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Eric Voegelin's Mystical Epistemology and Its Influence on Ethics and Politics

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Eric Voegelin's Mystical Epistemology and Its Influence on Ethics and Politics Louisiana State University LSU Digital Commons LSU Historical Dissertations and Theses Graduate School 1994 Eric Voegelin's Mystical Epistemology and Its Influence on Ethics and Politics. Charles Warren Burchfield Louisiana State University and Agricultural & Mechanical College Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/gradschool_disstheses Recommended Citation Burchfield, Charles Warren, "Eric Voegelin's Mystical Epistemology and Its Influence on Ethics and Politics." (1994). LSU Historical Dissertations and Theses. 5782. https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/gradschool_disstheses/5782 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at LSU Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in LSU Historical Dissertations and Theses by an authorized administrator of LSU Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. INFORMATION TO USERS This manuscript has been reproduced from the microfilm master. UMI films the text directly from the original or copy submitted. Thus, some thesis and dissertation copies are in typewriter face, while others may be from any type of computer printer. The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. Broken or indistinct print, colored or poor quality illustrations and photographs, print bleedthrough, substandard margins, and improper alignment can adversely affect reproduction. In the unlikely event that the author did not send UMI a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if unauthorized copyright material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. Oversize materials (e.g., maps, drawings, charts) are reproduced by sectioning the original, beginning at the upper left-hand corner and continuing from left to right in equal sections with small overlaps. Each original is also photographed in one exposure and is included in reduced form at the back of the book. Photographs included in the original manuscript have been reproduced xerographically in this copy. Higher quality 6" x 9" black and white photographic prints are available for any photographs or illustrations appearing in this copy for an additional charge. Contact UMI directly to order. University Microfilms International A Bell & Howell Information Company 300 North Zeeb Road. Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346 USA 313/761-4700 800/521-0600 Order Number 9508555 Eric Voegelin’s mystical epistemology and its influence on ethics and politics Burchfield, Charles Warren, Ph.D. The Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical Col., 1994 UMI 300 N. ZeebRd. Ann Arbor, MI 48106 ERIC VOEGELIN'S MYSTICAL EPISTEMOLOGY AND ITS INFLUENCE ON ETHICS AND POLITICS A Dissertation Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of the Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in The Department of Political Science by Charles W. Burchfield B.A., The University of Alabama, 1985 M.A., The University of Mississippi, 1989 M.A., Louisiana State University, 1993 August 1994 ACKOWLEDGEMENTS I want to thank all the people whose ideas, writings, or conversations have helped me develop the intellectual perspective which informs this work. First, I wish to express my deepest gratitude and indebtedness to my mentor, Professor G. Ellis Sandoz, for his constant encouragement, suggestions, and inspiration. It was he who first kindled my tremendous admiration and respect for Voegelin's thought. I also have had the benefit of insightful comments and suggestions from Professors Cecil L. Eubanks, James R. Stoner, Keith A. Boeckelman, Edward H. Henderson, Robert C. McMahon, and Andrew A. King, all of whom gave their time to read the manuscript. I am indebted to them and to several other faculty members for their generous support and encouragement of my academic endeavors throughout the years of my studies. Finally, I am grateful to my family and friends who have helped me through the years with their prayer, support, encouragement and patience. TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS............................................ ii LIST OF FIGURES.................. ................ .......... iv ABSTRACT..................................................... V CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION.................................... 1 CHAPTER TWO A RESISTANCE TO UNTRUTH: THE CRITIQUE OF POSITIVISM.....................12 The Recovery of Lost Meaning...................... 26 The Analogical Nature of Communication: Theory of Symbolic Compactness and Differentiation and the Corresponding Priestly and Prophetic Movements...................35 The Experience of Order in History. ........ 56 CHAPTER THREE AN EPISTEMOLOGY OF MYSTICISM: THE LOVE OF SELF OR THE LOVE OF GOD.......... 69 Symbolizations and the Postulate of Balance....... 85 CHAPTER FOUR THE CONSTANCY OF HUMAN NATURE AND THE EQUIVALENCES OF EXPERIENCES AND SYMBOLIZATIONS: EXPERIENTIAL TRUTH AND ECUMENICALISM.......................... 92 Love and Death............ 105 CHAPTER FIVE MYSTICAL EPISTEMOLOGY IN THE CONTEXT OF MODERN, ANCIENT, AND CHRISTIAN THEORIES OF KNOWLEDGE.......... 124 CHAPTER SIX THE NOETIC SCIENCE OF MAN: A PHILOSOPHICAL SCIENCE OF POLITICS.........149 CHAPTER SEVEN THE ETHICAL AND POLITICAL IMPLICATIONS OF VOEGELIN'S MYSTICAL EPISTEMOLOGY.......180 CHAPTER EIGHT CONCLUSION..................................203 BIBLIOGRAPHY............................................... 214 VITA 224 LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1 ..................................................156 iv ABSTRACT The primary purpose of this dissertation is to examine and analyze Eric Voegelin's theory of knowledge, and to see what implications it has on his theories of ethics and politics. The profundity of Voegelin's epistemological search and recovery is apparent when placed in the context of his disillusionment with and resistance to the dominant epistemology of his day, namely, positivism. Through a recovery and restoration of the symbolizations of classical and Christian philosophy, Voegelin searches for and finds experiential knowledge which is gained through faith in search of understanding (fides quaerens intellectum), which brings about a vision of the whole and a formation of the heart (fides caritate formata) in the individual person through divine-human participation. These findings have important ethical and political implications. If we are to be whole persons, our communities must reflect our whole realm pf being and experience. The radical fragmentation of the social field into its parts— the religious, political, and educational— creates fragmented and deformed people. This diagnosis, coupled with Voegelin's epistemology and its call for ecumenicalism, lead to a therapy, which is that we must heal our communities and the individuals within them. The various realms of the social field, the realms of our experience, should work together as one, while at the same time checking and balancing one v another to insure that one does not rise toward an eclipse of the other. Such is the basis for community. Voegelin's mystical epistemology, his new science of politics, and their implications for modern thought and modern life recover and restore the noetic and pneumatic sciences to their proper and necessary place, which is a serious study of human existence and man's relationship to society, the world, and God. CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION If the heart is sensitive and the intellect keen, then a glance at the world will suffice to see the misery of creatures and to sense the paths to salvation; if they are insensitive and dull, then massive impressions are necessary to draw out the weak feelings. The sheltered prince's son saw for the first time a beggar, an invalid, and a dead man— and became the Buddha. A modern writer sees the mounds of corpses and the horrible destruction of thousands in the chaos of postwar Russia; it occurs to him that the world is not in order, and he writes a series of modest novels. The one sees in suffering the nature of creation and searches for salvation in the 'Weltgrund;' the other sees it as an evil condition, that can and should be actively countered. Some souls address the inadequacy of the world more strongly; some deny the existential magnificence of creation. The one experiences a Beyond as real only when it is accompanied by splendor and bustle, by force and terror of a superior power in the form of a sovereign person and organization; for the other, the visage and demeanor of each person are transparent and allow his divine solitude to shine through.1 The over-riding motivation behind Voegelin's life work is found in his struggle to make sense of the problem of evil— individual, moral, social, and political, and to reconcile it with the human experience of God. Voegelin recognizes that he lives in a broken world. He seeks understanding, healing, and reconciliation in the promises of the Goodness of God. The openness toward and search for xEric Voegelin, Political Religions (Lewiston, New York: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1986), 14-15. 1 the Ground2, and its resultant mystagogia and fides caritate formata (formation of the heart) is Voegelin's answer to much of the evil he observes in the world. As long as humans persist in their selfish and Godless derailments and deformations, the mass molestation and killing of innocents will continue. Voegelin exhorts each individual to stretch out his or her withered hand to God and be healed (faith in search of understanding). This endeavor
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