In Your Face, Joel Osteen -Will Brady
Let's get real: philosophy readings are hit-or-miss for me. There are some good readings that make us think about things like "Here's why you should actively pursue knowledge," and then there are readings that use painfully long and confusing methods to say worthless things like "Here's how you know that you are real" and "Here's how you know that this table still exists when you stop looking at it." Now, my displeasure was exaggerated just now, but some philosophy just has more meaning and value than others. Boethius' philosophy? "Here's where goodness comes from and how to be happy with your life even in painful circumstances." This is as good as it gets, folks. Boethius is striving to answer the age-old psalmist question of why the wicked prosper while the just suffer, and he's doing a marvelous job of it.
I'll point out the obvious for everyone returning from last semester: the Platonic influence is palpable. Everything Plato says about tyranny and its inevitable unhappiness in The Republic is echoed here to help answer the psalmist's question. "If there were any natural and inherent good in power and offices themselves, they would never come together to evil men. For things of opposite natures don't join together; nature reveals against such a thing," stuck out to me in Book 2. In Book 3? "Since nothing greater than God is able to be imagined, who can doubt that the thing that is surpassed by nothing is good? Truly reason shows that the Good is God." To summarize his arguments, power and wealth and prosperity as we would think of it cannot be the true human goals of goodness if evil men fall into them, become someone corrupt can't just "become" good while remaining evil (much like how an uneducated man can't just "become" a surgeon while remaining uneducated on the human body). Assuming the existence of an all-powerful God who rules creation, that God would be the highest form of goodness as there could be nothing above Him and no means by which He could be corrupted.
Boethius is intent on demonstrating that its foolish to say that the wicked prosper because that very question is grounded in a corrupt view of prosperity. Prosperity has nothing to do with power, fame, wealth, or any of the above--all such things come with a myriad of pitfalls which they cannot protect against and ultimately leave man in ruins. If prosperity is about having a bunch of stuff that will make life more miserable, it's self-defeating and contradictory, and I really wouldn't want it. True goodness isn't about the stuff, it's about the life and the soul. It's about an earthly existence and an eternity spent with God--something which possesses no disadvantage, for even if you're slain for your faith in God, eternity automatically invalidates the painful little blip on the radar known as mortal life. Once in eternity, your earthly lifespan will have been the equivalent of a blink, so quick and short that you almost forget it was there.
So no, the wicked do not prosper; they only think they do. But as their lives unravel as entropy demands, they will find empty hopelessness inside and little more. True prosperity, by its definition of "thriving, successful, lucrative" can't leave a man empty and dead. Only a life lived for God, even a life of suffering, can accomplish that.
P.S. I commented on Eliza and AnnaKate’s posts.
I'll point out the obvious for everyone returning from last semester: the Platonic influence is palpable. Everything Plato says about tyranny and its inevitable unhappiness in The Republic is echoed here to help answer the psalmist's question. "If there were any natural and inherent good in power and offices themselves, they would never come together to evil men. For things of opposite natures don't join together; nature reveals against such a thing," stuck out to me in Book 2. In Book 3? "Since nothing greater than God is able to be imagined, who can doubt that the thing that is surpassed by nothing is good? Truly reason shows that the Good is God." To summarize his arguments, power and wealth and prosperity as we would think of it cannot be the true human goals of goodness if evil men fall into them, become someone corrupt can't just "become" good while remaining evil (much like how an uneducated man can't just "become" a surgeon while remaining uneducated on the human body). Assuming the existence of an all-powerful God who rules creation, that God would be the highest form of goodness as there could be nothing above Him and no means by which He could be corrupted.
Boethius is intent on demonstrating that its foolish to say that the wicked prosper because that very question is grounded in a corrupt view of prosperity. Prosperity has nothing to do with power, fame, wealth, or any of the above--all such things come with a myriad of pitfalls which they cannot protect against and ultimately leave man in ruins. If prosperity is about having a bunch of stuff that will make life more miserable, it's self-defeating and contradictory, and I really wouldn't want it. True goodness isn't about the stuff, it's about the life and the soul. It's about an earthly existence and an eternity spent with God--something which possesses no disadvantage, for even if you're slain for your faith in God, eternity automatically invalidates the painful little blip on the radar known as mortal life. Once in eternity, your earthly lifespan will have been the equivalent of a blink, so quick and short that you almost forget it was there.
So no, the wicked do not prosper; they only think they do. But as their lives unravel as entropy demands, they will find empty hopelessness inside and little more. True prosperity, by its definition of "thriving, successful, lucrative" can't leave a man empty and dead. Only a life lived for God, even a life of suffering, can accomplish that.
P.S. I commented on Eliza and AnnaKate’s posts.
I love to read others responses to the text because it really clears up what is being said. Especially in a text written in this old english. I did not see it the way you did probably because I was struggling to understand the material. I love how Boethius likes to take a different approach to philosophy in that he will question thoughts and conclusions others think are completed or impossible to get a straight answer from. That being said I don't like when he talked about how small the earth is compared to infinity because you could just as easily flip the perspective by saying that to an ant the earth is infinity.
ReplyDeleteYeet. That's a mood right there... I honestly had found myself wondering why good people go through bad things, and why bad people go through good things... My focus had never correlated the physical world to the spiritual one in that aspect to the depth that I probably should have... I often found myself asking God what I wasn't doing enough spiritually to get out of the muck when I was stuck but I never once looked at a prosperous evil man and thought about how temporary his joy would be... or even if he felt joy at all, I guess I always just assumed that they did. Not that I would ever want a lot of stuff, I just sometimes look at those who I love in the face of their hate and wonder what I do to fall short in their eyes, ya know? I guess now I kinda have a think going on up in my brain, since what you said put me at peace in a way that the way that they see me isn't the way that God sees me... because sometimes the line between the two gets blurred to me... Hmm... I need to do some digging now.
ReplyDeleteNice! Boethius is a much more interesting read considering this applies to the everyday man. I really have never found myself questioning if a table is dependent upon my imagination or the fact God created a physical world. However, his teachings about the futility of seeking fulfillment in physical possessions immediately reminded me of Socrates and Plato. This makes the point in how the wicked only achieve what others Think is prosperity, and it turns out they have been wasting their life to perfectly reflect a whitewashed tomb- beautiful to onlookers but a totally decayed mess on the inside. He emphasizes the nourishment of the life and soul, refreshing any reader from a world focused on possessions.
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