Content area
Full Text
QUESTIONS ABOUT THE relationship of modernity to Christianity are frequently raised, not least by conservatives of theological as well as political varieties. Does a Christian view of history and society demand a negative appraisal of the modern world? Or should a Christian be at peace with the world, be it modern, postmodern, or of some other classification? A debate which was opened up 50 years ago may offer an enlightening inroad to understanding and answering such questions.
Around 1950 two books appeared that were destined to create a stir among historians and philosophers alike. Both books questioned in a most basic way what came to be called the legitimacy of the entire modern age. These books, Karl Lowith's Meaning in History (1949) and Eric Voegelin's New Science of Politics (1952), are complex yet concise and immensely readable works by two German thinkers whose thought was profoundly affected by the rise of Nazism in their native country. In both Lowith and Voegelin we find an attempt to return to classical and Christian sources of political thought in order to counteract the totalitarian tendencies of the twentieth century. What this attempt amounts to in Lowith as well as in Voegelin is a strong condemnation of modernity: The roots of modern totalitarianism are not to be found in the madness of a few disturbed individuals; nor are totalitarianism and modern barbarism simply a "recurrence" of non-liberal streams of ancient and medieval thought. Rather, totalitarianism is a distinctly modern phenomenon, the result of a way of thought that builds on a Christian foundation, but that at the same time has forgotten crucial insights best articulated by thinkers associated with Greek and early Christian thought. On the basis of this, Lowith and Voegelin have often been characterized as secularization theorists in the sense that they are thinkers who believe that modern thought has taken over important traits from Christianity, while at the same time adopting a thoroughly this-worldly ontology. Or, to put it differently, Lowith and Voegelin are thinkers who believe that the modern age builds on distinctively Christian elements, has maintained many of Christianity's most important features, but has left out the most important element of it: belief in a transcendent God.1
This essay will attempt to re-focus our...