The Selfishness of Christianity

Another passage in my thesis related to classical Greek virtue versus Kantian/Christian virtue. Kant is generally interpreted as belonging to the Christian tradition in ethics. This is both because of the culture in which he was writing and also because his first formulation of the categorical imperative is generally considered to be a formalisation of the Golden Rule. However, one important difference between Kantian virtue and Christian virtue is that Kantian virtue is only worth practising for its own sake, independently of any reward one might receive for it. Jesus actually often refers to a reward of some sort for one's actions. He exhorts his followers to "Ask, and ye shall receive; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you" (Luke 11:9) Granted, one will not necessarily receive any reward for virtue in this life, but one will be rewarded in an afterlife, "For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?" (Mark 8:36)

At the time of my thesis, I thought that this was simply because Christianity appealed to the self-interest of would-be converts. Kant would therefore have been trying to preserve a Christian ethic without the Christian metaphysical baggage. However, reading Kelley L. Ross's essay "Prudence, Goodness and Wisdom" (2002) has given me a much deeper understanding of Jesus's motives. Christianity is actually more consistent with the Greek approach to virtue. The Stoics taught that virtue was its own reward, but this actually meant, as it did in Plato, that virtue all by itself was sufficient for happiness--a claim with little empirical support! Indeed, earlier Greek thought was that life could not be happy, or at least could not be counted so until death brought an end to possible future misfortune. If Plato were at all uneasy about this, however, he covered the contradictions of experience with the notion that reward and punishment would be coming, regardless of the events of life, in the afterlife. Christianity, therefore, can simply be seen as an elaboration of Plato, whose doctrine in turn was a modification of Stoic philosophy.

Given this background, it is easy to see why Kant would have wanted to preserve Christian ethics without the Christian metaphysical baggage. If the reason for right conduct was simply that it got you into heaven, then once you rejected religion, you had to reject morality along with it. Indeed, exactly this attitude can be seen with many disillusioned Christians. But this is quite unjust, because as Kant recognised, the virtues of the Christian ethics could be appreciated quite independently of any reward whatsoever. Note, however, that even Kant thought that virtue would be her own reward, at least incidentally in the empirical world:

In fact, when the thinking man has conquered the temptations to vice, and is conscious of having done his (often hard) duty, he finds himself in a state of peace and satisfaction which may well be called happiness, in which virtue is her own reward.

(The Metaphysical Elements of Ethics, Preface.)

However, he goes on to say that in order to feel this happiness, one must first have performed one's duty for the sake of one's duty. So happiness could never be the real reason for doing the right thing, nor would one feel such happiness if that were one's only motivation to be moral.

Now, on the other hand, since he can promise himself this reward of virtue only from the consciousness of having done his duty, it is clear that the latter must have preceded: that is, be must feel himself bound to do his duty before he thinks, and without thinking, that happiness will be the consequence of obedience to duty.

(Ibid.)

The disinterested pursuit of virtue is also endorsed by both Confucius and the Bhagavad Gita. The Gita is, in fact, quite scathing of the Christian pursuit of virtue for the sake of heaven:

Their soul is warped with selfish desires, and their heaven is a selfish desire. They have prayers for pleasures and power, the reward of which is earthly rebirth.

(2:43, Juan Mascaró translation, Penguin, 1962, as cited in Ross, 2002.)

The statement of karmayoga, on the other hand, is:

Set thy heart upon thy work, but never on its reward. Work not for a reward; but never cease to do thy work.

(2:47, from Ross, 2002.)

It would seem that Kant was on the right track--and Aristotle agreed with him, as I also noted in the thesis. Even Ross concludes that "self-interest may be gravely damaged by moral action". However, he does also note that moral action is performed for the sake of a greater good, known by wisdom rather than mere prudence.

Well, now that raises an interesting question. You resisted the notion of heavy self-sacrifice for a very long time, which is why you had to write a whole Masters thesis to work towards a theory that removed that kind of obligation from you. Ross seems to be bringing you right back to the point that you rejected years ago.

But at least Ross is giving me more of a picture into what it is for which I would be sacrificing myself. It is far more inspiring than a mere utilitarian notion of self-sacrifice, and I do not mind it at all.

But that seems to me already to raise two major difficulties:

1. What is inspiring about Ross's notion of self-sacrifice that was not inspiring about utilitarian self-sacrifice?
   
2. If morality can be gravely damaging to self-interest, then how is this consistent with what I read in "The Fallacies of Egoism and Altruism"?
   

I'm going to have to address those questions in future sections.