east provided a necessary middle for adaption. A centre between the clash of diversification. The Christians in the west, the muslims in the east and the Chinese in the far east. The Mediterranean acted as a seaport for nations in the Middle East and North Africa. Italy had its Roman origins and subsequently was a profound centre of trade and distribution. As a centre for trade, it was inevitable ideas would accompany the materials. The muslims in the west were preoccupied with philosophy in Andalusia. Crusaders had brought back these ideas. An area rich in philosophical history took up the mantle as a trade centre. Crusaders enjoined the byzantine and islamic areas binding ideas into realisation. Urbanisation overtook the feudal static lifestyle. Towns flourished and one-time peasants were enriching. While the republics were run by wealthy capitalists, the service of trade acknowledged more humanistic ideals. The urban panorama expanded individuality and prompted self worth. As a crossroads for trade, cultural ideas swooned and invigorated the public. The republican notations became increasingly familiar.
Classical greek ideas flooded into the Italian stratosphere. Yet they didn’t replace the religious ethos. The Vatican was minutes away. Humanism was an attempt to synthesise classics and christianity. Similar to the eastern ideals of Avicenna and Al-Farabi centuries prior. Sephardi and Ashkenazi Jews present the most telling illustration. The Spanish Jews from Saadya to Maimonides were well versed in Plato and Aristotle while the French Jews from Rashi to Rabbenu Tam were less acquainted. There was even a controversy over philosophical learning amongst Jews. Many Italian Jews lived prior to the Temple’s destruction but the major change came with the Treaty of Venice's redirection of control to local rulers and the Pope instead of the Emperor who the French Jews were subservient. The expulsion of Jews from various parts of Italy enabled the refugees from Iberia to bring their ideas. The reenforcement of Spanish methodology brought in a new fervour to the Italian community. A community that was highly ashkenazi entrenched in talmud study inserted various styles of learning that reshaped the area before eventual persecutions and expulsions. Refugees, crusaders and merchants each brought more popularity to the age old phenomena.
Christianity has but voided questions of philosophy and the immersion in material craft whether paintings or sculptures. The rediscovery of classical architecture and scientific thinking promoted all types of inventions and innovations. The Mona Lisa, the statute of Moses and of course the Sistine Chapel. The architecture of the latter only furthered the church’s alignment with the new change. Freedom of speech didn’t emerge in the Renaissance. Humanism was religious hellenism. It wasn’t secular nor was it humanistic. The humanism was a more liberal attitude towards otherness. Permitting the reading of the heretical greeks. Humanism in its basic definition was an exposure to the classics. A movement with little enlightened identity. Synthesising the classics with catholicism only sought to strengthen the legitimacy of the creed. Yet at the same time applying classical methods to religion differed from the church’s education. These humanists weren’t polemicists. They retroactively justified in the name of the church. Though whether critical or not, the investments in literature and architecture paved a way for individuality to rise. Machiavelli and Montaigne both of varying beliefs and yet proceeded alongside the individualist persona.
It is growing individuality, enrichment and elevation that empowered Luther to publicise the known evils of the church. The reformation was a culmination in the spread of the renaissance across Western Europe. The promise of individualistic expression and invention birthed the printing press and accessibility for all. The classical revival was amongst the wealthy and scholarship. The printing press provided access to laymen for cheap. No longer was literate power in the institutions. More books meant more reading and more empowerment. Combined with the aspiration of Roman glory and overcoming the despotic reality, change would come. Increased reading only furthered polemical vestiges. The reformation sealed this with a publication that was spread throughout Europe. Luther’s theses did more in their dissemination than in stapling to the cathedral. His grievances were shared by many who believed that change was necessary. What else to change than elevating man. In a trend similar to the buddhist construction, protestantism emerged to raise the individual at the expense of catholicism. Just as buddhism restored man against hinduism so did the reformation. Calvin joined the ride with his own take on the christian alternative belief.
While classical thought itself played a role, it was improvement upon and technological advancements against institutionalism that altered the trajectory. The reformation nor the renaissance brought in the classical ideas with the exception of the scientific prescriptions. The science was aligned with the religious motif. Even Galileo interpreted his findings in line with the bible. It wasn’t religion that was the catalyst for enlightenment. What follows the reformation is more war and the counter-reformation for stricter catholic theology. This pushed the pilgrims to the new world. Puritans weren’t the first settlers in the new world but demonstrated a symbolic freedom to practice freely though forcibly amongst the group itself. The renaissance made its way through Western Europe but it wasn’t religion that set off the enlightenment nor was it anti-religion that set it off. The enlightenment was headed by religious thinkers but with strong classic ideas embellishing their traditional theology. Newton though not a famed member of the enlightenment, was not only a prolific physicist but a committed hebraist. Very engaged in philosophy and theology. What shifted the balance was the governmental apparatus. The institutional overhaul was too grave.
The debates emerging amongst the enlightenment thinkers concerned the shift from feudalism to absolutism. Whether a monarch was the correct motto, Hobbes definitely believed so while Locke disagreed. Hamilton was for an elected monarchy and Jefferson a limited candidate. The spurious differential clouded the political atmosphere. Beginning in the mid-seventieth century, the king's role was incrementally reduced to the head of state that he is today. The grievances of the colonists were not aimed at the king insomuch as they were at parliament. England was poised to removing their leader from his political role while still championing the legacy of the family (no wonder the English royal family is still relevant as a spectacle). The role of classical thought undermined the archaic hierarchical status of old. The new model sought to endow its citizens with more rights. Debates of enlightenment concerned the role of the political. Though ethical in nature, the source was the political framework that displaced British citizenry from their own equality. Italy was the first democratic society in the Middle Ages, it soon reverted into a monarchy. Britain changed and it stayed that way with a few hiccups here and there. Yet it seems the disruption was over the new elevated citizenry against the overbearing monarch.
The bill of rights is a political channel to limit governmental sovereignty. Yet this individuality is new. The rights afforded for the individual do not adhere to any governmental belief. Even the McCarthyist polemics were exceedingly unconstitutional. The idea of these god-given rights was that the individual could act as desired in the confines of civic law. This was a far cry from the institutional restrictions of earlier nations. Secularism was the pinnacle of permissive individuality. John Locke is usually perceived as the father of natural rights, but the enlightenment origin began with Jean Gerson in 1402. It is with these motifs that Luther pushed for theological autonomy though Luther’s anti-semitic remarks towards the end of his life demonstrate an exclusivist autonomy for Christians. It is difficult to assume whether the ancients were providing extensive autonomy to the masses or certain privileged groups. Cyrus and the stoics seem to provide a methodology for all men but the communitarian mindset may absolve the Lockean doctrine. The counterreformation and religious naturism was based in spiritual escalation.
Natural rights became more relevant in the tyrannical oppression of the citizenry. The first so-called secularists were conversos who despising the coercive inquisition resigned from all religious behaviour for a new idea. Spinoza was heir to a Dutch community filled with cynics. Spinoza’s secularist ideals were an attack on the religious invasion away from the protestant dogma. The political turmoil of the Middle Ages gradually opened the door for more equality. Volunteerism and extended legal compromises provided nuanced opportunities for individualistic growth. Monarchies were a way around the lord's power over the citizenry. The incremental growth was muddled by religious dominion. The inquisition was a dangerous institutional synthesis. The reformation which was intended to be a liberation that reduced to warfare. The rise of natural rights was amongst believers and sceptics in unison. The issue of the changing landscape and monarchical supremacy reassessed. Wars, dogma and sovereignty caused excessive questioning. Monarchs had procured immense power and reluctant citizenry pushed back though with their own self concerns in mind. Locke and Voltaire both spouted natural rights but were still for a constitutional monarchy.
The enlightenment thinkers weren’t equally distributive. Voltaire was a rabid anti-semite and Locke was at most tolerant of Jews. A fascination amongst many of the enlightenment. Emancipation was selective and provided a caveat. The first democracy was restricted to white landowners. Napoleon was the first to emancipate Jews to which the Germans quickly rescinded after his defeat. Natural rights were provided to all men but not the political arena. The political arena was decided by certain privileged folk and the rest were left to suffer under the thumb of the elected anchor. Natural rights could not be impeded but that doesn’t mean that corruption wasn’t destined to occur. Unequal justice and obstructive progress. Seeking to ensure a monistic paradigm. One race to win it all. Only one deserves the privileges. The new aristocrats without regal attitudes. Wishing to be the rulers of society. The religious inclination prompted a superiority complex though it is unclear if Voltaire’s insistence was strictly on religious grounds. He and Diderot weren’t seeking to place deism as the core of national religiosity. Instead the religio-political apparatus was to deny certain groups emancipation. First it was catholics then protestants and finally Jews. Other groups received their belated political power in time. Toleration was permissible but political access was strongly denied.
Toleration merely meant to live civilly with others. No love required nor companionship. The social and political over the legal and ontological. Social alienation and political denial over the legal permission and ontological reverence. Toleration unveiled a single layer promising every group instilled respect but that did not mean that institutional activity would follow. Religion played a role in assuming the power of a certain matrix that required protesting to ensure political rights were provided. Even when the law was on the books the social apparatus didn’t care too lightly for the diverse candidates. Others can have their rights as long as they stay quiet and let the true rulers reign. While there was a religious component in some countries other times the religious identity was translated ethnically into generalised aspects that divided ethnic groups. Any other was a problem but the other at times was condensed into tribal persecution. Race became a bigger factor and immigration was hounded. People were technically protected by the law but it didn’t mean it was enforced nor that it provided the sufficient protection. Blacks were provided the rights of whites and yet due to social and political reasons they were ousted and subdued. The law was at times against them. Corruption and discrimination stole the inalienable rights provided. Human rights were minute in the face of socio-political investment. Toleration was the most plausible with little remedy.
Democracy was a product of hellenised conduct infused with religious discrimination. Religion may have been the origin for secularist thinking but it was the absolutist experience that prompted citizenry defences. The monarchy’s reign was too great and with the urban surge the citizenry believed they could do it themselves. Slowly, regal ideals reduced to mockery. Revolutions replaced traditional sovereignty. The former appeased commoners were now in charge. They placed not their family but their ethnicity at the helm. Brand new patricians. Patricians so quickly abusing the plebeians. Some patricians had sympathy for other ethnicities. The American revolution had some more innovations in mind. With leaders who were more empathetic than the European philosophers. Leaders who believed in ethnic symmetry alongside Washington, Jefferson and Hamilton. While imperfect they were more advanced than their European counterparts who supported institutional hierarchies. While fringe groups and institutional oppression were advanced against slaves and ex-slaves, the anti-religious flavour of the American revolution was its salvation. The christianised outlooks of Locke and his contemporaries deluded other ethnicities. Those who fought against the traditional polis were successful when religion remained away from the discussion.
The Judaeo-christian perspective is flatly ignorant and disingenuous. Modernity did emerge from Christian Europe. The enlightenment thinkers were religious. Democracy was antagonistic to monarchical rule. Yet to assume that it was due to christianised ideas is to misinterpret history. The first liberalists were running from christian institutionalism. Enlightenment thinkers were selective in their push for full-length democracy and absolute rule was assisted by the church. Inalienable rights is very irreligious. Rights began in Athens in response to tyrannical rule with little religious impression. Thinkers were religious because many people were. Secularism had not made its dent yet. The religious pact sought to delimit access for other ethnicities. Natural rights and civilian policy were established by Alfonso XI in Portugal by way of reign not religion. The role of liberal thinkers sought to release their kind whether catholics or protestants from regal rule for their own elevation. They wished to replace but on their terms not for others. Notwithstanding the blatant contradiction between inalienable rights and religious obligations, there is an even more undeniable dissimilar relation. It was the political leaders whether Alfonso, Napoleon, Washington or Lenin that guided the search for the political empowerment of otherness.
There were imperfections in the creation of a perfect state equal in all respects. While the philosophers continued to deny the socio-political nature to the human other, the revolutionaries saw differently. The revolutionaries were empathetic to all struggles though not always to the poor or immigrants. The philosophers and politicians used their ideological charm to undermine the fabric of symmetrical expression. Religious thinkers dogmatically denied further assistance to those under the heel of oppression. The church didn’t help Jews during the Middle Ages nor the holocaust. They also did not stop slavery or promote democracy. Enlightenment intellectuals desired a Neo-aristocratic turf. A newly recognisable elite away from dynastic elites. Instead ethnically synchronic for a selective group. Throughout early modern Europe, Kant and his contemporaries including Fichte and Berkeley weren’t the biggest Jew fans. While they proscribed civil rights they antagonised the people incredulously. Later Hegel and non-christianised Nietzsche were some of the only defences of Judaism. Intellectuals mirrored disaster and monistic agendas. Seemingly destroying the possibility of a neutral angle nor equal society. The revolutionaries on the other hand were quite pro-Jewish and pro-everyone else. At times, stuck in their archaic avenues. Yet way fonder of change than the neo-religious philosophers.
There are religious themes to be respected and commended. Duties is an important aspect of social cohesion. Rights can become stale and used by degenerates to deny the promised beverage to the starving citizen. The correlation of religious instigation against the embedded separation is akin to illegal activity. Yet the invasion of dogma is keenly associated and unable to redeem the truth from the laced cocktail. Political thinking is the antidote not the bandaid. The failure of religious and philosophical thinking damned the innovation. Though philosophers were caught in their religious spiderweb. It was empaths who saved the downtrodden. Who pushed for reform. It was the political investment that is to share. The secularist thinking of Hellenistic classics that should be praised. While some of the religious spirituality may have modified the Athenian duality it is the bedrock of Athenian collaboration that prided the ideal of equality.
