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Books about Politics and Current Events in The Radical Academy Bookstore Click Here for New & Used College Textbooks at Discount Prices Click Here for College Education Information & Study Resources Shop Amazon Stores in the Radical Academy Bookstore Magazine Outlet Music Store Video Store DVD Store Computer Store Camera & Photo Store Computer/Video Games Software Store Outlet Store Cellular Phones Toys & Games Tools & Hardware Outdoor Living Consumer Electronics Kitchen & Housewares Baby Superstore Apparel & Accessories Gourmet Food Sporting Goods Jewelry & Watches Health & Personal Care		Political Pataphysics of the State by SARTRE   Any attempt to understand the condition of modern society must address the long assault and reputation of traditional values and the metaphysics that supports those moral mores. Many social scholars will dissect political philosophies and compare and contrast civic movements, while most ignore the subject of truth, sought in the study of being -- ontology, and the study of the structure of the universe - cosmology. This lack of axiomatic foundation is a fatal flaw. Sparse attention is given to the unseen, as inexhaustible concentration is given to the systems and institutions of organization. This fault inevitably brings rise to the invention of abstract substitutes for the belief, role and function of religion. During an era of nonconformity 1957-1973, Evergreen Review became the bible for a generation of radicals and free thinkers. One might think that such revolutionary underground activism is long dead, but upon a close examination you will find that it has gone mainstream. Concealed from the populist masses, who have barely an inclination to scrutinize, much less deal with such subjects; the pataphysics of this final age has attained a religious influence. From Pataphysics: a Religion in the Making, the author Asger Jorn states: The history of religion seems to be made up of three stages -- so-called materialist or natural religion, which reached its maturity in the bronze age; metaphysical religion, beginning with Zoroastrianism and developing through Judaism, Christianity and Islam to the Reformation of the 16th century; and finally, Jarry's ideology from the turn of the century, which has ended up laying the foundations of a new religion, a third kind of religion that could very well become the most widespread in the world by the 22nd century: pataphysical religion.   Natural religion was a spiritual confirmation of material life. Metaphysical religion represented the establishment of an ever-widening opposition between material life and spiritual life. The various degrees of this polarization were represented by various metaphysical beliefs, and were intensified and made all the more backward by an attachment natural rites and cults that were more or less successfully transformed into metaphysical rites, cults and myths. The absurdity of this cultural mythology's persistence at a time when scientific metaphysics have already triumphed was demonstrated clearly by Kierkegaard's choice of confirming Christianity: one must believe in absurdity. The next question was: why? And the obvious response was that secular political and social authorities need to maintain a spiritual justification for their power. This, of course, is a purely material, anti-metaphysical argument from a time when the radical critique of all traditional mythologies was beginning. Since the post modern acceptance in the belief, that science is the ultimate truth, society and certainly politics has adopted a ritual observance of the priesthood. Jorn sums up the dilemma in this way: A religion can no longer be considered as the truth if it conflicts with what is known as scientific truth; and a religion that does not represent the truth is not a religion. This is the conflict that is about to be overcome by pataphysical religion, which has placed one of most fundamental concepts of modern science at the level of the absolute: the idea that equivalents are constant. When Jorn points out that Christianity has long maintained the principle that "all men are equal before God", his observation echoes a central premise reflected in scripture. However, when he concludes: "But it was only with the development of science and industry that the principle was imposed in every area of life, culminating, with scientific socialism, in the social equivalence of all individuals", he falls into the same old trap of the social engineers. What is held out as evolutionary progress, namely; substituting the STATE as the replacement authority for God, seals the fate of mankind to eternal enslavement. Kierkegaard makes a plea in all his writings never to take a road to knowledge without the pain of doubt, paradox and passion. He illustrates this point about the story of Abraham: The ethical expression for what Abraham did is that he meant to murder Isaac; the religious expression is that he meant to sacrifice Isaac -- but precisely in this contradiction is the anxiety that can make a person sleepless, and yet without this anxiety Abraham is not who he is. As Kierkegaard rigorously points out in Concluding Unscientific Postscript, the very concept of an infinite God subjecting Himself to a relationship with a temporal being establishes the nature of religions absurdity. Note that this assessment from a student of John Drabinski named Jeffrey, captures the rational mindset that the Evergreen crowd would promote. However, Kierkegaard is a believer in the divinity of Jesus Christ. For him: "Faith is the highest relationship to the paradoxically absurd God, specifically in the person of Jesus Christ, that a person can experience. There may be many in every generation that do not experience this relationship with the absurd, but no one goes further". Abraham is the pivotal example of faith. But was his trust mere blind faith? Consider the parallel with the crucifixion of Christ when Jesus prayed, "My Father if there is any other way, let this cup pass from my hand, yet not as I will but as You will" Abraham was brought to a point where his faith (deepest relationship with the absurd) was truly under trial. The cited summary concludes: "The question for Abraham was not if obeying God was greater than following his desire, the question was "Is God truly God"? The ultimate way that a person exists in relationship with God is the willingness to follow at all cost." The ability to stand as a single individual in an absolute relation to the absolute is a core concept for understanding Kierkegaard as a forefather of existentialism. Drabinski's response to his student: It is not just that one lives passion for god in faith, but that one lives the passion for the ethical insofar as one gives it up for god. The double terror comes from the same source: to love the ethical, I have to deny its scope and power . . . one is right, in faith, to love the ethical, but only as a consequence of leaving it behind. You cannot love the ethical on the front end; it has to be disposable. Disposed of, it reappears. The 'pataphysical' religion that is resonated in the secular state has science as its doctrine and the government as its almighty. Since knowledge in science is incomplete and often incorrect, the doctrine of the creed is but another leap of faith. With the denial of the ultimate authority of a revealed and supreme being, this "new age" alternative cult falsely claims dominion over the functions and apparatus of temporal governance. At the core of the rejection of traditional values and authentic conservative prescriptions, is the smug arrogance of science as the sole embodiment of truth. When this conceit applies its trade to codify an enlightened vision for the idea that equivalents are constant -- we are subjected to all the horrors of the "collective," in all its socialistic versions. Repudiation of the Abraham's GOD and the renunciation of the unerring precepts embodied in the Ten Commandments, has produced the absurdity that we live under and accept as normal. When the pataphysics mentality asserts that the LAW given directly to Moses can be improved, by men of science posing in the robes of judges, we are damned to a sacramental devotion of a black mass. When politicians demand the authority that only God holds, we are compelled to worship upon an altar of Baal. The pataphysics radicals and nonconformists didn't rebel against the established government, but actually perfected its perversion and empowered its expansion into the malignant cancer that ravages mankind. The tumor of meticulous exalted governance, which denies the willful Abraham obedience to God and the Kierkegaard leap of faith of accepting Him, are doomed to be enslaved under that scientific socialism, in the social equivalence of all individuals. The evident absurdity is that mankind is unable to see the difference. The supreme key for wisdom is that our freedom and purpose is achieved and fulfilled only when we admit our homage and submission to the eternal and under the authority of His Law. This insight and judgment, escapes the Statists on all varieties. Achieving actual conservative values without a fundamental affirmation and acceptance of God's commands, are not possible. Even the libertarian relies upon man made absurdities for nonexistent solutions. The Evergreens have become shrubs for bushes that practice pataphysics while preaching piety. So now you know how folks learned to live with absurdity .. . . all because - oh ye of little faith! SARTRE Archive SARTRE (aka James Hall) is a reformed, former political operative. This pundit's formal instruction in History, Philosophy and Political Science served as training for activism, on the staff of several politicians and in many campaigns. "Populism" best describes the approach to SARTRE's perspective on Politics. Reforms will require an Existential approach. "Ideas Move the World," and SARTRE'S intent is to stir the conscience of those who desire to bring back a common sense, moral and traditional value culture for America. Visit SARTRE's website: BREAKING ALL THE RULES. Contact SARTRE by e-mail: BATR@sartre.info. SARTRE's Blogs: Existentialism Philosophy Blog , and Old Right - BATR Reflections. Also BATR News.   Enrich your life with a book about politics and current events... Enrich your political & social life with a politics or news magazine... Politics Resource Center Main Page
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