Pollution vs Enrichment of FaithI have been listening to a
course-on-CD on Dante's Comedia (the trio of epic poems about the poet's journey thru Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven - Inferno/Hell is the most famous) and a though that seems to have been Dante's has been hitting me hard. Especially when I cross-reference with some stuff from C.S. Lewis.
But before I explain, let me give the other side of the argument. It lead me to appreciate my side much more. In college, the physics department one day had a visit from the head of the Biology department. She is a very intelligent and well-read person, and a Christian of very similar background to me. We had a discussion that day on how she reconciles her Christian faith with the emphasis that biology places on Evolution (specifically macro-evolution). I expected her to respond with something about "theistic evolution" (God working thru the macro-evolutionary process) or "intelligent design" (the current buzzword for creationism) or "deism" (the idea that God generally lets natural processes work out His will). Instead, she proclaimed her belief that the evolution/creation debate was a result of "the pollution of Christianity by Greek thought." She believed that Christ's preaching was a purely Hebrew philosophy, and that Paul had caused many problems by bringing in the ideas of the Greek philosophers. She claimed that generally Hebrew thinkers - even modern Jewish thinkers - have no problem with Evolution, because they do not demand literalism from Genesis. Thus, "pure Christianity" would have no problem with Evolution.
I don't want to get into the Evolution side of the debate. But what I want to highlight is this person's idea that Christianity must work hard to avoid being "polluted" by other lines of thought. Her position is specifically focussed on the Greek philosophical tradition, but it would be equally applicable to lines of thought brought to Christianity by Eastern thinkers, European thinkers, etc. This seems to me to be an error that fails to take into account God's absolute control over His creation (as indicated in both the Hebrew scriptures and the Greek ones). If God is the god of both Israel and the whole world - in fact if He is capable of creating the whole cosmos - then He is certainly one who will be minding this world, and orchestrating the various lines of thought and illumination to best effect. Certain peoples, based on their historical experience, would logically be more open to certain trains of thought. The Hebrews were a people always in the middle of the fertile crescent, placed between Egypt and Mesopatamia, and thus always in the middle of wars between two great powers. Thus, they are a people who will have much time to ponder the all-powerful nature of God and His soverignty in their lives, and also to learn how to live in both peacetime and war. The Greeks were a people who had their own archipelago isolated from the majority of other people groups. Thus, they had time to meditate on the nature of things in relative peace (of course, they still made their own wars between city-states). Thus, they would be a people to have time to consider the ideals of philosophy, not worried about when the next rampaging army might come thru. The Egyptians were a people largely isolated between the deserts and the fertile Nile delta, with land and sea routes to other lands. Thus, they would be a people with time to consider the nature of things without much fear of invasion, but also in a way that opened them up to many ideas from many different lands. Bringing together Israel and Egypt allowed for one set of scriptures to be produced - the Old Testament - as the Hebrews came to understand God not only thru their own unique experiences but also by contrasting them against the thoughts of another powerful people.
Would Israel have fully understood the draw of idols on a population, had they not seen Egypt where every wall was plastered with history/mythology of one god or another, one pharoah or another? Would they have ever written down the scriptures into a durable form if they had not met up with the Eyptians as a people who felt it important to write down everything in order to ensure the static nature of their own culture? The very man who initiated the scriptures (Moses) was trained in Egyptian schools, steeped in their philosophies and methodologies. These do not seem like "pollutions" of Hebrew culture, but rather the influences that allowed the children of Abraham to have an identity separate from that of other Semitic peoples.
Likewise, the union of Greek and Hebrew thought allowed for the production of the New Testament scriptures, and was a way for God to use the ideas that He allowed to germinate in Greece and Rome for their own purposes. Would we have been able to fully understand who Christ was without the ideas of Plato? His discussion of forms and ideas, allow us to understand that every physical thing is a reminder/image/iteration of a higher principle. Thus, we understand what Paul is saying when he talks about Jesus as "He is the image of the invisible God". Likewise, the Greek ideas brought us the idea of the "Logos" (English translation "Word") as an organizing principle that brought order out of chaos during the process of creation. So that when John the apostle says, "In the beginning was the Word" in referring to Christ, we understand that it is not just a statement of existence but telling us that Jesus was also active in the creation. A very person of God himself. "Pure" pre-Greek Hebrew thought would not have come up with these on their own. They lacked the right environment to produce thinkers and methodologies that alow these kinds of thoughts.
Where does this intersect with Dante? Dante was a child of the Middle Ages, and as such was steeped in both a rich biblical tradition and a rich tradition of the classics (i.e. Greek and Roman literature). He used the images of classical Greek - not just the philosophers, but the pagan characters like Odysseus/Ullysses - to illustrate many Christian ideas of virtue and vice. He used a pagan poet - Virgil - as a guide to Hell and Purgatory, because he understood the ideas behind the structures of justice and redemption, even though Virgil never knew Christ. The union of the two traditions allows for a richer product than could be produced by the one alone.
C.S. Lewis once said about God that He "takes what do you better than you meant it." He was talking about individuals here - saying that a sinner's selfish request to God to save him from the flames is taken as a God-centered offer to serve the King of Kings - but you can see from his own work (especially that of the Narnia stories) that the same principle can be applied to the products of societies. Narnia is made richer by the images of witches taken from British/Germanic stories, the images of fantastic creatures taken from Greco-Roman mythology, and the images of nyads/dryads taken from Norse legends. My handbell choir teacher in college once said that it was the duty of artists to "redeem every method of expression and use it to glorify God." This is very much what we are seeing in Dante, and Lewis, and even in the way Paul and John make use of the pagan philosophers.
We even see this process continuing to unfold in our own time. Consider the case of "passive resistance." Jesus demonstrated it as a political tool on the cross (even as the same cross was being used for a more purely spiritual work.) The early apostles practiced it earnestly and most died horribly - though in expressions of passivity - even while the Church grew massively around them. Eventually, it was largely forgotten as a political tool as Rome became a Christian Empire under Constantine and the religion became common throughout Europe. But later it was picked up by Mohatma Gandhi in India. He combined it with Indian thoughts and experiences, and produced a revolution in the nation which allowed the ousting of British rule without the shedding of blood. Then this same line was picked back up by Martin Luther King, Jr. in America and used as a political tool for the betterment of black Americans, against a very nation that considered itself "Christian." An idea is taken, combined with non-Christian (but good) ideas, and comes back to us strengthened and useful for the ends that God has for it.
Christianity is founded upon one Truth - Christ and Him crucified for our sins - but it is open to the ideas of the outside world, so long as they do not demand denial of the one Truth.
