This is a course about the history of Skepticism from the ancient Greeks to today, with special attention to the political ramifications of questioning man's ability to know the world and himself with any certainty. We will discuss the debates raging between Plato and the Sophists, the rise of Christianity in the Roman world, and the so-called 'Skeptical Crisis' of the Renaissance as well as Pierre Bayle's Skepticism and David Hume's. In addition the Natural Law tradition will be explored and the relationship between Skepticism and Conservatism. In the second part, we will explore the systematic relations between Skepticism and politics. What is skeptical doubt? When is doubt relevant? How does Skepticism relate to tolerance and to freedom of expression? And can it help us to solve political problems not only in a critical, but also in a creative way?
Montaigne to Bayle
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From the course by Erasmus University Rotterdam
The Politics of Skepticism
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From the lesson
Skepticism and Religion
We will sketch some of the skeptical arguments against Christianity developed by Roman philosophers, but we will also see how Skepticism soon turned into an ally of Christian theology. By the end of the seventeenth century, however, Pierre Bayle turned Skepticism into a highly questionable source of support to revealed religion.
Meet the Instructors
Wiep van BungeProf. dr.
Faculty of Philosophy
Tim De MeyDr.
Faculty of Philosophy
[MUSIC]
So far, we've seen that Christianity in the Roman Empire was hardly touched by
skepticism.
On the contrary, skeptical arguments pointing, for instance,
to the failure by Pagan philosophers to reach any kind of agreement
were embraced in order to highlight the security offered by faith.
By the late 16th century, however,
skepticism was starting to present something of a problem to Christianity.
That's why we refer to a skeptical crisis.
It's not as if due to the popularity of skepticism as a school of thought,
all over Europe people were losing faith.
As a matter of fact, the first philosophical and
explicitly atheist treaties would have early dates from the 1650s.
It's a so called clandestine manuscript entitled Theophrastus redivivus,
Theophrastus revived.
We don't know who put it together or even where it was composed.
But it would seem the author was very close to the [FOREIGN].
A group of late humanist callers active in Paris through the first half of
the 17th century, who cultivated a pretty cosmopolitan,
very realistic if not a cynical outlook on life.
Several of them were working at court and
there is something aristocratic about their outlook as well.
In particular the emphasis on the political purpose served by religions
could easily lead to put a perspective religious claims to truth.
Yes they were Catholics, but it would seem mainly by habit.
Advise their readers to follow the customs cherished in the country
they happened to inhabit.
When in Rome, act as the Romans.
Montaigne, one of their favorite authors
had made this point already at the end of the 16th century.
Why am I Catholic?
Because I was born in Bordeaux.
If anything Montaigne taught his readers to be modest about their own views.
We may call Indians barbarians, but who knows how they feel about us.
We like to think that human beings are infinitely superior to animals.
But are we really?
Montaigne 's pupil or Peirre Charron, had gone even further.
Often he'd argued it is wise to hide one's true feelings.
[MUSIC]
It was only by the end of the 17th century, however, that
skepticism resurfaced with a vengeance with the writings of Pierre Bayle.
The French Protestant living in Rotterdam, who was to become famous for
his Dictionarie of 1697.
But whose views had upset many of his contemporaries much earlier already.
A Protestant refugee from [FOREIGN] Pierre Bayle had barely arrived
in the Netherlands where he launched a theory first developed among
the [FOREIGN] that atheism did not necessarily lead to immoral behavior.
As a matter of fact,
Atheism at the time was widely held to be a moral issue first and foremost.
People denying the existence of God were widely held to be unable
to live decent lives, as they refused to believe in any kind of reckoning.
Now, Bell argued that it was a mistake to believe
that people act inspired by the ideas they cherish or the beliefs they hold.
If this were true,
the history of Christianity would not have been as bloody as it was.
According to Bayle, people act out of instincts and because of their interests.
According to Bayle,
the religious affinities of people simply did not affect their moral behavior.
In addition, he was ruthlessly honest
about the disasters rolled in the name of Christianity.
He was one of the first scholars to admit
the rise of Christianity had been marred by Christian intolerance and
that the crusades have been a pretty criminal enterprise.
And finally the wars of religion following the reformation have been an outrage.
Perhaps, at this stage it should be added that Bayle's frustrations over
the moral history of Christianity, of course had a deeply personal background.
He was a refugee himself, in 1685 following the revocation of the Edict
of Nantes his brother Jaques, a protestant minister, had died in a french jail.
We know how deeply Bayle was hurt by this tragedy.
Heroically however he next came up a pretty radical defense
of religious tolerance racial deeply affected by his skepticism.
According to Bayle, a protestant, we always have to obey to our conscious.
It's our duty to do so, as it is in our conscious that we are facing our maker.
This implies, or so Bayle argues, that we are entitled to make mistakes.
In the end, it's only up to God to decide who is right, and
who is wrong following their consciences.
It's easy to see why this should be such dangerous
line of reasoning from a theological perspective.
If religion is instead an essentially private matter,
does this also mean that rational disputes among adherents of different faiths
is essentially impossible?
The fact that religious disputes as a rule lead to violence definitely suggests
that religious impervious to reason.
And worse was to follow.
For in the Dictionnaire, Bayle unleashed the full force of skepticism,
arguing that theology was unable to answer some of the most basic questions.
For instance, regarding the existence of evil.
Not content with St Augustine's comments on the non-being of evil,
Bayle put the simple question how it could be that God is both omnipotent and
benevolent with so much evil all around.
Evil is real, Bayle insisted.
And sadly enough, Christians throughout the ages have had their fair share, so
why does God not prohibit it's occurrence?
Famously, Leibniz would take the the bait,
publishing his Théodicée of 1710 as a direct reply to Bayle.
[MUSIC]
So much for Bayle, a major skeptic, who kept insisting that he was a Theodicist,
a Christian that is who felt that the truth of Christianity should
not be demonstrated racially, but accepted on the basis of faith alone.
But most of his contemporaries appear to have felt that he only used
his appeal to faith as a mask, hiding from view his real intentions.
To be added that to this day, Bayle's colors are deeply divided over
the question whether he was a [FOREIGN], a complicated protestant,
or just forced to disguise his true feelings.
Bayle is a pretty elusive author.
What's the purpose of the story Bayle and his Philosophical Commentary II,
9 about the imposter returning from war?
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