Futuristic metaphysics

The paper examines the controversy as to the futuristic role of metaphysics being desirable or otherwise. The author takes a middle position between an optimistic and pessimistic appraisal in stressing the reality of futuristic metaphysics and the dynamic of evolving freedom. The paper was developed in response to the speech by Vaclav Havel, "On the Need for Transcendence in the Postmodem World," in response to America's celebration of its independence and to the counter-response, "Is Transcendence Necessary," by Edward Cornish, as president of the World Future Society. The author creates new wording in distinguishing chosenness, in the universal spiritual choice of "The Fatherhood of God and Brotherhood of Man," from chosinness, a sinful choice, wherein chosenness is religiously and secularly applied to the detriment of others.

The title of this article was engendered by Vaclav Havel's speech, "On the Need for Transcendence in the Postmodern World," in response to America's celebration of its independence and to the counter-response "Is Transcendence Necessary," by Edward Cornish, as president of the World Future Society, both of which appeared in the July-august 1995 edition of the FUTURIST.

I would like to consider my own article as constituting a trilogy, of sorts, in agreeing with the major points of their different positions while continuing with their differing and my own perspectives.

Havel presents his central argument for the need for self-transcendence in meeting postmodem needs for "unified meaning," in response to which Cornish states, "History shows us that metaphysical doctrines have only too often led to intense conflict rather than increased harmony."

Cornish proceeds to emphasize his point by referring to one particular historical involvement in Havel's capital city, Prague, among numerous savage religious battles, wherein outraged Protestants threw two Catholic councilors from the windows of Hradcany Castle, which later became the residence of Czech presidents. He then proceeds to question how any metaphysical propositions, even those as carefully non-doctrinal as those proposed by Havel, can escape the inevitable "fanaticism" of the metaphysical process.

Cornish's reminder, nevertheless, seems more relevant to others rather than to Havel, for Havel is well aware of the historical abuses of metaphysics in distancing himself from them. Havel is faulted a second time, however, not for his metaphysical reliance but for his metaphysical relevance . . . in relying upon the Anthropic Cosmological Principle and the Gaia Hypothesis. The Anthropic Principle suggests that the universe was expressly built for humans, and the Gaia Hypothesis portrays the world around us as a living Earth Mother, in response to which Cornish questions how unlikely it is that devout Christians, Moslems and other religionists will switch their allegiance to Gaia or Anthropic Cosmology.

My first reaction to their positions was to agree with Cornish as to the need for metaphysical caution, but to disagree with his pre-cautionary critique of Havel. It seemed as if Havel were put in a metaphysical bind, wherein he was faulted for relying on metaphysics on the supposition that metaphysics is inevitably fanatical and doctrinal, despite the fact that Havel goes to great lengths to disavow the traditional and the inevitable of not only fanatical doctrine but of any system of ideas contrary to "a science producing ideas that in a certain sense allow it to transcend its own limits."

It appeared to me that Havel was first prejudged to be at fault in his metaphysical reliance based on a metaphysical judgement before all the metaphysical facts are in, that metaphysics, per se, is at fault. Secondly, Havel, was thereupon post and past judged to be at fault as to the past in his metaphysical relevance, in not relying on the relevant, metaphysics of religionists, which ironically was presented in Cornish's own example of the Hradcany Castle to be the central fault of relevant metaphysics.

Cornish is right to caution us about metaphysics, but those cautions are not right as to Havel's position, in the simultaneous cautions that Havel has not gone far enough in bringing too much of the past into the future, while going too far, in not being able to move into the future without moving with the relevant present.

It were as if Havel were being faulted for going back to the future and forward to the past ... in not being able to get there from here ... in not being able to get anywhere, metaphysically, from here. If he went metaphysically forward, he would inevitably bring the doctrinal fanaticism of the metaphysical past, and in any case, he couldn't possible go to any metaphysical future without the metaphysical relevance of the past that is the present... that is the problem to begin with.

To employ the metaphor of a metaphysical scale, Havel's unlimited metaphysics were judged to be both too limiting and unlimited, in failing to weigh in within the limits of the metaphysical scale. The limits of the metaphysical scale, according to Cornish, are weighted against any metaphysical weighing, in the limits of Havel carrying too much and too little metaphysical baggage - in carrying too much of the metaphysical process of the past and too little of the metaphysical substance of the present.

In attempting to incorporate what's applicable in both of these positions - that of Havel's unlimiting metaphysical encountering with Cornish's counter of metaphysical limiting - the futuristic nexus revolves around one's choice of any one metaphysical choice in synthesizing the relevant with the futuristic and the particularistic with the universal. A futuristic metaphysics must not only transcend its own limits, as Havel suggests, but it must not transcend against others, as Cornish cautions.

If one wants to further categorize the metaphysical positions of Havel and Cornish, one can easily decipher a continental European philosophy of meta-of going beyond-physics versus that of a down home Yankee know-how: in preferring to know the scientific how rather than the philosophic how. Haval presents his adaptive philosophy of essence to which Cornish responds with his American logical positivism through a reliance on the tools of "a reformed social science"

At this stage of our journey, a further metaphor for our futuristic metaphysics is called for in calling for a car with a manual transmission whose mission is transcendence - in accelerating in the right direction, a la Havel, while breaking at every wrong turn, a la Cornish.

In preparing to metaphysically drive in our futuristic car, Havel is cautioned by Cornish to check his metaphysical brakes for being too loose, in not being able to hold back the vehicular monicidal metaphysical momentum of the past; while Havel is also cautioned for being too hard on religionists, for having too much of an anti-lock braking mechanism in locking out what's religiously relevant.

The message appears to be more than that of safe metaphysical driving and more than that of drive at your own metaphysical risk to don't risk driving at all, in being unsafe, metaphysically, at any speed .. . in under or over braking.

Cornish's recommendation of "reformed social science" in conjunction with the "possibilities of new electronic technologies" is correct as far as it goes, but it doesn't go far enough ... metaphysically.

Nevertheless, in analyzing the prospects for a futuristic metaphysics, I, for one, feel grateful to both Havel and Cornish- to Havel for putting his foot on the metaphysical accelerator, and to Cornish, for putting his on the brake.

In driving onward and, hopefully, upward on the road to a futuristic metaphysics, I'd recommend that we turn on the metaphysical ignition, as Havel does, while keeping our eyes on the speed limit, as Cornish advises. Before shifting into any futuristic gear, however, we need to put ourselves in the drivers seat rather than in the passenger seat of our vehicular metaphysical choice.

The choice to be made is that of choosing how to unlimit our metaphysical freedom in facing metaphysical limits without being limited by them.

The greatest danger in unsafe metaphysical driving is not that of falling into historic potholes, although that remains a danger as Comish correctly warns us; but the greatest danger is to assume - in making as ass of you and me - that freedom makes you free. One's freedom can be used to make oneself unfree, to include the modern process of one freedom to be unfree, in the post-modem processing of one's freedom.

Ironically, the process of American freedom as an increasingly one world modem process of free trade and economic liberalism appears to be far more post-modernly conservative in conserving by avoiding, in more avoidance of the implications of its freedom than in the avoidance of freedom in the newly free escapes from freedom in the post-Communist world. As compared to the old world European philosophic essence that's both adopted and adapted by Havel, the one-world philosophy of American-styled freedom presents itself as far less than free in its daily constitutionals of freedom than it does in its Constitution of freedoms. Similarly, in a related avoidance of freedom, America has avoided the political consequences of the victory of its economic freedom over Marxist-Leninism in avoiding the defeat of freedom in the world trade, trade-in of Market-Leninism.

Just as the avoidance of freedom can be as dangerous as its suppression, metaphysical choice cannot be avoided, as Cornish would like to avoid it, for no choice is a faulty choice of metaphysical default that produces the metaphysical faults of post-modern default that Havel wants to avoid.

In putting ourselves into metaphorical gear, metaphysically and futuristically, we need to be careful in keeping the road signs in sight, particularly the particularistic religious ones that Cornish refers to, while not being too careful in downshifting to a safer gear than necessary. While it's supposedly better to be safe than sorry, the pre-supposition to be metaphysically safe is to be futuristically sorry.

Correct metaphysical driving, however, is not metaphysical correctness, but, rather, correct metaphysical choice. Knowing what's immediately wrong or incorrect, nevertheless, doesn't mean that we know what's ultimately right. At our universal best, we need to know not what's singularly best, but what's best for our universal human nature and for our natural universe. Immediately, and at a minimum, we can begin to know what's most incorrect, at present, and most wrong for our future, in modifying what's most wrong into something that's least wrong and, hopefully, most right.

If we refuse to hope for metaphysical reform because the task is too hopelessly metaphysical, then we are left with the assumption of metaphysical inevitability-the metaphysics of ass over umption-in assuming all the faults of faulty and defaulted metaphysical choice as our only futuristic choice.

For those of us who drive stick shift automobiles, we're accustomed to the fifth gear as our highest gear, whereas Havel has shifted into a sixth futuristic gear of transcendence, for going even higher. Some might think that Haval is exceeding the metaphysical speed limit; and indeed he is, in exceeding the limits that we, as Americans, have imposed on ourselves.

There's an analogy, here, to the autobahn, one that many Americans who've been in the military have experienced, in driving on the speedlimitless German autobahn. The analogy is that speed, even an unlimited one, need not be dangerous, provided that you're well trained and your car is engineered for that speed. At present, however, exceeding the speed limit can be dangerous in America, since almost anyone can get a driver's license and keep it into senility, and since most Americans cannot afford highly engineered Mercedes, Audis, and BMW's. Therefore, speeding is quite dangerous for Americans, but it need not be in a different context of better trained drivers and better engineered cars.

A safety conscious American might say that Havel's acceleration is metaphysically breathtaking-to the degree of taking one's metaphysical breath away-as occurred in Cornish's out of breath metaphysical braking, in his metaphysical road sign of "Stop Before You Proceed."

My own road sign in driving towards futuristic metaphysics is to "Proceed With Caution But Do Proceed," while being ready to brake, when necessary, in gearing into first in shifting upwards toward the futuristic gear. In further employing the metaphor of defensive metaphysical driving, it's imperative that we keep Cornish's road sign in mind, even when we're of a different mind, in watching out for the historical road conditions of danger-and in avoiding old and new metaphysical potholes.

One cannot, however, avoid the metaphysical dangers on the futuristic road by idling the engine and shifting into neutral metaphysics-in standing still in going nowhere ... metaphysically. Just as the best defense is offense, the best metaphysics is to go beyond taking historical offense to taking the offense, futuristically, without giving offense. . in falling into the historical, modem or post-modem offensiveness of metaphysical fault or default.

We need to be watchful, so as to see what to avoid ahead, rather than to avoid seeing what's ahead. If we drive correctly, if our car is well engineered, and if our vehicular metaphysical acceleration is monitored by the right quality control, then we should be able to drive around rather than through old and new metaphysical hazards.

However, is driving ahead we need to check our rear view mirror in shifting into first, not only to avoid any rear end collision in colliding with the reckless driving of past metaphysics, but, also, to harness the religionist momentum of the past and present. In so doing, we can wee the Abrahamic tradition that gave birth to the monotheistic religions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Nevertheless, we also need to incorporate other spiritual traditions and the insights in the Way of the Buddha, in particular.

We need to observe, as some of my Buddhist friends have observed, how much violence is associated with the history of monotheism to include the violence of Abraham, himself, in his willingness to obey God to the homicidal extent of killing his sone as a sacrifice. Sacrifice seems to permeate the Abrahamic tradition from the religious sacrifice of the Jews, to Jesus as the Sacrificial Lamb of the Christians, to the sacrifice of oneself and others in the Islamic Surrender to the Will of the Prophet.

In reference to the futuristic metaphysical goal of universal human brotherhood, we can observe that the great monotheistic religions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, as great as they are in their belief, have often been less than great in their practice of that belief. All three have at one time or another persecuted not only each other, but themselves, in intra-religious holy wars even more unholy in their ungodliness than the inhumanity of inter-religious crusades, pogroms, jihads, inquisitions (those of the English as well as the Spanish to include Protestants along with Catholics), and "God gave your land to me" religious and ethnic cleansings.

One can easily understand why many would like to keep God out of our metaphysical future in their belief that more of God has brought less to man and, therefore, lees of God should bring more to man. It's easy to understand this secular belief in religious non-belief without agreeing with it, for there exists a fatal flow in the secular humanistic critique of God and man. This flow lies neither in humanism nor in God, but in man's proclivity of secular belief in man as God, when he rejects the religious belief in a God for all men. The well-intended secular humanistic intention that less of God brings more to man is correct, but in a quite different way than intended. That more was alluded to by Dostoevski in The Brothers Karamazov in the statement, "If there is no God, then anything is possible," to include more of any secular evil in compounding religious evil.

Nevertheless, this suspicion of the very idea of God in any man's religion is historically well founded in the illustration that Cornish presents among countless others; and it is one that needs to be understood in its futuristic implications. One can understand, however, without rejecting the idea of an understanding God that some men rejected in the practice of religion, even more than in the secular denial of it.

Let us metaphysically allow for a futuristic understanding of God; but let us proceed into second gear with a more universal understanding to incorporate the traditions of the Great Spirit of indigenous peoples and the Ultimate One of Buddhism as a supplement rather than a substitute for the Judeo-Christian and Abrahamic traditions.

One can assert that metaphysical oneness can be a source of both good and evil, in bringing people together in love or in pulling them apart in hate. My own religious hypothesis is that the more narrow and straight one's religiosity in reference to one God, the greater one's propensity to go to wide and crooked extremes in denigrating others.

Accordingly, while the lesser gods of Buddhism and the greater saints of Catholicism, as the two major religions of East and West, share some similarities in offending some fundmentalists, they also share a futuristic propensity for metaphysically countering the traditions of ethnocentricity, traditionalism, literalism and fanaticism in some other religions. Some of these other religious traditions fuel a past and present metaphysics of Divine Hate, in a Theology of Crime in offending against others, in the morally dirty crimes of ethnic and religious cleanings.

In accelerating in second gear, we encounter choseness, the Chosen People tradition of the Hebrew Covenant that also manifests itself in the Christian Covenant. Both of these convenants of choseness culminate in the Judeo-Christian Bible of the Old and New Testaments. Some purists may assert that Judeo-Christian is a misnomer because of major differences between Judaism and Christianity; but regardless of those obvious differences, the major similarity of choseness justifies the Judeo-Christian hyphenate, in my opinion.

In reference to Jewish, Christian and Moslem religionists, Cornish is quite correct in cautioning Havel that these People of the Book-be it Old Testament, New Testament or The Koran-are unlikely to choose to turn in their old books in order to turn to new choices inherent in the Gaia Hypothesis and the Anthropic Cosmological Principle.

Chosenness, defined as universal spiritual chosenness, in choosing one God for all men, is integral to any humanistic interactive relationship with God. In futuristic theology, one might describe it as being "on-line with God"

Nevertheless, there's an inherent religious danger in the spiritual metaphysics of chosenness, in plugging in one's religion to keep oneself On-Line, in keeping others plugged out ... in their being religiously Off-Line, downed and out of the system. The uplifting metaphysical software of an interactive program of universal spiritual chosenness-in everyone's choice of choosing and being chosen-can degenerate into a programmed choice in the self-serving religious hardware of being hard on others in wearing them down ... while one is easy on one's self in lifting oneself up in a group holiness that's wholly at others expense.

The holistic negation of the one and the same holiness of one God for everyone occurs when one God becomes one's God only, in a God gave this or that to me in my taking it from you. In both historical and recent examples, the taking of others land not to mention, "slaying of the inhabitants thereof" by some Christian missionaries and some Jewish settlers has given the "chosen" Judeo-Christian tradition a less than Godly heritage that no truly Godly Christian or Jew can be proud of. The colonial exploitation of "The White Man's Burden" was aided and abetted by "the false choseness of the Godly Burden," in making God an unholy burden by burdening others (and God) with one's own chosenness.

Therefore, while chosenness in its universal spiritual dimension can be a metaphysical blessing, its application, be it religious or secular, can be a metaphysical curse. The best protection from the proclivity of the blessed choice of chosenness to become a cursed sinful choice-what I term chosin-ness in the choice of sin in sinning against non-chosen others-is spiritual universalism.

The traditions of spiritual universalism in the East and West must be brought together and used as a rigorous monitor, in monitoring the religious tendency to turn universal spiritual chosenness into self-serving religious chosinness. Only when chosenness is metaphysically defined as God being chosen by and for all men, will there ever be a futuristic theology that can function as a metaphysical counter to the "ever again" of religious and ethnic cleansing-in a "never again" to any group being chosin (in the sinful choice of being perceived by others as less chosen than themselves).

In shifting upward from the first gear of one's God as one God for everyone and the second gear of universal spiritual chosenness, we find ourselves developing more secular speed but less spiritual power in the third gear of the secular humanistic acceleration of the Enlightenment.

Once again, we find ourselves with strengths and weaknesses and virtues and vices in needing to know when to accelerate and when to brake, in the acceleration of secular humanism. One of the metaphysical potholes of secular humanism, and one that I referred to earlier, is a fatal flaw in its critique of God and Man. That flaw lies in the belief in man as God when a religious belief in God is rejected.

The Enlightenment philosophy in the West was quite different from Buddhist Enlightenment in the East. In freeing Western man from a transcendent God, it left him with a transcendent belief without a belief in the Transcendent, a transcendence without the Transcendent; in a belief in any belief-culminating in laissez-faire (lousey-faire) capitalism, international socialism (Communism), national socialism (Nazism), and more recently, national communism (in the newly free escape from freedom in many former communist lands).

Nazism, in particular, was a logical development rather than an aberration in the land of Goethe, of a secular humanistic enlightenment that defined what was good for oneself and one's group without reference to any universal God as the basis of morality. That humanism-in all its human perfection-could become perfectly inhumane was a paradox, but not a contradiction. Such a development is quite logical when man transcends himself without the Transcendent. The fact that the religious history of man acting in the name of his one God was often quite ungodly, only became even more godless when man secularly transcended himself by putting himself in God's place.

Both the religious ungodliness and secular godlessness of man proceeded neither from God nor from man alone, but from disassociation of the correct association of God and man. Therefore, a correct metaphysical conceptualization of the Divine is more than a matter of personal faith in the intellectual assent of one's will to one's religion. The correct metaphysical association between God and men involves the collective will to perfect one's religious faith in being perfected in one God for all men, rather than being perfect in one's faith for oneself or one's group.

The disassociation of God and man in either believing in one God for oneself instead of for all men as brothers, or in denying God by acting like a god, with the secular dogmas of human predestination according to evolution, class, economics, ethnicity, or more recently, the cognitive elite (whose cognition as to others shows itself to be less than elite), explains the greatest metaphysical irony of all: good and evil become one and the same with the greatest good justifying the greatest evil. Whether it be religious or secular totalitarianism, what is totally good becomes totally bad, with the best virtue justifying the worst vice. The ultimate vice of this religious or secular virtue proceeds from the incorrect association of oneness with God by defining one's own God or good in terms of what is good for oneself in one's group.

The Hitlerian refrain of "Ein Volk, Ein Reich, Ein Fuehrer" (one people, one realm, one leader) is the ultimate secular version of ethnic cleansing that proceeded from the secular version of chosenness: a religious cleansing wherein the religious concept of a Chosen People became that of a "Chosin" People- a People of Sin-when a new Chosen People, the Master Race, appropriated chosenness to themselves in eliminating Jews and others as "chosin."

Whether man denies himself in the name of God or denies God in the name of man, men have disassociated themselves from God in the death of Man rather than God. Mankind's unkind history of religiously and secularly appropriating oneness with the one true God to himself, alone, at the expense of nature (which calls forth the GAIA Hypothesis), or to his group, to the exclusion of others, at the expense of others human nature (which calls forth the Antrhopic Principle), has been a persistent metaphysical lie in opposition to the everlasting truth of a universal inclusive God.

There is a need for a futuristic metaphysical conspiracy to conspire for God in a human brotherhood and sisterhood of those who believe in one God for everyone over one's god for oneself or one's group. Religion needs not only to be acknowledged, as Cornish acknowledges it, but respected, as well, if there is to be any progress in getting well on to a futuristic metaphysics from the here and now of religion. However, the respect due religion is a spiritual respect, in respecting religion as God meant it be rather than as man has made it to be.

The metaphysical obscurity of God is so dense, however, that some have already said that God is dead; and others might say that if God's alive, he's a well kept secret. The sublime secret of futuristic metaphysics must be that God need not be a dead secret, although God has been kept secret by those who do evil in the name of good by putting their belief in their God, or in their secular substitute for God for themselves, in the place of one God for everyone.

The futuristic metaphysical conspiracy should be a quirk of faith in being unique in being universal, in being existentially free in being essentially bound in the spiritual foundations of a universal God. The conspiracy is to be the same and to be different, in having the same faith as others in their religious faith in God without rejecting others according to religion. The conspiratorial metaphysics lies in this religious quirk of faith that goes beyond religion without rejecting religion, in attempting to build what has yet to be built and house what has yet to be housed in the spiritual metaphysical architecture of a religious Fatherhood of God in addition to the Fatherhood in religion, and in building a Brotherhood in one God to supplement any one Brotherhood in religion.

In so proceeding, in building upon the Abrahamic religious foundations and upon the secular humanistic foundations of The Enlightenment, we also need to incorporate and build upon The Way of Enlightenment of the Buddha. The Enlightenment philosophy of the West needs to be integrated with the philosophic Way of Enlightenment of the Buddha-in a yin and yang balancing of one's transcendent self with the transcendent denial of self.

The next metaphysical gear, that of the fourth gear of ecumenical universalism has to be more broadly ecumenical in order to keep up with the increased breadth and depth of futuristic metaphysics. The Ecumenical Movement has made enormous progress since Vatican II and the most holy Pope John XXIII (who was never holy at wholly others expense), in improving Catholic-Protestant-Anglican-Orthodox relations, and in denouncing the historic scandal of anti-Semitism. There has also been some movement on the Catholic-Muslim level, although much more needs to be done in removing limits to mutual tolerance rather than in joint moves to put limits on birth control.

Nevertheless, the ecumenism of a futuristic metaphysics is not a prayer that "They may all be one," but, rather, a prayer that any one religous minority may be tolerated by any one and all majority Further, much more sensitivity is needed in reference to non-Abrahamic spiritualities-as evidenced in Pope John Paul's Sri Lankan visit where his unfortunate description of Buddhism as negative was most negatively received.

Such negative descriptions are most ecumenically negative, indeed, in attesting to a negative disregard in the ill-chosen statement of a well-intentioned Pope. Although my own statements don't carry the weight of the Papacy, I like to think that they carry the weight of truth, in stating from my Jesuit educated Catholic background that The Way of the Buddha has been the most positive experience of my life.

In the future, and I'd recommend the near future, we need to hear more from our Buddhist brothers, who know us; and we need to hear less from some of us, be it from a Popemobile or a tele-evangelist in Mobile, Alabama, about what they think about others whose wisdom they don't know.

In reference to ecumenical universalism, I recall what I consider to be the best definition from a conversation a number of years ago with a Vietnamese Buddhist monk. At that time, in having been theologically educated with the analytic rigor of the Jesuits, I was foolhardy enough to assume that I could apply Western theological analytic criteria in my inquiry into Eastern spirituality. After attempting to theologically define, categorize and delineate, the gentle and patient monk replied as follows:

"When you get to the top of the mountain, what is more important... how you get there or that you're there?"

To which I replied by nodding the obvious.

"Also, when you look down from the highest point, doesn't everything below tend to look the same." In response to which I replied again by nodding.

To this day, I know of no better description of ecumenical universalism than the silent answers inherent in his non-adversarial rhetorical questions that answered themselves. As a final comment on Christian-Buddhist relations which I believe can and should be improved, I know of many Catholic religous who have worked with Buddhist monks, not one of whom, to my personal knowledge, had ever referred to Buddhism with expressions other than those characterizing it as most peaceful and beautiful.

The next gear is that of the fifth gear of metaphysical freedom, the cruising gear of choosing freedom not only for oneself but for others. Freedom of any kind, however, is easier said than done, as America's Constitution of freedom, for example, cannot unsay and undo all the failures of freedom in the daily constitutionals of America's problems with it freedom.

Martin Luther, who took offense at the Catholic freedom of indulgences, indulged in his own Protestant freedom to give offense during the German Peasants revolt by refusing to protest against the German landlords, in allowing them to take more freedom for themselves in disallowing more freedom for their subjects. The unfree peasants, who quoted the freedom verses of Luther's Bible of freedom, took their faith in freedom seriously in a bloody revolt for their freedom. They put their faith for salvation in Luther's faith for salvation by faith alone, to find themselves faithlessly alone, in being bloodied not only by their landlords, but by Luther, who kept his faith with the Germanlandlords rather than with his Christian Lord.

As a result, they experienced the lost of their very physical salvation, along with their faith in salvation by their freedom, alone, in the experience of their Protestant patron of freedom patronizing the freedom of the Protestant establishment to the total disestablishment of their freedom and themselves.

I refer to this phenomenon as the Lutherhan Dilemma which is a dilemma of freedom by no means limited to Luther...in one's taking freedom for oneself in taking it away from others.

The next stage in the accelerating struggle for freedom was neither a Catholic nor a Protestant struggle, but, rather, a Masonic one in the American Revolution: one that is commemorated in millions of exchanges every day in the Masonic symbol of the all seeing eye on America's dollar. While the almighty dollar may have lost some or even all of its might, to the yen and deutschmark, the one all-seeing eye of its freedom has made its world wide mark in others yen for the modem process-if not substance of its freedom.

Not only was George Washington, as the Father of his country and the military leader of the American War for freedom, a Mason, but many other founding fathers who wrote the Constitution of the United States were Masons as well. What they shared in common was a strong influence and adherence to Masonic principles as to freedom from religious and political dogmatism. There is considerable but largely unknown historical documentation that shows a direct linkage between the Masonic Constitutions of the Reverend Anderson, a Scottish Presbyterian minister, (often referred to as the Anderson or Masonic Constitutions) and the American Constitution, which closely follows its tenets and principles.

Some anti-Masons, who contrary to common assumptions are more numerous in Protestant than Catholic circles, may dispute this association as no more than a coincidence; but it cannot be disputed that if it is a coincidence-it is a most extraordinary coincidence, indeed. Such an unlikely coincidence, in fact, would probably exceed a scientific probability correlation association in excess of .01-which in common parlance translates to a random probability that's not only most improbable, but's as next to impossible as one can possibly measure the probability of any possibility.

Despite the advance of freedom in the American metaphysics of its revolution, however, the constitutional system of American freedom presided over a revolting system of slavery, that quoted its own nativist Bible of freedom to itself in lighting burning crosses as it ignited the burning fires of an American holocaust Native Americans.

Only now, as we approach the twenty-first century, over two centuries after America's war against England and over one century since its Civil War against itself, is America ready to redefine its own history from that of "How the West was Won" to "How the West was Lost." The manifest destiny of its westward expansion was, manifestly, an expanded Final Solution for the destiny of the Native Americans. As a statistical fact, it destined for elimination a higher percentage of the Native American population (to exceed 90%), than even that of the deadly efficient Naza Final Solution (in finalizing approximately 66%) as to The Chosen people .. . in that recurrent chosen-chosin metaphysical process of choosing oneself in one's group over others.

America, however, did move ahead in constitutionalizing its virtue of freedom, despite its vices in denying freedom to some of its own as well as to some others. Further, that freedom continues to work, sometimes well in freely owning up to the needs of others, and sometimes not as well in its freedom to disown the needs of others, in continuing to work in spite of the abuse of freedom without which freedom cannot be free. One might characterize that abuse as those on the left doing more than what's needed and those on the right doing less than what's needed.

While there are new threats to that freedom in correctness-be it political" sexual, racial or whatever, in whatever's legislatively correct, in the hate legislation that hates hate in the hateful legislative correctness of correcting hate-American continues, as the modern process of freedom, to move towards a post-modern metaphysics of freedom. Its special strengths reside in its all seeing eye in seeing the freedoms of speech and religion, in continuing to see an all-encompassing civil liberationism one that's often in accord with civil libertarianism but one that occasionally differs in striking a different cord in emphasizing the social liberation of humans rights to balance the personal liberty of individualistic human rights,, wherein no one opinion or religion is more free or correct than another in being corrected or in being guaranteed more freedom than another.

The next and last gear for now, in moving at present with the momentum of the past, in shifting into our futuristic sixth gear, is that of self-transcendence, even though transcendence, itself, is question (a la Havel and Cornish). Although the metaphysical options have increased,, (per example Havel's Gaia Hypothesis and Anthropic Principle), to include new and old options from East and West, the most conservation options (per example the religionists referred to by Cornish) appear to be predominant.

Rather than the freedom and danger of a metaphysical Promethesis unbound, who steals fire from the Gods, more people prefer to steal themselves away, in being religiously bound, in lighting ungodly fires in the name of God in setting fire to religious liberality. A Protestant Professor of Theology at Princeton University was quoted as stating that the religous future seemed to belong to a reformed Catholicism and to a mature Pentecostalism, with the more liberal main-line Protestant denominations continuing to fade away. In a related observation, one can also refer to a growing fundamentalism among Muslims and Jews.

Perhaps this trend is a little more than an awareness of the insecurity of transcending old transcendence in new metaphysical opportunities. Perhaps, also, as is evident in the dangerous metaphysical process of chosenness-chosinness, there may be a fear of a recurrence of any new choice of transcendence, with or without the Transcendent, in retreating to the old and secure process of one's already chosen transcendence within a fundamentalistically known religiousity or secularity.

Nevertheless, regardless of the psychology of metaphysics, fear of transcendence will not remove the fact of transcendence-be it with or without fault or by default-in the reality of futuristic metaphysics.

Proceeding, even with a conservative "Fear of the Lord is the beginning of all wisdom," is preferable to a liberal dispensation not to proceed at all in ignoring the relevance of metaphysical realities.

We should be fearful, in "fearing only fear itself," in metaphysically fearing the fear of metaphysics. The greatest fear that we should have is not a metaphysical one, but a futuristic one, in the fear of our futuristic metaphysics being defined for us by the past or in not being defined at all.

The result of allowing others to define it for us is evidenced in the continuing history of past and present religous and secular dogmatism. Freedom, itself, in freedom processing itself, can become dogmatic, in itself. Unless freedom evolves continually, in learning from the past, and futuristically, in learning for the future, freedom will devolve. In tbe post-modern devolution of the modern evolution of freedom, the substance of evolving freedom devolves in any one process of freedom that denies the substance of freedom in processing others or in one's processing of oneself.

Freedom has to be metaphysically and futuristically defined or else it defines its faults as its self, in a process of free default. That process of default produces faulty processing, wherein an undefined and unlimited process of freedom defines and limits the substance of freedom into a faulty freedom. In the processing of the free-prefixed process in the post-modern posting of one freedom as an unfree process, there is the one freedom to be unfreely one and the same. That one freedom is inconforming to the free prefix norm of free-trade, free-market, free-society or free-whatever, with the greatest freedom for the free-prefixed process.

In the unfree processing of the free-prefixed process, there is an unfree expectation of conformity to the means and ends of that process, in the processed means of taking one way to freedom, in taking the end substance of one's freedom away. Ironically, in the prefixing of freedom, one is expected to be unfree in one's freely conforming to any one free-prefixed process ... in internalizing one impersonal process as one's personal substance.

Post-modern freedom, therefore, personally particularizes an impersonal universal process in personal conformity to impersonal process. The particularistic personalisms of one's particular free person become particularly free of one's personal substance of freedom in one universal freedom of process .. . in one's freedom to be unfree in one freedom.

In the post-modem posting process of freedom, one's freedom is processed to the extent that free process not only replaces the substance of freedom but substitutes itself as the substance of one's freely processed self. One is most free to be most commonly free in any one free process with others .. . in the unfree process of the self-processing of one's uncommonly free self.

Without freedom, transcendence cannot transcend one's self, but even with freedom, transcendence for oneself doesn't free one of one's self ... in the freedom of self-transcendence.

In the future, with or without a religous God, spiritual chosenness, scientific secular humanism, ecumenical universalism or the transcendent metaphysics of evolving freedom, the metaphysical freedom of a futuristic metaphysics will be free in defining itself-for good or for evil.

That freedom, however, as well intentional as it might be, in shifting forward with the skill and caution of careful acceleration and braking in each progressive gear, has a manifest destiny of its own in the Lutheran Dilemma that is everyone's metaphysical dilemma with freedom. That dilemma rests in defining how to metaphysically ascend in taking any one freedom to transcend, without transcending by descending in taking freedom-one' own or others-away.

About the Author

E. Scott Ryan, a former Woodrow Wison Fellow and Visiting Fellow at the U.S. Department of Justice, is a tenured Full Professor in the State University System of Pennsylvania. He is a novelist as well as an author of professional publications in Criminology, Education, Philosophy, and Psychology.

Copyright Project Innovation Fall 1996
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