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ABSTRACT
Leo Strauss argues that the “theologico-political” problem arose from the competing claims of rationalist philosophy and theology. Although he urges others to take sides in this debate, most theorists see it as insoluble, since it is rooted in competing traditions and different, non-demonstrable, epistemic principles. Strauss, however, argues that there is a common ground capable of sustaining a contest between the two: their appeal to the pre-philosophic understanding of justice as moral virtue. The contest between the Bible and Socratic-Platonic philosophy centers on which of the two better understands what justice is, what completes it, and in what respect it is good. Strauss enables us to see why Plato’s Socratic dialogues became indispensable models for classical and medieval philosophers who sought to meet the challenge of theology on the vital common ground of philosophy and theology.
Acknowledgment
I thank Robert A. Goldberg, Kelly Lutz, and Michael Rosano for their helpful comments on earlier versions of this article.
Notes
1. Bruell, “Question of Nature”; Velkley, Heidegger, Strauss; Bernstein, Leo Strauss.
2. Spinoza, Theological-Political Treatise, chaps. 1–5. In Persecution and the Art of Writing, Strauss identifies Spinoza’s Theological-Political Treatise as “the classic document of the ‘rationalist’ or ‘secularist’ attack on belief in revelation” (142–43). See Beiner, Civil Religion, 164 n. 84; Zuckert and Zuckert, Truth about Leo Strauss, 154.
3. See also Chalier, Spinoza, lecteur de Maïmonide; Nadler, Book Forged in Hell.
4. Hobbes, Leviathan, Part IV.
5. Locke, First Treatise of Government, I. 86; Locke, Second Treatise of Government, II, 5.
6. Habermas, “Awareness,” 75–76.
7. Manent, Situation de France.
8. Hammill and Lupton, Political Theology, 1.
9. Schmitt, Political Theology II, 36; Schmitt, Political Theology, 155–56.
10. Scott and Cavanaugh, Companion to Political Theology, 1.
11. For example, Derrida, Politics of Friendship 85, 115; Lefort, “Permanence of the Theologico-Political”; Lilla, “Kant’s Theological-Political Revolution”; Manent, Situation de France, 3–9; Schmitt, Political Theology II, 90.
12. Monod, “Le problem theologico-politique.”
13. E.g., Marchal and Shaw, Carl Schmitt and Leo Strauss; McCormick, “Post-Enlightenment Sources”; Thiem, “Schmittian Shadows.”
14. Strauss, What is Political Philosophy? 13.
15. Strauss, Spinoza’s Critique of Religion, 1.
16. Strauss, Natural Right and History, 74; also, Strauss, Persecution, 142–43.
17. Strauss, “Law of Reason in the Kuzari,” in Persecution, 107 n. 35.
18. Strauss, “Preface to Hobbes,” 2.
19. In Heidegger, Strauss, Velkley argues that Strauss uses the “theologico-political” in much the same way as other contemporary theorists use it, and that Strauss believes that the political is always “a realm of enduring tensions, one of which is the tension between the authority of divinely sanctioned law and human statesmanship’s need for autonomous flexibility in practical judgment” (12). See also Janssens, Between Jerusalem and Athens, 120. Most commentators, however, take Strauss to be referring to the fundamental question whether we should rely solely on our own reason or whether we should be guided principally by divine law and religious faith. See Meier, Leo Strauss, 3–28; Pangle, “Introduction”; Smith, Leo Strauss; Zuckert and Zuckert, Truth about Leo Strauss.
20. Rorty, Objectivity, Relativism, and Truth, 13, 32.
21. Rorty, “Religion as a Conversation Stopper,” 168–74; Rorty, “Religion in the Public Square,” 141–49; Rosenbaum, “Must Religion Be,” 353–409; but Rorty, “Looking Backward.”
22. Rorty, “Looking Backward”; Habermas, “Awareness,” 16. Postmodern thought may open the door to new religious forms, but postmodern theologians believe that resistance to metanarratives will exclude the most radical, illiberal theological claims (e.g., Vanhoozer, Cambridge Guide to Postmodern Theology, 9).
23. Lynch, Praise of Reason, 7–10, 52–53, 41–42, 49–52.
24. Qutb, Social Justice in Islam, 287–88; Qutb, Shade of the Qur’an, 6.
25. Qutb, Islamic Concept, 11.
26. Qutb, Social Justice in Islam, 287; Qutb, Shade of the Qur’an, 20.
27. Strauss, “Influence of Theology and Philosophy,” 117, 116; Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 269, 266.
28. E.g., Bernstein, Leo Strauss, xiii, 13; Smith, Reading Leo Strauss, 16; Zuckert, Political Philosophy, 75.
29. Strauss, “Influence of Theology and Philosophy,” 111, 113; Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 270.
30. Smith, Reading Leo Strauss, 101–2; Tanguay, Intellectual Biography, 180; Velkley, Heidegger, Strauss, 71–73.
31. The quotation appears in Strauss, Political Theology, 174; Velkley, Heidegger, Straus, 160; also, Janssens, Between Jerusalem and Athens, 120.
32. Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 269.
33. Strauss, Spinoza’s Critique of Religion, 30; Pangle, “Introduction,” 22; Zuckert and Zuckert Leo Strauss, 316. Believing that Strauss accepts that philosophy ultimately rests on faith, Tanguay concludes that Strauss’s philosophic endeavor ultimately fails on its own principles (Intellectual Biography, 184, 191).
34. Strauss, “Influence of Theology and Philosophy,” 116; Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 260; Velkley, Heidegger, Strauss, 196; Zuckert and Zuckert, Truth about Leo Strauss, 153.
35. Strauss, “Influence of Theology and Philosophy,” 114; Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 262.
36. Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 266; Strauss, Spinoza’s Critique of Religion, 29.
37. Guerra, “Leo Strauss,” 64; Zuckert and Zuckert, Truth about Leo Strauss, 151–52; see also Smith, Reading Leo Strauss, 26–28; Velkley, Heidegger, Strauss, 149–51; Zuckert and Zuckert, Leo Strauss, 92–115. Strauss delivered “Progress or Return?” as a three-part lecture in 1952. Even though Strauss did not publish the lecture he used parts of it in “The Mutual Influence of Theology and Philosophy” and in Natural Right and History (36, 74–76, 81, 85). This analysis is based on the text published in The Rebirth of Classical Rationalism (1989).
38. Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 245, 246.
39. Ibid., 248, 253, 255, 253, 252–53, 256, 258.
40. E.g., DeHart, Reason, Revelation; Hazony, “The Bible and Leo Strauss.”
41. Strauss, Natural Right and History, 21–39, 43; Strauss, 1962 Spinoza’s Critique of Religion, 1–31; Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 270.
42. Strauss, Natural Right and History, 83 n. 3, 81, 122.
43. Ibid., 90; also, Strauss, On Tyranny, 212–13; Strauss, Natural Right and History, 94; Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 256.
44. E.g., Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 260.
45. Strauss, Natural Right and History, 123–24; Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 141–52, 260.
46. Strauss, City and Man, 19, 120; Plato Phaedo 96–101; Xenophon Memorabilia I.1.16, IV 6–7.
47. Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 256; cf. Strauss, Natural Right and History, 90; Homer Odyssey X 303–306.
48. Strauss, Spinoza’s Critique, 17; Strauss, “Influence of Theology and Philosophy,” 112; Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 256; Strauss, “Interpretation of Genesis,” 393.
49. Strauss, Natural Right and History, 81; Strauss, “Influence of Theology and Philosophy,” 393; Strauss, “Classical Political Rationalism, 253.
50. Strauss, “Interpretation of Genesis,” 393; Strauss, “Influence of Theology and Philosophy,” 110, 112.
51. Strauss, “Athens and Jerusalem,” 368–69, 369–70, 373, 372, 374.
52. Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 259.
53. Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 260; Zuckert and Zuckert, Leo Strauss, 326, 314, 326–27; Janssens, Between Jerusalem and Athens, 193.
54. Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 113, 260, 253, 259; also, Strauss, “Athens and Jerusalem,” 113; Strauss, “Influence of Theology and Philosophy,” 113–14.
55. Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 269–270.
56. Ibid., 255.
57. Burns, “Rationalism,” 151; Meier, Leo Strauss, 24–25; Pangle, Leo Strauss, 27, 125; Stauffer, “Reopening the Quarrel,” 125; Velkley, Heidegger, Strauss, 149–50.
58. Strauss, What is Political Philosophy? 16–17.
59. Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 248.
60. Strauss, City and Man, 83.
61. Strauss, Natural Right and History, 150 n. 24.
62. Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 253–54; also, Strauss, Platonic Political Philosophy, 31; Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 142, 182. Noting that Strauss points to justice being the common ground between the Bible and Greek philosophy, Sorenson infers that Strauss is implying that the common understanding of justice is natural. This implication, she points out, would significantly qualify Strauss’s frequent claim that the Hebrew Bible neither contains a word for “nature” nor ever conceives of nature (Sorenson, Discourses on Strauss, 35; cf. Strauss, Rebirth of Classical Political Rationalism, 253 and 72). It is, however, more plausible that Strauss believes that the understanding of justice that is common to both the Bible and Greek philosophy is not “natural” in the strictest sense. A common, elementary understanding of justice might emerge on its own in the laws of different cultures and of different ages, but it would not be identical to the natural order that comes to light only through philosophic examination (Strauss, Natural Right and History, 82–90).
63. Strauss, Natural Right and History, x; Spinoza’s Critique of Religion, 30.
64. Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 253.
65. Strauss, What is Political Philosophy? 86.
66. Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 253.
67. According to Toth, in Life and Legacy, “Qutb wrote much to describe the virtuous believer who strives to follow God’s path and to institute God’s dominion but who then suffers pain and misery. The question of why good people fail and why bad people succeed is answered by referring to divine wisdom that can ensure punishments for the evil and good for the good in the afterworld” (112). An example can be found in Qutb’s reflections on the “Story of the Makers of the Pit,” in Milestones, where he describes how a group of “believing, righteous, sublime, and honorable souls were pitted against an arrogant, mischievous, criminal, and degraded people.” In the story, the tyrants cast the Believers into a pit of fire and enjoyed watching their destruction (103–4). In the end, however, the Believers were victorious not only because they showed the purity of their hearts but also because they won both lasting honor and a reward in the Hereafter (108).
68. Rawls, “Justice as Fairness,” 225.
69. Beiner, Civil Religion, 200 n. 7.
70. Strauss, What is Political Philosophy? 10–15, 78–94.
71. Plato Apology 21c, 24a4–8; Alcibiades Major 118b; Euthyphro 10d, 11c4–5; Gorgias 472b–c, 475e; Greater Hippias 287b.
72. Cf. Plato Euthyphro 3a, 4e, 7c–e, 11b–14a with Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 148–183, 191–92, 199, 202–4; also cf. Plato Republic 330d, 363a–66b, 377b–83c, 443a, 443c–44a, 497c, 505a–e with Strauss, City and Man, 67–73, 88–91, 98–99, 106–112, 138.
73. Strauss, City and Man, 241.
74. E.g., Bury, “Introduction.”
75. Morrow, Plato’s Cretan City, 9–13; Taylor, Laws of Plato, xiii.
76. Strauss, Plato’s ‘Laws’, 1–2, 17, 27, 61, 35, 61, 182, 35; Lutz, “Argument and the Action,” 424–40.
77. Strauss, Plato’s ‘Laws’, 16–17, 9.
78. Ibid., 140–56, 146; also ibid., 58, 56, 7, 58; Plato Laws 713e–14a.
79. Strauss, Plato’s ‘Laws’, 185–86.
80. Strauss, Natural Right and History, 76.
81. Strauss, Plato’s ‘Laws’, 141; Strauss, City and Man, 241.
82. Strauss, Rebirth of Classical Political Rationalism, 256. It may seem that Socrates never challenges and never is challenged by divine law insofar as the laws of Athens do not derive from a strict code traceable to a single prophet, as the laws of Crete and Sparta were said to have been. Yet, even if the Athenians manifestly make many of their own laws, the most fundamental of their laws are believed to have been established by gods who continue to care that they are obeyed. See e.g. Plato Euthyphro 4b-c, 5d; also, Xenophon Memorabilia 4.4.19–21.
83. Strauss, Plato’s ‘Laws’, 133, 1.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Mark J. Lutz
Mark J. Lutz is Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and Director of the Society for Greek Political Thought. He is the author of Socrates’ Education to Virtue: Learning the Love of the Noble (1998) and Divine Law and Political Philosophy in Plato’s Laws (2012).