Gunderson, Martin L

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Macalester InternationalVolume 8 Contending Gods: Religion and the GlobalMoment Article 13Spring 5-31-2000Response to Tirosh-SamuelsonMartin L. GundersonMacalester College, gunderson@macalester.eduFollow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/macintlThis Response is brought to you for free and open access by the Institute for Global Citizenship at DigitalCommons@Macalester College. It has beenaccepted for inclusion in Macalester International by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@Macalester College. For more information,please contact scholarpub@macalester.edu.Recommended CitationGunderson, Martin L. (2000) "Response to Tirosh-Samuelson," Macalester International: Vol. 8, Article 13.Available at: http://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/macintl/vol8/iss1/13ResponseMartin GundersonIn her essay, “A Jewish Perspective on Religious Pluralism,” Dr.Tirosh-Samuelson provides several arguments for religious pluralismfrom the Jewish perspective. To be effective, an argument for religiouspluralism must produce reasons for people who are non-religious aswell as for people of various religions. If, for example, we are to per-suade those who are creating the global monoculture that Tirosh-Samuelson fears, then we must find reasons that they are committed toaccepting, at least insofar as they are reasonable. This produces a chal-lenge for Tirosh-Samuelson, since she argues from the perspective of aparticular religion—Judaism.There are two senses in which one could argue from the Jewish per-spective. First, one could use lessons from Jewish history and Jewishthought that provide insights that any reasonable person shouldaccept. Second, one could argue from the Jewish perspective by relyingon premises that are accepted by most Jews, but that might not beaccepted by non-Jews. From this perspective one produces argumentsthat may be compelling for Jews, but which cannot be expected to haveforce outside the Jewish tradition.Some of Tirosh-Samuelson’s arguments are of the first sort, and Ifind them tempting. She argues, for instance, that Jewish history showsthat those political structures that allow diversity are more stable thanthose that do not. A totally convincing argument for religious plural-ism on these grounds would, of course, need a great deal of historicalevidence taken from a variety of religions. While pursuing this historyin depth would take her beyond the scope of her essay, Dr. Tirosh-Samuelson at least points the direction for an argument that would beacceptable for Jews and non-Jews alike.On the other hand, some of Tirosh-Samuelson’s arguments rest onJudaic premises that have little appeal for those who are not religiousand, in some cases, little appeal for religious people who are not Jew-ish. She argues, for instance, that from the Jewish perspective humansare created in the image of God and that this is inconsistent withoppressing people. In order for this to constitute an argument for reli-gious pluralism, Tirosh-Samuelson needs another premise to the effectthat the establishment of a single religion inevitably results in oppress-ing people in a way that is incompatible with their being in the image123of God. This, of course, provides a reason only for religious persons,but even some religious persons might not accept this argument. Areligious person who believes that his or her faith is the true faithmight argue, for example, that establishing the true faith does notrequire oppressing people in any way that is incompatible with theirbeing in the image of God, since those who worship false Gods havedrifted from God’s purpose and thereby have already drifted awayfrom being in the image of God.There are two ways in which one might be tempted to answer thisobjection. One way is to say that we resemble God insofar as we havefree will and that to stifle our freedom is to attack us in the respect inwhich we are in the image of God. This requires a convincing defenseof the view that we have free will. It also requires a convincing argu-ment that free will is the respect in which we resemble God. A secondtempting answer is to claim that no one knows what the true faith isand that, therefore, responses that assume that one religion is the truereligion are inadequate. Tirosh-Samuelson develops an argumentbased on this sort of skepticism. She argues that humans cannot pos-sess the entire truth about the divine, since the divine is infinite andhumans are finite. Hence, allowing one version of the truth to prevailis to propagate error. She also follows Martin Buber in arguing thatany claim of divine revelation is subject to human interpretation andthereby subject to ambiguity and opaqueness. Insofar as this skepticalargument succeeds, it shores up her image of God argument.This skeptical argument creates its own problems, however. If noone can know the divine, it is not clear why religious pluralism mat-ters. There are two possible answers, but both lead to further difficul-ties. One answer is that religion is a matter of faith and not knowledge.If that is true, however, then the fact that we cannot know the divinedoes not provide a reason for pluralism in the first place. Those whoseek to establish one religion may simply claim that it is a matter oftheir faith to attempt to try to establish their religion as the one univer-sal religion. They do not run afoul of the argument from skepticismbecause they are not making knowledge claims in the first place.A second possible answer is that while we cannot know the divinein its entirety, we can at least come to know through revelation a partof the divine. Even if subject to interpretation, as Tirosh-Samuelsonclaims, there is still at least some religious knowledge. This response,however, puts us back in the soup. A person with a partial revelationmay say, for instance, that although the revelation did not provide theMacalester International Vol. 8124entire truth about the divine, it at least provided enough truth to knowthat competing claims to revelation are false and should be overrid-den. We can imagine a group of fanatics arguing, for example, thatalthough they do not have the full truth about God, they at least haveenough truth to be confident that God wants a holy war against Israel.We might claim that they are sadly mistaken, but the argument basedon partial truth does not justify our claim. The underlying problem isthat not all oppression is motivated by a belief that one has the entiredivine truth.Working from within the Jewish perspective also raises the issue ofmoral relativism. Tirosh-Samuelson is well aware of this and statesthat while she is defending pluralism, her defense does not commit herto relativism. There are two ways in which moral principles can bethought to be relative to a culture or group. First, moral principles canbe relative in that they do not apply universally. That is, not all peopleare subject to the dictates of the principles. The scope of moral princi-ples, in this form of relativism, covers only some people. Second, moralprinciples can be relative in the sense that they do not provide all per-sons with a reason for action. This is the more troubling sense of rela-tivism that must be avoided in order to provide an adequate defense ofreligious pluralism. I shall refer to this sort of relativism simply as“moral relativism.”Tirosh-Samuelson cites principles within the Jewish tradition thatapply to all people, such as principles against murder, theft, and incest.These escape relativism in the first sense and may even constitute rea-sons for all persons and thus escape relativism in the second sense. Theproblem is that insofar as they escape relativism in the second sense(moral relativism), they are not peculiar to the Jewish perspective. Herdeeper arguments from the Jewish perspective escape relativism in thefirst sense, but do not escape moral relativism. The argument based onthe image of God, for example, applies to all persons in the sense thatall persons are within the scope of the argument—they are in the classof people to whom the argument applies. But, it does not provide allpeople with a reason for acting. This is because not every reasonableperson is bound to believe the premises on which the argument rests.This creates a problem for Tirosh-Samuelson’s defense of religious plu-ralism. Given that her argument is designed to motivate people torespect religious pluralism, she needs to deny moral relativism; but, asnoted, principles peculiar to Judaism avoid relativism only in the sensethat the principles she cites include all persons within their scope.Martin Gunderson125In the end, Tirosh-Samuelson is caught between a rock and a hardplace. Insofar as she argues for religious pluralism from the uniqueperspective of Judaism, she does not provide reasons that are reasonsfor all people and is thereby committed to moral relativism. On theother hand, insofar as she avoids moral relativism, she is forced toargue from principles that are not unique to Judaism, and the Jewishperspective becomes irrelevant.*****The general problem that lurks behind these arguments from the Jew-ish perspective is that reasons for religious pluralism based onpremises from a particular religious perspective are unlikely to pro-vide convincing reasons for those who do not share that perspective.The arguments I have given against a defense of religious pluralismbased on Jewish precepts can be given against similar defenses basedon precepts peculiar to any religion or even to any culture-based ideol-ogy. The following is an example of such a generalized argument.The justification of religious pluralism requires moral argument.Regarding issues such as religious pluralism, moral reasoning is pri-marily a method for resolving disputes and building agreement. Wedo not simply justify our moral views; we justify them to others.Because of this, moral reasoning requires that we find principles thatare reasons for others as well as for ourselves. It could also be claimedthat what separates moral principles from rules of etiquette, custom orprudence is that moral principles apply cross-culturally.1There are several ways of finding such principles. We can find areaswhere our belief systems overlap.2 While this may work to resolvesome disputes, it will fail to justify religious pluralism if we look forthe overlap in the area of religious belief. This is, in part, because somereligions claim to be the one true faith. People who hold such a viewmust find a justification for religious pluralism outside their religion,i.e., on secular grounds. This is also in part because an argument forreligious tolerance must appeal to those who reject religion, even tothose who believe that religion is little more than a dangerous supersti-tion. It is unlikely that arguments based on religious premises will bepersuasive to such people. But, what kind of secular reasons might beconvincing?I believe that we can adopt an argument from John Stuart Mill toprovide reasons for religious pluralism that both have the potential toMacalester International Vol. 8126be convincing to a wide variety of perspectives and are compatiblewith a number of other statements made by Tirosh-Samuelson. Theargument I shall suggest is analogous to Mill’s argument for freedomof speech in his book, On Liberty. Mill grounded his argument on utili-tarianism (the view that actions, policies, principles, etc., find their ulti-mate justification on the basis of how much happiness they produce).Yet, Mill’s defense of free speech can also be given a contractarian jus-tification. In particular, it can be claimed that the principles that Millsuggests are the principles that reasonable people would agree on,given appropriate conditions for reaching agreement.Paraphrasing Mill’s argument, we might say that one ought to toler-ate, and even welcome, diverse religious views.3 First, one might, infact, have religious views that one would find inadequate when con-fronted with more compelling views. Second, even if one’s own viewsare sound, other views might also contain part of the truth. Third, evenif the other views are false, having to confront the false views forcesone to be more clear about one’s beliefs and ensures that one’s ownbeliefs will not be held in the form of dogma rather than a living, vitalfaith.This provides further justification for various statements made byTirosh-Samuelson. The first and second reasons, for example, providea way to further elaborate her statement that religious persons cannotbe certain that their views are the whole truth about the divine. Thethird argument provides a way of further understanding Tirosh-Samuelson’s statement that the vitality of Judaism requires that inter-pretation be kept alive and that this requires a plurality of opinionsand practices.Mill’s defense of free speech is not, of course, without its own prob-lems. Perhaps the most worrisome problem is that Mill’s views onspeech rest on the assumption that views can be exchanged freely in amarketplace of ideas so that the most compelling views will eventuallybe accepted. The problem with this assumption is that it does not holdin a society in which the wealthy and powerful can dominate themedia.4 Regarding religious pluralism, however, this problem is miti-gated by three factors. First, many religious groups have enoughresources to make full use of the media. Far from being squeezed outof the marketplace of ideas, religious groups are sometimes part of theproblem of media domination. Second, new forms of sharing ideas,such as the Internet, promise to be more egalitarian than old-linemedia, such as television. Third, in those countries in which the sepa-Martin Gunderson127ration of church and state has been achieved, religious and politicalgroups have difficulty bringing the power of the state to bear either tocrush a religion or to establish a dominant religion.It might be objected that the arguments I have presented rest on theEnlightenment view that it is possible to find reasons that transcendparticular cultures and historical periods. Postmodern philosophersmight claim that there are no reasons that apply cross-culturally. Itmight also be argued that my position rests on a liberal political theorythat has also been heavily critiqued by postmodernists. A defense ofmy position against all the various postmodern critiques that could belaunched against it would be beyond the scope of my discussion. I do,however, believe that even if the postmodern critiques are correct, twopoints follow from my analysis. First, defenses of religious pluralismbased on particular religious traditions are not adequate for the job.Second, if postmodern critiques of all reasons that apply cross-cultur-ally are correct, then religious pluralism cannot be defended at all.Postmodernism should not be dismissed too quickly, however.Defenders of postmodernism are right to be concerned with the way inwhich those who claim to have cross-cultural principles sometimesadopt culturally-based reasons, claim that they are universal, and thenuse those reasons to oppress others. This is a form of conceptual impe-rialism, and it may be tempting to claim that the position I am defend-ing is an instance of cultural imperialism because it relies on reasonsthat must be cross-cultural. It is important to note, however, that thebasic principle that we need in order to appeal to people on the basis ofreasons that are reasons for them is a principle that respects others. Onedoes not oppress others by treating them in accord with reasons towhich they are committed insofar as they are open to discussion andreasonable. This basic principle is then used to develop a defense ofreligious tolerance. Religious tolerance is not oppressive and is pre-cisely the position that Professor Tirosh-Samuelson is defending. Bothof us are concerned with postmodern relativism and with defendingreligious tolerance. We differ only in the background principles thatare used to justify our positions.*****In conclusion, those who want to defend religious pluralism will havea very difficult time doing so if they appeal to precepts from the per-spective of a particular religion. The problem is that the reasons givenMacalester International Vol. 8128will not provide reasons for those who do not share that perspective.Contractarianism and Mill’s utilitarianism provide promisingapproaches to the justification of religious pluralism. The great advan-tage of these theories is that they provide reasons that have at least ashot at being reasons for all. Those who adopt a postmodern critiqueand claim that there are no reasons that can be reasons for all peopleplace themselves in a position in which religious pluralism is virtuallyimpossible to defend.Notes1. This view of moral reasoning is given its most thorough and careful exposition byContractarians who hold that we can derive substantive moral principles from therequirements of moral reasoning or rationality. Still, as T. M. Scanlon points out, oneneed not be a Contractarian to accept this view. See T. M. Scanlon, What We Owe to EachOther (Cambridge, Mass.: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1998), 189. Fora more general discussion, see Scanlon, Chapters 1, 4, and 5. See also, Thomas Nagel,who claims that this view derives ultimately from Kant’s Categorical Imperative, inThomas Nagel, Equality and Partiality (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press,1991), Chapter 5. For an excellent edition of Kant’s basic ethics, see Kant’s Groundwork ofthe Metaphysic of Morals, translated and edited by H. J. Paton (New York: Harper andRow Publishers, 1964).2. For an extended discussion of this sort of overlapping consensus, see John Rawls,Political Liberalism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993): Lecture IV.3. John Stuart Mill, “On Liberty,” Collected Works of John Stuart Mill, Vol. 18, J. M. Robson,ed. (Toronto: University of Toronto Press and London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1977),Chapter 1.4. C. Edwin Baker, Human Liberty and Freedom of Speech (New York and Oxford: OxfordUniversity Press, 1989), Chapters 1 and 2.Martin Gunderson129

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