Plato vs Diogenes: Dueling biographies

 At the Atlantic, Kieran Setiya reviews what is billed as the first full-length bio of Plato, and a new English translation of a relatively recent bio of Diogenes.

I agree at least in part, though not necessarily fully, with the main points on both philosophers.

Plato:

Dull;

Mixed and muddied Socratic ethical thrusts with metaphysics;

The ancient version of an academic theoretician.

Diogenes:

Man of ethical action and truer heir of Socrates;

Unlucky in philosophical history;

Allegedly learned about reinterpreting Delphi.

Note that I said I don't fully agree with either.

Aristophanes said Socrates was a Sophist; I agree, contra protestations of many philosophers, including friend Massimo Pigliucci. Setiya doesn't mention this. It's why Plato surely redefined Sophism in some ways. And, one doesn't need to learn Greek, unlike Izzy Stone, to see not just problems with Plato's portrayal of Socrates, but what was likely genuine to semi-genuine in that portrayal. Above all, re the "Wisest man in Athens" BS, Socrates was not what Plato cracked him up to be, and on this, I think Socrates was cracking himself up to be this, too. And, I remained unconvinced that Socrates was metaphysics-free. In fact, I think he had musings on the metaphysics of his ethical rhetorical questions that led Plato to his Forms.

Diogenes? The idea that Delphi told him to "debase the currency" and that he later realized that was meant to be metaphorical has struck as being more likely to be urban legend than truth. Setiya ignores that Diogenes was assisting his dad in this. It's a nice philosophical cover story, but probably no more than that.

Otherwise? Yes, sadly, Zeno of Kitium muddled Diogenes' ethical imperatives to live away from culture with Stoic metaphysics, even though he was a second-generation disciple. Setiya misses the issue that under Alexander's Diadochoi, then the Roman imperium, that this had to be trimmed to the sails.

Both books could be good in their own right. Or not so good. The end of Setiya's piece indicates that Plato biographer Waterfield appears to cut semi-blank checks, at least, to the fascism of The Republic.

Fascism in the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod? Yes; The Cross and the Swastika

Rick, I am SHOCKED there's gambling in the house of Matthew Harrison (pictured at right), and the people even more wingnut than him). And, sadly, in another sense, I didn't think of the addendum to the original headline, punning on a 50-year-old book that might be remembered by a few, until after the original post.

Vermont Digger has the details on a former distillery owner there who appears to be the owner of a podcast that pushes Lutheran fascism. 

Actually, a Rolling Stone article to which it links has the real details, about a Corey Mahler who co-hosts a podcast with who seems to be Ryan Woodie Dumperth, the Vermont guy, as well as an overview of LCMS President Matthew Harrison's attempts to douse? control? the flames without getting burned himself. (Harrison was just elected to another three-year term to run the denomination, at about 1.8 million, the main one in the conservative wing of Lutheranism, last month.)

A report on Mahler and others from outside the LCMS notes that young alt right are reportedly attracted to Lutheranism because of Martin Luther's own antisemitism. And, that is real, though not unique to Luther in his day, but not just a late-life issue, and sis and others I know, please don't try to explain it away. Martin Luther was antisemitic, not just anti-Judaism after he discovered he couldn't use Jews to do theological judo on the pope.

And, not-quite full-on Nazis in the LCMS didn't want to believe Mahler was who he is until Machaira Action's report forced the issue.

Update, March 22, 2024: Mahler's also some sort of conspiracy theorist. I ran into him on Twitter over a nutter idea he was proposing and ...

Confessional fascist (Lutefash) Corey Mahler spouting conspiracy theories.
Shock me.https://t.co/K8VDcKYC1i https://t.co/qpvdmrYvab

— TheRealSocraticGadfly 🥝☢️🌻🌲 (@real_gadfly) March 22, 2024

He later blocked me.

In detail, here are Part 1 and Part 2 of their report. Punning on Scandinavians and an alleged food delicacy, they call this movement "Lutefash."

That said, per the Rolling Stone piece, Matty Harrison's "excommunication warning," per this blog, appears to have become excommunication action. But, what about Dumperth? What about the other cockroaches that will operate more subtly, perhaps with the cooperation of willing pastors here and there?

Per comments at this "Occidental Dissent" site, there's probably a few parish pastors among the commenters, and others in the Wisconsin Synod, about one-fifth the size of the Missouri Synod, and both even more hardcore traditionalist on theology and further right politically than Missouri. One commenter references a YouTube by Rev. David Ramirez, a LCMS pastor from St. Paul's, Union Grove, Wisconsin. (I guess Hispanic counts as "White" in this world?)

Bethany Lutheran Church, Springdale, Arkansas, and Rev. Gregory L. Jackson another to watch, per this blog by either him or it. Here's Jackson's Goodreads authorial page. Interestingly, he's also a King James Version nutter. Dude took a deep dive in an empty pool, too. Went to the former Lutheran Church of America's Augustana in Rock Island. Then an STM at Yale. Then Notre Dame. Then that deep dive in the empty pool.

As for how this all happened? My sister notes that Matty played with fire by entangling church and state years back. He's been the LCMS president since 2010, and as in the previous presidential election, fended off far-right challengers. He's semi far-right himself, as I see today's Missouri Synod, which is like today's GOP, and just as it's laughable to hear a Republican (like Will Hurd just announced for president) called a "moderate," the same holds true whenever applied to Harrison. He's won on the first ballot every time since his first election, but he's never broken 55 percent. Tim Klinkenberg, a seminary classmate of mine, was the apparent semi-right challenger in 2019. The Wiki link has links to all election results in its footnotes.

It should also be noted that German-Americans broke harder for Trump than any other white ethnic group, apparently driven in fair part by their liking in 2016 his claims to breaking with the neoconservatives within the GOP and having a more isolationist stance in his "America First," and the LCMS' roots are primarily in German-Americans. The LCA, part of which eventually became the ELCA of today, had its roots in older German-Americans from 200-plus years ago who lost more their Germanness, but even more in Scandinavian Lutherans of the Upper Midwest. The ALC half of the ELCA merger had a mix of German-Americans of about the same migration date as LCMS Lutherans, but with a Scandinavian contingent at least half that of the LCA as leavening.

As for how this all plays out? Harrison is enough of a political chameleon to largely stay above the fray, despite the Lutefash pinpricks. To the degree he thinks its too much heavy lifting, he'll ignore the underground network of pastors and congregations, of which I've only scratched the surface. (For the unfamiliar, the LCMS is almost, but not quite, as "congregational" in its church polity as the Southern Baptist Convention. It has all sorts of "underground networks," as I'm sure the SBC does as well. I have family-related info on that as well.)

Beyond that, Harrison has big financial fish to fry, namely the Hot Chalk lawsuit and others (perhaps consolidated into one, I would think, on the student lawsuits) over the LCMS' abrupt closure a couple of years ago of Concordia University Portland. Harrison's mixing of secular politics and church governance was a factor in how the pooch was screwed in its closing, too. So, too, was his eye on the dollar signs CUP was generating with Hot Chalk, and of course, the LCMS, like many conservative wings of mainline Protestant denominations, has a "golden calf" problem as it and others lose members.

Add this to Matty's political chameleon behavior, too. The Boy Scouts of America recently voted to accept gay Scouts, but not leaders. So, Harrison is going down the Bill Clinton route of 30 years ago and saying it's "don't ask don't tell" on gay Scouts at troops affiliated with LCMS congregations, and beyond that, in a legal memorandum of understanding, individual congregations still have the right to boot Scout troops. And, contra Rev. Bart Day, no, sexuality was always an issue in the BSA, until it decided to do its split-the-difference bullshit, presumably on grounds that gay Scoutmasters would be "groomers." (This ignores the BSA's long history of tolerating sexual abuse by Scoutmasters, of course.) I have no idea of what this Trail Life USA alternative to the BSA is, and wonder what happened to the old Lutheran Rangers. As for the Lutefash? Teh gay was sometimes OK in the early days of the German swastika boys, but after the Night of the Long Knives it went pretty much deep underground.

==

Update, Dec. 18, 2023: Matty's got new, and related, troubles since then. Like a pastor arrested as one of Fani Willis' "Dirty 19" Georgia election fraudsters. Said pastor, the Reeevvvvvv Stephen Lee, has gone on to likely violate LCMS doctrine about interfaith participation by appearing at a non-Lutheran church service to promote his part in the Trumpian cause.

Yet more on the wrongness of Heidegger

 I know philosopher friend and Heidegger lover student? (that doesn't sound fully explanatory either but works well enough as a one-word edit, and I told him I would edit, but see update below) Brett Welch has heard the basics of Martin Heidegger's antisemitism before, but the LA Review of Books has more on how his son and literary executor Herman has been at the lead of turd-polishing his literary estate. And, there's no way to put it any more politely than that.

Beyond the turd-polishing is general unprofessionalism, including massive amounts of sloppiness from poor manuscript handling by family members and sycophants.

The piece then raises the apparent ultimate issue:

The controversies that have haunted the publication of Heidegger’s work are significant, insofar as they concern not merely occasional and understandable editorial lapses but instead suggest a premeditated policy of substantive editorial cleansing: a strategy whose goal was to systematically and deliberately excise Heidegger’s pro-Nazi sentiments and convictions.

It's hard to say that's not the case.

Of course, the problem starts with Heidegger doing that himself to and for himself during the first years of Germany emerging not just from the physical rubble of World War II but the intellectual and socio-psychological rubble of the Third Reich.

To me, it seems clear that Heidegger, to riff on Nazi ideology, thought that "international Jewry," if not itself a virus, was a carrier of a virus — that of modern technology, along with related alleged ills.

That leads to this:

Whether Heidegger overcame these prejudices later in life is extremely doubtful. After the war, he bemoaned in the Black Notebooks a “conspiracy” purportedly initiated by “world journalism” (Weltjournalismus) to keep Germany in a condition of fealty vis-à-vis the Western Allies. When, in 1986, Hans-Georg Gadamer—Heidegger’s star student—was queried about his mentor’s postwar ideological leanings, he avowed that “Heidegger remained sufficiently a Nazi after the war that he was convinced that world opinion was totally dominated by Jews.”

I would only quibble with the use of "overcame," as I infer that it implies a conscious effort by Heidegger to address his own past antisemitism and I see no such effort.

Otherwise, the Heideggerian cult strikes me as one of the three biggest pseudo-intellectual cults of the Western world in the 20th century, along with Carl Jung and Ayn Rand. In the East, Mao and his Little Red Book, etc. was no slouch as a cult itself.

And thus, contra Richard Wolin and a brief interview by Yale Press, publisher of his new book from which this comes, I reject the idea that he's the most important philosopher of the 20th century. Even with him being overrated and his language philosophy NOT being "ordinary" language philosophy, Wittgenstein is more important. Kurt Gödel and his incompleteness theorems, especially combined with Tarski's undecidability theorem that Gödel anticipated, is definitely more important.  If you meant "most influential," I would halfway buy it — if you confine yourself to discussing philosophy inside the academy.

Update: As noted, I changed lover to "student." But, per Brett's own comment, maybe "Lover of Heidegger's strictly philosophical ideas" would be a better edit, but I'll leave the simple edit I made at that. As for whether one can separate Heidegger's other ideas from his purely philosophical ones, we'll probably disagree. I speak personally, having not read T.S. Eliot in more than a decade as my realization of the breadth of his antisemitism and its intertwining with so much of his poetry led to increasing disgust. As for the power of Heidegger's ideas in a world of increasing fractures and silos today? Brett knows Heidegger's overall philosophy better than I do. If it works for him, it works for him.

I will also note that, beyond this issue, most modern "Continental" philosophy, outside of existentialism, simply doesn't do much for me. Within the world of theology, Paul Tillich and his "ground of being," which has obvious parallels to Heidegger, never came close to enthusing me. I forgot that, a full decade ago, I wrote some highly snarky thoughts — yet highly serious ones — on "the Ground of Being." And, I stand by them. That said, as Tillich clearly did not follow Heidegger's path in politics, one can use such ideas as expressed by people other than Heidegger.

More stupidity at r/AcademicBiblical that I can't call out there

 The series of comments on this post by r/SmartFool are washed up. In fairness, in part, he's citing scholars that are wrong, but he's also way stretching things on his own.

First, no, no first edition of John was written pre-70. The link he cites discusses the "Signs Gospel," which is NOT, and NOT CONSIDERED TO BE, an "early version of John."  That's on him, period. "Quality contributor" my ass.

Second, in that first post, he next says:

(1) John is only source to mention a number of pools that were later destroyed and aren't mentioned by later Christian writings or Josephus. (2) has accurate geography and topography and seems to assume his readers know the details as well (3) Jewish customs and debates that were highly regular pre-70 AD are preserved in the gospel (4) features more Jewish festives that fit prior 70 AD and overall is the most Jewish gospel (5) Shows parallels to Josephus in how the priests would act toward messianic leaders (7) Further archeological evidence in the gospel such as Pilate’s Throne and the High Priest’s house are present (8) stone jars that are more prominent prior to 70 AD (9) The portrayal of Nicodemus is more typical prior to 70 AD.(10) Furthermore the portrayal of Jesus replacing the temple seem to suggest prior 70-AD and seems to have no knowledge of the temple's destruction unlike the other gospels (11) Jesus’s diologue with the Samartarian women implies that worship was happening both on Mt. Gerazin for the Samartians and at the temple for the Jews…this seems to imply pre-70 AD worship. (12) first edition (as mentioned) was heavily influenced by signs...this is the same focus Paul had when he said (Jews demand signs) in his letter to the Corinthians (1st Corinthians 1:22).

Problem? None of that is discussed in the Early Christian Gospels link about the Signs Gospel and that's the only link he has in the comment. So, he's violating rules.

Second, partially contra point 3? Per Yonathan Adler's new book on Jewish origins, per Part 3 of my review, none of the three big Jewish festivals, especially Pentecost and Sukkoth, were even semi-firmly established until Hasmonean times, and Sukkoth especially was probably still being tweaked into post-Temple Tanaaitic rabbinic times.

His second comment in the thread? Point 2 is horrible.

This was the brief story in 28:9-10, where Mary Magdalene and “the other Mary” (28:1), after having discovered the empty tomb and setting out to go on their way, encounter the risen Jesus. The account is quite similar to the narrative in John 20:14-18. Both of these reports (a) come after the discovery of the empty tomb and an angelophany (Matt 28:2-7; John 20:12-13); (b) record Jesus’ first resurrection appearance; (c) involve Mary Magdalene; (d) refer in one way or another to touching Jesus (Matthew: “took hold of his feet”; John: “do not hold me”); and (e) have Jesus commanding the woman or women to go and speak to “my brothers”

Reality? Matthew 28 and John 20 resurrection stories are nowhere near that close to being alike. Matthew has multiple women versus just Magdalene; Matthew has them grabbing Jesus feet vs him telling Magdalene not to. Matthew has them meeting Jesus first, at the empty tomb while John has her running to tell Peter first, then returning.

Points 3-4 in that thread likewise focus on just one verse here and there, where the content parallels aren't THAT close even if the structural ones are. And, it ignores the possible influence of oral tradition.

And, as far as this not being all his own? Yeah, he's referencing Dale Allison. That doesn't totally let you off the hook. Beyond text-critical developmental issues, Allison, definitely on the conservative end of NT critical scholarship (as conservative as a James McGrath or more) has reasons to push the Johannine-Matthean ties to tout an early John, IMO. Yeah, William Lane Craig may, for his own polemical reasons, overstate Allison on the historicity of Jesus' resurrection. Or he may not. Anyway, the likes of Allison and McGrath strike me as fundagelical fellow travelers. They're certainly exemplars of the "Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!" mental stance, something that I rejected in knowing that I couldn't move from conservative Lutheranism to just stopping at liberal Lutheranism — even a truly more liberal theological version — in my deconversion process.

And, elsewhere? Smart Fool claims Luke is the linguistic elite of the NT world. He doesn't know what he's talkng about and presumably doesn't know Greek, either; that would actually be the author of Hebrews. Again, quality contributor my ass.

And, he's just wrong on Paul allegedly passing on a tradition about the Lord's Supper. Nope, Paul invented it.

And, this one is getting its own post.

And, I find out why he believes this shit. He's a conservative evangelical apologist, per this comment citing favorably Dale Allison. And ugh, he's also now a moderator. That means that site sucks more canal water.

R/Ask Bible Scholars has some nuttery too

 Here's an interesting one. From what I've read of his comments, Dr. Wonderful is NOT a fundagelical or close. He's a liberal Xn who takes much of biblical theology "non-literally." He's also a ThD in systematic theology. The ThD not PhD means it's likely from a Protestant denominational seminary.

He claims that there's a new scholarly consensus on WAY early dating of Christian gospels.

As for his op cits? This Bloomsbury book presumably makes claims refuted elsewhere about Mark 13's background. I find other presumptions of him less than plausible.

He's also wrong on the dating of P52. And, other things about it. Given how small it is, it could be a fragment of the Egerton Gospel. Or, if of John, could be of a version of John from before its final redaction.

Finally, given that Paul invented the Lord's Supper, there's no way any of the Synoptics could come before him.

That's not his biggest stupidity, though.

Claiming "the afterlife doesn't exist in Judaism," is.

He gets his theology wrong in one of two ways. He either is claiming that Orthodox Jews, along with many Conservative and Reconstructionist ones, don't believe in an afterlife, or he's claiming that Yahwism of the pre-rabbinic era is Judaism. If he's an academic with a ThD and making that claim, his master's and doctorate work obviously taught him nothing about the Tanakh/Old Testament. Or, by the whole comment, it could be BOTH. Anyway, not only is he not a fundagelical, he appears to be a New Agey flower child version of a Protestant Christian.

Yet other political nuttery OnlySky gets wrong

 I've repeatedly called out the Self-Besotted Philosopher, Jonathan M.S. Pearce, for his errors at the semi-Gnu Atheist site.

Now, time to further turn my guns on M.L. Clark.

I saw NAFO Fella and warmonger Nadin Brzezinski touting being on CounterSocial as well as Mastodon instead of Twitter. So, I googled, not having heard of it before. Saw this piece by Clark.

Problem? Yes, starting here:

The Jester, a prominent US hacker with a military background, made the choice to block six countries with high rates of cyber attack from the site: Russia, China, Iran, Syria, North Korea, and Pakistan.

First, banning entire populations of those countries based on their governments' actions is not very secular humanist. Second? Doesn't the US do cyberhacks? Doesn't Israel? The flash-drive hack called Stuxnet says hell yes.

An imaginary graduation homily and theme

At the Catholic school that's part of my newspaper beat, the homily for the graduation mass before commencement (the parish has a K-12 school) was focused on the readings of Acts 23, Paul's "appeal to Caesar" pericope, and John 21, Jesus' charge to Peter to "feed my lambs."

And, yeah, both of these are surely imaginary.

I've already spoken about Acts 23, in context that from Paul's arrest on, the rest of the book is almost certainly non-historical. (That's not to imply that Acts 1-22 has high historicity, just that the conclusion is even worse.)

John 21? We all know it was added later, but how much later? If John 1:19-John 20, the likely original core (less editing battles over John 6 and of course no John 7:53-8:11, which itself probably originally began with today's John 8:3) was written around 100, then John 21 didn't get added — even if written earlier — than what, 125?

The editorial note:

18 Very truly I tell you, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go.” 19 Jesus said this to indicate the kind of death by which Peter would glorify God. Then he said to him, “Follow me!”

Would also indicated a date well after 100. The Letter of Clement's comment about Peter is much vaguer, per 5:4

There was Peter who by reason of unrighteous jealousy endured not one not one but many labors, and thus having borne his testimony went to his appointed place of glory.

and if we presuppose traditional date of circa 100, and with John not being written from anywhere near Rome, you have some time later. If one takes a later date for Clement, per discussion, then, at least fir this being attached to John, it's post-150.

Of course, this didn't happen either. There was NO Neronian persecution of Christians after the Fire of Rome; that's almost certainly an interpolation. And, no early tradition mentions Peter killed by Jews.