A very powerful article. I must contemplate this for days. I have some (not great) familiarity with Schmitt and what I know I thought I had rejected out of hand. The ideas you frame in this article probably refute that I have only deceived myself and perhaps much of our society from (Rachel Maddow to Tucker Carlson) are all a lot more Schmittian than we realize.
Hi Zo—This was a wondrously articulated commentary but I was wondering if you would comment on the following quote? "Mature religion begins with the realization that our moral and spiritual responsibility does not hinge on our metaphysical efficacy. "* *Religion Without Control
So little is written about this. On the separation of powers, I enjoyed Eric Nelson's The Hebrew Revival, covering a period of 150 years before Spinoza during which Western political thinkers turned to rabbis to learn about the Hebrew Bible's political theory. The debate, he says, led Milton and others to assert a balanced and republican form of government over kingly sovereignty. Milton unknowingly followed Josephus, Nelson says. In coining the term "theocracy" for his Roman audience, Josephus had concluded that the Israelites in 1 Samuel 8 “deposed God from his kingly office.” I also love so much of Daniel J. Elazar's work and his equation of covenant with federalism. His understanding of the messianic vision involves the restoration of ancient Israel's tribal system: “the biblical grand design for humankind is federal.” Bernard M. Levinson has a great article on Deuteronomy as the world's first written constitution with a balance of powers--the courts, the prophets, and the king all separated and brought under Torah.
If God is “tickled” by the trifle that is human political governance, perhaps we should expect to find no revealed guidance for this sphere of human existence, at least until we get things so wrong as we did in the sociological sphere before the flood, that then triggered G’d’s plan to start over with Noah and continue through Abraham and Moses to reveal G’d’s desired way for humans to behave.
A very powerful article. I must contemplate this for days. I have some (not great) familiarity with Schmitt and what I know I thought I had rejected out of hand. The ideas you frame in this article probably refute that I have only deceived myself and perhaps much of our society from (Rachel Maddow to Tucker Carlson) are all a lot more Schmittian than we realize.
Hi Zo—This was a wondrously articulated commentary but I was wondering if you would comment on the following quote? "Mature religion begins with the realization that our moral and spiritual responsibility does not hinge on our metaphysical efficacy. "* *Religion Without Control
So little is written about this. On the separation of powers, I enjoyed Eric Nelson's The Hebrew Revival, covering a period of 150 years before Spinoza during which Western political thinkers turned to rabbis to learn about the Hebrew Bible's political theory. The debate, he says, led Milton and others to assert a balanced and republican form of government over kingly sovereignty. Milton unknowingly followed Josephus, Nelson says. In coining the term "theocracy" for his Roman audience, Josephus had concluded that the Israelites in 1 Samuel 8 “deposed God from his kingly office.” I also love so much of Daniel J. Elazar's work and his equation of covenant with federalism. His understanding of the messianic vision involves the restoration of ancient Israel's tribal system: “the biblical grand design for humankind is federal.” Bernard M. Levinson has a great article on Deuteronomy as the world's first written constitution with a balance of powers--the courts, the prophets, and the king all separated and brought under Torah.
If God is “tickled” by the trifle that is human political governance, perhaps we should expect to find no revealed guidance for this sphere of human existence, at least until we get things so wrong as we did in the sociological sphere before the flood, that then triggered G’d’s plan to start over with Noah and continue through Abraham and Moses to reveal G’d’s desired way for humans to behave.