As many of you are aware, I have been watching the series by
Jordan Peterson, The
Psychological Significance of the Biblical Stories. I have written a couple of posts commenting
on certain statements made by Peterson and insights gleaned by me.
With this post, I will capture several different tidbits,
taken from several of the videos. I am
focused on his points about culture, albeit he makes dozens of other equally
insightful points. I do not attempt to
cite Peterson word for word; I merely attempt to capture the substance.
I will not link to each video separately; I suggest that if
you find the following of interest, take the time and watch the videos…which
will take a real commitment, as the total runs about 25 hours.
I must say up front, this experience has been eye-opening
for me. Not so much for what I am
learning (although this is extremely valuable), but because of how I have not considered these early
chapters of the Bible previously.
What do I mean? The
Creation, Adam and Eve, Noah and the Flood, Abraham, the Tower of Babel, Sodom
and Gomorrah…I am not sure to describe how I considered these people and
events. I know how I didn’t consider these; I didn’t consider
these in the way presented by Peterson.
And, like a few other moments in my intellectual and
emotional life, I immediately went through an “aha” moment almost from
Peterson’s first words.
Whether one believes these stories and events are the Word
of God, infallible and literal history, or whether one believes these stories
and events capture an oral tradition going back countless millennia…in either
case, it was kind of stupid of me to believe that there weren’t some
tremendously important meanings in these stories beyond the surface.
If it is God speaking, why didn’t I expect more? If it is man capturing oral tradition going
back tens of thousands of years, why wouldn’t I expect something more?
Finally…it seems reasonable for me to suggest: Peterson’s
views on the value of culture to civil society, the value of maintaining
culture in order to avoid tyranny…let’s just say he is eminently more qualified
than I am to make such points. More to
the point: he is eminently more qualified on this topic than any mouthpiece on
the left (to include left-libertarians).
Of course, the Cultural Marxists understand this. Then again, I may be biased as I find his views
and my
views overlap considerably.
From Peterson:
When
you are going through a book like the Bible and you come across a phrase that
you don’t understand, that actually means you missed something. It doesn’t mean that that’s not germane to
the story…it means you’re stupid.
This is clear to me now.
What is interesting is that the “something more,” as
explained by Peterson, fits very nicely into my views of the importance of
culture and tradition. Whether you
believe this history is handed down from God or from man’s dawn of time, this
is probably important. Not important
because it matches my views; important because of the source – either source: God or tradition.
Being
critical of the culture is OK if your objective is to separate the wheat from
the chaff; not OK if your intent is to burn the entire field.
In all views of what is described today as the left: from Gramsci
and the Cultural Marxists to the left-libertarians, this is their intent: to
burn the entire field.
Destroy
a culture and you will end up with tyranny.
I have long awaited reasoned arguments to the contrary. I still wait.
Conceptualize
the highest good and strive for it; to suggest that there is a highest good
means we will be judged. But we don’t
want to hurt anyone’s feelings by saying that one thing is better than another,
so we talk about equal. It would be a
catastrophe to sacrifice the good for the equal; this would mean we would all
be equally unredeemed and miserable.
Equal and universal – condemning man to a hell (“unredeemed”)
in every corner of the earth.
Man
says he would believe if only he was shown a sign. We had a sign – the entire 20th
century of this Marxist culture-destroying work in action. Yet man still doesn’t believe.
And how many on the left – to include left-libertarians –
cannot put two plus two together…or, don’t want you to know that they have?
Satan
is often depicted as the most intellectual, most rational being; its flaw is
that it falls in love with its own productions.
This leads to the fall. We see this
in the Tower of Babel: man tried to reach God; God responded unfavorably. This is parallel to today’s post-modernists;
if they succeed, the outcome will be similar.
Beginning with the Reformation.
Start
fixing the world by cleaning up your room.
I found this, perhaps, the most useful insight. It would be nice if utopians around the world
would unite under this banner.
We
are fed this diet of rights and freedoms, and there is something so
pathologically wrong about that. People
are starving for the antidote. The antidote
is truth and responsibility. That’s the
secret of a meaningful life. Without a
meaningful life, you are left with suffering and nihilism.
This is the political battle being waged in the west today;
few can articulate it this well.
Regarding the Soviet Union:
…the
state became corrupted because each individual allowed themselves to become corrupted;
the consequence of that was the end of the world.
Regarding society generally:
The
reason society corrupts is because individual people lived crooked lives, they
swallowed lies and spoke them and didn’t stand up for the truth. The corruption that spread from each
individual pulled the entire state mechanism into that corruption and made
everything hell.
Every thought leader that we are allowed to respect is
corrupt. Hence, the people become
corrupt and demand a corrupt state.
I
have plans to develop a web site where a student can enter the name of the
university, the professor, and the course number; and an artificial intelligence
agent will tell them if the course is post-modern neo-Marxist
indoctrination. The goal is to drop the
enrollment in the indoctrination courses across the United States by 75%.
This guy Peterson really impresses me. I feel toward him as I do toward Stephen F. Cohen
when Cohen speaks about Russia: a sane voice from academia; a place where you don’t
expect to find any sane voices.
But this project on top?
I suspect the demand will be high.
We
have this built in capacity to posit a higher self and then move towards
it. Maybe that’s part of where the
religious instinct came from. We have
this notion of this transcendent ideal, that seems to be pervasive across
cultures.
If
you can posit an ideal, why can’t you posit the ultimate ideal? Well if you can, then instantly you’ve got a
religious sensibility. Why have we got a
religious instinct? Because the idea
that it’s mere superstition – we can just dispense with that – that’s just wrong. There is some reason why that religious
instinct exists.
But mention the value of religion as part of humans being
human, and you are mocked.
Conclusion
A
minority of people who stand against corruption can keep destruction at bay.
Peterson is certainly doing more than his share.
Thank you, BM, for alerting me to the existence of this series. Because of a previous post, I viewed episode X and was blown away by Peterson's brilliance and wisdom. I'm some kind of a Christian (anabaptist?), so I don't agree with Peterson on everything. I've since watched his first episode and am looking forward to more.
ReplyDelete^^^What he (or she, as the case may be) said.
DeleteThank you; I owe this find to gpond.
DeleteYou might try also his maps of meaning class from University of Toronto. The last class in the series provides a summary of the ideas, then each individual previous class contains a lot of detail. It's a pleasure to be exposed to such discourse let alone try to absorb in it's entirety.
DeleteThanks very much, bionic mosquito! I had never heard of Jordan Peterson's lectures until your article. Kind Regards!
Deletehi, came to you via posts on whr/rinf, and lewrockwell. you seem open to various interpretations of things biblical as taught by parable/metaphor. "Satan is often depicted as the most intellectual, most rational being; its flaw is that it falls in love with its own productions."
ReplyDeletethought i'd share these thoughts for your consideration. 'Satan/Devil/Lucifer" what most people refer as the same entity... is metaphor for man's ill-Reasoned use of The Gift of Free Will, and its consequences. 'He' is not evil personified.. he's representative of man's foibles, weaknesses, which in extreme can be evil. he visits no evil on this sphere or in the heavens; he exposes evil originating in the heart and through the hand of Man. in exposing that evil(illreasoned thought), brings the 'light' of truth. Lucifer, the light bearer.... doubt it not. in summary, he, as metaphor teaches truth. he teaches by example of what of not to do. in more modern conceptual terms, he's a FAIL meme.
thx, for your time..
kikz
Thank you for the comment. In my post, I offered Peterson's view. I didn't offer anything one way or the other about mine.
DeleteI have written elsewhere: I take the Bible quite literally as the Word of God. You may deduce from this that my position regarding Satan is not very malleable.
This does not mean that I do not learn from others: Peterson holds a much different view of the Bible than do I, yet I am learning much from him and his interpretations.