Charlie Hebdo, a Beheaded Teacher and the Abuse of Free Speech

Could we possibly imagine a serious ethical and moral framework that would justify the killing of a person who, under the guise of artistic creativity or political freedom of expression—despite being degrading to specific individuals or groups—expressed their convictions? Of course not. The brutal beheading of the teacher must be unequivocally condemned. There may be causal explanations for such an act, but there is no excuse for it.

However, the horrific act that led to the teacher's death should not obscure the fact that the teacher himself made a mistake. Rather than using the controversial cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad from Charlie Hebdo as an example of the abuse of free expression, he used them to justify and exemplify free speech. In doing so, he unintentionally triggered a misguided radical to commit a politically and religiously motivated murder.

The reactions to the French teacher's beheading by an Islamic extremist further reveal, with few exceptions, how inadequately educated many of the so-called "educated" people are and to what extent they lack the capacity for critical thinking.

It should be the task of every educator to convey that freedom of expression is not absolute and, therefore, not unlimited. Like all other areas of human activity, free speech must be limited by the responsibilities inherent in the exercise of human freedom. Elsewhere, I have discussed the connection between freedom and responsibility and made clear that they are two sides of the same coin. We cannot think of freedom without responsibility, and responsibility is void if one is not free to act. The liberty of human beings is, therefore, about responsible freedom. Irresponsible freedom—defined as the arbitrary exercise of will, manifesting itself in unchecked egoism—gives only the illusion of freedom. A person who is a prisoner of their impulses and self-centeredness is not free; rather, they are held hostage by their own morally deficient personality.

From my essay on the Crisis of Morality: "True human freedom is finite freedom, limited by the conditions of social coexistence and the legitimate aspirations of all other individuals. We must not mistake freedom for independence from everything; instead, it must be understood as a choice within the framework of something larger."

This quotation highlights that our responsibility as human beings extends to all other individuals and living organisms, in every social and political context, because they hold relevance in relation to our actions. The boundary between our freedom and the freedom of others, when expressed in a formal and universally applicable manner, is what we commonly refer to as justice.

Injustice, therefore, occurs when one's freedom extends beyond the boundaries of justice and infringes upon the freedom of another, thus preventing them from exercising their own choices. When we meet the demands of justice through our own actions, we practice ethical and moral righteousness. This principle also establishes the ongoing responsibility of the legislature to define, at any given time and place, the legitimate claims to freedom of all individuals in relevant contexts and to codify them into law. The application of justice is dynamic, as it must account for the evolution of human coexistence and its respective contexts, but the concept of justice remains timeless and unchanging. This truth explains why positive legislation that neglects this normative principle can embody wrong—something that has occurred throughout history.

As a result, it becomes clear how utterly irresponsible and morally unjustifiable any form of blasphemy is, as it violates the legitimate claim of religious practitioners to freedom, without justification for such interference. Even if a legal provision (whether immoral or ill-conceived) were to permit blasphemy, it would never be ethically justifiable to mock or ridicule another person's faith. Provoking Muslims by making fun of the Prophet Muhammad is just as inappropriate as provoking Christians by mocking Jesus Christ in satirical works or art. In Paris, Charlie Hebdo was misguided and irresponsible when it mocked Islam's religious figures in its satirical magazine, just as Pamela Geller’s cartoon contest "Draw Muhammad" in Garland, Texas was irresponsible. In both cases, the agitators hid behind misinterpretations of the principle of free expression—either a misguided understanding of the U.S. First Amendment or a neglect of the moral-philosophical ideal that dictates responsible action.

Truly free and responsible individuals have long understood that responsible behavior is never simply about complying with the law. They recognize that legal provisions primarily set the boundaries for what one cannot do to avoid harm, while moral responsibility dictates what we must do and how we should act.

 

 

Can A Muslim Be President? Why Dr. Ben Carson Was Right

Dr. Ben Carson got caught off guard when he stated in an interview that he couldn't possibly envisage a Muslim exercising the office of the president of the U.S. Yet, in principle, his answer was right on. The outcry in American-Muslim and progressive quarters demonstrates once again the want for proper erudition on significant subject matters of political and cultural affairs in this country. 

Islam's limited appeal to open and democratic societies stem from the absence of a dogma separating religion from State. What is still missing in the Muslim creed is something similar to the two-swords or two-kingdoms doctrine that Christendom has articulated, reaching back to St. Augustine and his De Civitate Dei. 

When Augustine distinguished the Civitas Dei, the City of God, and the Civitas Terrena, the City of Men, or the Earthly City, he laid the foundation for the separation of Church and State.  By separating the heavenly and spiritual realm from the temporal earthly domain, Augustine paved the way for developing the dualist Christian doctrine that sees the Church control the spiritual kingdom, whereas, in contrast, the State is in charge of worldly affairs. While the spiritual realm stands hierarchically higher and allows the Church to influence politics and societal matters, the doctrine excludes the City of God's enforcement upon the City of Men. In other words, a Christian theocracy would collide with the dogmatic principles of the religion itself.  The wisdom of this corresponds with Jesus' sayings, "My kingdom is not of this world" (as stated in John 18:36) and "Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and unto God the things that are God's" (Matthew 22:21). On the basic tenet that the Kingdom of God awaits the Christian believer in a different world, one of divine and spiritual nature, it is proper and suitable to establish and submit to earthly authorities in Man's worldly existence. In the vein of this accepted wisdom of western thinking, the concept of the nation-state evolved and spread across the globe, with its original idea of a separation of powers and monopolization of force by secular political entities.
 
Unlike Christianity, Islam does not separate religion from politics. Attempts to reconcile Islamic tenets with secular governance are barely visible. Sharia law is prevalent, which means, strictly speaking, that divine law imposes upon earthly conditions. Jurisprudence in Islam is merely the expansion and application of Sharia onto worldly circumstances. In other words, in its most serious interpretation, Islam is a religion that aims to manifest God's kingdom in the realm of men. The objective is to establish the Ummah, the community of the true believers, of all Muslim people, sharing the same ideology, culture, and beliefs, dictated and held together by (divine) Sharia law. 

Islam must provide a straightforward solution to the separation of Church and State, religion and politics, a division between the ecclesiastical and civil sphere, and the divine and secular realms. Until accomplished, any representative of this religion will unavoidably be in collision with either his/her Muslim belief system or the political environment of a Christian-based society in which he/she wants to live. 

This circumstance does not impair or curtail religious freedom that Christian societies usually grant other faiths by allowing them the free exercise of their religion. As shown, the restriction to hold individual political offices emerges from the dogma of Islam's religion itself. 

However, particularly concerning the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, the discussed aspect highlights the general problem of equal treatment of all religions in a political system based on Christianity's intellectual, cultural, and social heritage.  The question is how this heritage, as it reflects itself in the customs, laws, and cultural configurations of this very society, be upheld if religions whose traditions and spiritual principles are in many respects irreconcilable with the Christian host environment are considered equal? 

The question directed at Dr. Ben Carson could ensue consequences and entail a public debate that might lead far beyond the aspect of whether or not a Muslim could become president of the United States of America. It brings to the fore a weakness in the First Amendment that the founders didn't foresee when they adopted this amendment on December 15, 1791. 

We have to assume that in those early years of the new republic, the legislators could not have possibly anticipated that the Christian roots of this new nation would ever be discredited or put in doubt. And neither that somebody could seriously raise a question of the kind directed at Dr. Carson.