Is there a movement to history? Is the history of man a smooth journey to happiness and flourishing? Or is it bound to end in failure? How does history work? It’s hard to talk about the philosophy of history without talking about Hegel. Hegel thought that history was the self-realization of the spirit. This self-realization was defined by the struggle between a thesis (let’s say the work of priests and rituals; it could be anything) an antithesis (Let’s say philosophy and writing). The struggle would result in synthesis, meaning the problems between those two groups had been solved.
His work gave birth to the discipline of philosophical history. Obviously, most of the people who listened to him didn’t believe that he had actually discovered the final truth. This was a discipline that tried to find principles for how history works. I want to explore some versions of philosophical history that are popular today or have been popular in the recent past. I want to suggest a Christian response with a Christian understanding of philosophical history. You might say, a Christian understanding of progress.
Popular understandings of progress.
While Hegel popularized idealist history, very few people have a similar understanding today. Idealist history focusses on the knowledge of spirit. philosophical history today is much more materialist. Materialist history focusses on the struggle between classes or between man and nature, not so much on ideas. It is good to know that there is a difference here, but it will not be important for the rest of our paper.
Many, maybe most, people today would unthinkingly hold to the “whig theory of history.” This is the idea that things will slowly and naturally progress throughout history. People will become more peaceful and open-minded. Innovations will continue to progress: slowly but surely raising the standard of living. New knowledge will be continually superseding old knowledge.
Contemporary activists, whether they fight for LGBT rights or women’s rights, hold to a similar understanding. They are, however, much more revolutionary in their methods. In the mind of these activists, the highest good is egalitarianism and the greatest enemy of the good life is exlusivism. They seem to believe that society will continually become more open to those that are different than themselves. We have seen huge strides against racism directed against African Americans; they want to see it again through their fight for other minorities.
Personal theories of progress
Like the egalitarians, Marx also saw revolution as a means toward the end of happiness. He argued for violent revolution. Marx saw the goal as the happy life of each person “working according to his ability and receiving according to his need.” In Marx’s mind, the thing that stood in the way was “property rights.”
It may initially seem funny to compare a libertarian like Rothbard with Marx. Rothbard is a defender of property-rights. But he himself sees a similarity in that he is fighting against the oppressive class. There is an oppressive class and an oppressed class. Rothbard is fighting against the old order of Europe Marx may be wrong on economic theory. He may be wrong on his use of the apparatus of the state in order to bring about revolution, but he sees the importance of revolution against the oppressing class. For Murray Rothbard, the ultimate goal is liberty, while the obstacle to that goal is the oppressor. The way forward is in continually standing against the tyrants of the day.
Christians and progress
In a way, Murray Rothbard comes the closest to what we might call a Christian view of progress. In the scriptures, there is a strong sense that we are moving toward liberty. The old order (in this case the order before Christ), is not necessarily evil, but it is something that we have grown out of. We can think of Paul in Galatians 4, speaking of the children of the Jerusalem above who were under a tutor at one point and now have grown up.
There is an evil old order as well. It lives alongside the other old order, which is the law. This is the the oppression of sin and death. It is the rule of what Augustine might call the libido dominandi, that is, the desire for power. That means that the desire to oppress men is in all of us. Christ brough about salvation by humbling the libido dominandi.
How does this apply politically? Christians understand that all men need to be delivered from that sin and death and that it begins with their own deliverance. Once delivered they need to keep putting to death their desire for power. Christ taught us how to attack that desire for power in ourselves and in others. Christ humbled himself. He took the same advice he gave his disciples in Matthew 18. He accounted himself as humble, just like a small child. Through humility, we undermine the structures of power by beginning with ourselves.
Christians disagree with Rothbard in two areas then. We disagree that there is an old order out there. That old order is in us. That is why revolutions will often lead to something worse than that which they were attacking in the first place. It follows that we also disagree with revolutions. Revolutions don’t deal with the desire for power that is in everybody.
Christians do believe in progress. Our goal is the freedom to practice the righteousness of Christ. The problem is our own complicity in enslaving others and enslaving ourselves. The means is the humility of Christ, which can only be accomplished by trusting in Christ. Christ is the only humble man and, as the one who has been resurrected and ascended to the right hand of God, he provides the means we have to fight against our own desire to control other people.