Quote Needs a Little Revising

"Our worst fear is not that we are inadequate, our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?' Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God; your playing small doesn't serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God within us. It is not just in some of us, it is in everyone, and as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."

Rather beautiful quote. But I think it would be even more beautiful if it were less Christian and more Aristotelian.
Specifically, the following two excerpts:

"You are a child of God..."

"We were born to make manifest of the glory of God within us."

What would be the Aristotelian translations here?

Post 1

Sunday, February 14, 2010 - 11:08am

Where does the quote come from? It strikes me as quite alien to Aristotle's concerns, so I don't know what an Aristotelian rewriting might be. How would you rewrite it.

Post 2

Sunday, February 14, 2010 - 1:27pm

I found the quote from the following article:

http://www.dumblittleman.com/2010/02/power-of-thinking-big.html

It's to my understanding that most (if not all) transitions from Christian thought to Aristotelian thought is by definition a change from Mystical thinking to Naturalistic thinking. So I'm thinking an neo-Aristotelian version would involve an explication of our rational nature and its relationship with Nature, and the consequent potential that is necessary to achieve for us to be happy human beings -- y'know, something along those lines..

Post 3

Sunday, February 14, 2010 - 1:46pm

There was a thread here some time ago where a re-write of "Desiderata" was proposed. Controversy aside, there's a line in that poem that, ironically, given the brewhaha over the rewrite, is a line that could be a secular replacement of the "Child of God" line: "You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here."

(I just bought a reissue of King Crimson's LIZARD album today, and a reprint in the liner notes of an original 1970 ad for the album featured "Desiderata", where I re-read this line, so that was kind of interesting timing.)

Post 4

Sunday, February 14, 2010 - 11:02pm

Good suggestion, Joe. I like it:

"Our worst fear is not that we are inadequate, our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?' Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of the Universe, an agent of Causality, a force of Nature; your playing small doesn't serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We were born to manifest the very glory of our rational nature, the beauty of our creativity, the ecstasy of our happiness. This is not just in some of us, it is in everyone, and as we let our brilliance shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."

Edit: last minute changes.

(Edited by Warren Chase Anspaugh on 2/14, 11:23pm)

Post 5

Monday, February 15, 2010 - 10:23am

The quote is an excerpt from this book: Marianne Williamson: A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of "A Course in Miracles"

It is misattributed to a speech by Nelson Mandela in several places on the net. Great quote, thanks for posting it.

Warren: Your changes to this quote are similar to what I do in my mind in discussions with friends and family who are christians, believers in God and spiritual things. I translate into the benevolent universe context in my own mind and find we are not far off. Many "religious" persons who simply mind their own business and try to live good fulfilled lives simply have their own way of describing the benevolent universe. I'm happy to know them, we don't try to convert each other. It is the proselytizers who don't believe in the benevolence of the universe. That describes a great many "religious" people who I have no use for, including socialists and some "objectivists".

Post 6

Monday, February 15, 2010 - 10:40am

Mike,

I remember watching Rand - I think it was on Donahue, but it might have been some other interviewer. She said, "God bless you" to the host when he was saying something about her being an atheist and her reply was that she held "God" in her mind, in this context, as symbolic of "One's highest value." She was clearly benevolent at that moment in just the fashion you are describing.

Post 7

Monday, February 15, 2010 - 11:24am

At the end of one of the Ayn Rand Letters she wrote something to the effect that "If I was Christian I would say 'God bless America'. I will say it anyway: God bless America.'"

And JG said, "By refusing to say �It is,� you are refusing to say �I am.� By suspending your judgment, you are negating your person. When a man declares: �Who am I to know?� he is declaring: �Who am I to live?�

This applies to that part of the start of this thread: "We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?' Actually, who are you not to be?"

Post 8

Monday, February 15, 2010 - 12:37pm

Referring to my post above, I went to YouTube and looked. Ayn Rand says, "Thank God for America" and says that she has always like that saying, and "God bless you," explaining that for her it means the highest of values. It is in the interview with Tom Snyder, part 3, near the very end, say the last 15 seconds or so.

Post 9

Monday, February 15, 2010 - 12:50pm

God is an aesthetic, not a metaphysical concept.

Post 10

Monday, February 15, 2010 - 3:10pm

Ted,

This is an area that isn't explored as it should be - the different layers or coloring of meaning that are more about context, the speaker and the purpose than meaning in the usual sense.

You said that God is an aesthetic concept. I could say that God is a psychological concept, when I'm watching the way someone uses the concept in their life (as a father-figure to enable them to stay child-like on some level). That person clings to the belief for psychological support - and their psychology may tell them that this concept fits EVERYTHING so well that it must be true. Two philosophy students could be discussing the metaphysical or the epistemological aspects of a belief in God. Two religious fellows are talking about... variations in a shared mystical belief.

When God is the concept under examination only a child, who is doing no more than innocently regurgitating what they have been told, would seem to be using the normal genus-differential form of meaning.

Post 11

Monday, February 15, 2010 - 3:43pm

As used by some atheists (and many theists of the type Erickson mentions), God is a perfectly valid aesthetic notion, a personification of benevolence.

I am not quite sure exactly what you mean by calling God a "psychological" concept, Steve. I think you mean something like a crutch. To use it that way would make it a pathological, as opposed to an aesthetic notion. "Will" or "subconscious" are psychological concepts.

Post 12

Monday, February 15, 2010 - 4:03pm

Ted, I'm not sure what to call it. But I know there are people who feel a deep affinity with mystical concepts and who are more emotional than rational in their method of judgment. It is too superficial to just label the use of a word as pathological (even though my example led that direction). After a person acquires a concept that has a strong emotional attachment for them, their attempts to communicate become examples of attempting to convey their sense of rightness about the concept at the same time they are using the concept in the more mundane - subject/verb - fashion. They communicate with tone of voice, body language and in the theme of a discourse, all this subtext of meaning, the meaning that God will protect, or explain, or provide. Like ads that sell the sizzle not the steak, words play a more important psychological role than we tend to acknowledge.

Conspiracy theorists rarely have just one theory they find attractive. And anarchists have common intellectual traits. I'm not talking about a psychological crutch as much as I'm talking about a predisposition to a certain shade of meaning that arises out of already held beliefs AND psychological traits.

Post 13

Monday, February 15, 2010 - 5:48pm

Part of the problem was my using the word concept in the first place. The aesthetic concept is personification, and the notion of God (which is not technically a concept) is an instance of personification. So far as it goes as a personification, the notion of God (capitalized, as in the supreme being) can serve an artistic purpose. It's a powerful image and a shorthand way of saying a benevolent universe in human garb.

Of course there are people who do use that literary notion improperly, to, say, attribute the voices in their head to some other agency. They have a pathology, and are saying "God told me to X" in the same way that other people say their "dog sam told them to X." That sort of pathology will be with us as long as is schizophrenia is with us. The problem is that some of these people with voices in their heads are threats to others, and all too many people, from lazy parents to mad mullahs want to scare their wards into submission with a bogey man.

Post 14

Tuesday, February 16, 2010 - 6:30am

I find that in just about any quote that uses the word god, it makes more sense if you just replace god with existence, or in some situations reason.

From Red Mars, by Kim Stanley Robinson---�Whenever I hear a scientist claim that they are a christian, I have to take it as an esthetic statement.� (John) �What, the church of wouldn�t it be pretty to think so.� (Frank)

Post 15

Wednesday, February 17, 2010 - 6:15pm

Steve: "And anarchists have common intellectual traits."

Perhaps you could elaborate on what you perceive these traits to be?

Post 16

Wednesday, February 17, 2010 - 8:38pm