Transcendent Turn to Agape Love as a New Source of the Good–and Means of Transformation
Cheakamus Lake, British Columbia
This blog post will pursue some of the insights of Charles Taylor with respect to a possible transcendent turn in moral philosophy and culture. I continue to pull on the threads of his wisdom for a renewed moral vision for the twenty-first century. Indeed, this could be a life-saver for Western culture in late modernity, answering the question: How should we then live and what vision will inspire and sustain us? Constitution of the moral self/spiritual identity has the double connotation of both the contents of the self, and the way in which the self is constructed. It leads the current discussion into an examination of what Taylor calls the epiphanies of transcendence. This provocative concept opens our investigation to moral sources beyond that which is possible within a naturalistic metaphysics (a dis-enchanted world/closed immanent frame). It moves it towards a creative interaction with a larger horizon: one of divine, transcendent, trinitarian goodness. This seems like the next important step in our thought series. There is a lot at stake in the game of life, as we unpack together the important qualitative nature of freedom of the will. Ill-defined freedom doesn’t work that well, and can lead to getting stuck in life. It needs to be defined in terms of a creative, dialectical relationship with the good.
Throughout his work in Sources of the Self, Taylor makes the irenic suggestion that there is no good reason to exclude the vision of agape love of the Judeo-Christian heritage as a viable hypergood (a term defined in blog post 4. https://ubcgcu.org/2024/07/09/qualities-of-freedom-of-the-will-4/). He posits it as a very high form of human relationship, and reinforces the idea in the 2007 volume A Secular Age. Taylor (1989) writes, “Nothing prevents a priori our coming to see God or the Good as essential to our best account of the human world” (C. Taylor, 1989, 73). As a significant percentage of the world population holds to be true, “God is also one of those contemporary sources of the good, the love of which has empowered people to do and be good” (C. Taylor, 1989, 34). Commentator Michael Morgan argues that Taylor’s account in Sources of the Self re-establishes the plausibility of the divine-human relationship for moral experience: “God is one of those entities that has figured in our moral ontology, that has provided a standard or ground of value, and has given our beliefs and actions meaning and significance” (M. Morgan, 1994, 53). More recently, this relationship has become occluded in contemporary Western culture and philosophical ethics through a process of reductionism and disenchantment. Taylor recovers the articulate grasp of agape even as he illuminates its possibilities for ethical discourse and joyful life together–robust community and communion.
The potential impact of the hypergood of agape love and the constitutive good of a trinitarian God on moral discourse is explored below. It is done with a view to unthink nihilism, and release our minds from the restrictions/grip of the Closed Immanent Frame ideology such as in the New Atheists, and the dysfunction of the resulting Crisis of Affirmation. This opens up amazing new possibilities for the moral self and for identity within a larger, richer moral horizon. Furthermore, it wrestles with the concept of accountability to other beings, both natural and human, through new concepts like goodness-freedom, a word that I have coined. There is a new hermeneutic/interpretive strategy at play in what emerges. This investigation of Taylor’s wisdom is like detective work: it involves a process of recovering lost things in culture.
The creative engagement/interface of freedom and divine goodness is proposed and explored as a fruitful way forward in ethics and spirituality, a creative segue out of personal despair, will-to-power violence, and stifling nihilism. It further explores the idea of a transcendent turn in ethics, and then draws on some of the insights of philosophical theology to flesh out a plausibility structure for interpreting the moral self in fresh terms. Today, there is an increasingly robust and fruitful dialogue between theology and ethics, between theologians and post-structuralist philosophers in the early twenty-first centuries (G. Ward, 1997; J. K. A. Smith, 2004; J. Bernauer & J. Carrette (Eds.), 2004). In addition, trinitarian theology is a substantial, rich, and relevant academic discourse in its own right, especially in Britain (Colin Gunton) and the United States. In a future blog post, I will draw on British (Alistair I. McFadyen), American (D. Stephen Long), and German (Christoph Schwöbel) scholarship to flesh out these ideas. Below, I lay the groundwork of the transcendent turn to agape.
Taylor (1989, 71) cautions that, “at least some hypergoods on offer … must be illusory, the projection of less admirable interests or desires.” For example, he questions ones that lead to human reductionism (make us less than full persons with dignity), or ones that abstract an individual out of real life, distort reality or exclude a major aspect of human experience. Ethics and morality is about how we should live and flourish as individuals and as a society amidst our networks of obligation. Corruption is always possible, where a good turns into an ideology or idol. Ethically, one never starts from a position of neutrality. Taylor argues that our moral framework springs from the best account of the human domain we can arrive at, and this account must be anthropologically relevant and livable, it must relate to deep meaning, identity, and purpose. Our spiritual outlook must be plausible: we need strong sources of the good if we are to maintain high ideals or high standards/principles in our hypergood. Taylor argues at this point,
The belief in God … offers a reason … an articulation of what is crucial to the shape of the moral world in one’s best account. It offers a reason rather as I do when I lay out the most basic concerns in order to make sense of my life to you. (C. Taylor, 1989, 76)
Epiphanies of Transcendence
Now I want to expand our spiritual imagination through introducing the language of epiphany. Epiphanies are suggestive of transcendence. Michael Morgan (1994, 56f)) points out that Taylor sees a parallel between the epiphanies of art and poetry in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and the I-Thou epiphany of religious encounter with the divine. Taylor elaborates the idea of epiphanies (1989, 419f, especially 490-93). He sees Post-Romantic and modernist art as oriented to epiphanies, episodes of realization, revelation, or disclosure. Epiphanies and epiphanic art are about a kind of transcendence, about the experience of coming in touch with that which lies beyond oneself, beyond the immanent frame, something new, a ground or qualitative pre-eminence. Taylor reviews various ways of articulating the concept of epiphany in Sources of the Self (1989, 419-93). He shows how God, inserted into this idea of epiphany, fits as a moral source (1989, 449-52).
Epiphanies can be a way of connecting with spiritual and moral sources through the exercise of the creative imagination. Such sources may be divine (Taylor et al), or in the world or nature (German Romantics, Wordsworth), or in the powers of the imaginative, expressive self (Foucault et al). These epiphanies are an exemplar cases of what Taylor calls recovering contact with moral sources. A special case of this renewal of relationship between the self and the moral source is Christian religion and the relation to God, which he sees articulated in the work of Russian writer Fyodor Dostoyevsky. The relationship to art parallels the relationship to religion. The self is re-oriented in the presence of the inaccessible or sublime, something beyond one’s immediate grasp. It captures one’s amazement, produces awe.
For example, we experience this when our eyes are riveted to a certain painting in a museum, or our inner emotions are deeply stirred by a poem or a story of human courage and high virtue. One is taken beyond oneself, into an experience of transcendence. The experience involves both encounter, revelation, and calling. We could think of the absolute sense of wonder in viewing the Northern Lights. Sometimes this happens in reading a biblical Psalm or a poem by Malcolm Guite, where art and revelation coinhere. Epiphany engages the human imagination at a deep level as it did for Moses in front of the burning bush, or at Jacob’s Ladder, or with the Apostle Paul on the way to Damascus. The person is often shaken to the core of their being.Transcendence means more than a selfless exposure (ecstatic experience/spiritual high) or reorientation alone, but also a receiving that deeply involves the self, its imagination, its inner resources, its visions and revisions. In this calculus, for religion and art, the self remains autonomous and yet becomes more full as it opens itself to the impact of the epiphanic other. Epiphany can deeply influence our relationships—we are moving towards agape as part of the chemistry of such encounter.
Michael Morgan, in commenting on Taylor’s work, elaborates through the example of Jewish writer, Martin Buber, on this concept of religious epiphany or I-Thou encounter (M. Morgan, 1994, 60-61). Taylor appreciates (1994, 226-29) Morgan’s use of Buber in relation to his (Taylor’s) concept of epiphany. For Buber, the religious event, revelation, involves a meeting between the self and the divine other, an encounter that depends upon both parties. It is an act of self-affirmation, even as it is a giving over of the self to the other. In this case,
The self is receiver, but it is a receiver, not of a content, a proposition, a truth, but rather of a ‘Presence, a Presence as Power’. Furthermore, that Presence provides ‘the inexpressible confirmation of meaning’, a meaning that calls out to be done, to be confirmed by the self in this life and in this world.… This confirmation and this affirmation of God and self in the world are what Taylor calls a ‘changed stance towards self and world’, which doesn’t simply recognize a hitherto occluded good, but rather helps to bring this about. (M. Morgan, 1994, 60)
This entails the emergence of a fresh experience of high goodness in one’s experience. Thus, the concept of strong transcendencethrough epiphany, something that has currency for artists and poets of the twentieth century, provides a category to extend to the transcendence of God. The idea of God as a possible constitutive good should be intriguing to many ethically reflective and sensitive people today. Taylor’s historical account of moral ontology incorporates an advocacy of religion and the potential of a transcendent turn to the divine, in particular that of the Christian Trinity. Given the language of moral sources, it provides a contemporary moral and cultural discourse for such moral sourcing within the divine. As Taylor (1989, 479) notes, an encounter with God can be the epiphany that reveals an “unambiguously good moral source.” Morgan (1994, 63) clarifies: “In Taylor’s terms, practical reasoning about goods can apply to such goods in the religious context. Revelation—the religious epiphany—gives access to the divine.” This is what is involved in the transcendent turn, involving the recovery of a transcendent divine goodness. It is one that lies in relation to moral self-realization, one which lies beyond human experience, and yet engages one fully in one’s moral, spiritual, and cultural lived experience. It offers a space for transformation, where one is excited about personal, extra mile sacrifice for the good of one’s neighbour, or one’s efforts to bring about reconciliation between alienated parties or family members. We can often sense a new kind of freedom and voice to act and speak for justice, human rights, and benevolence.
What is the Path Forward?
Definitions of transcendence can appear confusing, even overwhelming, so here is some clarification of what I mean by this language. There is a type of transcendence that secular thinkers (those constricted by the closed immanent frame outlook) like Foucault are attuned to, a horizontal transcendence in the weak sense—a transcendence-within-immanence. Transcendence of this variety remains a form of intra-temporal transcendence, as in personal resolutions or plans for change. For example, this is what is attempted in Foucault’s quest for the self-fashioned, beautiful life, life as a work of art. The emphasis is on becoming something new—horizontally—within one’s own history, self-orchestration of one’s personal change or identity. To distinguish strong transcendence in Taylor’s sense, I want to use the idea of encounter with radical alterity. This means an encounter with radical exteriority, the radically transcendent, divine, personal other. It is characterized by the incursion of the eternal into the temporal, informed by the descent of divine transcendence into the historical life of the self (as in the incarnation of Christ). Eternity links up with time. The movement is both ways. This strong type of transcendent good provides a stance whereby no one culture-sphere (science, aesthetics, morality, or religion) or ideology (scientism, relativism, nationalism) can gain hegemonic control over such a good, or claim a God’s-eye viewpoint. Strong transcendence functions as a principle of restraint, while being efficacious within all culture spheres.
Charles Taylor firmly believes that this understanding of strong transcendence is critical to one’s best and most robust account of the moral world and the moral self. The moral economics of grace and gift are critical here: The refusal of, or resistance towards, strong transcendence is a choice to restrict one’s moral horizon and confine one’s moral imagination (to disenchant) unnecessarily. It entails a biased refusal of such a radically otherepiphanic encounter. Indeed, it is not a neutral decision over which we have total control, but one with serious consequences. High ideals/hypergoods without strong sources outside oneself puts a heavy burden on the individual–it can result in discouragement and cynicism, or giving up on the moral enterprise altogether. One can then begin to blame others (or institutions like the church) for their problems, weakness of character, or moral failure. This exit from the economy of grace is the choice that far too many make; it affects their ability to see the world and themselves as good, and produces a crisis of affirmation(Taylor, 1989, 448). Taylor asks us a really tough question at this juncture: Do we have to choose between a form of soul-destruction or self-condemnation, the disavowal of moral goods or world-hatred? “Does one have to either judge oneself negatively, or mutilate oneself spiritually?”, he asks (C. Taylor, 1989, 520). The crux of the dilemma is whether one can affirm the world and self, and at the same time affirm high moral standards of justice, responsibility for one’s neighbour, and benevolence.
This concept of a transcendent epiphany is captured in the Christian faith by the term in Greek: agape love. Agape exceeds the bounds of reciprocity; it cannot be defined in terms of prescriptions for self-realization, self-sufficiency, or self-interest alone. In this kind of love, we find ourselves involved in a strong transcendence. Agape can animate and empower the moral individual, so that sacrifice for the other is seen as mutually beneficial within the economy of grace. But when this grace disappears or when we become cynical, we retreat to a coercive stance of contempt or hatred. We devolve into a malignant narcissist. Terror sometimes flows in to take the place of benevolence. Fyodor Dostoyevsky makes a very interesting connection between self-hatred and terror. The Foucauldian autonomous self takes a stance over against society and the other (anti-humanist), a stance of resistance and self-protection, attempting to discover dignity in precisely this manner which Dostoyevsky discourages: of separation from the world, turning one’s back on the world. This explains the willingness of the aesthetic/self-creating self to take responsibility for itself, while exhibiting an unwillingness to take responsibility for the other and for the common societal good. But, agape love provides a whole new footing for identity.
There is So Much More to Agapeat this Juncture The kind of love at issue works itself out in the economy of loving one’s neighbour, it is a love which finds its ultimate motivation and efficiency in love that is freely given. It is a love that loves for the sake of loving: it entails a non-possessive love, a love that loves in spite of being unrequited, a love that expects nothing in return. Taylor’s recovery of such transcendent moral sources through this transcendent turn ultimately implies an opening of the self to something outside the closed immanent frame that empowers it. Agape has density and gravitas; it can transform our various human loves in ways that are a mystery to us. It is full of surprises as a creative moral source; it can turn morality from a burden to a meaningful adventure. This larger horizon could give enhanced perspective and positive energy to Foucault’s artistic self-creation; in fact, it does rethink his doctrine of self-creation. Foucault is open to the epiphany of self within a self-reflexive horizon, but does not access, was not open to, this epiphany of agape love within a transcendent horizon. With this concern in mind, Taylor holds out hope for a transcendent turn, hope for a different type of transformation from well beyond a pure immanent, choice-focused self-invention, one which brackets the social world and God. In this, he is advocating for critical realism. Taylor’s generous critique of the Parisian giant Foucault has revealed Foucault’s lack of openness to this more fulsome, robust grappling with oneself. There is a fresh discovery of self within the economy of grace or gift, a discovery and a transformation that offers a different stance towards self and the world. The individual is elevated by this love, as she sees that all parties benefit from it. The economy of grace spoken of here is connected to transcendence, to the goodness of a triune God. Taylor writes about Dostoevsky’s amazing insight:
What will transform us is an ability to love the world and ourselves, to see it as good in spite of the wrong. But this will only come to us if we can accept being part of it, and that means accepting responsibility.… Loving the world and ourselves is in a sense a miracle, in face of all the evil and degradation that it and we contain. But the miracle comes on us if we accept being part of it. Involved in this is our acceptance of love from others. We become capable of love through being loved; and over against the perverse apostolic succession [of terror and violence] is a grace-dispensing one. Dostoyevsky brings together here a central idea of the Christian tradition, especially evident in the Gospel of John, that people are transformed through being loved by God, a love that they mediate to one another, on the one hand, with the modern notion of a subject who can help to bring on transfiguration through the stance he takes to himself and the world, or the other.… What he [Dostoyevsky] was opposing was that humans affirm their dignity in separation from the world. (C. Taylor, 1989, 452)
There is a certain wonderful and mysterious strangeness to the idea of transcendent, divine goodness, and agape love. It exceeds one’s human cognitive grasp, or ability to define or contain it. One can offer terms like infinite, excellent, most intense, purest, unfathomable, or superlative. But one cannot fully grasp the qualitative dimensions of transcendent, divine goodness with human propositions. It is radically other, a radical alterity, trans-historical, eternal. This is very good; it is well beyond our normal human creative imagination. At one level, it is incompatible, incommensurable with human concepts of the good. It is definitely no mere human projection onto the cosmos. Goodness that we find in the human world points to, and participates in, but is not identical with goodness that is God. Divine goodness clarifies, animates, and reinterprets us while empowering us to love like we never thought we could, to bring us out of our cynicism, nihilism, and narcissism. This is very relevant to positive race and international relations. Paul the Apostle taught that agape was the hub from which all other virtues radiated, the source of all Christian virtue; the imitation of Christ proved the standard for a certain kind of life within communities of mutual admonition and esteem (1 Corinthians 13).
Application of Agape Love
Agape is a prophetic love. It refuses to equate anyone with his/her immediate observable being. A human being is not deeply and essentially the same as the one who is visible to the employer, neighbour, salesman, policeman, judge, friend, or spouse. A human being is destined to live in eternity and is fully known only to God. Agape is about the spiritual destiny of the individual; destiny is a spiritual drama. My destiny is my own selfhood given by God, but given not as an established reality, like a rock or a hill, but as a task lying under divine imperative…. Agape is simply the affirmation of this paradox and of this destiny underlying it. Agape looks beyond all marks of fallenness, all traits by which people are judged and ranked, and acknowledges the glory each person—as envisioned in Christian faith—gains from the creative mercy of God. It sets aside the most astute worldly judgment in behalf of destiny (Political Scientist Glenn Tinder, 1991, 25, 28).
~Gordon E. Carkner, PhD, Author, Blogger, YouTube Webinar Producer, Meta-Educator with UBC Graduate Students, and GFCF Scholarly Lectures.
Bernauer, J. & Carrette, J. (Eds.) (2004). Michel Foucault and Theology: The politics of religious experience. Aldershot, Hampshire: Ashgate.
Carkner, G. (2024). Towards an Incarnational Spiritual Culture: Grounding Our Identity in Christ. Wipf & Stock Publishing.
Morgan, M.L. (1994). Religion, History and Moral Discourse. In J. Tully, (Ed.), Philosophy in an Age of Pluralism: The philosophy of Charles Taylor in Question. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Smith, J. K. A. (2004). Introduction to Radical Orthodoxy: Mapping a post-secular culture. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic.
Taylor, C. (1989). Sources of the Self: The Making of the Modern Identity. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Taylor, C. (1994). Charles Taylor Replies. In J. Tully (Ed.) Philosophy in an Age of Pluralism: The philosophy of Charles Taylor in question (pp. 213-57). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Tinder, G. (1991). The Political Meaning of Christianity: The Prophetic Stance. Harper Collins.
Ward, G. (Ed.) (1997) The Postmodern God: a theological reader. Oxford: Blackwell.
ubcgcu 
Leave a comment