The next topic we will tackle is Rushdoony’s view on the scope of liberty. He starts with asking a question whether liberty is the most basic need of man or if liberty should be sacrificed for anything else. Before we answer the question, we must first ask ourselves whether we are truly, absolutely free. The answer for man is that all creation comes under the dominion of God and only He alone is absolutely free from the control of others or circumstances. Given this, we know that in absolute terms man is not at complete liberty so we are forced to determine where those limits are. First, there should be universal agreement that some constraint to liberty is required otherwise the result would be catastrophic. With absolutely no checks to an individual exercising their liberty, no liberty would be possible for anyone. As a result, we know that some limits to liberty must be put in place in order to maximize true liberty for everyone. Rushdoony correctly points out that “we must beware of those who talk about defending liberty when they actually want to promote anarchy.”(pg. 13)
So far we have determined, that man has liberty, that the very liberty he has is circumscribed in some way, and that those restrictions are legitimate and necessary in order to preserve liberty from descending into anarchy. The way that our liberty is restrained is through laws. Because laws are necessary to maintain maximum liberty, those who advocate freedom from law are actually anti-liberty. As was discussed in an earlier post, a shift is already well underway whereby the Christian foundation of laws are being replaced with humanism. When this happens, the basis for law is disconnected from eternal truth and realigned with a relative standard entirely at the whim of those in power. Instead of “liberty going hand in hand with responsibility,”(pg. 15) man abdicates his personal responsibility to the state who in turn redefines law to protect and promote its statist and humanist agenda rather than actually promoting the liberty of its people. At this point, a vicious cycle ensues where true individual liberty is gradually subsumed by the state as it consolidates power even further. Instead of achieving the “freedom” that progressive pundits, politicians and judges trumpet by advocating a detachment from our Christian foundations, the individual is merely deprived incrementally of personal liberty.
There may be some who say that just because we have left our Christian foundation, that is not necessarily why we see the continual decline in personal liberty coupled with increased tyranny of the state. While this may be true, Rushdoony does make an excellent case for this causality given that he did not make these statements in hindsight and has had fifty years to see such an outcome reinforced. In later posts, it will become clearer why such a path was envisioned by Rushdoony, who saw the fracture of America’s religious foundation tied to the breakdown in every governmental sphere including family, church, school, government, etc. When these various areas of responsibility were left without a solid foundation, Rushdoony correctly posited that something was going to fill the gap and thus we are left with the overbearing statist and very humanistic civil government we have today. When individuals fail to live up to their responsibilities, they will inevitably lose their liberties.
No comments:
Post a Comment