Is it better to suffer than to do wrong?

Robert Tulip 2 · Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2007 7:30 am Post subject:

Hello again. I hope to join you in this discussion of Arendt if I find time, as I enjoyed reading her books during my MA on ethics in Heidegger's ontology. Eichmann in Jerusalem carries echoes of Christ in Jerusalem, except that "Hitler as messiah" was a perverse inversion. The legitimacy of the suffering of Christ came from his connection to the whole, understood as representation of God. Jesus had a vision of truth as love, which was worth dying for in order to transform our planet. DH is therefore quite wrong to imply that legitimacy is conferred by 'practical systems'. (Dissident Heart: "This notion that a principle or value or vision or hope or (?) carries more legitimacy and demands more allegience than practical systems of greed and punishment...is peculiar beyond meaning. It's absurd.") On that basis, Eichmann was 'legitimate' against the 'practical system' of Nazi law. Real legitimacy is something deeper, grounded in sustainable human values based in evidence. Suffering for a truly noble cause is honorable. However, today we see another perversion of this doctrine in the terrorist ideal of martyrdom. The problem is that the terrorist vision is not honorable or based in evidence.

Dissident Heart · Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2007 11:59 am Post subject:

Robert Tulip 2 · Posted: Mon Dec 24, 2007 7:27 pm Post subject:

[quote="Dissident Heart"]

Dissident Heart · Posted: Thu Dec 27, 2007 1:35 pm Post subject:

Robert Tulip 2 · Posted: Sat Dec 29, 2007 8:46 pm Post subject:

Is it better to suffer than to do wrong? In this form the options are far too broad, and are not directly comparable. Arendt sees rejection of complicity with Nazism as the prime example of when people suffer by refusal to do wrong, but this example is not sufficient to justify the general principle. Suffering can be meaningful or meaningless. Meaningless suffering such as natural evil (disaster, disease, etc) and suffering inflicted for no reason are not relevant alternatives to wrongdoing. Meaningful suffering includes the path of the cross, where the sufferer has a moral vision which they take to be more important than the harm they will suffer in promoting it. In this category Jesus is of course the exemplar, but national liberation movements, where a people suffer rather than submit, can also be in this category. George Orwell commented that losing a war is an easy way to bring peace, indicating that suffering through sacrifice is preferable to dishonor. There is also a grey area, especially with terrorism, where a person thinks wrongly that their suffering is meaningful, and so both suffers and does wrong. Suffering as just punishment for crime is another distinct example, which seems bad for a prisoner but good for society in terms of protection and example. Even here the alternative is not clear, as society would say it were better the evil deed were never done. A further ambiguity rests in the meaning of ‘better’. It seemed ‘better’ for the Roman Empire that they plundered the possessions of conquered nations to live in selfish opulence, but clearly, the long term consequences for the planet were worse – ‘they made a desert and called it peace’. In this context of moral philosophy, ‘better’ should be defined as ‘having better overall consequences’. Otherwise the sentence lacks traction, as it seems better for me, selfishly speaking, to get away with wrong which benefits me than to suffer. Arendt’s point is to ask how a wrongdoer can live with their conscience. I think this is a big issue. For example the karma of wrongdoing, eg slavery and conquest, is a subtle cultural pathology which distorts national mentalities of people who are in denial, often imposing as much psychic harm on the victor as on the vanquished.

Further on the ‘might is right’ theme, I do think sustainability is important for legitimacy, as things which are not sustainable stop. I support the old Chinese political philosophy of the mandate of heaven as conferring moral legitimacy on a ruler, with dynastic change indicating a fall from cosmic grace. My previous comments on the British imperial motto of Honi Soit, which could be translated even less charitably as F*** You, illustrate, notably in the case of Gandhi, how the power of tao is greater than the gun. We are seeing this now in the example of climate change, which cannot be slowed by any number of inter continental ballistic missiles, which are being cuckolded by Gaia.

On Buddhism, I just googled the four noble truths at http://www.thebigview.com/buddhism/fourtruths.html, which looks a good summary. I think it is enlightening to consider these ideas, for example about attachment, in the light of Arendt’s vision of personhood and the question of this thread on suffering and wrongdoing. Arendt seems to be asking how an authentic and accountable person relates to the totality of truth. To this end, she engages the Christian faith tradition with its transformative focus on will as the master of desire. An important moral issue at stake here is whether the self is real (Arendt says yes, Buddha says no).

Saint Paul said in Romans 5:3 that we rejoice in our sufferings as they produce endurance, character and hope. There is something in this, in that imperial persecution bonded the early church in its vision of salvation, but Roman Catholicism has perverted it, for example in penance through mortification. I don’t think suffering is ever a good in itself, only as a means to a good end.


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