The teachings of Jesus of Nazareth
Traditional spirituality and modern socialism
Jesus of Nazareth has been recognized for two thousand years as a messenger of peace and justice, who stood against war traffickers, the shedding of blood, and the accumulation of wealth. He denounced common activities of deception and fraud, and he rebuked the rabbis, the supposed religious leaders, for their vane conflicts and atrocious crimes, including the assassination of prophets, the falsification of revealed Scripture, and all forms of usury and hypocrisy. Jesus took a firm stand and struggled against such evils of his time. He reformed and reintroduced the Mosaic Law that had been distorted and badly interpreted. He preached purity, humanitarianism, love, and service to humanity. Thus wrote Muhammad Husain Beheshtí and Muhammad Yauád Bahonar, Shiite Islamic theologians and high officials in the Islamic Republic of Iran, killed in 1981 by explosives set off by enemies of the Iranian Revolution.1
Modern capitalism, unconstrained by traditional moral values, will take something as sacred as the celebration of the birth of Jesus and convert it into an orgy of consumerism, driven by the pursuit of profit as the undeclared highest value.
The market itself is a good thing, indeed, a necessary dimension of human economic and social development and an important component of the great civilizations of human history. But the market unconstrained puts everything for sale, even that which ought not be for sale at any price. The market unconstrained is a destructive force.
The rise of the unconstrained market in the modern era is rooted in the ascent of the merchant class in European feudalism, in which it had been a marginal economic force. In alliance with monarchs against the power of feudal lords, the emerging commercial class forged modern nation-states and modern armies and navies, enabling the conquest of the empires, civilizations, and societies of the earth from the fifteenth through the twentieth centuries. Unlike the Islamic conquests of previous centuries, which appropriated the wisdom of the conquered peoples in accordance with the revelations of the Prophet, the conquest by modern European nation-states sought the total transformation of the conquered societies, so that they would serve the new god of the unconstrained market. The Enlightenment consolidated the new order, declaring the sacredness of the individual; and proclaiming that knowledge is rooted only in reason and empirical observation, without the guidance or assistance of the revelations of the prophets.
But the modern order was unsustainable. It would eventually run out of new lands and peoples to conquer, braking its advance. And the conquered peoples, driven by a universal human desire for freedom and dignity, would refuse to accept the terms of subjugation imposed. They would form movements that would become increasingly mature in grasping the unsustainable contradictions of the world-system and the necessary steps in the construction of a more just and sustainable world order.
The elites of the powerful nations of the twentieth century lacked the wisdom to perceive the inherent limitations of the world-system that they ruled. They showed themselves to be incapable of reorienting the world-system on the basis of justice, equality for all, and sustainability, which would have been a politically viable world project following the two world wars of the twentieth century. So it has been left to the colonized peoples to forge a more just and sustainable world order, and they have been doing so since 1946, on the basis of a synthesis of traditional and modern conceptions and of materialist and spiritual values, drawing upon the political philosophies of the West as well as the traditional wisdom of their own societies. In this synthesis from below, Christianity and Islam, in versions undistorted by wealth and power, have a place.
An important characteristic of our times is the incapacity of the West, including elites, academics, and so-called activists of all political ideologies to discern these fundamental characteristics and tendencies of modern human history, which by contrast, are understood and explained by the leaders and intellectuals of the Third World movements, who are forging, in theory and practice, a more just and sustainable world order, based in such principles as the sovereignty and equality of nations, the rights of nations to control their own resources and economies, and the rights of citizens to health care, education, housing, and nutrition. The myopic view of the West, still possessing political/economic power but in moral decadence, is a serious threat to humanity. It is a question of whether or not the emerging world order is able to consolidate itself before the West in desperation and decadence destroys all.
In this situation, the recent emergence of post-modern ideologies with respect to race, gender, and sexuality generates even greater confusion and division, especially in its belief that truth is a matter of social construction, removing political practice from its necessary foundation in reason and morality. At the same time, the individual turn to traditional religious beliefs and practices, although it avoids the post-modern confusions and absurdities, tends toward purely personal resolutions.
In contrast to Western post-modern ideologies, modern Western political parties, and traditional religious beliefs and practices, the Third World emancipatory projects are showing humanity the necessary road: a synthesis of materialism and spirituality as well as of traditional and modern concepts, in the common human quest for a more just and sustainable world order. To escape from their myopia, Western intellectuals and activists have to personally encounter the discourses of Third World leaders and intellectuals, particularly the historic leaders of Third World nations that are constructing socialism. They have taught that the true and the right can be understood and defended in political practice; and that exceptional leaders of people’s revolutions, guided by their grasp of the true and the right, can lead their peoples to the construction of just, peaceful, and prosperous societies.
“Religion and modern socialism: The universal human quest for the true and the right,” February 22, 2022
“The cognitional theory of Bernard Lonergan: The invariant structure for understanding the true and the right,” December 25, 2022
“The spiritual worldview: A traditional wisdom necessary for our times,” December 27, 2022
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Muhammad Husain Beheshtí and Muhammad Yauád Bahonar. Introducción a la Cosmovisión del Islam [Introduction to the Worldview of Islam]. Qom, Islamic Republic of Iran: Fundación Cultural Oriente, 1988. As is common among Islamic theologians, Beheshtí and Bahonar do not accept the Christian doctrine of the Trinity. I leave aside the question of whether Jesus ought to be understood as fully divine and fully human, in accordance with Christian beliefs; or as a prophet in the emancipatory monotheistic prophetic tradition that includes Adam, Abraham, Moses, and Mohammad, in accordance with Islamic teaching. I focus on what I take to be a reasonable interpretation of his teachings, based on available testimonies.