Imagine the scene at Harvard in the spring of 1978 when Alexander Solzhenitsyn gave his now-famous address. Solzhenitsyn had already won the Nobel Prize for The Gulag Archipelago and other great works exposing the murderous nature of atheist Communism. But at Harvard Solzhenitsyn touched on a topic much closer to home.
Even though he was second to none in his denunciation of totalitarian socialism, Solzhenitsyn said, "should someone ask me whether I would indicate the West such as it is today as a model to my country, frankly I would have to answer negatively." The whole address is worth reading, but here are some highlights.
On the lack of courage in facing a totalitarian enemy: "The Western world has lost its civil courage, both as a whole and separately, in each country...and of course in the United Nations....Such a decline is especially notable among ruling groups and the intellectual elite....They get tongue-tied and paralyzed when they deal with powerful governments and threatening forces, with aggressors and international terrorists."
On how materialism makes a nation soft: "Every citizen has been granted the desired freedom and material goods in such quantity and of such quality as to guarantee in theory the pursuit of happiness...So why and for what should one risk one's precious life in defense of common values and particularly in such nebulous cases when the security of one's nation must be defended in a distant country?"
On what has happened to the rule of law: "People in the West has acquired considerable skill in using, interpreting and manipulating law....If one is right from a legal point of view, nothing more is required, nobody might mention that one could still not be entirely right and urge a willingness to show restraint or sacrifice. Everybody operates at the extreme limits of those legal frames....A society without any objective legal scale is a terrible one indeed, but a society with no other scale but the legal one is not quite worthy of man either."
On the rights of criminals: "Legal frames especially in the United States are broad enough to encourage not only individual freedom but also certain individual crimes. The culprit can go unpunished or obtain undeserved leniency with the support of legions of public defenders. When a government starts an earnest fight against terrorism, public opinion immediately accuses it of violating the terrorists' civil rights. There are many such cases."
On the abuses of freedom: "Destructive and irresponsible freedom has been granted boundless space. Soceity appears to have litle defense against the abyss of human decadence, such as misuse of liberty for moral violence against young people, motion pictures full of pornography, crime and horror...Such a tilt of freedom in the directionof evil has come about gradually but it was evidently born out of a humanistic concept according to which there is no evil inherent to human nature."
On freedom of the press: "The press, too, enjoys the widest freedom. But what use does it make of this freedom? The press has become the greatest power within the Western countries, more powerful than the legislature, the executive and the judiciary. One would then like to ask: by what law has it been elected and to whom is it responsible? How many hasty, immature, superficial and misleading judgments are expressed every day, confusing readers, and without any verification? Thus we see terrorists made into heroes, or secret matters pertaining to the national defense publicly revealed, or shameful intrusion into the privacy of people under the false slogan: everyone has the right to know everything."
On the atrophy of the spiritual life: "Mere freedom does not in the least solve all the problems of human life and it even adds some new ones....We have placed too much hope in political and social reforms, only to find out that we were being deprived of our most precious possession: our spiritual life."
Thirty years ago, the very chattering classes mentioned in Solzhenitsyn's address ridiculed the man as a reactionary and a crank. The literary critic Susan Sontag describes Manhattan cocktail parties at which the cultural left would laugh at Solzhenitsyn. No one--certainly not liberals and libertarians--wanted to hear what the New York Times called Solzhenitsyn's "hectoring jeremiads."
But today when you go to Asia you hear everywhere the slogan, "Modernization, yes; Westernization, no." Throughout the Muslim world there is a reaction--exploited of course by the Islamic radicals--against what is perceived as the shamelessness and decadence of Western values and culture. Even in the West there is deep ambivalence about what has happened to cherished notions of liberty, the rule of law, freedom of the press, and the pursuit of happiness.
We don't have to agree with Solzhenitsyn on everything to say that, far from being a reactionary, here was a man who was ahead of his time in diagnosing some of the serious ailments of the modern era. Not only was he right about the Gulag; in many respects this forlorn Russian hermit was also right about us.
Reader Comments ( Page 4 of 19)
46. 44. GHB/Brian,
I don't believe that the eternal burning (present progressive emphasized) doctrine is rock solid. Do you want me to answer your question from straight theology? Meaning do you want that answer regardless of its import to you? Knowledge for knowledge's sake you could say.
oneblood at 7:43PM on Aug 5th 2008
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Well, I knew that you weren't that bad, not a hypochrist, as it were... So no surprise that you sense a problem with the eternal burning thingy. That's your morality showing, something most of the others here never show. But sure, answer it from the theological perspective. I haven't even gotten that much yet out of anybody.
Godless Heathen Brian at 7:47PM on Aug 5th 2008
47. Peter,
Atheism aside, you and Hays are in a lot of emotional pain. You both have severe unresolved rejection issues. Now we all have them, but you and he take the cake on the blog. -There are some theists here in that camp too-
For Pete's sake stop being bitter.
oneblood at 7:49PM on Aug 5th 2008
48.
If you read the entire snopes article, especially down near the bottom, you'll see that this soldier DID write the email, stated it was ONLY for his family and not for the general public.
My bets are on the fact that he recanted under pressure from the Obama camp.
I believe what he wrote is real and true and what's more, I believe that many see through the "smoke-screen".
R. T. Jones at 7:56PM on Aug 5th 2008
49. bet you think you're a christian. All you are is a filthy fucking dirty pathetic evil scumbag.
(Godless Heathen Brian)
("AND, I hope you go to Hell and burn, baby, burn, you fucking freak" the part that the hypocrite forgot to finish off his godless post with. )
soldier at 8:03PM on Aug 5th 2008
50. GHB,
I think you and I touched on this a couple days ago, maybe a week ago. I'll try to be more informational without boring you.
As much as I can tell, like all cultural ideas, which religion (any) most certainly is, hell is kind of an aggregate and not so much a singularity.
Most of the atheists here and some of the theists are aware of the Greek influence through Hades and its three places of: you were alright, you were a demi-god or hero, or you were a titan (punishment) or somebody else worthy of eternal torture. Not to mention the "pan-ification" of satan.
In the Old Testament/Tanakh you get a somewhat ambiguous idea of the "afterlife." At death everybody goes to the grave, but there will be punishment at the resurrection. The scriptures call it "eternal abhorrence."
The New Testament/Christian scriptures differ somewhat in the description of afterlife punishment. You can be assured that most of the more orthodox believers do not get the hell beneath our feet doctrine from the book of Revelation but from an amalgamation of the Greek Hades, Dante, and a parable in Luke.
It's not that Revelation doesn't have punishment in it, but it deals with it in the capacity of a future war. It kind of baffles me as to how people talk about 'a lake of fire' in the present tense.
My two cents is that the bible is not strictly deterministic when it comes to people who don't believe, who are literally ignorant of 'the gospel/knowledge of God,' The Old Testament especially.
But as far as people who knowingly reject God and persecute His people (according to the bible) will be punished.
And to be brutally honest, if I were to give you all the verses on the afterlife in the protestant bible, it would give you a varying picture. None of which have to do with a cloudy heaven above us constantly receiving the good christians, or a smokey burning hell with pan, I mean satan, torturing people below us.
I could literally go on and on about this but I get tired of it. I find that I'm not too interested in the people who want people to 'burn in hell.' They seem to be worried less about their own accountability/behavior than others' a/b, which ticks me off.
oneblood at 8:40PM on Aug 5th 2008
51. RT: if you read even further through the snopes article and did not hae a preconcieved conclusion in mind, you would have noticed that the DoD released a video of Obama with the troops at Bagram.
Ryan Anderson at 8:47PM on Aug 5th 2008
52. “Mere freedom does not in the least solve all the problems of human life and it even adds some new ones....We have placed too much hope in political and social reforms, only to find out that we were being deprived of our most precious possession: our spiritual life." What a bunch of horse manure. If Solzhenitsyn's writing is really like that then it's likely to be just more mostly nonsense puke.” - Peter
Ahh yes. The inimitable Peter. Mr. Objective Reality vs. possibly the greatest writer of the last 50 years. Let’s see: Peter says Solzhenitsyn’s thought’s are a bunch of horse manure. And this coming from a man who doesn’t understand the philosophical meaning of “materialism” and the confuses a personal attack (you dummy) with the ad hominem fallacy.
“Freedom is inherent within objective reality, it is not granted by any Delusion of State Power.” - Peter
I love when you put yourself out there, mocking everyone that might demonstrate theistic beliefs, with doozies like that.
Why? Let’s see if you are capable of actually explaining something in detail Peter.
Why is freedom “inherent within objective reality?” From where does this inherent “right” arise? Since this is the beginning of a blog and not page 60, by which I’m completely exhausted from the “mythical god” remarks, I’d love to hear a clear, lucid explanation why the above statement is the case. Are you capable?
Try to leave out the faith-freak, mythical god crap. I beg you. Pretend you are Prof. Atheist Philosopher, and you’ve just lectured to the class on “freedom and objective reality,” and a student raises her hand and asks: Professor, can you elaborate a little more on the statement: “Freedom is inherent within objective reality, it is not granted by any Delusion of State Power.” If not Peter, anyone else?
Eric at 8:59PM on Aug 5th 2008
53. Oddly enough I'd have to disagree with the phrase 'freedom is inherent in objective reality.' Freedom is a human invention, as are the laws that restrict it, as is the society that operates with it. Without humans, there would be no freedom. It only exists with humanity due to our intellect.
Infact I'd have to say objective reality limits freedom. I don't have the freedom to levitate under my own power. Or transsubstantiate. Or teleport. The atoms of my body are subject to the rules of strong atomic force. Those atoms are joined according to the rules of chemistry. They form tissues as directed by my genetics.
Somber at 9:30PM on Aug 5th 2008
54. HELL. Hell is the place of punishment and imprisonment for those who rebel against God. It was created for Satan and the rebellious angels (Mt. 25:41). Unsaved men will go there also (Mt. 25:41-46). In the O.T. the word Hell (sheol) has two meanings. Sometimes it means the place where the bodies of the dead are laid (Ps. 6:5; Ec. 9:10; Is. 38:18,19). Usually, though, it means the place where departed spirits go (Ge. 37:35; De. 32:22; Ps. 9:17; 16:10; 55:15; 30:3; Pr. 9:18; 15:24; 23:14; Is. 5:14; 14:15; Eze. 31:16; 32:21,27).
WHAT IS HELL LIKE? (1) A place of punishment (Mt. 25:46). (2) A place of banishment (2 Th. 1:9). (3) A place of fire (Mt. 13:42,50; Mk. 9:44-48; Re. 20:15; 14:10). (4) A place of torment (Lk. 16:23; Re. 20:10). (5) A place of worms (Mk. 9:44,46,48; Is. 66:24). (6) A place of darkness (2 Pe. 2:17; Jude 13). (7) A place of consciousness and feeling (Lk. 16:23). (8) A place of thirst (Lk. 16:24). (9) A place without hope of escape (Lk. 16:26). (10). A place of unfulfilled desires and unanswered prayers (Lk. 16:27-31). (11) A place of wailing and gnashing of teeth (Mt. 25:30; 24:51). (12) A place of remorse (Lk. 16:27-28).
Man_in_Wilderness at 9:39PM on Aug 5th 2008
55. G.H.Brian-
It might surprise you that some of us Christians also have no use for religion.It is the politics of religion that bring misconceptions such as hell being eternal torment.It is definitely not scriptural.Hell is the second death,where the souls of unbeleivers go to die.So,in that sense,you athiests are partly right.After the final judgement,you will be no more.
Now,if one of you could answer my question.I have seen literally thousands of sites disproving Darwin's theory,as well as scientific findings pointing to the existence of God(my own study of science has only strengthened my belief),but no one has been able to show any tangible evidence that Darwin was right.Have you ever seen any actual proof,besides Lucy,the Piltdown man,or the numerous other hoaxes?
Bill Triebel at 9:45PM on Aug 5th 2008
56. BIBLE DESCRIPTIONS OF HELL: (1) "hell fire" (Mk. 9:47). (2) "the fire that never shall be quenched" (Mk. 9:43,45). (3) "where the worm dieth not" (Is. 66:24; Mk. 9:44,46,48). (4) "an abhorring to all flesh" (Is. 66:24). (5)" tormented in this flame" (Lk. 16:24). (6) "everlasting destruction" (2 Th. 1:9). (7) "flaming fire taking vengeance" (2 Th. 1:8). (8) "everlasting punishment" (Mt. 25:46). (9) "perdition" (2 Pe. 3:7). (10) "tormented day and night forever and ever" (Re. 20:10). (11) "cast into the lake of fire" (Re. 20:15). (12) "tormented with fire and brimstone" (Re. 14:10). (13) "no rest day nor night forever and ever" (Re. 14:10). (14) "wailing and gnashing of teeth" (Mt. 13:42,50). (15) "cast into a furnace of fire" (Mt. 13:42,50). (16) "depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire" (Mt. 25:41). (17) "cast him into outer darkness" (Mt. 22:13).
Man_in_Wilderness at 9:53PM on Aug 5th 2008
57. WHAT WILL NOT BE IN HELL? The following things will not be in Hell: God, the Bible, Christians, hymns, fellowship with friends and loved ones, light, hope of escape, love and kindness, pleasure, comfort, the preaching of the Gospel, rest, pain killing drugs, books, animals, money, entertainment, freedom, choice, pity, sports, hope, mercy.
ARE THE WICKED ANNIHILATED IN HELL? (1) Plain Bible passages say the sinner will suffer in Hell eternally (Mt. 25:46; Mk. 9:43-48; Re. 14:10-11; 19:20; 20:10). (2) The Bible says the punishment of the unsaved will be worse than violent death (Mk. 9:42). This proves the punishment is not annihilation, but is eternal torment.
(3) Jesus said it would have been better if Judas had never been born (Mt. 26:24). Jesus' words make no sense if Judas was only going to be annihilated.
THE LORD JESUS CHRIST'S TEACHING ON HELL. See Matt. 5:22; 12:23; 13:42,50; 18:8-9; 23:33; 25:41,46; Mk. 9:43-48; Lk. 16:19-31.
Man_in_Wilderness at 9:54PM on Aug 5th 2008
58. SOUL. The word "soul" has various meanings in Scripture. Sometimes it refers to the whole man (Ge. 2:7). Often, though, it refers to a conscious, immaterial part of man which exists beyond death apart from the body. Bible words must be defined by the context in which they are found, since almost all Bible words have various usages and definitions in different contexts. This is true with words in normal language usage in or out of the Bible.
OLD TESTAMENT TEACHING ON THE SOUL. O.T. examples of the soul as an immaterial, conscious part of the man are seen in Ge. 35:18 and 1 Ki. 17:21-22. In Ge. 35 the death of Rachel is recorded, and we learn that her soul departed when she died. "... as her soul was in departing, (for she died)..." In 1 Ki. 17 it is recorded that a young boy died and was raised again through Elijah's ministry. The Bible plainly says his soul departed and returned again to him: "... O Lord my God, I pray thee, let this child's soul come into him again. And the Lord heard the voice of Elijah; and the soul of the child came into him again, and he revived" (1 Ki. 17:21,22). Obviously the prophet Elijah did not have the same idea about the soul and death as some cults do.
NEW TESTAMENT TEACHING ON THE SOUL. In the N.T., the word "soul" is also used to describe a spiritual part of man distinct from his body. “... I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.” (1 Th. 5:23). Here we are told that man has three parts. Paul did not say man IS a soul; he says man HAS a soul.
Man_in_Wilderness at 9:55PM on Aug 5th 2008
59. Decadence is an epiphenomenon of Capitalism. And yet conservative Republicans worship at the altar of Capitalism, the very thing that is destroying their moral and spiritual values.
Don't like pornography? Yet porn is a multi-billion dollar business, as are prosititution and drugs. And the first commandment of Capitalism is: there shalt be no regulation of business.
The bottom line of Capitalism is the bottom line. There are no other "values".
As Karl Marx observed: Socialism is merely the logical culminaton of Capitalism, after Capitalism has destroyed all values except material values.
Logician at 9:59PM on Aug 5th 2008
60. "For Pete's sake stop being bitter." - oneblood
I'm not bitter oneblood. I'm concerned about the various cults that my birth family members and their offspring are in since they are highly virulent cults and have had a very negative impact upon the quality of our relationships - for no real reason, only imaginary mythologies! That is the evil of your mythology when taken as if it's real. That is the evil of your faith based beliefs when taken as real. They are pernicious and vile and empower the faith based believer to commit crimes that they then justify with their bible (or whatever) thumping.
So you are mistaken about me.
I simply do not tolerate mythologies as if they are real when it's clear WITH EVIDENCE that they are not real but imaginary nonsense invented by primitive human CULTures a long time ago.
Peter at 10:08PM on Aug 5th 2008