Mortimer Adler's Kryptonite

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Mortimer Adler and his wife with Pope Paul VI

Mortimer Adler's Kryptonite

Readers of this blog will be aware of my love and admiration of Mortimer J. Adler (1902 - 2001). To him I owe my knowledge and familiarity with a host of philosophical ideas. Not only did he introduce me to the fundamentals, but he also steered me away from some pretty severe philosophical mistakes. He taught me how to read a book, and introduced me to The Great Books of the Western World. He greatly influenced my writing style, and his essay on learning and teaching became the foundation of my approach to teaching. 

And yet, like all superheroes, Adler had his weakness. Unfortunately, that weakness was religion. Specifically, Thomistic Catholicism.

This post is not intended to be a comprehensive treatment of Adler's views on Catholicism, or on theology in general. If that is of interest to you, read his book Truth in Religion: The Plurality of Religions and the Unity of Truth (1992), which will be discussed later in this blog post.

Instead, in this post I will present an email which I wrote to one of my rabbeim (whom we'll refer to as RJM) ten years ago, at the height of my Adler odyssey, inquiring about Adler's fall into Catholicism. 

Here is my email and RJM's response, minimally edited for publishing on this blog. Links and transliterations were added by me.

[Note: even though I say so clearly in my email, I want to emphasize that the third question was not asked by me, but by one of the younger yeshiva guys; I, myself, would have phrased the question differently - in a decidedly less "Christian" manner.]

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Kol ha'Seridim to RJM

Dear [RJM],

As a fellow reader of Mortimer J. Adler, I have three question about Adler and religion that I'd like to hear your thoughts (or opinions) on.

Question #1: What's up with his conversion to Christianity? I was just rereading the passage at the end of his second autobiography, which details his conversion: 

In March of 1984, after a trip to Mexico in February, I fell ill, probably from a virus that I had picked up there. The illness was protracted. I was in the hospital for five weeks and, after leaving the hospital, was in bed at home for several months or more. Though I underwent all the diagnostic tests and procedures that the physicians could think of, the illness was never adequately diagnosed; and the cure, when it finally came, involved numerous antibiotics and two blood transfusions that brought my red corpuscle blood counts back to normal.  

During this long stay in the hospital, I suffered a mild depression, and often when Caroline visited me I would, unaccountably, burst into tears. Father Howell, the Rector of Saint Chrysostom's Church, also visited me, and once when, at my bedside, he prayed for my recovery, I choked up and wept. The only prayer that I knew word for word, was the Pater Noster. On that day and in the days after it, I found myself repeating the Lord's Prayer, again and again, and meaning every word of it. Quite suddenly, when I was awake one night, a light dawned on me, and I realized what had happened without my recognizing it clearly when it first happened.  

I had been seriously praying to God. But had I not said at the end of How to Think About God, that no one who understood the God of the philosophers as well as I thought I did, would worship that God or pray to him. Only if, by the gift of grace, one made the leap of faith across the chasm to the God of religious Jews and Christians, would one engage in worship and prayer, believing in a morally good, loving, just, and merciful God.  

Here after many years of affirming God's existence and trying to give adequate reasons for that affirmation, I found myself believing in God and praying to Him ...

In your opinion, is this just another example of an otherwise rational mind being overcome by a powerful religious emotion at a time of insecurity and proximity to death? Or did Adler himself commit a severe philosophical mistake - no doubt originating in his preoccupation with Thomas Aquinas - of which we he was unaware? At the end of this chapter in the autobiography, Adler makes some statements about "the mystery of the Trinity." I find it baffling that the same mind who wrote How to Think About God can simultaneously embrace faith in the Christian doctrine, all on the basis of "grace" which was "received" during a bout of illness and a period of depression. 

Again, perhaps this is just another example of how we humans can compartmentalize, shutting off our minds in certain areas of our lives, no matter how rational we are in everything else. 

Question #2: What about the Torah mi'Sinai argument? From How to Think About God, it appears that Adler was completely unaware of the Sinai argument: 

A third point to be noted follows directly on what has just been said. In the three monotheistic religions of the West - Judaism, Christianity, and Islam - the proposition that God exists is not an article of faith or religious belief. The first article of faith in all three religions is that God has revealed himself to us in Holy Writ or Sacred Scripture. This, of course, entails the affirmation that God has revealed himself to us in Holy Writ or Sacred Scripture. This, of course, entails the affirmation that the God who has revealed himself exists. But it goes far beyond that proposition to something that can never be proved, or even argued about, something that is always and only an article of faith or religious belief: namely, the fact of Divine revelation ... 

It is in no way improper to argue about whether belief in God's existence can be established by reason alone, or at least thereby made reasonable. But it would be quite improper to argue about the reasonableness of the first article of religious faith, that Sacred Scripture represents God's revelation of himself to us. That belief can be neither proved nor disproved, nor is it really a proper subject of argument pro and con. 

Did he just not encounter Torah mi'Sinai in his reading? Does he have some argument against Torah mi'Sinai of which I am unaware? If so, I would love to hear it.

Question #3: What is the state of Adler's soul? This is a question that one of the other guys in yeshiva asked me. I don't really know enough about the soul to be certain that I understand the question, which is why I have turned to you. 

Any thoughts on these questions would be most appreciated. 

- [Kol ha'Seridim]

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RJM to Kol ha'Seridim

Dear [Kol ha'Seridim],

Great to hear from you. I hope you are well.

Response to Question #1: I think Adler had an unusual attitude to religion, inasmuch as he accepted the Thomistic distinction between matters of faith and matters of reason. He seems to have systematically excluded theological doctrines from genuine philosophical scrutiny, because of his assumption that their acceptance or denial is premised on faith and not rational analysis alone.

Adler has a whole book on the subject of religion, called "Truth in Religion", which, in my opinion, is the worst volume he ever produced, poorly reasoned and very obviously a "set up" designed to lead the interested person to the "leap of faith" into Catholic Christianity.

The book starts out rationally, seeking to demonstrate that we must reject relativism and seek objective truth even in the realm of religion. Nowadays, this is a major point that needs to be stressed, so kol ha'kavod to him for making it clear. He summarily dismisses polytheistic religions for good reason, but these are about the only meritorious aspects of the text. It is all downhill from there.

Adler argues, for example, that the mysteriousness of a religion is evidence for its veracity, because a purely rational religion wouldn't require revelation for its establishment. In these passages he is clearly arguing in favor of Christianity and against Judaism, although he is never so explicit. All in all, it is not an objective I don't recommend the book, although I am confident that you would not come to any harm in reading it ...

By the way, it is well known that a disproportionate number of Adler's Jewish students in the University of Chicago converted to Catholicism after studying Aquinas with him, although he waited till much later to do so.

Response to Question #2: I doubt if he was aware of the argument. Most philosophers aren't. For example, David Conway (ironically, a student of Antony Flew) authored a book called "The Rediscovery of Wisdom", in which he argues that the ultimate goal of philosophy should be the contemplation of God, and that generations of philosophers have been misled by the gross distortions of later thinkers. He basically shows that the purpose of philosophy was classically understood as a process of achieving yediat Hashem (knowledge of God) and ahavat Hashem (love of God), and also argues that many of the supposed "debunkings" of proofs for God's existence are fatally flawed and should never have gained the currency they now have in academia. He therefore reestablishes the existence of God as a fact and the goal of knowledge of God as the raison d'etre of all rational creatures.

Amazingly, he brings Judaism into this, looking at the varied interpretations of Maimonides and Spinoza vis a vis the purpose of mitsvot. Conway concludes that the Torah's objective is indeed what Maimonides states - the same as the objective of philosophy, to enable the Jewish nation to dedicate their lives to the contemplation of God. Keep in mind that this guy is a secular academic, so this is all pretty amazing already.

The problem emerges when he compares the relative merits of philosophy and Judaism, and questions the basis for belief in the revelation claim. He literally totally misreads the story and misrepresents the tradition, claiming that Jews themselves believe that the events were not written down until hundreds of years after the fact, etc. He doesn't even mention the mass revelation component because, as he states in the text, his impression is that Moses went up onto a mountain by himself to receive the laws!!! (I tried to contact and correct him, but I was unsuccessful and kind of gave up).

BTW, I also penned a letter to M.J. Adler, which he received and which was read to him, literally days before his death. The response I got from his assistant was that matters of religion are very personal. But I did argue for the rationality of belief in Judaism as opposed to Christianity quite passionately. Perhaps he had hirhurei teshuva (thoughts of repentance) before he died.

Response to Question #3: Ultimately, I don't think anyone but the Ribbono Shel Olam (Master of the Universe) can know the answer to this question in a definitive manner. We have no access to the recesses of anyone's soul, how they truly conceive of God, etc. So speculation is all we have.

Adler accepted an idolatrous religion but his sophisticated version of that religion precluded him from the gross philosophical materialism, emotionalism and infantile God-concept normally associated with it. So it would seem that the possibility exists that Adler's soul was sufficiently actualized and thus distinct from matter such that it could have survived his physical death. And from the standpoint of halakha he was certainly a tinoq shenishba (a "captured baby" i.e. a Jew who was raised without knowledge of Judaism) par excellence, so a halakhically mandated karet (spiritual excision) wouldn't be an issue. Plus, the remote chance exists that he may have recognized his error and repented in his last moments of life.

On the other hand, it is possible that his conception of God (the foundation of his understanding of reality) was not sufficiently purified of its material elements and thus his soul remained imprisoned in the shackles of physicality and perished.

In the end, whatever he was zocheh (meritorious) to, we can be sure he received it! 

I hope this speedily composed response is helpful. Feel free to continue the correspondence as you see fit.

Best Regards,

RJM

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I found RJM's response to be enlightening, since it provided a greater context for Adler's theological misstep. I was particularly intrigued by RJM's attempt to contact Adler on his deathbed, and the latter's response (via his assistant) that "matters of religion are very personal" - an uncharacteristic response from a man who was so committed to truth and precision in thinking.

In writing this blog post I came across an article by Deal Hudson about Adler's conversion, entitled The Great Philosopher Who Became Catholic. Hudson writes:

The more we talked the more I realized Mortimer really wanted to be a Roman Catholic, but issues like abortion and the resistance of his family and friends were keeping him away. I tried to show him that his own Aristotelian-Thomistic metaphysics of act-potency led him to understand the necessity of protecting unborn life. But just at that moment, Mortimer would uncharacteristically mutter, "It's all too complicated," and change the subject. But I knew that he knew he was being inconsistent. I didn't have to press him – because I knew he knew, and it was only a matter of time before he acquiesced.

At several of our seminars was the Catholic prelate of San Jose, Bishop Pierre DuMaine. The bishop and I would sometimes tag-team the philosopher on the Catholic Church, and we would all end up laughing about how Mortimer deflected the inevitable conclusion.

These reports of inconsistency and evasiveness on Adler's part in matters of religion are consistent with RJM's testimony about Adler's response to his letter. 

It would be easy to pass judgment on Adler and condemn him for this severe intellectual / philosophical / epistemological shortcoming. Indeed, when I first learned of this truth, I held it against him, and was almost angry at him for this failing. I felt: "How could MY Adler, whose views on all philosophical matters are backed by airtight reasoning and solid arguments - how could he hold such a stupid view? Arriving at a false conclusion through a mistake in reasoning is one thing, and I realize that no human being is infallible, but to accept an irrational belief system on the basis of an irrational 'faith experience'? That is unforgivable." 

Looking back at my reaction, I am reminded of one of my favorite passages from John Steinbeck's East of Eden:

When a child first catches adults out - when it first walks into his grave little head that adults do not always have divine intelligence, that their judgments are not always wise, their thinking true, their sentences just - his world falls into panic desolation. The gods are fallen and all safety gone. And there is one sure thing about the fall of gods: they do not fall a little; they crash and shatter or sink deeply into green muck. It is a tedious job to build them up again; they never quite shine. And the child's world is never quite whole again. It is an aching kind of growing.

Now, ten years after this email exchange, with an additional decade's worth of learning, maturity, and self-knowledge under my belt, my judgment of Adler has softened considerably. I have come to realize that we ALL have our blind-spots. Some people go through their entire lives without becoming aware of their blind-spots. Others, like Adler, actively resist the distortion in thinking which arise from these hidden biases, but ultimately succumb in moments of weakness. None of us is immune to this type of blindness, and we can never be sure that we won't succumb. 

Now I am at the point of maturity where I realize that it is possible to acknowledge that a great thinker can make a childish error, without this diminishing the emunas chachamim I have when reading his works, "for there is no man so wholly righteous on earth who does [only] good and never sins" (Koheles 7:20).

Every superhero has his kryptonite.