A LETTER FROM YALE

I am writing this from New Haven where I am attending the annual meeting of the American Philosophical Association, which is this year the guest of Yale University. There are several hundreds of philosophers at this gathering, including such distinguished figures as Prof. Charles W. Hendel who is to give the Gifford Lectures at Glasgow next year and Prof. Paul Tillich of Harvard who is the foremost American theologian.

As one looks over this group of significant thinkers he notices a shortage of idealists. Idealism was once well established in American universities with Royce and Hocking at Harvard, Bowne and Brightman at Boston, Creighton at Cornell, Noah Porter of Yale, Howison at California, and Harris (as a layman but as important as any) in St. Louis, to name only a few. Harvard was the stronghold of American idealism, for in addition to Royce and Hocking there were James, Whitehead, and Perry. This was “the golden age of American philosophy,” which was partly influenced by German idealism, especially the thought of Hegel. W. T. Harris of St. Louis started a philosophic journal for the purpose of giving Hegel to American people in English. A number of “Plato Clubs” emerged, the most influential being at Jacksonville, Ill., where I recently resided. Friends met once a week and exchanged idealistic concepts of man and the universe in order to draw themselves away from the absorbing cares of everyday life. This was in the 1860’s, and for a long time thereafter idealism was strong.

Today it is different. At this Yale gathering one can hardly find an idealist with a fine-toothed comb. There is Brand Blanshard of Yale and Charles Hartshorne of Emory still left. They are both at this meeting, but their hair is white and they too will soon be gone. American Philosophy is going the way of her culture: pragmatism, linguistic analysis, logical positivism — and of course Paul Tillich’s and Reinhold Niebuhr’s existentialism! Blanshard is one of the strongest voices against “the philosophy of analysis.” He was a key speaker of this same meeting last year at Columbia. He is on record as avowing that the present trend of philosophic thought will take the “wisdom” our of philosophy and make the philosopher a master cf logical subtlety and acuteness. He believes that philosophy is losing its central position in education and is moving to the periphery “where it will be pursued by those with special talent for logical and linguistic inquiry.” Blanshard is unhappy that contemporary philosophy is so greatly concerned with mathematics and science and so little concerned with literature, art and religion.

To me it is a most interesting question as to what happened to idealism in America, so I have been asking a few of the fellows around. One philosopher said it was outmoded, but I thought this was begging the question. Why is it outmoded? There is no easy answer of course, but it may be that idealism has died along with the decay of western culture in general, a culture that is more interested in things than in the spirit of man. Western culture is less religious and therefore less idealistic. It has learned through science and logic how to take care of itself apart from God, so what need is there for metaphysical speculation?

Several of our speakers have asserted that philosophy must come down out of its Ivory Tower and help the world solve its problems, for this was the role of philosophy when it was born in the golden age of Greece. Even the Yale president who spoke to us at the banquet tonight urged that we think of the Russians and Chinese as brothers, and that philosophy should lead the way into this brotherhood. Professor John Wild of Harvard, president of our association, stated that philosophy must be in closer touch with literature, art and religion. And he comes from the university that is now the hotbed of logical positivism! But perhaps that is not why he is leaving Harvard to go to Northwestern. Anyway as one of the little fellows at this meeting I will put my two-cents worth in and say that it will take a resurgence of idealistic thought if philosophy is to do what our leaders want it to do. I cannot see how a logical positivist can make much of a contribution toward brotherhood with Russians and Chinese.

Paul Tillich is always interesting to watch. Since Harvard days I have been impressed with his kindly face and benign spirit, not to mention his tall, rugged frame. He both looks and talks like the robust German that he is. He chaired a symposium on “The Concept of God,” in which three professors read papers. Tillich served as both chairman and critic. His criticisms of the three papers were interesting and amusing. One paper was on “The Hiddenness of God and Some Barmecidal God Surrogates.” Tillich asked the young professor to explain what he meant by such language, that he had looked up some of the words in the dictionary and still didn’t know!

The symposium got very interesting when one of the professors read a paper on “Beyond Being” in which he criticized Tillich’s own position on God as Being. Tillich denied that such was his position, whereupon the professor quoted word for word from Tillich’s Systematic Theology, and then said, “I am shocked that Prof. Tillich denies the very position that he is known so widely as holding and which is stated clearly in his writings.” The philosopher sitting next to me, a professor from the University of Toronto, thought Tillich was a little upset by it all. “He seems a little uneasy,” he whispered to me. But I did not think so. Tillich never answered the attack, but it was because there was time left only for concluding remarks by others on the program.

I felt somewhat responsible for the fracas in that I arose from the floor and requested that the professor from Harvard be permitted to make his criticism of Tillich’s position, for he had stated in his opening remarks that when he wrote his paper he did not realize that America’s most distinguished philosopher-theologian was to be the chairman, and that since his position was a criticism of the school to which Tillich belongs, he had prepared a postscript in which he had made a special argument against Tillich’s viewpoint, which he would read if time permitted. But he had not read it when we were well along in the question period. So instead of asking a question when Tillich recognized me, I ask the chairman if he would not permit the professor to read his postscript. That did it. The professor buttonholed me later to thank me for giving him a chance at Tillich, but he added, “Tillich was not interested in replying to me.”

These philosophers are keen critics of the finer points. In one session they argued as to whether God is “a Necessary Being” or “self sufficient.” I never quite saw the point, but due to the fervor of the meeting I take it that there was a point. Another session on what constitutes a choice made more sense to me. These philosophers have great respect for each other despite the differences. But let me warn you to never attend one of their business meetings. They will argue for an hour over something that does not matter anyhow. But in the entire history of philosophy I have never known a philosopher to put another one in jail.

I am here to criticize a paper written by a New York woman on the creativity of childhood. Her idea is that the child in his play-world is the genius of human creativity. The child is poetic and aesthetic by nature and he longs to reach out and find an “at homeness’ with the world outside. So the inner nature of the child and the outer nature of the universe are one. The child is not the father of the man, for a man in one sense should always be a child in that he remains as free and as creative as the child. She believes that the poets and the artists are what they are because they have maintained a continuity with their childhood. Delinquency is the result of the child’s frustrated efforts to reach out and find his world meaningful. Educators thwart the creative spark by their own stupidity and insensitivity to the needs of the human spirit. She sees love as the connecting link between the inner nature of the child and the world without. She quotes Dr. Edward Hopkins as saying that “childhood and adulthood are extremely subtle functions of one another.”

She says that the body is a mental tool, that it is indeed an extension of man’s soul. We feel and think all over just as a bird flies all over. Mind and body work as one in communication. Culture takes place within the framework of language. Things go wrong when the communicative genius of the growing child is some way blocked. She is terribly concerned that modern man is so poorly cultured, and she closes her paper by lamenting the fact “that religion is taboo.” She is a Freudian in that she believes that childhood experiences set the tone for adulthood, and she also follows Freud in diagnosing adult mental illness by a study of the childhood of the sick person.

This woman has never been to college, and yet she has been honored by Columbia University for her research work. She believes that a study of autobiographies, especially as they relate to accounts of childhood, opens the way to new areas of human understanding. Consequently she has collected many autobiographies which are presently housed at Columbia. She has suffered considerable financial hardship and nearly all her research work has been by great personal sacrifice. Let none of us make the complaint, therefore, that we cannot do something substantial for humanity for lack of money or education. I suppose this woman is the only one on the entire program that does not have a Ph.D. from some big university, and yet I do believe that she talks more sense than any of them. At least Professor Hartshorne, referred to above, told me that her paper was the most thought provoking of any he had heard today.

This New York woman reminds me of my friend Carl Ketcherside in St. Louis. He is another that could not produce a college diploma if his life depended on it, and he too grew up in poverty. And yet he knows more than a whole roster of Ph.D.’s. I have “walked with kings” in these professional meetings and at several universities, and I have sat with scholars renowned the world over, but I have not yet met the man that is superior to Carl Ketcherside in intellectual grace.

I do not intend to suggest that our young men should not take their Ph.D.’s. To the contrary I am now urging and helping several college men to go on for the degree. But in these days of what William James called “the Ph.D. octopus” we must realize that all degrees are but invitations to learning, a kind of “letter of intent” to a lifetime of study. Degrees are but means to an end, not the end itself. I refer to my New York and St. Louis friends to illustrate that intellectual accomplishment is after all a matter of personal doggedness. So go to work!

REACTIONS TO BETHANY MOVE

“You have now reached the very bottom of your apostasy.”—Nashville, Tenn.

“Congratulations upon your going to Bethany College. I think that you will be very happy there in your work.”—Nashville, Tenn.

“We share your enthusiasm for your new work at Bethany. After reading The Fool of God we feel a keen interest in that locale which brought forth such a vision. Perhaps God will use you to help revive his dream and give it substance again.”—La Grange, Ill.

“Perhaps Restoration Review will be another Millennial Harbinger. Why not?”—Santa Monica, Calif.

“I do most sincerely hope that your estimate of Bethany and your relationship to it will help the cause in which you are enlisted, and while I am not so optimistic about the prospect, I trust that you will be helped, not hindered, in your endeavor to serve the needs of this generation.”—St. Louis, Mo.

“I learned early this summer of the invitation extended to you on the part of Bethany College. Our best wishes.”—Cookeville, Tenn.

“I know the news of your move to Bethany will cause incredulity among some of your old adversaries and some allies. But I know well the cause you are seeking to serve, and I have no such feelings of alarm.”—(APO, New York)

“It seems to me that your greatest strength is absence of complete identification with any faction. I wish you were in a state college as this would increase your position of independence.” — (Murfreesboro, Tenn.)

“We feel that we understand your purpose in going, and we shall back you to the fullest. But you might as well get prepared to give a defense of yourself once the news of this leaks out to the brotherhood. The papers will say that too much education leads to modernism and that you have now identified yourself with the Christian Church brethren, and that you are headed for the same pitfall as brother Eugene Smith fell into.”—Gallipolis, Ohio

“I was sitting and dreaming the other day that perhaps someday I shall be at a college such as Bethany teaching philosophy of religion and related subjects. I hope at any rate that I will never lose my ability to make my philosophy relevant to life situations.” —Boston, Mass.

“It is one of the ironies of the Restoration Movement that I might run into opposition in having you address a group of restorationists here, which would not have been present before you went to Bethany.” —Rollo, Mo.

“I don’t know whether I ever met you, but I have known of you for a good while, and I am wondering what you are doing over there at Bethany with those who have in many things ‘departed from the faith’.”—Pueblo, Colo.

Editorial Comment: A free man in Christ should be able to teach the history of ideas in any institution in the world, whether it be Jewish, Roman Catholic or Protestant. I was once invited to teach in a Roman Catholic high school, which I might have done had I not been engaged elsewhere. For reasons that I will not now go into, I would not choose to teach in a Bible College or seminary, nor in any “theological department” of a college or university, but I can conscientiously teach philosophy in any educational institution in the world.

There are several reasons why I choose to teach at Bethany. One reason is because I believe in the educational philosophy of Alexander Campbell and am in sympathy with his intentions in founding a college. Bethany is within a tradition that I love and of which I consider myself a part. It is Alexander Campbell’s college. He founded it to educate young Americans, and that is precisely what I am doing here. If Bethany were a parochial school or a religious institution, it might make sense to talk about heretics and digressives. One may as well talk about the “digressives” at Center High School! It is true that on the Bethany faculty one finds teachers of many religious persuasions, and even some perhaps of no religious persuasion at all. But this is as it should be in an educational institution. Men are to be employed on the basis of their scholarship in the arts and sciences, not on grounds of “loyalty” to some sectarian creed. A college should not be a church nor should it do the church’s work. And so it should not be judged as one would judge a church. Alexander Campbell saw this distinction and he was consistent in it from the day he founded the college. He had a Presbyterian on his very first faculty, but I am sure he would not have had a Presbyterian as an elder in the Bethany Church of Christ, which he also established.

The trouble is that some of the schools within the tradition of the Restoration Movement are religious institutions that are expected to uphold the sectarian peculiarities of some Disciple sect. While I could teach my academic discipline in such institutions (and I can think of none that need philosophy more!), I must admit that I would not feel free, and it is almost certain that the fun would not last long. The article by Professor Meyers in this same issue will point out what I mean when I call such colleges parochial. Yet these colleges are conducted by my brethren whom I love. I would only wish that they would declare their independence and become truly liberal in their educational philosophy.

It is unthinkable that there are a number of our people that will not hear a man speak because he is connected with this or that college. If our reader is right in this judgment, and I suppose he is, then it underscores the tremendous task we have even within our own ranks to make men free. I would be most happy to address such people on the words of our Lord, “If the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.”