"Imagine yourself a Don Quixote of eighteen!" These are the words of Alexandre Dumas describing a young D'Artagnan in the four musketeers. Of course Dumas was pre-existentialism and its questioning of the rationalistic method. In fact, Dumas knew nothing of modernity and the thoughtful reactions which grip our thinking today. In fact, Romanticism came easy for Dumas given the peaks and valleys in the trajectory of his own life. Not only was romanticism filtering through french culture during his early years but the events of his life could have been scripted by a Romantic. His father had a direct connection to Napoleon himself; he was born of mixed racial ancestry; he rose to incredible heights of fame and fortune; and he died almost penniless. Dumas sought adventure and extravagance. His fictions such as Man in the Iron Mask, The Count of Monte Cristo and of course the Three Musketeers were part of my reading when I was in the seventh grade at Park Junior High. When I was 13 years old an eighteen year old Don Quixote del la mancha was quite intriguing to me. D'Artagnan was daring beyond his abilities. Naively idealistic beyond the realities and intrigues of the day and somehow he found his way to become a Musketeer. In fact his sword play abilities and simple idealism were forces for his redemptive influence in a very ignoble environment.
How different that world is than that of Isaiah Berlin. I don't know a lot of Isaiah Berlin but I have read The Crooked Timber of Humanity. This is in fact a line borrowed from a critique of pure reason by Immanuel Kant. A lot of postmodernists react to Kant as a pure rationalist and the height of everything they are journeying away from. But remember this was a critique of pure rationalism. A rationalist discussing the reasons rationalism needs to be fine tuned. The crooked timber for building any philosophy or world view is us human beings in all of our rationalism. This is the beginning point for Isaiah Berlin. I read this book after reading Why I am not a Christian by Bertrend Russell. I am a modernistic pastor of a church with a positive faith to share and I really care about what our critics think. Because those critics are our neighbors, our families, our enemies and sometimes they are ourselves.
Isaiah Berlin turned off to Christianity when he read Machiavellian as a student at Oxford. Machiavelli's point is that Christian virtues and reality are incompatible and when practiced by a people become the weakening which leads to the downfall of that society. He also was impacted by Voltaire's idea that mistaken ideals were the disease of modern society. Berlin sees two factors shaping human history our science and our ideological systems in short both need to be questioned.
This blog grows long so let me get to my point. I contend that there is as much a need today in the midst of whatever we call the conflict between modernity and post modernity for an eighteen year old Don Quixote as ever. Yes, there is a lot that needs to be questioned. But there is a role in this conversation between those who are gripped by questions and those who hold on with one hand gripping all the good of the past heritage of Christian faith and the other hand gripping the hand of the people we love who sincerely are on a new journey. This may seem as no way to skip down the yellow brick road exploring the Oz of a new century. On one side we hold the hand of the cowardly lion (post-modernity's view of modern Christianity) and on the other side the straw man ( old fashioned Christian heritages view of emergent Christianity). But then again, we are D'Artagnan we can do it!!! I am no longer 13 I am 52. My back is sore from playing basketball two weeks ago. The thought of an eighteen year old Don Quixote seems a long way away. And yet did the old Don Quixote ever realize he wasn't eighteen?
