Weber & Bureaucracy (was: MO's Vision...

[Paul Mackin]

Interesting reply, Michael, though you didn't mean to imply, did you,
that Aquinas didn't make as much use of Aristotle's  metaphysics as
of  his logic. Potency and Act. Matter and Form. Being and 
Becoming. Essense and Existence. Substance and Accident.  Body and
Soul. The unmoved mover. All that sort of thing. The Scholastic
explanation of the Euchrist (transubstantiation) was based on principals
of Being that are very Aristotelian. 


		P.

 
On Tue, 24 Oct 2000, Michel Ryckx wrote:

> First: Terrance's observation: "(...) It is possible that there is something
> inherently secularizing about Christianity, for no other religion seems to
> give rise spontaneously to secular  beliefs.(...)"
> 
> Then Paul : "Just a stab, but did any other religion set about to analyze and
> rationalize itself with Aristotle? Did Islam? Does thinking too hard and
> precisely about the sacred tend to destroy it? Substitute something else?
> Protestants weren't big on Aquinas's legacy. Augustine's approach seems more
> suitable to any possible modernist reconciliation to religion I'd think.
> Who's to know? "
> 
> And me.
> One has to make a difference between religion (having one or more convictions
> that cannot be proven scientifically, shared by more people and uttered in a
> more or less structured way), religiosity (the need to feel oneself part of a
> greater entity) and ethics (the (judgment of) human behaviour).
> 
> Some religions, like Buddhism or Confucianism, do not need conceptions like
> supernatural beings -though one may use them.  Life on the planet is at their
> centre.  They are already secular in their own way.  The christian
> conceptions lose their value, or have lesser adherents where man has a
> greater grip on his environment.  Science often provides such a control.
> This is a tendency, which means it is not a natural law; there are exceptions
> (i.e. christian fundamentalism in the US).
> 
> The link between protestantism and the rise of capitalism is not direct,
> though some ideas in protestantism made accumulation of capital easier,
> especially the idea that to be good is reflected in the richnesses one may
> acquire in this world -it was (is) considered a blessing.  This was one of
> mr. Weber's main ideas.  Do not forget there was a main tabu on accumulating
> wealth just by lending money during the Middle Ages.  Transnational banking
> business was developed mainly in protestant areas.
> 
> One can ask the same question an other way: imperial China knew a division of
> labour, a scientific development and an accumulation of wealth that can be
> compared to Europe's.  Why did capitalism did not evolve there?  The answer
> (according to Marx) was that Western Europe lived in chaos politically and
> economically -hence the possibility of concurring-, while China's Emperors
> were doomed to reign very strictly in order to tame nature (the economy of
> water) and to control the peasants.
> 
> A bit on Aristotle: Spain, under the Kaliffs, was the main port for Aristotle
> to enter Western Europe.  The Islam (and their jewish friends) was profoundly
> aware of the interesting knowledge Aristotle offered.  But Islam has nover
> known -and will never know, I think- one and only one main theology.  The
> catholic church is unique in the rigidity of its dogmas, but has been able
> sometimes to incorporate 'new' ideas, like Aristitelism.  But there was a
> battle for about 100 years at different universities which parts could be
> used.  In the end, it was only logic.  Those who wanted to go further, like
> Abélard (author of Sic et Non, Yes or No) or Siger of Brabant, one of the
> great philosophers named by Dante, were marginalised.
> 
> One of the main characteristics of Protestantism is predestination.  It is
> clear that Augustine/Plato is more relevant to a protestant theologian than
> Aristotle -it has more mysticism in it.  If I remember well -correct me if
> I'm wrong- is that Aquinas was the man of the transsubstantion theory, an
> idea that is even now repulsive to other christian churches.  But are holy
> texts not even more important to book readers like protestants?  The hard
> science (mr. Pynchon mentions Leibnitz) was, at the same time, Aristotelian
> by nature (the use of formal logic).
> 
> Sorry for the chaotic reply.
> 
> Writing from a town where every third citizen has voted fascist,
> Michel.
>