Jazz and Politics

This blog has been dormant for some time, probably since 2015, but that does not mean that my passion for this uniquely American music has waned. I have written about jazz mostly since then at All About Jazz. But I offer a short reflection on jazz and politics sparked by a book I started reading.

As a jazz aficionado and political conservative (but not a Trump fan), I sometimes observe that conservatives are hostile to jazz as a destructive force. Richard Weaver thought so, and I responded to this screed at All About Jazz some time ago. On the other hand, today I was reading a book of jazz history and interpretation called Living Space, which casually dropped a line that the progress made in free jazz was somehow counteracted by a turn to the right in politics. This was offered as self-evidence and not elaborated on. Perhaps the author will elaborate later in the book.

Jazz is sometimes tied to cultural and political rebellion. It gave voice and expression to many African- Americans during segregation and Jim Crow. Rebelling against evil is good. Rebelling against good is evil. But conservativism in politics does not mean to conserve racism, but rather allow for liberty under law for the common good. There is nothing anti-jazz about that nor is jazz against that.

Later this year, a book will be published called "Theology and the Blues," which will feature a chapter by me called, "Racial Progress Through American Music: Spirituals, Blues, Jazz, and Beyond," which outlines how blacks have advanced their cause through music. This was originally a chapter in my book, "Fire in the Streets," which is a critique of Critical Race Theory. However, when the manuscript swelled beyond the original word limit, it had to be excised. My appreciation for black achievement in music and politics through music is not contradictory to the Christian-conservative vision I articulate in "Fire in the Streets."

 "Most Reluctant Convert"

Kathleen and I just finished watching "Most Reluctant Convert," which is the story of C. S. Lewis's conversion. The entire narration and much of the dialogue is taken directly from Lewis's writings, such as "Surprised by Joy" and "Mere Christianity." As the story progresses, a compelling apologetic for Christianity is built up. I have never beheld anything like this: a full apologetic argument told through narrative based on a brilliant man's story and performed well--despite the inexplicably inapt beginning and ending of the film.

I have not used this page for about three years. Why not post something now?

The New Jerusalem comes down from heaven as God’s gift of cosmic restoration and not as the culmination of human progress. Nevertheless, it is a glorious city—not a restored garden—which bears the uniquely human touch.

—Truth Decay, Douglas Groothuis,  p. 255 

This Blog Has Moved!

Please join me on my new website, www.DouglasGroothuis.com, which will be the new site of The Constructive Curmudgeon blog. While I will no longer post here, the old blog will remain as an archive.

“The book, that stubbornly unelectric artifact of pure typography, possesses resources conducive to the flourishing of the soul. A thoughtful reading of the printed text orients one to a world of order, meaning, and the possibility of knowing truth.” - Douglas Groothuis

Sunny Groothuis

On Miles Davis

Miles Dewey Davis was born on this day eighty-eight years ago. This musical genius excellent at playing his trumpet, composing, and leading various bands with members such as John Coltrane, Bill Evans, Tony Williams, John McLaughlin, and Wayne Shorter. No one could play the horn with such sweetness--and such fire. Miles's work on mute is without peer as well. He brought out the best in nearly all the musicians in his bands. A book of his paintings was recently released as well.

Sadly, Miles the man was another story. He was famously moody, fathered several children out of wedlock, was foul mouthed, beat at least one of his three wives, and was for long periods addicted to drugs.

I suggest that you listen to some Miles Davis today or tomorrow. The classic is "Kind of Blue," but his early fusion was remarkable as well. Consider "In a Silent Way" and "Bitches Brew."

Davis illustrated the Pascalian principle of "deposed royalty." He was a prince of a musician, but a pauper in his moral life. There is no evidence that he sought the grace of God in Christ for his redemption. Nevertheless, we can receive much of his music as gifts from the Giver of every good and perfect gift. 

Jazz

Jazz makes up only a small part of the music market; but it makes up a giant part of American history and culture. It is something uniquely American, although it thrives offshore in places like France and Japan.

After attending a jazz performance last night, I realized again the hospitality and conviviality of jazz--the easy enjoyment, fellow-feeling, and buoyancy of the music. Jazz musicians tend to smile at each other during performances--and root each other on--more than any other musical form I have seen. Jazz musicians know the standards--the canon of traditional tune--and can play them without rehearsal. They esteem history and deep feeling.

I love jazz. You should, too.

Beyond Crood: A Film Review

The film, "The Croods," is based on the general assumption that humans evolved from sub-human creatures. This is the humorous story of their ascent. While I don't accept this Darwinian explanation of man, the film is worth seeing for several reasons.

First, the computer animation is stunning (at least to me). The characters' expressions and gestures, the landscapes, and the animals (all hybrids of known animals) are so far from the animation that I saw as a child that it seems to come from another civilization. (Maybe it does.)

Second, while the films assumes a naturalist view of the world, it undermines itself wonderfully. The Crood family begin as fear-based pre-humans (or semi-humans) whose only goal is not to die. But their teenage daughter wants more. She wants to live and be curious. By meeting a more evolved character, the Croods begin to think about "tomorrow" and end up "following the light."

It is all delightfully done, mind you--the hyper-slapstick and constant verbal and physical humor can be nearly hysterical. But it does not fit Darwinism, which allows for no transcendence of the material world. The Croods, you, see begin to act beyond instinct and conditioning. They dream; they explore; they hope. They are not merely evolved animals.

Thus, the human essence, made in God's image and likeness, shines through even this supposedly Darwinian tale, which makes it even better. This also chimes in with a New York Times article which recently related that an atheist group was holding "services" and wanted more of a sense of "transcendence."

Almost everything I need to know I learned from my mother (1930-2010):

1. Pray.

2. Say "please" and "thank you."

3. Ladies first. That means opening doors in and out.

4. Write thank you notes.

5. Don't interrupt people.

6. Italian food is the best.

7. Show special concern for older people.

8. Finish what's on your plate. I had an intuitive sense of this.

9. Stay in touch with family and friends.

10. Write letters to the editor.

There is more, but thank you again, Mom.

How to be a Bad Teacher

How to be a Bad Teacher

1. Fail to be taught by good teachers.
2. Fail to study the teaching of good teachers.
3. Think that teaching is easy because the best teachers make it look easy.
4. Do not prepare.
5. Forget that God is watching and holding you accountable for every word.
6. Forget that you are informing the eternal destiny of all whom you teach.
7. Model yourself on characters you watch on television.
8. Fail to police your mannerism, speaking voice, and verbal ticks
9. Try to speak in an informal, casual way.
10. Think that the classroom should copy what is going on in the rest of the culture.
11. Enslave your teaching to "learning styles" of students.
12. Be more concerned with "getting through" the outline than in imparting knowledge.
13. View questions from students as interruptions.
14. Use pointless video clips.
15. Abandon lecturing since it is no longer cool.
16. Never improvise because you are not deep enough to do it well.
17. Use a small vocabulary.
18. Teach on line.

Art by R. Wesley Hurd

Christianity and Art-Making

The Gordon Lewis Center for Christian Thought and Culture will host a seminar on Christianity and art-making in later May. Please stay tuned to find out the details. The instructor and discussion leader will be R. Wesley Hurd, painter and philosopher and my long-time friend and ministry partner.

The Essence of Spiritual Formation

"The Word of God well understood and religiously obeyed is the shortest route to spiritual perfection. Nothing less than a whole Bible can make a whole Christian."
—A. W. Tozer

Jars of Lies

My response to the Jars of Clay singer who endorses same-sex marriage:

The love of Jesus is never expressed against his character and that of the Bible, which fulfills and authorizes. God ordained heterosexual monogamy as the pattern of God's creation and design. Same sex couples can no more be married than a square can be a circle. To pretend otherwise, is simply sin. To be an influential Christian and to claim otherwise is an especially heinous sin. This is further evidence of the decline of American civilization and the apostasy of so many who name the name of Jesus Christ.

Theism and Personality

If we, as theists, believe that the universe is fundamentally personal in character, it follows that our ultimate understanding will not be in terms of things, which occupy space and may or may not possess certain properties, but of persons, who characteristically do things. Action, not substance, will be our most important category of thought. It is a truth too long neglected by philosophers--J. R. Lucas, Freedom and Grace, p. 111 (as quoted in Nicholas Wolterstorff, Art in Action)

Evidence for Easter

Millions of Christians celebrate Easter every year, a day commemorating an event that distinguishes Christianity’s founder from all other religious leaders—the resurrection of Jesus Christ. It’s not about colored eggs or cute bunnies. It’s about one who claims authority over all creation as the living Lord. Is there good reason to believe this? 

In a pluralistic culture, diverse religious ideas are often viewed as merely products of subjective faith. A religion is “true” if it “works,” if it gives a sense of meaning to life and a connection to a community of faith. Matters of objective fact are dismissed in order to avoid controversy and strife. However, Easter makes no sense apart from the reality of a historical event. The Apostle Paul wrote to the early Christians, “If Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith” (I Corinthians 15:14). 

In a free society every religion is allowed to make its case publicly without fear of censure. All have the constitutional right to practice any religion or none. But this does not answer the question of what faith—if any—one ought to embrace. Easter offers an answer based on the compelling evidence that the story of Jesus coming to earth to redeem his people from their failures is vindicated by his space-time resurrection from the dead. 

No blind leap of faith is required to believe that the resurrection of Jesus is more than a nice religious idea. The Gospel accounts that attest to the resurrection were written by people in a position to hunt down and check out the facts. They were either disciples of Jesus (Matthew and John) or individuals who carefully interviewed those closest to the event they described (Mark and Luke). These accounts were written shortly after the events they narrate; there was insufficient time for such mythological additions as a resurrection. The Apostle Paul, writing sometime in the 50s, spoke of Christ publicly appearing to many people, many of whom were still living at the time he wrote (1 Corinthians 15:1-8). Had there been no resurrection, this kind of statement would have been suicidal, since hostile witness could have refuted Paul’s claim. We have no record of a refutation. 

Moreover, all the New Testament books have been accurately preserved over time. Scholars have access to thousands of ancient Greek manuscripts from which to translate our modern versions of these books. 

The earliest record of the Christian movement (the Book of Acts) reports that the church proclaimed a resurrected Christ as the source of its courage and drive. The first Christians weathered intense persecution for their resurrection-faith; yet they persevered—some even unto death. Had the notion of the resurrection been fabricated, it would have unraveled under the relentless social and political pressures it faced. As former Nixon aide Charles Colson has pointed out in his book Loving God, he and the other White House conspirators could not pull off the Watergate cover-up, despite their unmatched political clout. When the crunch came, the truth was quickly flushed out. The early Christians had no such power to obfuscate or intimidate; but they never recanted. Their resolve is best explained by their knowledge of the resurrection. 

Those hostile to these determined followers of Jesus could have easily refuted the nascent movement by simply exhuming the dead body of Jesus and displaying it as the decisive evidence against any claim to his resurrection. Both the religious and the political authorities of the day had reasons to resent these Christians and to stop their evangelism. But there is no evidence that anything of the kind occurred. The tomb was empty. 

Belief in the resurrection of Jesus is entirely different from the fascination many people have in supposedly supernatural events (of "The X Files" variety) that have no logical support. When Christians observe Easter they stand on the solid ground of history, looking upward with rational hope for a better life in the world to come.

Outline for my Talk at University of Colorado Law School Today

Doug.Groothuis@denverseminary.edu

CIVIL LAW, MORAL LAW, AND GOD

I.                   WHAT IS LAW THAT WE SHOULD RESPECT IT?

A.    Declaration of Independence: inalienable rights granted by our Creator

B.     The Nuremberg war trials and Nazi “crimes against humanity” (See John Warwick Montgomery, The Law Above the Law)

C.     Martin Luther King and the reform of civil law based on higher, moral law

D.    Questions of jurisprudence: philosophical basis; justification of law; meta-ethics

II.                ARTHUR LEFF AND THE JUSTIFICATION OF LAW

A.    “The modernist impasse” or the secularization of law in the West (see Phillip E. Johnson, “Nihilism and the End of the Law”)

1.      Law as independent of God: “We’re free of God”

2.      Law as expression of contingent human arrangements only: “Oh God, 

      we’re free”

                  B.  Arthur Leff’s “Unspeakable Ethics, Unnatural Law,” Duke Law Review

1.      Thesis: Authority of law depends on an ultimate Evaluator; without this      

                       Evaluator all law is arbitrary, however it is formulated.

                 2.   This God would have to be personal, moral, and communicative.

                       3.   Moral statements as “performative utterances”

                       4.   The conditions of performative success: authority in a situation

                       5.  The absence of God in the moral sphere: no moral authority

C.     Other non-divine principles for establishing the law

1.      Descriptivism/conventionalism: leaves everything alone; no outside judgment upon established legal systems. Legal positivism.

2.      Personalism: authority in individuals (godlets)—anarchy

3.      Majoritarianism: no basis in a moral principle beyond godlets

4.      Constitutionalism: not infallible, requires interpretation; not exhaustive

III.             LEFF’S DILEMMA AND THE MODERNIST IMPASSE

A.    All other evaluators fail to perform; morality and law are unjustified, unauthorized.

B.     No one can replace God as the ultimate Evaluator and justification of moral

                        law and civil law (“There is none like unto the LORD”).

                 C.  Nevertheless: evil exists; heroism exists (“Sez who?”).

                 D.  Either God or nihilism (“God help us”)

IV.             ANWERING LEFF’S DILEMMA

A.    An argument for the Ultimate Evaluator (by modus tolens)

1.      If there is no God (P), then morality and law lose their foundations and there is no objective good and evil (Q). (Leff and other arguments: Nietzsche, Sartre, Dostoyevsky.) If P, then Q.

2.      There is objective good and evil. Leff: “There is in the world such a thing as evil.” (See Romans 2:14-15 on the law written on the human heart.)

3.      Therefore: it is false that morality and law lose their foundations and there is no objective good or evil. (not-Q)

4.      Therefore: God exists as the Ultimate Evaluator (Leff, illogically, to the contrary). By modus tolens: not-Q; therefore, not-P.

5.      Therefore; nihilism is false.

B.     An argument against atheism, the claim that there is no Ultimate Evaluator

1.      If there is no God (P), then morality and law lose their foundations and there is no objective good and evil (Q). If P, then Q.

2.      There is no God. (Leff: “It looks as if we are all we have.”) (P)

3.      Therefore: morality and law lose their foundations and there is no objective good and evil (nihilism: “God help us”). By modus ponens: P; therefore, Q.

4.      But: Leff: “There is in the world such a thing as evil.” Objective good and evil do exist. (not-Q)

5.      If not-Q; therefore: not-P. By modus tolens

6.      Therefore: God does exist as the Ultimate Evaluator (same conclusion as the previous argument).

7.      Therefore, nihilism is false (same conclusion as the previous argument).

C.     The simplified argument (disjunctive syllogism)

1.      Either God exists (P) or nihilism is true (Q). P or Q.

2.      Nihilism is not true. (not-Q)

3.      Therefore, God exists. (P)

D.    Responses to three objections to God as the basis of morality and law

1.      Making God the ultimate Evaluator makes morality and law arbitrary.

a.       God’s commands are based on God’s character and the nature of the

      world God has created. “I the Lord do not change” (Malachi 3:6).

b.      God’s evaluations and commands are not arbitrary edicts of 

      changeable divine will, but are based on wisdom (Proverbs 8).

c.       Christian perspective: God’s character is demonstrated historically in Jesus Christ (Luke 1:1-4; John 1:1-3; 14-18).

2.      Moral truth can exist objectively apart from God’s existence.

a.       Moral law needs a Law-giver, imperatives, claims upon us, duty.

b.      A godless world coupled with human knowledge of objective moral principles is exceedingly unlikely give an impersonal, chance universe.

3.      Recognizing God as the Evaluator would lead to a dangerous theocracy.

a.       A theological basis for law does not entail a theocracy; consider early 

      American law and jurisprudence.

b.      An unacceptable nihilism seems to be the only other alternative;

      consider the USSR. Law and rights were created by the State alone.

V.                CONCLUSIONS: GOD CAN HELP US

A.    Modernist impasse is not solvable given its own premises: “God help us.”

B.     God as Ultimate Evaluator gives a solid basis for morality and civil law.

C.     Two qualifications to my argument

1.      Not a complete apologetic for Christian theism, although a foundation for personalist theism and some suggestions. Many other arguments available.

2.      Much more is required for a good society than well-rooted, authorized civil law: moral and spiritual renewal and consistency.

VI.             RESOURCES ON GOD, MORALITY, AND LAW

A.    Stephen L. Carter, The Culture of Disbelief: How American Law and Politics Trivialize Religious Devotion (New York: Basic Books, 1993). Examines the secularization of law and how it marginalizes religion.

B.     Douglas Groothuis, Truth Decay: Defending Christianity Against the Challenges of Postmodernism (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2000).  See especially, chapter eight, “Ethics Without Reality, Postmodernist Style,” on postmodernist attempts (particularly by Rorty and Foucault) to establish morality apart from God and objective moral truths.

C.     Douglas Groothuis, Christian Apologetics: A Comprehensive Case for Biblical Faith (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2011). See especially, “The Moral Argument for God,” which draws on Arthur Leff’s essay, “Unspeakable Ethics, Unnatural Law.”

D.    Douglas Groothuis, “Thomas Nagel’s ‘Last Word’ on the Metaphysics of Rationality and Morality,” Philosophia Christi, 2nd series, no. 1 (1999):115-122. A critique of one attempt by a notable philosopher to establish objective morality and rationality apart from the existence of God.

E.     Phillip E. Johnson, “Nihilism and the End of the Law,” First Things, March 1993, 19-25. A reflection on Leff’s dilemma and how it relates to contemporary debates about civil law in America.

F.      Arthur Leff, “Unspeakable Ethics, Unnatural Law,” Duke Law Journal, 1979, no. 6 (December):1229-1246. A pivotal and penetrating analysis.

G.    John Warwick Montgomery, The Law Above the Law (Minneapolis, MN: Betheny Publishers, 1975). Considers the relationship between civil law and theology.

H.    J. P. Moreland, Scaling the Secular City: A Defense of Christianity (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1987). See especially, chapter four, “God and the Meaning of Life,” for a defense of the claim that the existence of God is required for objective morality and existential meaning.