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{"id":18510,"date":"2016-11-11T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2016-11-11T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/leithart.level2d.com\/?p=249"},"modified":"2016-11-11T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2016-11-11T00:00:00","slug":"giving-modernity-its-due","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/leithart\/2016\/11\/giving-modernity-its-due\/","title":{"rendered":"Giving Modernity Its Due"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

L<\/span>amber Zuidervaart thinks that Christian scholars have a \u201cmodernity complex\u201d (Religion, Truth, and Social Transformation<\/a>, 222). He illustrates with quotations from writers from Groen van Prinsterer to Merold Westphal, and concludes that Christian scholars need \u201ca nuanced sifting of what is intrinsically worthwhile and intrinsically problematic in supposedly \u2018secular\u2019 ideas. We also need equally careful judgments about the better or worse roles these ideas play in society\u201d (223).<\/p>\n

He ends his essay with an exhortation to be \u201cpostmodern without being antimodern, and to recover medieval humility and ancient wonder without embracing the narrow parochialism and rigid stratification of a premodern world\u201d (236). We shouldn\u2019t forget \u201cthe dark side of Greek philosophy: how its notions of logos and order ratify a social hierarchy built on slavery and the oppression of women.\u201d And, whatever we admire in medieval Christendom, we need to remember that \u201cmedieval wonder at God\u2019s mysteries\u201d occurred in \u201ca world where illiteracy, poverty, disease, and human servitude ran rampant\u201d (234). <\/p>\n

He puts in a good word for modern subjectivity, and for Descartes, arguing that neither Heideggerian nor the poststructuralist critiques of modernity \u201cwould be possible without the modern construction of the epistemic subject.\u201d Further, \u201cmodern subjectivism puts a heavier emphasis on human responsibility than one finds in medieval or classical culture, and it gives an impetus to cultural self-criticism of the sort that postmodern thinkers can only continue.\u201d Spiritually, \u201calthough modern subjectivism seems to move us away from trust and reverence toward that which sustains and renews all creation, nevertheless it also powerfully awakens us to the creative potential that God has given to even the most ordinary of human beings\u201d (235).<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"