RELIGIOUS FELLOWSHIP AS THE CULMINATING SOCIAL INSTITUTION
In this chapter I shall undertake to sketch the plan of a religious
society as determined by the spiritual ideal herein set forth.
The religious society is the last term in the series of social
institutions, and its peculiar office is to furnish the principle for
the successive transformation of the entire series. It is to be the
laboratory in which the ideal of the spiritual universe is created
and constantly recreated, the womb in which the spiritual life is
conceived. No single religious society can adequately fulfill this
purpose. The spiritual ideal itself must necessarily be conceived
differently by different minds; but the great general purpose will be
the same, despite variations in shades of meaning and points of view.
The fellowship of the religious society must be based on the voluntary
principle; membership must be a matter of free choice.[100] In
antiquity the boundaries of the political and religious organizations
coincided. The citizen was under obligations as a part of his civic
duty to worship the divinities of the state. In modern times a state
church is still maintained in some countries and supported out of the
public funds, while dissenting and nonconformist bodies exist more
or less on sufferance at its side. But this arrangement is harmful,
especially so to those whom it seems to favor. Erastianism paralyzes
religious spontaneity. The state, it is true, is profoundly interested
in the flourishing of ethical idealism, and in the constant rebirth in
its midst of spiritual ideals. But it is not competent to determine
what the character of these ideals shall be. The moment they cease to
be freely produced they lose their life-giving power. The state within
limits may enforce actions; it may not even attempt to enforce beliefs.
On the other hand, the “secularization of the state” has given rise
to the deplorable impression that the state exists only for so-called
secular purposes, and has stripped the idea of the state of the lofty
attributes with which the greatest thinkers of antiquity had clothed
it. It is the function of the religious society, dwelling uncoerced in
the midst of the state, to reinvest the state with the sacred character
that belongs to it. I do not of course intend to exalt the state after
the manner of Hegel, as if it were a kind of earthly god or to set it
up as an object of religious or quasi-religious devotion. The object
of religious devotion is the infinite holy community, the spiritual
universe. The function of the religious society is to generate the
ideal of the infinite holy community, of the spiritual universe. The
family, the vocation, the nation, are sub-groups of this, lesser
entities. Even mankind itself is but a province of the ideal spiritual
commonwealth that extends beyond it. To concentrate worship upon the
state or nation as some propose, would be to usurp for the part the
piety that belongs to the whole.
In describing a religious society three main aspects are to be borne in
mind:
The teaching, the organization, the worship.
_A. The Teaching_
In the religious society as here conceived there is to be worked out
a body of doctrine, and there is to be a body of specially designated
teachers. An ethico-religious society cannot ignore or dispense with a
general philosophy of life and statements of belief. It cannot restrict
itself to encouraging practical morality without regard to what are
called metaphysical subtleties. A moral society of this kind would soon
become ossified. On the contrary, an ethico-religious society should
excel in the fertility with which it gives rise to new metaphysical
constructions and original formulations of ethical faith. The will
cannot be divorced from the intellect. The active volitional life
cannot be successfully stimulated and guided without the assistance of
the mind as well as of the imagination.
But the relation between philosophy and formulas of belief on the one
hand and volitional experience on the other should be the reverse of
what it has been in the past. Here there must be a new departure. The
doctrine, the formulations, whatever they may be, must not be dogmatic
but flexible. Growing originally out of ethical experience, they must
ever prove themselves apt to enlarge and deepen ethical experience.
By this test they will be judged and they must therefore ever be
subject to revision and correction. Every dogma, every philosophic or
theological creed, was at its inception a statement in terms of the
intellect of a certain inner experience. But then it claimed for itself
eternal validity, compressing the spiritual life within its mold, and
checking further development. The body of doctrine which I desire and
foresee will likewise be an interpretation of ethical experience,
intended to make explicit the fundamental principles implicit in
ethical experience, and thereby clarifying it, and assisting its
further unfolding. But it is not and should never be allowed to
become dogmatic. The difference, I take it, is plain: in the one case
experience contracted in procrustean fashion into a rigid formula, in
the other case an elastic formula adapted to and subordinated to the
experience.
Thus much for the body of teachings. There should also be a body
of teachers. A teacher in an ethico-religious society will retain
something of the character of his predecessors—priest, prophet, rabbi,
pastor. The priest is the mediator of grace; the prophet is the seer
of visions; the rabbi is learned in the Divine law, and the pastor is
the helper of the individual in securing his individual salvation.
But these functions will now be seen in an altered light, and will be
radically modified in their exercise. The magical attribute of the
priest disappears. The confident prediction of future events, based
on the assumption that the moral order is to be completely realized
in human society, has ceased to be convincing. The Divine law is no
longer identical with the Law revealed in the Scriptures and their
commentaries, and the salvation of the individual is to be accomplished
by other means.
The religious teacher of the new kind is to resemble his predecessors
in being a specialist. The word specialist in this connection may,
perhaps, awaken misgivings, and these must be removed. He is not a
specialist in the sense of having a conscience unlike that of others,
or in being the keeper of other men’s consciences. Nor shall he impose
his philosophy of life or his belief authoritatively, but propose
it suggestively. His best results will be gained if he succeeds in
so stimulating those whom he influences that they will attain an
individualized spiritual outlook of their own, consonant with their
own individual nature and need. But specialists of this kind are
indispensable. The generality of men have neither the time nor the
mental equipment to think out the larger problems of life without
assistance, and the attempt on their part to do so leads to crudities
and eccentricities of which one meets nowadays with many pathetic
examples among those who have severed their connection with the
traditional faiths, and have tried in their groping fashion to invent
a metaphysic or a creed of their own.[101]
The preparation of the ethical teacher for his special task consists in
making himself thoroughly acquainted with the great religious systems
of the past, in which much that is of permanent spiritual value is
enshrined.[102] He is to fit himself to revitalize what is vital, not
to repristinate what is obsolete. There is required of him a first-hand
knowledge of the great ethical systems, and of their philosophical
backgrounds: furthermore acquaintance, so far as it is as yet
accessible, with the moral history of mankind, as distinguished from
the history of ethical thinking; in addition, he should intensively
study the economic, social and political problems of the time from
the ethical point of view, and the psychology both of individual
and national character, so far as that fascinating and difficult
subject has been opened up by competent writers. Apprenticeship in
the social reform movements of the day, direct touch with the inner
life of people, on its healthful as well as on its sick side, is also
presupposed.
Since no single person can be adequately prepared in these various
subjects, and since a variety of gifts and talents is demanded, it
follows that the teaching function shall be exercised by a body
or group of teachers, not by a single pastor at whose feet the
congregation are supposed to sit. Some of the persons engaged in this
work will excel as public speakers, others as writers, others as
teachers of the young, others as leaders of vocational groups. But all
these different functionaries must learn to work, not only in harmony,
but in organic, reciprocal support, themselves illustrating in their
group life the spiritual relation, the knowledge and the practice of
which they are to carry out into the world. The guild or group idea
must be applied to the religious teachers of the future.
_B. The Organization_
Every religion exhibits a certain form of organization peculiar to
itself and derived from its controlling idea. The organization of the
Buddhist fellowship is dependent on the Buddhist ideal of preparation
for absorption in Nirvana. The constitution of the Jewish synagogue
reflects the conception of the relation of the Chosen People, as an
_élite_ corps of the divinity. The organization of the Christian church
is characterized by its bifurcation into an _ecclesia militans_ and an
_ecclesia triumphans_, and further by the idea of incorporation into
the body of Christ, a difficult mystical conception as of a typical
divine individual including within his body a multitude of other
individuals.
The organization of the ethico-religious society has been foreshadowed
in the chapter on the vocations. The society is to be divided into
vocational groups. In each vocational group is to be worked out the
specific ethical ideal of that vocation. In the groups the general
ethical philosophy of life is to be applied, tested and enriched.
The so-called ethical teachers will here come into fruitful contact
with those who are in touch at first hand with actual conditions,
and are cognizant of the difficulties to be surmounted in ethicizing
vocational standards. The members of the groups in democratic fashion
will contribute to the advancement, not only of ethical practice, but
of ethical knowledge, and thus become on their side teachers of the
teachers. The danger of the formation of an ethical clergy will be
averted. The teachers will be in certain respects the pupils of the
taught, and the relation be reciprocal, that is, ethical.
Among the groups the vocational group of Mothers will occupy the
central place. The influence of women, especially of the mother group,
must penetrate the religious society through and through, for the
purpose of drawing the entire fellowship together into a coherent
unity. Women henceforth will take a deeper interest in the ethical
development of human society. A main factor, if not the only factor
in the ethical development of human society, is the elevation of the
vocational standards. The group of mothers will therefore be in close
touch with the other vocational groups in order to gain a knowledge of
the higher standards therein proposed, in order to appraise them, and
to inspire the growing generation with the devoted purpose to carry
these standards out in practice.
_C. The Worship or Public Manifestation of Religion_
The ideal of worship likewise must undergo transformation. It has
meant an act of homage toward a superior or supreme individual; it
has meant eulogistic affirmation of the power, wisdom, goodness, of
that individual; it has meant prayer or petition for help from that
individual. It has also meant spiritual edification.
In all these various modes, religious worship heretofore has focused
attention on a single individual deity as one who embodies in himself
the sum of perfection. In thus presenting the ideal of perfection, it
has encouraged preference for unity at the expense of plurality. The
salient feature of the spiritual ideal sketched in this volume is the
affirmation, on ethical grounds, that plurality is of equal dignity
with unity, and hence that the divine ideal is to be represented not as
One, but as manifold; not as an individual, however supereminent, but
as an infinite holy community,—every human being being in his essential
nature a member of that community.
But can worship be offered to the members of a holy community? In a
certain sense one might say, Yes, preëminently so, since worship may
be taken to mean Worthship, and the worth intrinsic in our fellowmen
is the object of our unceasing homage. At the same time very different
associations have gathered about the word. Public worship consists
largely of eulogistic singing, prayer, adoration, genuflexion, and
these are appropriate only to deity conceived as an individual. We
cannot even say with the Psalmist “the heavens declare the glory
of God, and the firmament showeth his handiwork.” For though the
beauty and order apparent in Nature is one aspect of nature on which
we delight to dwell, yet we cannot disingenuously suppress the
counter evidence of disorder, ugliness and suffering which Nature
no less obtrudes on our sight. The argument from design implied in
the Psalmist’s words is no longer tenable. Certainly we cannot any
longer pray for material assistance as our forefathers did, or invoke
supernatural intervention in situations where human science and human
helpfulness are impotent. But worship also aims at ethical edification,
by holding up to the mind the moral ideal as an object of imitation,
and as a rebuke to man’s shortcomings. This indeed is its highest
function. Nevertheless the moral ideal, as we conceive it, is incapable
of being presented in the guise of an individual being, no matter by
what superlative language the limitation inseparable from individuality
be concealed. The bare attributes of omniscience and omnipotence are
abstract and convey no positive meaning whatever. In actual worship
a concrete image is invariably associated with the notion of the
individualized Deity, such as the Father image or the Christ image. And
as soon as this is done, the vast ethical ideal tends to shrink to the
dimensions of a human image; and instead of the ideal in its fullness,
only certain selected but inadequate aspects of ethical excellence are
presented to the worshiper.
And yet in an ethico-religious society also the public manifestation of
religion is indispensable. Of what elements shall it consist?
First, there are to be the public addresses by the teachers, having
for their main object to arouse or intensify a certain kind of
spiritual distress, and then as far as possible to appease it. Every
religion in my judgment originates in a particular kind of anguish,
and is an attempt to assuage it. The spiritual distress in which the
ethico-religious society has its origin is the agonizing consciousness
of tangled relations with one’s fellow-beings, and the inexpressible
longing to come into right relations with them. He is fit to be a
public teacher of this religion who profoundly experiences this
distress, who desires nothing so much as to cease to be, for his part,
a thorn in his neighbor’s side. We are that, each of us, inevitably.
The more this feeling is strong in him the more will he arouse similar
feelings in others, and thus awaken those who are spiritually asleep,
the self-righteous, the self-satisfied, and he will then indicate to
the utmost of his power, the way of relief.
The specific ethical ideals of life are also to be presented in public
assemblies—the ideals of private ethics, of marriage, friendship,
and the rest. These expressions of the specific ideals, charged with
feeling, and taking on appropriate imagery, will gradually attain a
certain classical fitness—classical at least for a time—and may be used
as public readings.
But is there a substitute for prayer?
Among the advantages of prayer is often mentioned this: that in it
the soul reaches out towards its source, and in so doing wonderfully
recruits its spiritual energy. It finds, ethically speaking, its second
wind. It reaches down beneath its utmost strength to find an increment
of strength not previously at its disposal. The question is whether
this increment of strength cannot be obtained more surely and to better
purpose in another way, namely, by concentrating attention on the
spiritual need of the fellow-beings with whom we are in daily touch,
and by becoming aware to what an extent the finer nature imprisoned in
them is dependent for its release upon our exertions. The appeal of the
God in our neighbor is the substitute for the appeal in prayer to the
God in heaven, the call of the stifled spiritual nature in the men and
women at our side, is to draw out of us our utmost latent force, the
strengths underneath the strength.
The common life we share with our fellow-members in the religious
society demands expression in song and in responsive services. The
high wave of this common life welling up in us, rising to the surface,
makes the glow of religious meetings, gives them fervor, and a touch of
rapture, not indeed the common life conceived as a uniform life, but as
the life we live in others, and they in us.
The addresses that awaken and appease spiritual pain, the presentation
of the various modes of right living, the songs that lift the
individual above his private self and help him to live, not indeed
submerged, but rather spiritually accentuated in the life of the whole,
these are the public manifestations of ethical religion as I see them.
They will contribute to make of the society itself the symbol of its
ethical faith. We shall not have an external symbol like the cross: the
fellowship itself will be our symbol.
There will also be festivals. Every religion must have its
festivals. In place of Baptism the solemn taking of responsibility
for the spiritual development of the child. A festival of vocational
initiation, like the ancient assumption of the _toga_. Festivals of
citizenship, inspired by the ideal of the national character as one to
be spiritually transformed. Festivals of humanity in connection with
the commemoration of great events in the history of our race and of
great leaders who were inspired in some degree by the ideal task of
humanity. Festivals of the seasons, deriving their significance from
the spiritual interpretation of the corresponding seasons of human
life,—youth, middle age, old age. And a solemn though not mournful
festival in commemoration of the departed.
The religious assembly should itself be organized; the members of the
different vocational groups should be allocated to different parts
of the meeting hall, as were the Guilds in certain of the mediæval
cathedrals.
Besides the public manifestations, the private religion will receive
attention. The religious society as a whole is to be the microcosm of
the spiritual macrocosm, a miniature model of the ideal society, but
care must also be taken for the private communion of the individual
with the spiritual presences which the ideal evokes. There should be a
special breviary for the sick, a Book of Consolation for the bereaved,
a Book of Friendship, a Book of direction for those who pass through
the experience of sin, and a book of preparation for those who face the
end.
FOOTNOTES:
[100] Among other ethical relations based on free election, friendship
is the most important. In a separate _Book of Friendship_ which I hope
to publish, I intend to review the ideals of friendship as they have
arisen from time to time in the history of civilized mankind—the ideal
of Pythagorean friendship, the ideals presented by Aristotle, Kant,
Emerson. And I shall endeavor to show in each case the connection
between the friendship ideal and the general philosophy of life. I
shall then set forth that ideal of friendship which is the corollary
of the spiritual conceptions outlined in this volume: the friend being
in my view one who assists spiritual development as a spectator. He
is the faithful mirror of his friend’s progress toward personality,
the benevolent yet incorruptible recorder and appraiser. By this token
friendship is distinguished from the interlocking relations such as
that between partners in marriage, vocational co-workers, etc.
[101] In certain Ethical Societies abroad, the fear of encouraging
the rise of a new clericalism led to the plan of drawing for ethical
teachers on professors of universities, and others engaged in various
lines of practical activity. These persons could of necessity give
only the leavings of their time and thought to the complex questions
which they undertook to discuss; and the experiment, as might have been
foreseen, proved disastrous.
[102] It has been said that the science of today lives only in
superseding the science of yesterday. Whether this be true of science
or not it is not true of religion. The religions of the past are not
merely superseded. There is much in them that is to be reinterpreted,
and thus perpetuated.