Reviews for Origins of Sectarianism in Early Modern Ireland

The average rating for Origins of Sectarianism in Early Modern Ireland based on 2 reviews is 3.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2015-11-08 00:00:00 Thomas Kincaid In Faith and Criticsm, Basil Mitchell deals (in my opinion decisively) with the apparent tension between the unconditional nature of faith and the way any belief opened up to rational criticism appears to be rendered necessarily tentative. It would appear that faith, if truly unconditional, must be closed off from rational criticism; faith must truly be blind. A surprising array of Christian thinkers appear to take this dilemma to be a genuine one: fundamentalists on the one hand, who hold that wherever rationality appears to conflict with faith, faith has to win out; existentialists such as Rudolf Bultmann and Soren Kierkegaard (on certain popular readings, at least), for whom faith requires an existential choice that would be impossible if it were rational, and so tenets of faith are to be radically separated from human knowledge and reason; and, post-modernists, for whom any putative rationality is essentially arbitrary anyway, and so religious faith appears to be on at least equal grounds with rationality. Moreover, there is another conflict even among those who grant that faith has to incorporate ongoing rational critique in light of new knowledge provided by science, history, philosophy, etc. This conflict arises between what Mitchell calls 'traditionalists' and 'progressives.' Traditionalists maintain a deep loyalty what has already been received, wanting to avoid giving anything up too hastily; progressives are insistent upon scrutinizing the faith in light of new knowledge, wanting to avoid missing out on the fruits that can be gained by integrating new knowledge. Mitchell's first step in addressing this problem is to show that it is not at all unique to the domain of religion. Through various examples, Mitchell demonstrates how a certain kind of tenacity--that is, a willingness to hold onto certain beliefs beyond the extent to which they are strictly justified at the moment--is necessary even in the hardest sciences, and an openness to rational critique is beneficial even in matters of deepest commitment, such as marriage (this last is demonstrated nicely with an example drawn from Jane Austen). Thus, a vision of rationality which sees the need for a kind of faith in all intellectual pursuits actually makes better sense of human reasoning all around, and a vision of faith which sees the value of openness to critique makes much better sense of human commitments. Mitchell suggests that a sort of sliding scale of "faith" is discernible in moving from the hard sciences to the human sciences to "world-views" to religion, but that commitment is indeed necessary all the way through, and at no point is it incompatible with criticism. Along the way, Mitchell makes two other incredibly helpful distinctions I think are worth noting. The first is between impartiality and neutrality. Impartiality turns out to be epistemically virtuous, while neutrality is neither epistemically nor practically virtuous. That is, it is important to consider arguments opposed to one's own views according to their merits, etc., but rationality does not require that we put aside all commitments whatsoever. In today's political and intellectual discourse, in which it sometimes seems that anyone's arguments can be dismissed if we can identify an interest or commitment behind them--without any attention to the merits of the arguments themselves--this distinction is badly needed. The second is between the epistemological and the soteriological roles of faith; it is one thing to say that salvation is by faith alone, and another to say that knowledge of God is by faith alone. Moving from these other domains to specifically religious faith, Mitchell argues that faith requires an unconditional commitment to an object *given the existence of the object of faith.* He makes use of a parable about a certain man who takes himself unconditionally to be subject to the king of France. Imagine that he then discovers without a doubt that there is no king of France; would he be judged disloyal if he no longer held himself to be subject to a king he now knows not to exist? It would appear not. The unconditionality of faith, then, appears to be related to the costs of acting consistently with a belief reasonably held to be true; faith is not a commitment to hold a belief even when it is proven false. Now, Mitchell notes, it may sometimes be difficult to distinguish between temptation to be resisted and genuine counter-evidence which one ought to consider, but to insist that no such evidence could ever warrant giving up belief would be to make madness a virtue. Mitchell also considers the position that religion makes no claims that are even susceptible to rational critique or justification. Dealing with this more radical objection requires a turn to intellectual history in which Mitchell deals with the legacy of Hume and Kant. Given this legacy, which supposedly ruled out the possibility of a rational basis for faith, the options for theologians appeared to be exhausted by various forms of fideism on the one hand (Barthian neo-orthodoxy) and a radical gutting of orthodox faith on the other (Bultmannian demythologizing and other forms of classically Liberal theology). That is, either (A) there is no way to justify belief in the literal resurrection of Christ by any standard and thus it can't be said to be a 'historical' event, but we know it anyway through faith, or (B) there is no way to justify belief in the literal resurrection, but genuine religious faith has to do with some deeper, mythic reality that is inaccessible to human reason and could not possibly contradict rational disciplines like history or science. For Mitchell, both of these options accept the flawed and unrealistic understanding of rationality bequeathed by Hume and Kant, an understanding which--Mitchell argues--would rule out a great deal of contemporary science as well, removing all metaphors, models, and theoretical entities. This point occasions some attention to the way model and metaphor function in both science and religion, as well the clearing up of some misconceived distinctions between the two, namely that science is literal while religion is metaphorical, and that science has precise epistemic procedures while religion does not. From here, Mitchell begins to develop a positive position on reason in theology, starting with the analogy of personal acquaintance. He posits that "Our understanding of people, whose inexhaustibility entails that our knowledge of them is never final or complete, provides the closest analogy we have to our knowledge of God." This suggests a "reciprocal relationship" between knowledge and love, and thus, between criticism and faith. Mitchell then picks up a consequence of this relationship, specifically the resulting tension between traditionalists and progressives. He sympathetically elaborates on the valid fears that each side has regarding the other. These fears make it difficult to recognize that these two tendencies are in fact engaged in the common task of both being faithful to what is revealed in the tradition and carrying that forward into new circumstances and in light of new knowledge. The progressive fears that "being faithful to the tradition" in any robust sense means a fundamentalist repetition of what has already been said, while the traditionalist fears that the progressive has given up any commitment whatsoever to maintaining continuity with the tradition. A more flexible and expansive notion of faithfulness or continuity would allow the liberal to speak in terms a traditionalist could recognize. Seeing that progressives are not, in fact, asserting that all developments are to be equated with progress might clarify for traditionalists their shared project. Ultimately, Mitchell argues, "both seek to adhere to that interpretation of Christian doctrine which would best reflect the Christian message in light of the full tradition of the Church and whatever knowledge is now available to us which might further illuminate it." This vision grants an essential place to both traditionalists and progressives in a common project. Traditionalists ensure that we do not give up too readily the truths that have already been received, while progressives bring in new insights from other areas of human knowledge which can indeed shed light on the already-existing tradition. At this point, Mitchell has put forth a positive vision of the relationship between faith and criticism, and defended it from both the fundamentalist-existentialist side and from the post-modern relativist side; from here, he goes on to apply this positive vision to several practical problems related to Christian ethics, religious education, and Christian participation in a "pluralistic" society. In my estimation, Faith and Criticism is a fantastic (and fantastically readable) little volume which has not received the attention it deserves. As is typical of Mitchell, there is a lot of meat here, and little if any fluff or repetition. Compared to Mitchell's work, a great many academic works appear to consist of far less substance in far more pages; Mitchell always gets to the point and moves forward. Moreover, the distinctions and arguments Mitchell unpacks so clearly would dispel a great many misconceptions that remain as widespread as ever, equally among religious people as among religion's harshest critics. I cannot recommend this book highly enough to anyone interested in the relationship between religious faith and the wider world of human knowledge and rationality.

Review # 2 was written on 2019-05-15 00:00:00 William Valyo Fascinating review with so many good authors who had well-thought out, but differing, opinions. A must read on religion and its future.