Charles Taylor’s Faith and Hope Through the Modern Social Imaginary

Brayden BenhamCSP 2000

Submitted to: Dr. Kenneth KieransApril/20/09

Charles Taylor offers a postmodern philosophy thoroughly influenced by

Hegel. Taylor is influenced greatly by Nietzsche and the subsequent critics of

modernity who followed in his footsteps; he offers a synergistic interpretation of

these thinkers much in the spirit of Hegel. His book "Modern Social Imaginaries"

reads like a Foucauldian anthropological study, but while he takes the disinterested

attitude of Foucault he is also fusing it with Hegelian dialectic and the end result is

much different from anything that has come out of Foucault. Taylor's critique

concerns the question of the history of the will and the modern concept of it. Taylor

traces the origin of the will back its source and finds it in Augustine, he believes that

this idea has transformed over many years but still remains present in the modern

relationship to the will. Taylor sets up the "modern social imaginary" as an eternal

religious, moral, and ethical consciousness that cannot help but permeate and play a

part in political discussion. Taylor is able to look on the advancements of the

modern age in a post-modern way but still remains faithful to the Hegelian principle

of synergy.

In a specific way Charles Taylor's philosophy is postmodern. It is so in the

sense that that it is "undoubtedly part of the modern" (Lyotard, 115); it is a deep

reflection on modernism itself, but still operating within the bounds of modernism.

It's post-modern in the sense of Nietzsche's seminally influential critique of moral

values. It was Nietzsche's going beyond modernism that allowed him to ask the

question: "Do you want to accompany? or go on ahead? or go off alone?" (Twilight,

27). This is a post-modern question in that it implies a break from the modern

concept of equality and mutual benefit (i.e. "do you want to accompany?"), an ideal

that Taylor will argue is the basis of modernism which takes on increasing

importance as history progresses (Modern Social, 2). It can also be seen as an

extension of Nietzsche initial thought: "I mistrust all systematizes and avoid them.

The will to a system is a lack of integrity" (Twilight, 25). But Nietzsche has a firm

"mistrust" of systems (or meta-narratives) and sought to breakdown the old moral

order, and a lot of the post-modern thinkers like Lyotard and thinkers Taylor deems

postmodern, like Derrida and Foucault (Sources, 499), share in this mistrust of and

thereby reject all systematization and adopt a nihilistic stance. The postmodern

answer for Lyotard - in a very Nietzschean sense - is "[for] us [to] wage a war on

totality; [to] be witness to the unrepresentable; [to] activate the differences...

(Lyotard, 118). But though Taylor is also driven by Nietzsche's impetus he does not

"mistrust all systematizers" nor think that we should "wage a war on totality"; he

thinks, in the spirit of Hegel that systems are irrevocably valid and instrumental in

the modern social order. He is not as faithful in one as Hegel but he doesn't entirely

reject them either; in regard to meta-narratives he has said: "I'm knocking one or

some but that doesn't mean all" (Taylor, Keynote Speech Internet Video). Taylors

writing is imbued with the Hegealian language of unity, symbiosis, cognition, God,

and implicit ideas. He has much more respect and much more of a willingness to put

systems to positive use than Foucault who to Taylor "...seems to be claiming (I

believe) impossible neutrality, which recognized no claims as binding" (Sources,

519). Taylor is against this type of nihilism and offers a philosophy of "hope", in the

face of the paradigm of European modernity (Modern Social, 196) (Sources, 521).In

a postmodern way Taylor remains skeptical of systems in general but has a larger

capacity for affirmative action than the postmodern philosophers mentioned above,

in this way he seems to be fusing Nietzschean skepticism with Hegaelian

systematization. And he acknowledges this quality in himself, he says in regard to

Nietzsche's critique of morality: "Morality demanded a kind of self-overcoming in its

way. And perhaps one can say (or is this introducing a kind of Hegealian vision of

stages into Nietzsche?) that it was a necessary step (Sources, 453). Here Taylor is

looking at history as a series of steps, which has been an image of systematization,

meta-physics and Christianity since the time of Plato, Plotinus and Augustine,

epitomized by modernity in Hegel, and still in use to this day. Taylor, as opposed to

so many others, is using Nietzsche in a positive way with the aim of offering a vision

of unity in the spirit of Hegel.

But why does Taylor trust systems? What is so vaild in the Judeo-Christian,

Neo-platonic and Hegealian vision of metaphysics? Their importance lies in what

Taylor calls the "Social Imaginary". For him the "Social imaginary" is not motivated

by the specific ideas in these historically influential visions because "[i]t is..absurd to

believe...that ideas somehow drive history" (Modern Social, 63). Ideas do not drive

history but the extent to which they are interpreted and applied to a given culture

plays an instrumental role. The modern social imaginary is "that common

understanding that makes possible common practices and a widely shared sense of

legitimacy" (Modern Social, 23). The social imaginary can be derived from ideas of

God, ideas of justice, the good, political ideals and economic ideals, but they do not

become valid until they become "social" and thereby motivate a large number of

people. The social imaginary doesn't have to be a new idea either, or a reiteration of

an old, it can be both at the same time or either. This is where the social imaginary

derives its "divine" and "eternal" quality in that Taylor believes "...certain

motivations are dominant in history..." (Modern Social, 32), and thereby must

receive credit as eternally human and divine in that it is something that "...can never

be adequately expressed in the form of explicit doctrines because of its unlimited

and indefinite nature" (Modern Social, 25). Since certain recurrent concepts and

ideas keep coming up and being modified throughout history Taylor attributes this

to a transcendental source which seems to be unmovable and unchangeable but

which we change our human views on from time to time. The modern social

imaginary issues from “God” for Taylor, much like “Spirit” issued from God for Hegel

and is gradually revealed throughout history.

Taylor calls the historical process of the social imaginary "the long march";

this is "a process whereby new practices or modifications of old ones, either

developed through improvisation among certain groups and strata of the

population" (Modern Social, 30). An example of the modern social imaginary in

modern literature - and one that Taylor extensively employs - is that of the poetry of

T.S. Eliot. ""What are the roots that clutch, what braches grow/Out of this stony

rubbish? Son of man,/You cannot say or guess, for you know only heap of broken

images, where the sun beats,/And the dead tree gives no shelter , the cricket no

relief,/And the dry stone no sound of water..." (Waste Land, 19-24). Eliot got the

"Son of man..." bit from Ezekial 2:1 and the "dead tree...cricket..." part from

Ecclesiastes 12:5, but this poem was written in the nineteen-twenties and these are

references to the Old Testament. The intervening sentence: "You cannot say or

guess for you know only a heap of broken images..." is Eliot's own; in using the

language of the Bible to express his own personal feelings within the context of the

modern world he is appealing to the eternal truth expressed in the Bible and in this

way complements Taylor's idea of the social Imaginary. Taylor's reading of Eliot is

as a positive affirmation of the social imaginary, but he realizes that nihilistic

conclusions can be drawn from the "Waste Land": "The implicit narration here is a

history of decline" (464). And indeed this is the initial impression upon reading the

poem; we are presented with a vision of a land with infertile soil and no sign of

water for regeneration, we are lead to believe in this that Eliot is nostalgic for an

outdated "romanticism" which cannot be returned to. "But", Taylor says, "on

examination, this doesn't seem at all what is afoot...in Eliot's...work. The goal here

seems to be a kind of unity across persons, or across time..." (Sources, 465). This

idea of "unity" is crucial to Taylors overall philosophy and to his concept of the

social imaginary. It seems that Eliot attests to this concept of unity in making

Tiresias "the most important personage in the poem" (Waste Land, 42). In Tiresias

has immortal life, like the social imaginary, and is both male and female, thereby

holding an all encompassing and superior view to common man. In the Waste Land

Tiresias can be seen as an embodiment of the idea of the social imaginary in that the

goal of "unity across persons, or..time...is realized" in him (Sources, 465). Though

Eliot's Tiresias is an example of the positive manifestation of the social imaginary

there are many forms - some much more negative - that this concept can take.

In terms of Taylor’s definition of the “long march” the social imaginary is

something that is developed overtime but which revels certain fundamental

characteristics of human existence. The most dominant social imaginary, for Taylor,

is that of society for the purpose of mutual benefit and security. Through the scope

of the long march Taylor believes “the underlying idea of society as existing for the

(mutual) benefit of individuals and the defense of their rights takes on more and

more importance” (Modern Social, 4). In this light in Modern Social Imaginaries,

Taylor deals with the developing stages of this crucial driving force behind society.

The earliest and most influential example given of this is in reference to Book II of

Plato’s Republic- seemingly with a passage such as the following in mind: “I think a

city comes to be…because not one of us is self-sufficient, but needs many things…

and as they need many things, people make use of one another for various

purposes” (Republic, II:39:b-c). This remains the fundamental principle of society,

but over the course of history its importance is compounded and its definition is

transformed to suit a given age, nonetheless it remains constant. In this ancient

social imaginary people are convinced that they most band together, on an

individual level - in that they wish to avoid bodily harm, and on a spiritual level - in

that they believe that banding together is justified demanded by a higher order in

order for one to achieve spiritual well being. This is because moral order always

remains “a hierarchy in society that expresses and corresponds to hierarchy in the

cosmos” (Modern Social, 9). Taylor argues that in ancient cultures the evils of

independence from society were manifested in spiritual images and in this “we have

an order that tends to impose itself by the course of things [where] violations are

met with a backlash that transcends the merely human realm” (Modern Social, 10).

He cites Heraclitus’ example that if the sun were ever to derive from its nature

course the Furies would fly up and put it back into check (Modern Social, 10). This

view is similar to the Aristotelian/Platonic concept of the forms, and the Christian

concept of God (Modern Social, 9); this crucial imaginary comes to be developed and

adapted continuously over time in many different ways. Since the influence of this

ideal of mutual benefit justified by transcendence only becomes greater over time;

these archaic concepts of it that may seem ridiculous to modern readers but for

Taylor they gain increasing importance over the course of the long march of history.

Taylor believes that the Platonic concept of mutual benefit is crucially

expanded upon by Augustine, and that the Augustinian interpretation has “been

formative of our entire Western culture” (Sources, 132). The difference between

Plato and Augustine is God. More specifically the difference between Plato and

Augustine is the New Testament. For Plato the object of ones’ love and knowledge

should be the good and that we come to discover this good over time. But for

Augustine the object of ones knowledge and love is God. The difference here is that

for Plato the good is to be found externally and is eternally manifested in the

universal, but for Augustine God is both present in the external world and universe

but also within ourselves. In Taylor’s words the differences is that “…where Plato

the eye already has the capacity to see, for Augustine it has lost this capacity. This

must be restored by grace” (Sources, 139). Through this Augustinian interpretation

influenced by Christian benevolence in the sense of the “new commandment” that

Jesus delivers in the New Testament: “That ye love one another, as I have loved you,

that ye also love one another” (John 13:14). Here spiritual well-being is justified

through Christ and through God rather than through the individual in the face of the

good. Another crucial aspect of the Augustinian interpretation of Plato is his

emphasis on memory. To this Taylor says: “[Memmoria]…it is here that our implicit

grasp of what we are resides, which guides us as we move from our original self-

ignorance and grievous self-misdescription to true self-knowledge…[in this way] the

soul can be said to ‘remember God’” (Sources, 135). This implies an ancient form of

the social imaginary. Of course Augustine would never ever refer to God as

“imaginary”, but his idea of innate ideas does follow the criteria of the social

imaginary set up by Taylor: it “guides us” and it is “implicit” in that it “can never be

adequately expressed in the form of explicit doctrines” (Modern Social, 25).

Augustine’s achievement is that of fixing the social imaginary in God and putting an

emphasis on the inwardness that is required to come to know God. In this way “…

the will is the basic disposition of our being” (Sources, 138), but it is not our

individual will but God’s will in the sense of John 5:30: “…I seek not my own will, but

the will of the Father which hath sent me”. In vesting the relations of human will to

the will of God though inwardness puts man in a reciprocal position where causality

is “circular not linear” (Sources, 138), and the will of man is reciprocally justified by

the eternal will of God. This is a pivotal moment in the long march of social

imaginaries and this Augustinian concept will come to be interpreted in many

different and influential ways in the future.

This Augustinian idea of love, inwardness and benevolence based on the will of

God came to influence the modern world through its interpretation by Descartes

and the seminal Enlightenment figureheads. To this effect Taylor says,

“…the sixteenth and seventeenth [centuries], can be seen as an immense

flowering of Augustinian spirituality across all confessional differences…which

continued in its own way into the Enlightenment, as the case of Liebniz amply

illustrates…the impact is still potent today, and that it in a sense matches the

outlook and identity of modernity” (Sources, 141).

Descartes went on to develop the Augustinian idea of the will in his meditations. It is

here that he says: “I think therefore I am”. To Taylor this suggests the Augustinian

demarche that one can only understand oneself in the light of a perfection that goes

beyond ones powers (Sources, 141). Taylor describes the inwardness of Augustine

as a sort of “proto-cogito”: “this understanding of thinking as a kind of inner

assembly an order we construct [and] will be put to new revolutionary use by

Descartes” (Sources, 141). This concept of cognition will go on to be used by The

Enlightenment, Hegel, and will gain new importance and new meaning in the

nineteenth to twenty-first centuries. One of the most important enlightenment

figures for Taylor is John Locke who takes the idea of society and humanity as based

on good and puts it into a political context: “[The modern Lockian] picture of society

is that of individuals who come together to form a political entity against a certain

preexisting moral background and with certain ends in view” (Modern Social, 3).

The moral background here is Christianity and the new political entity is democracy.

For Taylor and many others democracy is the necessary evolution of the Judeo-

Christian doctrine of benevolence and the societal concept of mutual benevolence.

But the form that this development takes runs contrary to the original doctrines that

initiated it. In a specific way for Taylor we find this contradiction in Rousseau. In the

Augustinian/Christian sense Rousseau wanted to justify human endeavors through

God by reiterating in a political sense that “in the perfectly virtuous man, self-love is

no longer distinct from love of others” (Modern Social, 118), and in this way we

“distinguish two qualities in the will: good and evil.” (Modern Social, 116). In this

way democracy is seen as the natural will of God. This order in an Augustinian way

supposes a kind of Manacheanism in that it involves the physical representation of

good and evil as two opposing forces within oneself and society. It is in this that the

Augustine theory of the will comes full circle, but in a new and contrary form.

Justification is no longer cicular but linear, on the course of history. This doesn’t

happen at the exact point of the Enlightenment, at this point society is still strongly

based on religion it is the induction of a new social imaginary that allows for this

concept of providence to enter the secular sphere.

The economy is the new social imaginary that proceeds from the

Enlightenment. “The (market) economy comes to constitute a sphere…not only

objectively but in…self-understanding…secularly constituted…but…not public”

(Modern Social, 103). The economy was able to be held in this regard through the

framework of optimism and justification set up by the Enlightenment thinkers. The

economy is something vastly different from Augustinian concepts of the relationship

with God because in this case a hierarchy was constituted; those who pray are on

the top of this hierarchy, those who fight are in the middle and those who work are

on the bottom. This ideal was justified by the organic metaphor that “that the feet

are below the head is how it should be” (Modern Social, 10). But with our modern

democratic/economic order this aristocratic hierarchy is destroyed and we enter a

new objective framework of equality and polity. Once this emphasis on the

economic was set up we entered a new era of privilege for those who previously had

little. This takes place in the public sphere. This is a new place “transalted into our

modern public sphere, which consists of ‘bourgeoisie’ and ‘homme’ agents who,

manipulated by the economy, have reliance on church and family but not in the

original…sense” (Modern Social, 101). The public sphere is a space in which the

public may come and discuss matters that may or may not have political/religious

stance, but in a way that establish a consensus that merits certain norms within the

society. This is founded on the Augustinian/Christian concept of self-fulfillment

through inwardness and relationship to the world. The difference here though is

that “the ordinary is sanctified” (Modern Social, 102), and the power of grace is put

into the human hand rather than the hand of God. To Taylor this constitutes a

“secular” society. But this shouldn’t suggest that God is slowly waned out of society

but rather, “…it is the end of society as structured by its dependence on God or the

beyond. It is not the end of personal religion” (Modern Social, 187). In fact as our

democratic society continues, since it was originally justified by God, the question of

God’s existence should only burn hotter and hotter in us the further we move

further away from him.

“But this identification of civilization and modern moral order didn’t come

about without opposition (Modern Social, 179). In the centuries following the

Enlightenment there were a number of philosophers who saw what they thought

were negative implications in the democratic/economic society. Amongst them are,

Soren Kierkegaard and Friedrich Nietzsche. In describing the developments in

economic and democratic society Taylor speaks of a certain “leveling” which takes

place gradually as a result of this (Modern Social, 73, 180-1). This leveling has to do

with the expansion of Judeo-Christian benevolence and equality across the world.

What equality constitutes in this societal construct is a lower common denominator,

a lower standard which we are thereby free to pursue through common expectation:

“if we…reject the catholic idea…that all Christians must be 100 percent Christian…

than one must claim that ordinary life, the life that the vast majority cannot help

leading…is as hallowed as any other” (Modern Social, 73-4). To this Kierkegaard

would say: “Enthusiasm may end in disaster, but leveling is ipso facto the

destruction of the individual…It can therefore only be held up by the individual

attaining the religious courage which springs from his individual religious isolation”

(Kierkegaard, 54). This is a direct opposition to the development of Christian theory

in the light of democracy. Kierkegaard believes that such equality through

democracy will be the ruin of the individual and the religious way of life despite the

fact that it is founded upon this. Nietzsche is another example of this, who said: “For

the position is this: in dwarfing and leveling of the European man lurks our greatest

peril, for it is this outlook which fatigues—we see to-day nothing which wishes to be

greater, we surmise that the process is always still backwards…what is present day

nihilism? It is that we are tired of man” (Genealogy, 25). What this Christian doctrine

of equality introduces is for Nietzsche is a new era of politeness where consensus

and safety are the highest virtues. Nietzsche would rather switch back to the old

aristocratic way of thinking. He believes that the Judeo-Christian motivations behind

society have come to hold an authoritative grasp of the minds of men. The idea here

that the “process is still always backwards” is Nietzsche’s view of the Judeo-

Christian hold on modern morality. We reason “backwards” in that we only think

that happiness can be achieved through bottom-up initiatives of equality. It is this

mentality that allowed the Jews to escape from the Egyptians and for the Christians

to chastise the Scribes and Pharisee, and it has worked its way into the common

mind through the influence of religious doctrines and the social imaginary.

Although the Judeo-Christian democratic social imaginary has been met with

vehement refutations it remains the order of our society. Taylor is not trying to say

whether this is right or wrong rather, rather he says that, “their falsity cannot be

total” (Modern, 183). This is Taylor’s optimistic view shining through. He believes

since certain trends emerge from history and are accepted into our social imaginary

they must be valid in some truthful way. In a very Hegealian way Taylor says that

“belief and unbelief can co-exist as alternatives” (Modern Social, 187). This is a

breath of fresh air in the face of nihilistic philosophies like those of Derrida and

Foucault. But the position of nihilism is understandable to Taylor who says “to see

this question is profoundly unsettling, ultimately threatening our ability to act”

(Modern Social, 182). Therefore we are presented with a choice of whether or not to

act. Taylor has obviously chosen affirmative action. Rather than outlining the

differences and contradictions in history he analyzes the similarities and the

differences in a way that offers a more hopeful outlook without losing sight of the

drawbacks. In his words: “there is a lot we don’t understand…at the end of the day,

one model among many, a province of the multi-form world we hope (a little against

hope) will arise in order and peace…I hope that in a modest way it contributes to the

larger project” (Modern Social, 196). Taylor sets up the daunting task for himself

and us to make sense of it all, to try and integrate it so that “peace” and “order” will

come about. Even though this may seem an impossible task to some it is at least

encouraging to hear that some educated individuals still have faith in God and

society and a means to put such faith to work.

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http://fora.tv/2007/05/04/Keynote_Lecture_with_Charles_Taylor#chapter_05