There is much in what Armstrong says (more in this case than in what she has to say about Islam, regarding which she is purely bien pensant). But the cloud of unknowing has to do with putting off what we think we know in order encounter the transcendent- which we cannot "know" - and the logos is only aggressive when taken as it too often has been in a strictly intellectual sense. Understood as the Western equivalent of the Tao - which is how it ought to be understood, and how Heraclitus, for one, seems to have understood it - it is anything but.
It's interesting to me that Murchison's reply to Armstrong isn't all that civil. LOL Well, it's not nasty, but it's a bit disparaging. (When did "Vatican II-era nun" become such a putdown?)
ReplyDeleteWhich maybe indicates that Armstrong is correct, if about nothing else, that the tone and tenor of "discussion" has sunk very far away from civil.
I wouldn't agree with Armstrong on all points, most likely, although I do agree with her about compassion. I do find that the tone of this review, however, sort of proves her point!
It also makes me think of Deborah Tannen's book "Argument Culture," which is the best anlaysis of the failure of civil discourse in our culture that I've ever read.