A Positive Side of Philosophy

 When I was researching information on both proportionalism and MTD, I also came across something else that piqued my interest because in all honesty I agree with it.  It is found in Evangelical scholar Norman Geisler's book Christian Ethics, and although he is going to attribute this to a Reformed perspective, it is actually more of an Augustinian/Thomistic view as well and thus is compatible with Magisterial teaching.  The idea under discussion is called graded absolutism, and it does help make some clarifications on some tough choices we may or may not encounter.  But first, let me talk about Dr. Geisler.

Norman Geisler is a sort of household name among American Evangelical Protestants because he is one of their preeminent scholars.  In all honesty, his work is actually good, and his books on ethics, like this one, also can easily be utilized by Catholic and Orthodox people as well as there is much common ground.  Geisler is also one of those people who you know represents a balanced view of things too, and as far as Evangelical scholarship goes, he is very credible.  As an undergrad at Southeastern University, some of Geisler's work was required text for some classes, and therefore I am quite familiar with him.  While obviously I don't necessarily agree 100% with everything he may believe, I found a lot more common ground with him when it comes to ethical issues than I found differences, and that is why I am going to use his work here to talk about this concept of graded absolutism.  There is a lot to cover, so I am going to hone in on the basics of the chapter he devotes to it in his book just to undergird my own thoughts on the subject.

So, what is graded absolutism?  On pages 96 and 97 of his book, Geisler talks about moral absolutism, and he identifies three types:

1. Unqualified Absolutism - This view essentially means that no exceptions to a moral issue are to be considered.  You can't lie about anything, and stealing is out of the question.  Geisler associates this view with the more Old-Order Anabaptists, especially in regard to pacifism. 

2. Conflicting Absolutism - Essentially this means that one may have to do something messy that conflicts with Christian morality out of necessity.  While Geisler associates this with Lutheran tradition in particular, I would go a bit further by saying that it also applied to some Christian rulers of late antiquity and the Middle Ages - take the Emperor Constantine for instance, who despite having a conversion to and preference for Christianity, he still had to do unsavory things throughout his reign,  The way he reconciled this was to put off an actual baptism until the very end of his life.  This also has some Machiavellian undercurrents to it as well. 

3. Graded Absolutism - What Geisler means by this is essentially that at times we may have to do something that is morally conflicting in order to accomplish a greater good.  Two of the most noted examples of this includes how some Christian abolitionists help free Black slaves during the days of the Underground Railroad - this involved a risk of breaking civil property law, as well as some forging of papers to help people, but ultimately the greater good end took precedent over the more contradictory means.  The other example was of forged papers and armed resistance during World War II in Nazi Germany, which saved the lives of thousands of Jews as well as liberation of some lands like France by armed resistance which often had the blessing of a local religious leader.   While Geisler classified this as more of a Reformed Protestant perspective (and in Calvin's Institutes, it is advocated), in reality it also could be the conclusion drawn from reading people such as St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas as well, particularly in regard to situations such as "just war" theory or capital punishment.  

Geisler too notes that this existed to some degree in Augustine's writings, and he notes on page 97 that Augustine has three key points in regard to what graded absolutism is:

1. There is a hierarchy of virtues

2. Moral duties sometimes conflict

3. There is no culpability for obedience in doing the higher thing.

That is basically some of the takeaways I wanted to share from Geisler's chapter, as there is a lot more - perhaps one day when I get a print copy of his book I will explore and revisit this more.  This is going to provide an underpinning for what I am about to share at this point. 

First, an example and a story.  My good friend Stephen was a chaplain in the National Guard for many years, and due to an ideological issue that Biden pressed during COVID,  a bunch of bureaucratic higher brass - no doubt led by General Mark "Thoroughly Modern" Millie, a coward if there ever was one - targeted Stephen and so many others due to their political and religious views.  The main culprit that attacked Stephen was some officer named Ron Burkett, and the damage he did to Stephen (and probably others too) was catastrophic.  As a child of two Vietnam-era vets myself, I take this sort of thing seriously, as our military should have an honored place in our nation but oftentimes they are targeted and persecuted by idiots (usually on the Left) for just existing.  I totally sympathize with Stephen, but in a recent interview he really broke emotionally in regard to what this nasty, filthy coward of a military officer named Burkett did to him, and it was volatile!  However, I believe what Stephen demonstrated was graded absolutism, and therefore he did nothing wrong except being a human being with feelings who was at his limits.  And, there was also a righteous indignation in him, as I saw him not only expressing frustration for his own situation, but also for so many others who were targeted this way.  In the near future, Stephen is going to be publishing his own story about this, so I won't steal all his thunder here, but suffice to say his indignation was totally justifiable.  There may be some Christians who have a fourth form of absolutism called "faux absolutism" who will judge and fault Stephen for even using a couple of cusswords in his video, but I don't judge that - we are human, and yes, even on occasion I tend to utter an F-bomb if something upsets me, and I don't think that is going to consign me to the deepest pit of hell.  Besides, after I blow off steam, generally I quietly repent to God for it anyway and life goes on.  I think Stephen should be allowed that same grace too - after all, he served our nation honorably so I think he merits being able to vent a little.  Sometimes life can take us down some dark paths, and because we are concupiscent human beings and not perfect, we will have vulnerable moments. Anyone who says otherwise is lying.  Graded absolutism, I believe, is a way to deal with it and to make sense of it without compromising things.  But, even in history we see where graded absolutism was also a valid option, although at times it could be ugly.

Among the Church Fathers for instance, we have St. Athanasius of Alexandria, who is actually my confirmation saint.  St. Athanasius, in all the iconography and such, is depicted as almost angelic until you read some historic accounts - for instance, he beat the crap out of the heretic Arius for the damage done by the Arian heresy, and his disciple, St. Shenoute of Atripe, was equally volatile.  Even the famous St. Nicholas - who we like to depict as a mythological character called Santa Claus who doesn't even remotely resemble the real person - was known to clock someone upside the head if they upset him.  So you see, even saints had moments.  Even our Lord, Jesus Christ, actually horsewhipped a bunch of marketing hucksters in the Temple compound for doing what they were doing, and that is in the Gospels!  So next time you see that WWJD bracelet, perhaps the right thought comes into your mind when you want to horsewhip Joel Osteen for his nonsense when you see him on TV - that is probably what Jesus would have done too.  It means there is no culpability morally for doing the right thing, even if it takes a drastic action.  And, I will not even get into the stories of the class of saints called "Fools for Christ" (or Urodivi in Slavonic) - people thought they were a few drumsticks short of a bucket, but they had holy lives and many are canonized saints in both the East and the West.  We sometimes forget that as human beings, we are not angels, and thus perfection is not only not to be expected, but is also practically impossible.  But, even with our limitations, Jesus still loves us, and there is a certain comfort in that.  And, as a grace, he gifted us with the reality of graded absolutism to assure us that at times it is OK to risk doing something if it ultimately achieves a greater moral outcome.  That is graded absolutism in action.

A form of graded absolutism has been practiced by Christians without any moral qualms for centuries - from the tyrannical decrees of the Emperor Decius up to what has happened in recent decades in totalitarian and militantly Islamic lands - and in a way it is a defense mechanism that we have and there is no real sin involved if it is an act that preserves a family or a community.  But, I would argue that graded absolutism was not limited to just defensive action, as it could be offensive as well - the Crusades, for instance, were an offensive against Islamic colonialism that was persecuting other Christians.  Also, there is the story of Vlad the Impaler, the individual Bram Stoker's vampire character Dracula is based on.  I consider Vlad a hero because he took an offensive stance against a horde of barbaric Turks, and he didn't take prisoners - many of their barbecued corpses became the fuel source for candlelight dinners for him, and it sent a clear message.  As gruesome as some more sensitive individuals may find this, we owe Vlad a depth of gratitude - had it not been for his extreme actions, we might well be Muslim today, because the Turks would have taken larger parts of Europe.  Not only is it one dimension of graded absolutism in that an extreme action had a higher moral outcome, but it also was exactly what Aquinas meant by just war - cutting off the enemy at the source by acting offensively first may prevent a greater tragedy, as long as there are perimeters established.  Vlad, for instance, did not kill women and children - he took a preemptive strike against dangerous armed hordes who would have killed him just as ruthlessly had he not taken the initial offensive.  That preemptive strike may have saved civilization.  The same with Klaus von Stauffenberg during the Operation Valkyrie mission against Hitler during World War II - although Stauffenberg was unable to eliminate Hitler, it did show that there were brave German military officers willing to take a stand against something that was morally evil, and the way they saw fit to do that was by getting rid of the source of the problem.  For that, Hitler was shown too as the evil demonic psychopath he was, while Stauffenberg will be always immortalized as a hero (and given he was a devout Catholic as well, I think Stauffenberg was martyred and deserves canonization too).  If a law therefore is unjust, it is actually a moral imperative to defy it - the defiance may be carried out by extreme measures, but the end is the greater good.  I would say in that case, based on the moral just-war law of Aquinas and Augustine's teachings, there are a couple of stipulations for this:

1. A person who chooses to do this action cannot be coerced into it - it comes from their own free will and sense of duty.

2. Unless unintended, collateral damage to innocent people should be avoided.  The person carrying out an act of graded absolutist rationale is also doing this for those innocents too. 

3. One cannot be afraid of getting a little messy in doing the right thing - a justifiable homicide may happen, or some damage may result, but if it does it is fully circumstantial and not part of the actual plan. 

4. If an action like this happens, it must be thought out, and there needs to be a lot of prayer behind it - if there is a doubt or any uncertainty about it, then that just means it needs to be refined. 

When this is the domain of the military or law enforcement carrying out their duties, we remember also the verse in Scripture - blessed are the peacemakers - because law enforcement and military have the goal of making peace and keeping the peace.  "Peacemakers" are not skipping hippies with posies singing "Kumbaya," but are those people called to bring and maintain actual peace.  And, sometimes they wear a uniform.  This is why the whole "defund the police" crowd on the political Left are essentially immoral, because they don't want peace - they are following the opposite in many cases, a Nietzschean "struggle of will" mentality that seeks to bring anarchy and confusion to remake their own image of a utopian state, which oftentimes is the bigger nightmare (read Orwell's 1984 or Huxley's Brave New World, but also look what happened with regimes that started from that - the Bolsheviks, Nazis, Maoists, and every other totalitarian dictatorship started out that way).  In the case of a graded absolutist approach, no one should go looking for trouble, but we should always be prepared if it comes, and not just for us - we have our families, our neighbors, and our society as a whole to consider.  Again, to reiterate, don't go looking for trouble, but be prepared if it starts banging on your door.  

I thank you for enduring my ramblings on this topic, and much more can be said about it.  I will want to deep-dive it more once I read some more on it, but you get the idea.  A philosophical framework to our worldview is integral - philosophy is what we think, and theology is what we believe, and they are not in conflict.  Faith and reason are essential components in a balanced worldview, and it is time we stop trying to divorce them - that was the grave error of the Enlightenment, and thus it needs to be reversed in Christian thinking.  I will see you next visit.