[Serious] Book reports

[Belacqua]

In the Shoutbox, @Grandizer asked several relevant questions about Dominion . The first question was:

According to Holland, what's not Christian about preChristian ideals and beliefs?

In general, Holland is claiming that the Greek/Roman classical world took it for granted that athletic and military prowess were clear indications of a superior person. That in large part life was about winning, and those who won were just better and more deserving than those who didn't.

We know that Aristotle had no qualms about saying that some people are higher quality than others, and that some are natural slaves. In fact a major part of his Ethics is that properly evaluating people is necessary, and treating the better people better. The idea that slaves, women, or conquered peoples deserved the favor of the gods would have been laughable.

This is from page 34:

What mattered was victory, not the cost.

This spirit, this ferocious commitment to being the best, was one in which
all aspired to share. In Homer’s poetry, the word for ‘pray’, euchomai, was also
a word for ‘boast’. The gods invariably looked with favour upon an agon. Rare
was the sanctuary that did not serve as the venue for some competition, be it for
dancers, poets or weavers. From athletics to beauty contests, all had their divine
sponsors. When Aristophanes wrote The Acharnians he did so as a contender in
an agon. The Lenaia was held in honour of Dionysus, a god whose fondness for
drunken revelry and female company rendered him a more than appropriate
patron for Aristophanes’ brand of comedy. Kings and princes, of the kind who
on the plain of Troy had dared to fight even with gods, no longer reigned in
Athens. Less than a century before the time of Aristophanes, revolution had
come to the city and a radically new form of government, one in which power
was entrusted to the people, been enshrined there. In a democracy, the right to
contend with one’s peers was no longer the prerogative of aristocrats alone.
Indeed, the ethos of gods and heroes might come to seem, when viewed through the prism of a more egalitarian age, more than a little comic.

Aristophanes, who was nothing if not competitive himself, did not hesitate to portray them as oafs, or cowards, or liars. In one of his comedies, he even dared to show Dionysus, disguised as a slave, shitting himself as he was threatened with torture, and then being scourged with a whip. The play, like The Acharnians, was awarded first prize.

The tension, though, between ancient song and the values of those who
were not heroes, was never simply a matter for laughter. ‘Are there no guidelines
set by heaven for mortal men, no path to follow that will please the gods?’24
This question, which the sick, the bereaved or the oppressed could hardly help
but ask, had no ready answer. The gods, inscrutable and whimsical as they were, rarely deigned to explain themselves. They certainly never thought to regulate morals. The oracle at Delphi might offer advice, but not ethical instruction. ‘The god does not rule by issuing commands.’25

Note that Holland is too careful to say that it's all-or-nothing, simply winner-take-all. There was tension and debate. Nonetheless, he claims that an executed God and the announcement that the weak and poor are better than the strong and rich was a major change.

I know, of course, that we can find intimations of this idea earlier. The later Hebrew prophets, in particular, emphasize social justice for widows and orphans.

Also we know that, in our modern view, Christianity didn't go far enough, by failing to call for an end to slavery or equal rights for women. Holland claims that while Paul can't imagine the end to the reigning economic order, and saying slaves should be free, he nonetheless says that God loves slaves as much as others. This provided the seeds for development over centuries, resulting, among other things, in today's Social Justice Warriors saying that oppressed peoples deserve special treatment. Holland claims this is something that derives ultimately from Christianity.

I'm aware that, in an alternate history, we can imagine a case where equality was advocated even without Christianity. This book, though, sticks to the history we really have.

Other pages describe how later on many Christians who advocated equal rights were opposed and attacked by Christians who didn't support equal rights. Internal divisions were many.

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More questions from @Grandizer which I'll look at later:

And what exactly is Christian about the Crusades? I see secularism as a response to centuries of religious rule but it need not have been Christian. Secular Christianity necessarily must be Christian, I suppose, but not secularism in general.