Traitors to the Enlightenment - Europe turns its back on Socrates, Locke, et al.

National Review Online ^ | October 02, 2006 | Victor Davis Hanson

[RobbyS]

The regnant philosphy is deconstructionism, which embrazons Pilates's question on the wall: What is truth?

[RobbyS]

Socrates and Platon launched the scholastic enterprise. The abandoment of it by our educational establish explains the failures of our schools. The Sophists have taken over.

[ClaireSolt]

Yes, that , too.

[goldstategop]

European Christianity is dead. The craven surrender to Islam reveals Europeans have no real beliefs except immediate self-preservation and enjoying their pampered lifestyle. In short, Europe is really Eurarabia. And the more Europe shows its weakness and its contempt for the values that gave it birth, the bolder its enemy grows along with its assault upon Europe itself. As Europeans have learned in the past five years, their servility to Islam has won them no immunity.

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." -Manuel II Paleologus

[grey_whiskers]

Love your Freeper name.

Say hello to Gravel Gertie for me; and little Sparkle.

Cheers!

[grey_whiskers]

Perhaps VDH reads and understands the FR 'type' too much for you?

Not in the slightest.

He is a Democrat, and is painting the Democrat's stereotypical version of conservatives.

Cheers!

[neverdem]

European Christianity is dead.

While it's not a large country, I'm hesitant to ignore the effect of the Ould Sod, i.e. Ireland. Its scholarship helped to carry Europe through the Dark Ages, and the physical courage of its descendents helped to make the Anglosphere.

[Earthdweller]

[Tolik]

    Victor Davis Hanson Ping ! 

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[SquirrelKing]

We may be only 30 years behind Europe, but we are not quite there yet. And so Europe has done us a great favor in showing us not the way of the future, but the old cowardice of our pre-Enlightenment past.

Beautifully put. [Of course.]

[Valin]

I really don't think Victor Davis Hanson understands the Pope, or what his initiative has already achieved.

Could you expand please. Thanks.

[Valin]

Ain't it the truth.

[Tenacious 1]

[Hanson is a bright guy, but Pope Benedict can think circles around him.]

I am not so sure, but I can see by this article why offense can be taken. I don't think Hanson intentions were to belittle the Pope or his intent. I believe our Pope, for years now, has been surrounded with bad advisers. The Church's tepid political approach has weakened the foundation of the house built by Peter. Jesus did not equivocate on morals and values. There was right and wrong, righteous and evil. The Pope's follow up to the uprising is easily perceived as pandering, appeasement, apology and/or equivocating by the media and the faithful alike. I don't think Hanson is picking on the Pope but rather using the incident to reinforce his argument about the cultural weakness in Europe and to highlight what America's future holds if we don't take notice.

I think the Pope and our church would have been better served had Pope Bededict come out and stated unequivocally,

"My words were not offensive. I quoted an ancient leader. My point was obviously missed by the followers of Islam. Let me restate my point and try to be more clear. There is no God that wishes his faithful followers to murder innocent women, children, fathers, brothers and sons. Those that kill innocent women and children in the name of Allah are guilty of a mortal sin, need to repent and change their ways. Or else be condemned to hell by our most forgiving and gracious Lord."

[Tenacious 1]

[I believe our Pope, for years now, has been surrounded with bad advisers.[

To be clear, I include Pope John Paul in that, "...for years now." Following the end of the cold war, even Pope John Paul seemed to soften (IMO).

[Mrs. Don-o]

Hanson is an intelligent man whom I respect (and could get into a helluva dispute with) --- for instance, over this:

"And so Europe has done us a great favor in showing us not the way of the future, but the old cowardice of our pre-Enlightenment past."

Cowardice? Pre-Enlighenment?

It wasn't Locke or Voltaire who had the intellectual courage to bring the thought of Aristotle and Averroes into the University and dared to defend the ultimate compatibility of faith and reason by argument alone --- the equivalent of a Unified Field Theory of the Universe. It wasn't David Hume or Jean-Jacques Rousseau who mounted the barricades, crimson with gore, and saved Europe from the scimatars of Islam.

If it hadn't been for courageous intellectuals like Aquinas, and rough men of valor like Don John of Austria and King Jan Sobieski, there's be no West to save.

I'm glad to give the "Enightenment" its due (though I think it's misnamed and overrated), but Victor Davis Hanson himself --- the author of Carnage and Culture: Landmark Battles in the Rise of Western Power --- knows darn well tht it wasn't the Enlightenment, its men, its values, or its EU successors --- which has the power or the courage save us now.

[B.O. Plenty]

Thanks...

Gert is mean as ever and Sparkle has grown up and is a big time M.D.....she made us proud.

[GOPJ]

Thanks for the ping.

[alarm rider]

Well, this is sure to ruffle some feathers, but over all, I like it just the same.

This should be read by every American once, and every European twice.

[Dumb_Ox]

Europe became much more flattering towards Islam during the Enlightenment because brave "fanatical" Christian soldiers had defended the continent against Islam. Gibbon and Voltaire, among others, often preferred Islam to Christianity and are responsible for much of the pro-Muslim, anti-Christian romanticized gobbledegook in discussion today.

Somehow Europeans have ever-so-insidiously given up the promise of the Enlightenment that welcomed free thought of all kinds, the more provocative the better.

"No God but Allah and Mohammed is his prophet" is just the kind of provocative statement that would tick off Hanson, but Leftist captiulations before Islam are driven precisely by this "free thinking." Conversion to Islam is the current form of the juvenile "shock the bourgeois!" mentality that Hansen, for some bizzare reason, has kind words for.

[Blind Eye Jones]

"The French went down the wrong path, and (with the help of others) dragged a lot of continental Europe with them."

I agree, especially with the help of Jean Jacques Rousseau.