“We are fast approaching the stage of the ultimate inversion: the stage where the government is free to do anything it pleases, while the citizens may act only by permission; which is the stage of the darkest periods of human history, the stage of rule by brute force” (Ayn Rand).
In a previous article, we discussed the value of equality among people, focusing on its promotion during the French Revolution of 1789 under the motto, “Liberty, equality, fraternity—or death!” We presented arguments in support of the idea that, when viewed as an abstract ideal, equality could not be realised simply by postulating the power of human reason to produce and affirm it. Furthermore, ignoring the Christian roots of equality among people meant that it could not be promoted as a basic desire of human consciousness.
Building on this, we will now address the value of freedom as a guiding principle of both the French and American Revolutions. We will assess the extent to which freedom was pursued, implemented, and respected in French and American societies at that time, and in American history to this day.
The roots of the idea of freedom
As revolutionary France faced ten terrifying years of civil, legislative, social, military, and economic chaos, the British philosopher Edmund Burke strongly criticised its strategy of “total change.” He argued that the various freedoms of individuals and citizens were at the mercy of “every wild, litigious spirit”, precisely because all pre-existing laws and order had been abolished, as if everything were erroneous, flawed and contemptible, and as if novelty itself were a virtue. However, not everything that is new is necessarily superior to what came before. Burke wrote to a French friend: “France has bought poverty by crime! France has not sacrificed her virtue to her interest, but she has abandoned her interest, that she might prostitute her virtue.”[1] According to all evidence, the option that seemed more socially sound would have been to evaluate and start from an acceptable status quo, and then make gradual, partial changes and successive reforms, as had been practised in history. Total change was unheard of until then.
The French were criticised for rejecting or ignoring the expertise of specialists in politics and religion. They treated debates, resolutions, and procedures with contempt. When the neophytes—who considered themselves enlightened in all matters[2]—wanted to impose a new measure, they did not appeal to reason or competence; instead, they resorted to armed force.
According to French historian Jacques Madaule,[3] the effect of social chaos, in which there was no manifestation of social equality or freedom, was also due to the abolition of all forms of religious belief and practice. The atheistic civil constitution and the use of force created a divide between the revolutionaries and those French people who remained religious.
The fact that tens of thousands of murders and over half a million arrests were committed in the name of reason has had repercussions throughout history, affecting both the devout and atheists alike. A philosopher such as Nietzsche, standing on the ground of “Christian anti-Christianity” (Ion Ianoși), exclaimed: “Alas! reason, seriousness, mastery over the emotions, all these gloomy, dismal things which are called reflection, all these privileges and pageantries of humanity: how dear is the price that they have exacted! How much blood and cruelty is the foundation of all ‘good things’!”[4]
By contrast, America established its reputation as the “land of freedom” also following a revolution (1788) by putting in place the rule of law without destroying all existing foundations. American democracy was made possible by its support for civil law and Christian morality. In fact, civil laws were based on Protestant Christian morality. The motto “In God we trust”, printed on the dollar bill, symbolises American politics’ claim to the Christian religion of the first colonists. Another enduring symbol of America is the Statue of Liberty, which welcomes travellers from Europe.
“In the United States the interests of the country are everywhere kept in view . . . In America it may be said that no one renders obedience to man, but to justice and to law,”[5] said Alexis de Tocqueville in 1835. He was a French sociologist who had visited and carefully analysed American society. Five years after the Paris Commune, a new revolution in France, he admired the peaceful organisation, morality, and activism of ordinary Americans who had revolutionarily called themselves “We the People”. Beyond pursuing their own business and affairs, everyone seemed involved in public affairs: they debated political measures, gave speeches about the common good, and joined the community in combating alcohol consumption. As they became more involved, they became smarter and more skilled, more enlightened and more active than their predecessors. Their Christian morality was not heroic, but rather offered normality and equality among peers, encouraging the development of positive traits and discouraging negative ones.[6] When assessing his contemporaries in both French and American societies and the values they promoted, Tocqueville declared: “I should have loved freedom, I believe, at all times, but in the time in which we live I am ready to worship it. . . All of our contemporaries who would establish or secure the independence and the dignity of their fellow men must show themselves the friends of equality. . . Thus the question is not how to reconstruct aristocratic society, but how to make liberty proceed out of that democratic state of society in which God has placed us.”[7]
A diminution of liberty
However, in America, paradoxically, there was a risk of “tyranny of the majority”, according to Tocqueville. American individualism could become exacerbated against a backdrop of prosperity and hedonism, which would dull the civic vigilance of citizens. This would render the exercise of free will less prevalent and less meaningful.[8]
As Tocqueville noted, it is also paradoxical that this freedom-loving and pious nation pursued a tyrannical policy towards indigenous peoples and slaves. These deep contrasts and contradictions would only be partially resolved by a Civil War between the North and the South. Rather than offering a direct solution, President Abraham Lincoln offered a hopeful vision: the hope that one day, the newly freed slaves in the South and the harshly exploited industrial workers in the North would be able to improve their difficult lives and pursue happiness, as set out in the famous phrase in the Declaration of Independence: “the pursuit of happiness.”
According to Max Weber, the Protestant ethic of the Puritans who emigrated from England and the Netherlands was a defining feature of 19th-century American society. It was translated into effective social and economic norms for the United States, in contrast to the turbulent situation in France during the Revolution. According to the German sociologist, the rational asceticism of the Protestants oriented them towards the value of work, the dignity of the profession, temperance, modesty, and charity. However, Protestant asceticism “was in turn influenced in its development and its character by the totality of social conditions, especially economic.”[9] Over time, religious life deteriorated under the pressure of economic interests and its impact on social relations diminished.
Weber wrote: “The modern man is in general, even with the best will, unable to give religious ideas a significance for culture and national character which they deserve.”[10] Initially, concern for material needs was likened to a light cloak on the shoulders of the Puritan Christian, which they should always be able to take off if it became too burdensome.[11] Their freedom was guaranteed by the divine, and the freedom of their world was an extension of the principles of Christian life. In other words, it represented the Protestant ascetic way of being in the world without becoming worldly. However, gradually, that cloak turned into an iron cage, according to the author.
Present and future threats to freedom
As industrialisation took off and consumer society consolidated, American Protestants became increasingly caught up in the machinery of production and consumption, wealth accumulation, and perpetual business development. This made them more worldly. To a certain extent, Tocqueville’s prediction was coming true. One obvious reason for the diminished value of Christian principles in life management is a lack of awareness of their formative role when it comes to effective action.
As early as 1920, Weber expressed concerns about the unleashing of the “pursuit of profit” in the land of freedom, beyond religious morality. These concerns came to fruition 30 years later. The concept of the “lonely crowd”, developed in the 1950s by three American sociologists,[12] captured the process of breaking away from the Christian tradition of thought and Protestant values. The sociologists described how entire masses of people were abandoning the traditions in which they had been raised, including family life, community life, honest work, weekly rest, and church attendance. This process was brought about by technological advances, the labour market, and the phenomenon of commuting, as well as the migration of labour from one state to another over long distances. A different kind of socialisation was required: different lifestyles and an orientation towards oneself or others rather than tradition.[13] At the same time, this abandonment of family tradition and its values also represented rootlessness. The lonely crowd is found in large urban agglomerations where people do not interact meaningfully or deeply with one another due to a lack of free time and the hustle and bustle of everyday life, which isolate them. Loneliness can also stem from abandoning the healthy moral principles of one’s community of origin under pressure from the libertine morality of the metropolis. Thus, the individuals become alienated from themselves and their personalities, and the probability of realising themselves as free human beings decreases, given that their values change suddenly and profoundly.
In this process, the idea that democracy is the most permissive form of government is proven true because, it allows human depravity to flourish alongside human freedom and dignity, as observed by the theologian and Anglican priest John Stott.[14]
If we acknowledge that Protestant morality has a significant beneficial influence not only on prosperity but also on freedom, scrutinise the future and attempt to detect the direction in which secularisation,[15] so evident in today’s American society and most traditional Protestant communities, is heading.
A relevant phenomenon in this context is the emergence of unaffiliated believers, a relatively recent development that has attracted the attention of theologians.[16] This trend suggests a sense of disorientation among the devout, as well as a rejection of institutionalised faith or a general dissatisfaction with past church attendance. Unaffiliated Christians are those who reject the church’s mediation between themselves and the divine, separating religious values from ecclesiastical life and organisation. This certainly indicates a crisis in Christianity in general and in Protestantism in particular, but also a desire for spiritual freedom.[17]
In economic life, however, there is talk of the current “Holy Alliance,” completely secularised, supposedly comprising major financial institutions and transnational private capital. This alliance is said to be responsible for the enslaving debts of all countries, whether poor or rich.[18] These are signs of inevitable future economic crises and a lack of material freedom.
The idea that Eastern, non-Christian, vaguely deistic spirituality with Buddhist influences could join forces with the “science of the future” to help humanity overcome its material and spiritual crises has been seen by some as salvific in the Western world. A new morality is proposed that is not so much religious as “spiritual” and metaphysical. It promises to unite physics and metaphysics to create a unified worldview. This Eastern spiritual morality is supposedly based on feelings, intuition, and dreams rather than human reason.[19]
These considerations are reminiscent of the vision of the Dalai Lama, as set out in his 2005 book The Universe in a Single Atom: The Convergence of Science and Spirituality, for which he was awarded the Templeton Prize. In the book, the Dalai Lama proposes alleviating spiritual and material crises by cultivating qualities that already exist in the human heart. These qualities will determine the transformation of our attitudes. The motivation for this transformation appears to be the simple observation that it promotes well-being in those who practise it. According to the Buddhist leader, science and our experience can help with this. Religion provides no help here, as there is no universally accepted religion. The Dalai Lama’s moral project aims for universal validity![20]
In our opinion, this concept is the product of wishful thinking, seeking to unite that which cannot be united: Eastern virtues (wisdom, detachment from the world, and asceticism) and Western virtues (comfort, efficiency, and prosperity). It also implicitly postulates the existence of a unity of the human race in terms of psychological makeup. This time, resources are sought not in reason, but in human’s non-rational side: intuition, empathy, and dreamlike visions take control.
In light of all this, we cannot help but ask ourselves: Why, in times of crisis, is there a tendency to choose extreme solutions and exaggerate in one direction or another, following the rhythm of an invisible pendulum that seems to sway through our history?
Some authors also foresee a deterioration in human relations against the backdrop of worsening economic crises. We may wonder what will become of our freedom when the natural tendency is for humans to turn on each other. Thus, when discussing the current political, social, and military turmoil triggered by the global resource crisis, several analysts warn: “Whether our successors might call these regimes ‘capitalist,’ ‘socialist,’ ‘fascist,’ or whatever, malice would be their ultimately defining character trait. It is of course impossible to predict what human beings will do when confronted by such a threat.”[21]
Of the three aforementioned directions, which seems more plausible in reference to the complex trends in people’s spiritual and material lives? Is it the atheistic direction, in the spirit of the French Revolution, which views freedom as emancipation from religious belief? Or the Weberian direction, which argues that freedom and prosperity have been stimulated by Christian (Protestant) morality? Or the direction of a new spiritual morality based on non-rational experiences and the science of the future, which advocates equal freedom for all across the globe?
In this context, Ellen White’s warning about the grim possibility of a general social collapse in the New World due to the abandonment of Protestant morality and precepts is relevant. Without the support of faith, the author argues, civil laws would no longer be respected, leading to economic disaster, chaos, and, of course, the disappearance of freedom. The connection between civil law and God’s law is also represented by Christian morality, as understood by Max Weber.
In contemporary times, several concepts have been put forward that separate morality from religion and religious belief. Therefore, they propose basing legal norms on strictly secular morality.[22] However, in light of the dire predictions of global crises and social unrest, it is striking that atheist authors such as Ayn Rand and Christian authors such as Ellen White paint similar pictures, describing roughly the same troubled realities in a dire future: dictatorship, omnipotent discretionary government, and the enslavement of citizens. However, the criterion for evaluating the relevance of these two schools of thought is whether they also propose solutions, rather than merely describing the problems.