I’ve been interested in the reaction to my review of Atlas Shrugged which Chris Blosser linked to here. First of all, it might be the only thing I’ve ever written that has united both right-wingers and left-wingers (and everybody in between). Clearly, almost everyone dislikes Ayn Rand. But I was intrigued by the angry reaction of Rand fans, most of which focused on my treatment of her dismissal of original sin. What’s surprising about the objectivist objection to original sin is that the doctrine would almost seem to perfectly accord with their worldview.
Part of the angst seems to come from a mistaken understanding of the doctrine. Rand and her followers believe that the doctrine of original sin means that we are all born evil, but this is a gross exaggeration. Commenter Dale Price helpfully linked to the Catechism of the Catholic Church’s definition:
Although it is proper to each individual, original sin does not have the character of a personal fault in any of Adam’s descendants. It is a deprivation of original holiness and justice, but human nature has not been totally corrupted: it is wounded in the natural powers proper to it, subject to ignorance, suffering and the dominion of death, and inclined to sin – an inclination to evil that is called concupiscence”. Baptism, by imparting the life of Christ’s grace, erases original sin and turns a man back towards God, but the consequences for nature, weakened and inclined to evil, persist in man and summon him to spiritual battle.
This rankles the objectivists, but the doctrine as stated above is hardly much different than how many secular-minded philosophers have described human nature. When James Madison wrote than men were not angels, he was essentially hitting upon the notion that man is an imperfect beast. In fact, I don’t think he’d much object to the idea that human nature is “wounded.” In the Federalist Papers, both Hamilton and Madison—especially Madison—were influenced by David Hume, who wrote that it in “contriving any system of government, and fixing the several checks and controuls [sic] of the constitution, every man ought to be supposed a knave, and to have no other end, in all his actions, than private interest.” Hume’s statement is not necessarily a reflection of his view of human nature, but many of the Framers of the Constitution adopted this philosophy. I’d go so far as to say that they dropped the “supposed” part from their ruminations.
Rand doesn’t like the concept of original sin because it’s not fair, but she also claims to be expounding a purportedly realistic philosophy. What is so realistic about rejecting a view of human nature that common sense and experience tells us has quite a lot of merit? One need not be a bible thumping Fundamentalist to appreciate the imperfections of the human condition. As I said in my review, Randian utopians are no better than Marxist utopians or any other utopians in their completely naive outlook. Even if one does not fully accept the doctrine of origjnal sin, it is a rather extreme jump to embrace a doctrine of original perfection.
September 1st, 2009 | 12:31 am
This writer exhibits both ignorance of Ayn Rand as well as deliberate misrepresentation, as I posted at his other site. He’s linked it, you can read my countering of the rapid spin on this by Mr Zummo.
I’ll just challenge one of the roots of the Catholic presupposition (which went unanswered at the link): without quoting dogma, encyclicals, saints, Jesus, the Bible or the Baltimore Catechism, what is the objective reality method by which Catholics and Mr. Zummo derive the definition of “sin?”
John Donohue
Pasadena, CA
September 1st, 2009 | 9:42 am
And as was shown in the comments there, you displayed complete ignorance and total misunderstanding of the doctrine.
September 1st, 2009 | 9:45 am
There are moral imperatives that no human being cannot not know. They transcend era, culture, race, religion, gender. C.S. Lewis referred to it as The Tao.
If someone picks your pocket, are you outraged? Do you want your property returned? Do you want the perpetrator punished? If so, why?
“Thou shalt not steal” — or words to that effect in other cultures. The person who violates that indelible moral code has “sinned” — literally, has missed the mark, the mark that provides the foul line for human behavior, without which survival would become impossible.
And if survival is the only viable, materialistic, naturalistic explanation for why humans do what they do, then any behavior that threatens survival — of the individual, of the family line, of the group, of the species — is sin.
Rand would certainly appreciate the notion of personal integrity. What does it mean to be an integrated whole? Everything coheres: thought, word, deed. Everything coheres in such a way that it is impregnable to charges of deceit, falsehood, duplicity, disloyalty — the behaviors that threaten the integrity not only of the individual but also of the family, the culture.
If there is one “sin” that Rand deplores most, as exhibited in her novels, it’s the thief — the person who takes what is not properly his and tries to pawn it off as his own, debasing it in the process. (Think of the terms in which Peter Keating is drawn in “The Fountainhead.”) She despises even the ripping off of the tried-and-true (the neoclassicism fad) over and against the unique personal vision. Why? Because she saw it as a kind of parasitism, a mediocrity’s draining the life out of someone or something else.
But what’s wrong with that, if the leech in question can get away with it? After all, isn’t the leech merely exercising a viable survival mechanism?
Think of the character of Toohey, who knows only how to destroy what others have created, while the Roarks of the world want to create, to bring forth new life. But if Toohey can survive as a destroyer, can we really say he has done anything morally wrong, if the only natural imperative is to survive?
But it is wrong. We know it’s wrong. It’s sin — sin because, in Rand’s world, in anyone’s world, it’s the antithesis of life. It’s a form of grave-robbing when someone attempts to draw life blood from antiquity alone (an absurd and self-contradictory notion), and a kind of soul-murder when it is drawn from a living human being.
There is also this: religions acknowledge what all humans already intuit but that some seek to suppress — that survival for three score ten in this world, even if one were to live on in some sense through one’s progeny or accomplishments, is a cause for despair. We long for something more, something greater. We were born to it. All our unfulfilled aspirations, dreams — all the defects attending even those aspirations and dreams we realize — point to and even demand it.
In the immortal words of “Blade Runner’s” Roy Batty: “[We] want more life.”
And sin, in the Christian construal of things, equals death.
September 1st, 2009 | 12:19 pm
I reject Mr. Zummo’s point, for about the third time. I am not ignorant of the dogma around “Original Sin”, I am just ignoring it, pun intended. I do not care about the dogma. I only care about the effect on the idea in objective reality on human beings.
September 1st, 2009 | 12:48 pm
Mr. Sacramone,
Would it be fair to summarize what you just wrote as “you don’t need a philosopher to define sin; everyone just knows what it is.”?
That is not sufficient, in my opinion. One the one hand Mr. Zummo posits a very mild spin on Original Sin in his response to me countering my claim that the doctrine of Original Sin means “man is born evil.” He was rather vigorous in elucidating the mildness and flaming me for calling it ‘born evil.’ One the other hand, you say “Sin is death.” Well, this construct (it is not a definition) is rubber. Considering that Christ died for our sins and that people acquire Original Sin at birth, I’d say we deserve a more grounded and rational definition of “Sin.” With its roller-coaster construct, it is all too obvious that the Catholic Church deploys whatever position on the spectrum it needs at a given moment. That is a control mechanism.
As for your pointing to the obvious sins . . . my comment has always been “The first three Commandments are horrendous, the fourth is cynical, the other five are trivial.” It’s those first ones all Objectivists oppose. Not only do we not volitionally accept them, we really get steamed when people tell us we are born with a ‘tendency’ to sin against them, and that is death.
Ayn Rand’s number one virtue was rationality. I agree and hold accepting the first three commandments to be unvirtuous.
September 1st, 2009 | 2:00 pm
Murray Rothbard has pointed out that the concept of original sin is irrelevant to the issue of man and the State. If humans are inherently good, then everything is peachy. If humans are inherently bad, then it makes no sense to put one human or group of humans in charge of all else.
Indeed, the concept of original sin is, in and of itself, an argument for a decentralized (libertarian) society. Centralized authority represents a concentration of power which, in turn, acts as an amplifier of the evil and damage that those who happen to be in power can inflict on everyone else. The best way to reduce the power of evil is to destroy the amplifier of that power, meaning that it is best to destroy any concept of centralized authority.
So, either way (original sin or no original sin) you end up with the decentralized, individualized society being the best system, which is what Ayn Rand and many others have said all along.
September 1st, 2009 | 2:41 pm
Indeed, the concept of original sin is, in and of itself, an argument for a decentralized (libertarian) society.
Actually, I agree, and that’s what’s so perplexing about the objectivist argument against it. That’s precisely why I cited the Framers – they understood the human condition, and attempted to create a system of government that catered to that reality.
September 1st, 2009 | 5:34 pm
Paul,
The objectivists, like Ayn Rand, are a bunch of hair-splitting fanatics no different in character than the commies who used to argue about the dialectic.
Speaking of which, the story about how Murray Rothbard quit what he called the “Ayn Rand Cult” is really hilarious.
September 1st, 2009 | 9:36 pm
If Rothbard actually said this…
“If humans are inherently good, then everything is peachy. If humans are inherently bad, then it makes no sense to put one human or group of humans in charge of all else.”
. . . then he can’t even be called a libertarian. It is one of the worst false dichotomies I’ve ever read and both poles represent nightmares. Perhaps this was an erroneous paraphrase of his position?
“everything is peachy” is shorthand for “no government needed”, an anarchist’s rapture myth.
“…put one human or group of humans in charge of all else.” means totalitarian dictatorship.
May I split a hair here? There just might possibly be a little space in between these two for free sovereign human beings with no one ‘in charge’ of their lives, and a controlled, limited police-like enforcement agency to rectify violations of rights.
By the way, in the second case, who is doing the “putting?”
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