Anthony Lewis: Faith in Reason and Fighting
Fundamentalism
By Rabbi David Eidensohn
In his valedictory column in the New York Times, Anthony Lewis says good-by, and says, "I see a time of challenge to a basic tenet of modern society: faith in reason." He writes, "The phenomenon of religious fundamentalism is not to be found in Islam alone. Fundamentalist Christians in America, believing that the Bible's story of creation is the literal truth, question not only Darwin but the scientific method that has made contemporary civilization possible."
I grew up in a scientific home. My father was America's leading battery scientist, and was honored with the Navy's highest civilian award for doubling the battery submarine fleet's cruising power. My two brothers have medical doctorates and rabbinical training. We are bearded Talmudists, we believe in Creation and not in Darwin. When we meet, we talk about physics, psychology, Cabala, Talmud and politics. I think I appreciate reason as much as the next fellow, and I certainly welcome science and technological process.
Mr. Lewis promotes "faith in reason." That is an oxymoron. Faith implies something beyond reason, and reason does not need faith. Mr. Lewis gave away his hand with this error. He is not a reasonable person. He has "faith in reason," a humanist religion that imposes the worst things on reason and liberty. The French Revolution and Communism featured "faith in reason" accepting first one idea and the next, always with bloodshed. The French Revolutionary party of Girondists were slaughtered when their star fell. Before she was killed for belonging to the party, Mme. Roland called out, "Oh Liberty, what crimes are committed in thy name!" Mr. Lewis's humanist religion is the most fanatic faith, and is a direct cousin of the Stalinists who murder millions. Indeed, when Stalin slaughtered millions of peasants and others, the humanists did not protest. This, to them, was part of their "faith in reason" that requires blind belief.
Mr. Lewis might study a bit about the Age of Reason and the French Revolution. Fundamentalist religion was replaced with the guillotine, and people's heads were removed because their uncle was a tax collector. At one point, it was decided to make a statue of a certain actress minus most of her clothes and worship it as "reason." Unfortunately, that was the closest humanists ever came to real reason. It is surely more profitable to worship by looking at a nude woman than it is to worship the "mystery" of nature revealed by science, which is an oxymoron. How can a mystery be science?
Mr. Lewis writes, "The phenomenon of religious fundamentalism is not to be found in Islam alone." He then attacks Fundamentalist Christians and Jews. Why does he not include other fundamentalist beliefs such as Stalinism and Maoism? What about the gays who insist on freedom to infect other people and refuse public health measures?
He adds, "Fundamentalist Christians in America, believing that the Bible's story of creation is the literal truth, question not only Darwin but the scientific method that has made contemporary civilization possible." Steven Gould of Harvard is the leading authority of Darwin today; he is its icon. Mr. Gould has stated that there is no natural process of evolution, and that it happened by accident over long periods. He further stated that if the world were put together again, no life would result. If so, evolution is not a biological process, it happened despite nature and the predictions of science. If I don't believe in Darwin, do I deviate from pure science? Precisely because of these kinds of problems, the Nobel Prize does not give awards for biology. Indeed, all historical sciences, such as biology, epidemiology, medicine, archeology, cosmology, psychology and history are not real science, as they only guess what happened in the past and do not prove future processes and results. Therefore, when Mr. Lewis says that Creationists reject the scientific method, he obviously does not understand science, and certainly, he does not understand evolution and biology.
Mr. Lewis writes about "the scientific method that has made contemporary civilization possible." Our civilization is not founded upon a scientific method. Science can make tools for civilization, but civilization has a soul. As Oliver Wendall Holmes said, "Civilization is the process of reducing the infinite to the finite." Only when science and reason reveal religion do we have civilization. Humanists like Mr. Lewis despise a literal bible and a religion structured by any but secular and humanistic terms. They declare a religion of respecting others without any "reason" to do so. Fundamentalism and the Bible say that respecting others is reasonable, because G-d demanded it. Mr. Lewis respects others by whim. Civilization is not safe with secular "whims" as modern history has proven repeatedly.
Mr. Lewis, after 32 years with the New York Times, is leaving. Perhaps a new generation of writers will eschew the fanaticism that produced the atheist media. Then we can talk about reason.
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