“A
learned fool is more a fool than an ignorant fool.”
‘Things were
better when I was young,’ is the oft-repeated catch-phrase of the elderly.
Sometimes it may seem from their rhetoric that everything was better. The
people were giants and their achievements phenomenal.
Yet the listener doesn’t often give much credit to this talk of giants
and heroes, it is chalked down to nostalgia and rejected due to implausibility.
When it comes to making concrete what wisdom people may believe the
natural fool possesses, the word nostalgia springs readily to mind.
Youth, innocence and even pre-rational thought and existence, such as
that of some animals, are looked upon with a wistful air.
Knowledge is seen as a curse and it seems that whole systems of thought
look back on the good old days, when people were closer to nature, closer to
pre-rational existence and perhaps even closer to God.
By possessing this nostalgia, the agent is also implicitly accepting
certain values. For instance, they
are valuing highly the ‘simpler’ pleasures, such as food, sleep and sex,
while at the same time devaluing other things, perhaps the fruits of reason and
even human civilisation itself. In
this respect the agent is not simply acting out of an irrational nostalgia, they
are also making a considered value judgement, even if their conclusion may
paradoxically devalue the process of reasoning and rationality they use to reach
that conclusion. Perhaps this
respect for the natural fool has another origin – it could be saying something
about the nature of knowledge and wisdom. Mayhap
true wisdom and knowledge are out of our reach, and hence at heart we are all
fools, striving for that we cannot achieve.
For whatever reason, the figure of the natural fool seems to carry a
message about knowledge and wisdom.
The natural fool is
a person who, through the caprices of nature, is lacking in wit, reason and
knowledge. This includes
those born with mental deficiencies and those that acquire them in life due to
unfortunate circumstances. What is
central in the definition is that the natural fool is unintentionally a fool.
It is a natural state and not the result of deliberate choice.
Furthermore, the natural fool cannot escape the state they exist in. It is an involuntary condition.
Included in the broad category of natural fool are the young, whose
innocence is not permanent, but who still have all the authenticity of the
natural until they reach a certain level of development.
They possess a lack of reason and do not exist in this state through
their own choice and hence can properly be associated with the natural fool.
Also included in this category are the members of the animal kingdom, who
are likewise limited in their rationality.
Finally there is the group more classically associated with the natural
fool, the idiots who, like the other two types, both lack reason and do not
possess a choice regarding that lack. The
significance of these divisions is that in situations when, for instance, the
wisdom of childhood is lauded, there will also exist an argument that wisdom of
this kind will also apply to the more general category of natural fool. Each of these three instances of natural fool (child, animal
and idiot) possesses a similar enough relationship to reason and rationality
that the ways in which they are wise would not be incongruous.
When it comes to analysing the fool and explicating the ways in which we
see the fool as wise, it can be harder to do this in the case of the natural
fool than in the case of other kinds of fool, such as the artificial fool.
Our terminology for describing natural fools is often derogatory –
idiot, retard, stupid, naïve…. What I would like to say is that despite our initial tendency
not to see the natural fool as wise, on reflection, there are some things about
this fool we will most certainly call wise; furthermore, there are many
influential systems of thought that elevate this type of person and their values
because of, and not in spite of, their very nature.
To show just how
influential the seemingly absurd proposition that the natural fool possesses
wisdom is, let us look towards the dominant religion of Western society. The view that the natural fool can possess wisdom is a strong
theme in Christianity, and hence I shall argue that Christianity supports the
view that the natural fool possesses wisdom in some form.
By no means does Christianity hold the natural fool as an ultimate ideal,
but it certainly does place a positive value on some aspects of the natural
fool. Christianity includes
elements of the natural fools’ wisdom in its own account of wisdom.
One reason Christianity values the natural fool is because it values the
quality of innocence. Specifically,
Christianity values innocence with regard to the nature of sin. The implicit argument seems to be that blame cannot be
attached to those unable to recognise it. How
can one be guilty of a crime when one does not even have the concept of a crime?
Many commentators declare that innocence is actually a state of grace, a
state in which sin, by definition, cannot be performed, when sin is taken to
need an intentional component. To
give an example, let’s say I am in a clothing store.
I try on an item of clothing and I get a cell phone call.
I walk outside absent-mindedly with my now unintentionally purloined item
of clothing. Am I guilty of
breaking the commandment ‘thou shalt not steal’?
Many Christians would say that there was no sin without the intention to
perform a sin, and that the intention cannot exist without an awareness what sin
is and when it is being committed.
When it comes to the natural fool, since they have no conception of sin
and hence no intention to sin, they also cannot be held culpable. In this account sin cannot happen without awareness of sin.
Children, animals and the mentally handicapped, as instances of natural
fools, are without that awareness. This
is the first way in which the natural fool is held in high regard according to
Christianity. The natural exists in
a state of grace. Not only that,
but because of their status they cannot escape the state of grace without
escaping their condition. As long
as they remain an innocent to the nature of sin then they cannot possibly sin.
Christianity at times implies that it is essential to learn from the
natural fool. Repeated a number of
times in the bible is the exhortation to come to the gates of heaven as a child:
“verily I say unto you, except ye be converted, and become as little children,
ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.”
Obviously the passage does not demand that the seeker of salvation become
younger, only that this person must adopt certain characteristics shared by the
child and the natural fool. Most
interpretations see this passage as indicating that to achieve salvation one
must possess both the humility of childhood and the vulnerability of the young.
Another interpretation could be that the exhortation is to realise that
before God people are as children, comparatively lacking in knowledge or wisdom,
that we are as fools before God. Maybe
it is actually saying something about the futility of earthly pursuits – no
matter how much one achieves in one’s lifetime, at the end of it salvation is
achieved by setting these things aside. Thus the natural fool is actually not an unfortunate figure
at all. While they do not possess
earthly knowledge, they possess all the knowledge necessary to enter heaven;
they know how to be childlike. To
enter the Christian heaven it may be not only helpful, but even necessary to
adopt the innocence and childlike nature of the natural fool. Knowledge of worldly matters, rather than being helpful,
could be a hindrance.
Within Christian theory there is some debate as to whether what we
normally consider the innocent is actually truly innocent of sin. There is a strand of Christianity that espouses a doctrine of
original sin. The theologian
Augustine thought that due to original sin everyone started out life damned and
that it took some effort to relinquish this state: “the deliberate sin of the
first man is the cause of original sin”.
Hence even the apparently innocent are tarred with the brush of original
sin. Under this portrayal even the
mentally ill had no recourse to salvation, there was no exculpatory way to
escape original sin. There is evidence that the concept of original sin existed
before Augustine, but in his writings it found clear expression.
For the purposes of my argument it is not necessary for me to declare
this issue of original sin resolved. It
should suffice that I have presented the two strands of Christian theory and
noted that a tension exists between them. Also
note that the central issue within original sin is not whether the innocent can
be saved, but rather if anybody can be truly innocent.
Prima facie it may seem that the concept of original sin negates
the ethical blamelessness Christianity holds the innocent possesses, but when
examined more deeply, original sin does not say the innocent is not normally
ethically blameless, only that the innocent is not truly innocent of sin.
Taking the concept in isolation from Christianity, which can be
ambivalent on the issue of original sin, a commonsense perspective would be to
not hold ethically blameworthy people who can have no awareness of moral
properties. In the New Zealand
legal system insanity is taken as an exculpatory excuse.
It does not claim that there was no wrong committed, but it does claim
that the agent should not be held completely responsible for their actions.
Similarly, youth is also taken in most cases as at least a partial excuse
for wrongdoing. To take an example,
if you have a baby eat your homework, then how blameworthy would you find them
given that they have no idea what homework is, let alone why it might be bad to
eat it? The only appropriate
response would be to try and teach the baby that this is a wrongdoing, perhaps
by punishing them in some fashion, or to prevent the child from doing it again
by storing your homework in a pit of dingoes or the like.
Also supporting (or being supported by) the Christian notion of innocence
and intention is the legal theory of actus non facit reum nisi mens sit rea
– there is no guilty action without a guilty mind. For criminal responsibility to be established, both intention
and action must be concurrently present without a valid defence to dismiss them.
The natural fool lacks the ability to even possess the proper mens rea,
or guilty mind, necessary for criminal responsibility to be placed.
Actus reus may exist but criminal culpability would not exist
without the confluence of mens and actus, mind and action.
Innocence, while valuable and wise in the previous senses, is a property
that is out of the grasp of most people. Innocence
is not something that can be re-learned. Much
of the natural fool’s wisdom can be emulated to a certain degree, but at first
glance it may seem that the imitation or adoption of innocence is a near
impossible task.
Another instance of
the Christian respect for innocence is present in the biblical account of the
Garden of Eden. In this account the
most serious crime and that with the gravest consequences in the history of
humanity was the acquisition of forbidden knowledge.
It is noteworthy that the turning point in this mythic account of human
existence is the acquisition of knowledge, albeit knowledge of a very specific
type. Specifically the Bible says
that the knowledge was “knowledge of good and evil”.
This is also significant with regard to the status of the natural fool in
that they are close to that blessed state spoken of in the Bible, the
pre-lapsarian state of innocence.
If knowledge of good and evil is the path to human damnation, then it
surely follows that there must be something good about never acquiring this
knowledge. At least one path to
salvation must lie in moving away from this type of knowledge or in never having
possessed this knowledge in the first place. It is salvation that does not require redemption, as by
lacking knowledge of good and evil redemption is not even required.
While this is not the dominant theme of mainstream Christianity, it
nevertheless does appear to be the logical implication of this train of thought.
In respect to this doctrine, Christianity values the irrational.
By possessing knowledge of good and evil, human beings become able to be
damned. Prior to this they were in
a state of grace, a state prized highly in Christianity.
There are a number of similarities between the biblical account of Adam
and Eve’s lives in the Garden of Eden and this portrayal of natural fools as
being in a state of grace. While
little is actually told about the supposed lives of Adam and Eve, the Bible does
reveal that “they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not
ashamed.”
The natural fool in the forms of the child, animal and idiot are likewise
unconcerned with apparel. We are
also told that Adam tended the garden, “the LORD God took the man, and put him
into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it”, a reminder of the
cultural and literary traditions that uphold bucolic existences.
Neither of them knew of fear or possessed a fear of death, evinced by the
way in which Eve and Adam ate this fruit despite their belief that they would
die if they sampled it. In addition, we are told that they both learned fear after
sampling the fruit – God finds them hiding behind a bush from him, Adam says:
“I heard thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked.”
It is interesting that God does not deny that the new knowledge they have
gained is valid knowledge; God does not forbid them from sampling the fruit of
the tree because the knowledge it imparts is false.
One aspect of that knowledge is awareness of their nudity.
God does not deny that they are naked, hence showing that the tree’s
knowledge is valid, simply asking “who told thee that thou wast naked?”
Hence the state they were in beforehand, when they were unaware and
uncaring of their nudity, was an inauthentic state in which they were unaware of
what even God seems to think is a truth.
This portrayal of Eve and Adam in pre-lapsarian times is almost exactly
the same as the conventional picture of the natural fool.
Natural fools do not care whether they go naked or clothed and are
unaware of social conventions concerning these things.
The natural does not experience shame in most things.
Additionally, the natural is often seen as having a special connection
with nature and the land, similar to the connection Adam has with the land he
must care for, Eden. It seems more
than reasonable to assert that Eve and Adam’s state before the fall was very
similar to the state typically assumed to apply to the natural fool.
Since Christianity seems to place a positive value on this state, it
should be fruitful to ask what reasoning may lie behind this attribution of
value.
The first reason to value highly the state typically assumed to apply to
natural fools and to those living in pre-lapsarian times, and perhaps the most
obvious, is that which I stated before, namely that without knowledge of good
and evil, it is impossible to commit sin. Knowing
the difference between right and wrong is essential to being a moral agent, but
rather than being an immoral agent, the natural fool is an amoral
agent. Natural fools exist outside
morality and hence cannot be judged by its standards. It would seem that knowing about good and evil is a purely
good thing, yet true evil cannot be committed without it. It is, as Milton puts it, “knowledge of good bought dear by
knowing ill.”
This is by no means the only positive feature of innocence.
At least biblically there is also the positive feature of lacking fear.
Fear comes into the garden of Eden only after the fruit is sampled, where
Eve and Adam are portrayed as cowering away from God lest he see their nudity or
sense their guilt. They have also
learnt shame, but let us deal with fear initially.
Without knowledge, how is it possible for a person to know fear?
It seems that along with reason comes the ability to apprehend numerous
things which are fearful. For
instance, it takes a certain amount of sophistication to be able to perceive the
dangers inherent in things like air pollution, ozone depletion and the release
of greenhouse gasses. Even
comparatively uncomplicated fears remain unnoticed without a sophistication not
present in the natural fool. A
person walking through Central park in New York will be much less fearful if
they are unaware of the dangers.
As to shame, shame is an emotion which requires an awareness of how it is
others perceive you. This type of
awareness is lacking in the natural fool. Shame
and embarrassment are negative emotions and are associated with many of the
negative aspects of civilisation. As
Erasmus put it in his Praise of Folly,
“shame, infamy and opprobrium hurt only so far as they are felt.
If one has no sense of them, they are not evils at all.”
Just as with fear, it is impossible to be wounded by a social opprobrium
when you have no you have no comprehension of it.
However, while often we think of fear as being an important emotion in
that it can quite often save our lives, shame is usually a useless emotion.
It is an emotion that exists because of societal taboos of which many
people see as being arbitrary and restrictive, and perhaps only exist for no
greater reason than for the sake of restriction itself. Conversely, some certainly do have value in themselves,
taboos about incest for instance, a taboo which the emotion of shame helps
enforce, but many instances of shame are attached to actions whose values are
justified almost solely on the grounds that they are taboos – circular
justification in the extreme. In
these situations the natural fool is not just happier, but also has some
justification for their stance.
In the case of taboos, the position the natural fool is in has both
positives and negatives. Plainly,
the natural fool is only being wise in regard to taboos if those taboos are not
based on serious and genuine concerns. It
is not always the case that ‘what you don’t know can’t hurt you’, as
while natural fools may not feel the force and discomfort of social opprobrium,
they would certainly feel the effects of breaking a taboo that is based on
proper foundations. Nevertheless,
most taboos are not based on practical grounds but are rather based on religious
or cultural practices. To
illustrate my point, consider the number of taboos in existence in Western
society alone. Now consider what proportion of these are based on genuine
considerations. Natural fools may
not be wise in those instances, but they certainly are in most other.
Indeed, even fear as we know it is not such a positive emotion.
While it can serve to help us avoid situations where we might encounter
harm, in today’s society we have a tendency to fear all the wrong things.
To take an example, I fear clowns with a passion that is entirely
irrational. Underneath those
painted faces are just normal people, and not psychotic murderers.
On the other hand, I do not experience fear when I cross Symonds Street
in the middle of the day. Were I a
perfectly rational person I would realise that the chances of my getting maimed
as I jaywalk across the road is far greater than I expect, and the consequences
would be quite severe. Since what
we fear is usually out of proportion with what we should fear, the natural’s lack of fear is actually not such a
negative trait. Being afraid of
almost anything might keep a person alive longer, but what benefit is there in a
life lived in fear?
Given the above
points, Christianity does place a high value on the existence of natural fools. In Christianity knowledge is both a blessing and a curse,
salvation and damnation. Yet these
issues are not the central issues of Christianity. However, they are central to an apostacy of Christianity.
In contrast with Christianity, Gnosticism takes as central to its
doctrines the role knowledge plays in salvation.
The earliest accounts of Gnosticism place it near the beginning of
Christianity’s rise to power, during the first century AD.
It almost certainly existed before this time alongside Christianity,
influencing and no doubt being influenced by it. After this time it was declared a heresy, its take on normal
Christianity becoming too different for the church to allow to exist without
restriction. After that point
Gnosticism most likely existed with an ostensible veneer of Christianity,
shifting colour like a chameleon in order to continue its existence.
My central concern in examining Christianity was to see how it values
pre-rational existences and its associated take on the wisdom derived outside of
reason. Gnosticism and Christianity
share many qualities yet differ on the roles knowledge and rationality take in
their beliefs. Hence it makes sense
to look at Gnosticism insofar as it influenced Christianity’s thinking with
regard to knowledge and rationality. It it is also important to look at
Gnosticism’s own position towards knowledge and the wisdom of the fool for its
own merits.
In looking at the times Christianity places a positive value on innocence
and pre-rational existence, the Gnostic elements of Christianity come shining to
the fore. The name ‘Gnostic’
stems from the Greek word gnosis,
meaning knowledge; hence Gnosticism should be extremely relevant when it comes
to looking at Christianity’s rather equivocal relationship to the evaluation
of knowledge.
Gnosticism has a very different interpretation of the creation myth.
In the Christian myth we can see not only why innocence and a lack of
knowledge about the world is valued highly both on its own merit and on the
grounds that God favours it, but this is not the defining element of
Christianity. It is certainly an
important aspect, but within the religion itself the fall from grace through the
discovery of knowledge is taken as a given.
Humanity must work within the framework created by the sampling of the
fruit. Salvation is possible, but
it becomes a different account of salvation.
This is salvation, not through lack of knowledge of good and evil, but
through knowledge of it and through the correct application of that knowledge.
In contrast to Christianity, Gnosticism takes the matter of possessing
the right type of knowledge to be the
central issue. Just as its name
implies, salvation in Gnosticism is through the acquisition of a certain variety of knowledge.
Specifically, it is knowledge of the real nature of human existence, that
is to say as pure spirit, and a disregarding of knowledge that is tied to
material world. In a
reinterpretation of the creation myth, the eating of the fruit from the tree of
knowledge is seen not as the original sin, but as salvation. In Genesis the serpent tells Eve that if she and her husband
taste the fruit, “ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil”.
The Gnostics take this passage quite seriously.
The gaining of a certain type of knowledge is the only way to escape the
bonds that the creator-God, who is seen in a negative light, has placed upon
humanity. Human beings are, in
essence, sparks of divinity trapped within the material world.
The only way to escape the material world is through revelation of the
divine essence of humanity. Hence,
through accumulating knowledge, by eating of the tree, humans “shall be as
gods”.
The Gnostic reinvention of the myth turns it from an example of colossal
hubris into an explanation of how salvation is to be achieved.
Even the subtle snake of Genesis is cast in a new light, becoming,
instead of the great deceiver, a vessel for the “female spiritual principle”
and an “instructor”.
Jesus even tells his disciples to be as “wise as serpents”.
This is interesting with regard to the fool in that the path to salvation
and a higher state of being is achieved in two ways.
Firstly, a higher form of knowledge must be obtained, knowledge of
humanity’s spark of divinity. Secondly,
knowledge of the material world must be relinquished. This latter closely resembles many takes on the fool.
Like the fool of the tarot cards, Gnosticism instructs us to keep our
eyes focussed on what is beyond, just as the fool gazes off into space, and
ignore the trap of believing what is around us, as the fool does while walking
off the cliff. In this way the
fool, while appearing foolish, is actually evincing a higher form of knowledge.
Perhaps the latter may be a bit much to read into one tarot card, but I
think it is fair to say that the fool instantiates one half of the Gnostic duo,
the letting go of worldly knowledge. A
natural fool lacks knowledge of the world and lacks the reasoning ability to
gain it. Hence, while claiming the
fool is focussed on a world beyond this one may be a bit too much, saying that
they aren’t always focussed clearly on this one is an apt claim. It can even be said that the fool’s rejection of worldly
knowledge, whether intentional or unintentional, is an indication that standard
knowledge is not enough to achieve true wisdom. The existence of the fool implies that there may be another
type of knowledge that is required and that regular types of knowledge are
insufficient.
It is important to note here that Gnosticism does not say anything
explicitly about foolishness or the wisdom of foolishness. When I claim that the Gnostic sage would value the insight of
the fool’s wisdom into the search for salvation, I am merely making a
hypothetical claim. Because of the
place Gnosticism holds for knowledge I surmise that it would hold a similar
regard for the natural fool.
Gnosticism plainly has an ambivalent relationship to knowledge. On the one hand, normal knowledge, knowledge of the world and
its contents, is taken as being entirely negative, a trap designed to prevent
humanity from escaping its mortal limits. The
positive aspect to knowledge in Gnosticism is that through discovering the
Gnostic secrets, humans are able to escape that trap.
This latter type of knowledge is very unlike the former.
It and the realm from which it comes is described as being “acosmic,
even anticosmic”.
It is not knowledge in any normal sense of the word since it exists
outside the framework all our other knowledge stems from and exists within.
Given this, the fool becomes even more relevant to Gnosticism.
The fool’s rejection of worldly knowledge is, in fact, very close to
attaining that other type of knowledge, possibly as close as is humanly
possible. I said earlier that it
might be too much to claim that the fool is focussed on this higher plain of
knowledge and existence, but it might also be too much to claim that anyone
really is. If this knowledge is as
external to our normal existences as the Gnostics claim, then perhaps the
closest we can get is as close as the fool has gotten; the closest we can get to
true knowledge might just to be to realise that the type of knowledge we
currently possess does not constitute it.
The natural fool lacks knowledge unintentionally.
Generically, the fool also rejects standard conceptions of wisdom.
In the Gnostic myths wisdom is instantiated in the figures of Sophia and
Pistis Sophia (literally: wisdom and faith wisdom).
Sophia is a benevolent figure in Gnosticism.
She works to remind humanity of its true nature.
She sent Adam her daughter, Eve “as an instructor in order that she
might raise up Adam”.
In this way Sophia and, by association, wisdom are seen in a positive
way. In this sense wisdom must be
related to knowledge of that higher existence.
Sophia herself is a part of that existence.
Yet, at the same time and somewhat paradoxically, Sophia is also the
cause of humanity’s downfall. Sophia
is the lowest of the divine beings or ‘aeons’, a part of the sixth heaven,
the last heaven before the material realm.
The highest of these is the unknown and unknowable father.
This latter is not to be confused with the creator god in both
Christianity and Gnosticism.
If we take the rankings of the aeons at face value, within ultimate
reality wisdom is the lowest, the closest to our reality.
The nature of the highest form of existence is inscrutable.
This portrayal renders futile the kind of wisdom that consists in
substantive knowledge of how things are. Since
the highest form of reality is actually completely unknowable, the search for
wisdom actually takes a person further away from the Gnostic goal.
There are two accounts of wisdom operating here.
‘False’ wisdom is the wisdom gained from striving for worldly
knowledge, knowledge that is ultimately futile.
True wisdom is not striving to
know the unknowable, but to accept that knowledge is futile and should be
relinquished. So when I earlier
said it seemed inconceivable that the fool should be striving after a higher
knowledge than mere human knowledge or even should be privy to that knowledge,
it is actually not so inconceivable. If the higher knowledge is actually impossible for the human
being to achieve, then the fool’s lack of striving for any type of substantive
knowledge is the wisest path to take.
Within Gnosticism there is some confusion as to which version of wisdom
is working at any one time. Usually
this is discernable from the context of the word, but the ambiguity often
remains. This confusion stems from
scattered texts of Gnostic doctrines that are in existence.
Sophia is both salvation and damnation in the Gnostic myth. It was Sophia who shaped the creator-god and by doing so
helped engender the material world, the ‘prime mistake’ all others arise
from. It is her “defect”
that creates the material realm. Hence
‘wisdom’ can almost be described as the source of all worldly evil.
Even more curious is the name ‘Pistis Sophia’.
Pistis Sophia is the highest form of wisdom in this cosmogony, while
‘Sophia’ without the prefix of ‘Pistis’ is actually a child of the
creator-god.
The literal translation ‘faith wisdom’ seems to inject an
anti-rational element into wisdom; since most conceptions of wisdom base it upon
rational grounds. Faith contains irrational elements in that it goes beyond
rational support. If it were based
on rational standards of reason and proof, then that belief would simply be a
fact or item of knowledge. To have
faith in a God one must hold that belief regardless of physical or rational
evidence. Indeed, were faith not to
be a leap then it would have no value. If
someone had direct proof of God, then that person could not experience faith in
any real sense, just as it is impossible to feel faith with regard to something
you believe on rational foundations. So
‘Pistis Sophia’ is actually wisdom that is not based on a rational capacity
to secure evidence, a type of wisdom with its own problems, but one that is more
readily accessible to the natural fool. Faith,
it seems, is easy for a child.
To sum up, natural fools present one of the steps along the path of
Gnostic wisdom. Natural fools lack
worldly knowledge and in their lack they instantiate part of the route the
Gnostic sage must take to achieve salvation.
This also shows one of the ways in which some form of wisdom can be
achieved without possessing knowledge of the world.
However, the natural fool lacks the capacity to move any further along
the path of Gnostic salvation. To
move further, the Gnostic sage needs to possess the ‘higher’ knowledge which
is a more esoteric knowledge, a knowledge very likely to be inaccessible to the
natural fool. Moreover, since
natural fools achieve their state unintentionally, one wonders how much value we
can place upon their position on the path of Gnostic wisdom.
Perhaps the correct approach for the Gnostic sage to take in order to
achieve Gnostic salvation and the higher, esoteric wisdom will be that of the
artificial fool rather than the natural fool.
The artificial fool possesses normal capacities, but adopts foolishness
to attain some end or ends. Hence,
the true Gnostic sage resembles the artificial fool more than the natural fool,
in that they should adopt folly, in the form of relinquishing worldly knowledge
and wisdom, in order to achieve the higher end or a more esoteric knowledge that
is needed for Gnostic salvation.
This notion can even be taken outside of Gnosticism. If true wisdom involves relinquishing worldly knowledge, then
natural fools are wise. If wisdom
is not, as it has commonly been conceived of, accumulating worldly knowledge,
than the natural fool may possess some wisdom.
I have hopefully
shown up to now that both Christianity and Gnosticism can and do include
elements of the fool’s wisdom in their respective accounts of wisdom.
However, there is an implication in these systems of thought both that
wisdom is attainable and that in some sense knowledge of divinity is
possible. Contrasting with this
position is the view of, amongst others, Nicholas of Cusa.
Nicholas theorised that knowledge of the divine is impossible and that
the closest we can get to true knowledge and wisdom with regard to the divine
would be through a ‘learned ignorance’.
Note that he is not claiming that it is impossible to know whether the
divine exists; he certainly believed that it did and that we could have
knowledge of this; but rather that it is impossible to have any knowledge of the
divine’s nature. The divine
exists beyond the grasp of knowledge and beyond the reach of the rational.
Knowledge and reason can only take us so far and faith is necessary to
move any further.
He also makes the point that what little ‘fore-tastings’ of divine
wisdom are open to us are available through observation of the world around us
and utilisation of the natural judgement and reason we possess. Academic learning is not a requirement and more truth about
the divine is to be found in natural observations and reason than through
academic pursuits.
There are many links to be drawn between this latter account and the
wisdom of the natural fool. To
begin with, if the divine lies outside the grasp of the rational, then wise
folly, which implies that what is most valuable is outside rational attainment,
will be in accord with this. Nicholas
of Cusa is not claiming that through ignorance and folly we will be able to have
a comprehension of the divine, rather his contention is that through
understanding the limits of our comprehension we will be able to gain a hint of
true wisdom, we will live in a learned ignorance, comprehending the nature of
our ignorance, but working through it to learn as much as possible – perhaps
similar to the Socratic notion of wisdom as self knowledge.
This latter point seems to move beyond the natural fool’s wisdom to the
wisdom of the artificial fool. In
theory natural fools are characterised by their lack of knowledge, a lack that
most likely extends to their estimations of their own capacities; hence unlike
the person who adopts learned ignorance and realises the limits of their
comprehensions, natural fools simply do not make claim to knowing more than they
do because they are incapable of making such a claim.
The artificial fool, on the other hand, may adopt the role of fool to
illustrate their opinion of wisdom and learning – the adoption of the role of
the fool may allow them to express a similar view to Nicholas of Cusa, a view
that the limits of our knowledge and wisdom are closer to us than we think.
Adopting the role of the artificial fool puts them in a position of
humility when it comes to knowledge and wisdom.
Nicholas of Cusa himself makes a similar point when he writes “Layman
[to a famous orator]: Perhaps
the difference between you and me is the following: you think that you are
someone knowledgeable, although you are not; hence you are haughty.
By contrast, I know that I am a layman; hence I am quite humble.
In this respect, perhaps, I am more learned [than you].” (De Sapient,
pg 498). Since true and complete
wisdom is beyond the grasp of anything not itself divine, proclaiming oneself
anything other than a fool or a layperson is an act of hubris.
So in this respect artificial fools are wise as they have a correct
appreciation of their relationship to wisdom and thus become, paradoxically,
closer to it.
As in the carnival traditions, De Cusa proposes a reversal of values.
In his text Idiota de Sapienta there is a discussion between an
orator and a layperson,
with the layperson taking the lead in the discussion.
The orator represents conventional, learned wisdom: wisdom and knowledge
gained through book learning and study. The
layperson represents a different form of wisdom, a wisdom gained through simple
observation and reasoning; the layperson represents learned ignorance.
The layperson claims that in the eyes of God the orator’s wisdom is
“a certain foolishness; and, hence, it puffs one up.
By contrast, true knowledge makes one humble.”
True knowledge so understood seems very much like the knowledge of the
artificial fool. The person with
learned wisdom realises that they and everyone else are, to an extent, foolish
and should hence act in a humble fashion.
Another similarity between the wisdom of folly and De Cusa’s view is De
Cusa’s claim that what can be known about the divine is accessible only
through the most basic perceptions. First
the layperson points out that he is able to attain knowledge from all the things
around him. Wisdom “proclaims
itself in the streets”.
Then the layperson points out that the highest wisdom is inaccessible
since it is incomparable. To
illustrate, I am be able to comprehend the number one.
From this I can extend the idea and understand much greater numbers, all
through comparison. However, I
cannot understand the infinite in this fashion since the infinite defies
comparison. So too with the divine.
Since my theoretical understanding of concepts not directly appreciable
to my senses is informed by comparison with those things that are, a divinity
that is incomparable remains beyond my comprehension.
This is the central observation that informs De Cusa’s writings.
True knowledge is inaccessible. The
only thing we can attain is knowledge of our ignorance and thus knowledge of our
limits. Both these things are comprehended through simple observation
and reason. Natural fools are wise
in that they do not attempt to stray beyond what their senses tell them and
hence do not fall prey to the hubris of book learning and may attain some
knowledge of the divine. Artificial
fools are wiser still in that they too are humble in regards to their knowledge
and wisdom, but they are also wise in that because they possess reason they are
able to take their perceptions and apply reason to them in order to recognise
their inherent foolishness; and through this recognition become closer to
wisdom. The artificial fool as being able to exceed the natural fool’s wisdom
is, I think, a central theme to this dissertation.
Mortality, the fear
of mortality, and even the acceptance of mortality, are subjects that have been
constant companions of both philosophers and poets.
Just as natural fools are unaware that they should be afraid of many
worldly concerns, so too are the natural fools, or at least the simpler of them,
unaware of the prospect of death. If
this claim is too strong, then at the very least we can say that the natural
fool does not understand the reality of their mortality in quite such an
immediate fashion as the average person.
As with fear in general, lacking fear of death will have some positive
aspects. While it is not actually
achieving immortality, it is coming closer to it, at least mentally.
Young children are still mortal, but by being unaware of death and the
nature of human mortality they are able to create an illusion of immortality.
This intimation of immortality serves to liberate the child, and by
extension the natural, from the tiresome fears and concerns that come with being
aware of mortality.
Although fear of death might appear to be just another fear, it is a fear
of a fundamentally different kind. Specifically,
it is a fear of something that is utterly and irrevocably unavoidable.
Many philosophers have taken quite strong stances when it comes to death;
a lot of these stances are in accordance with the position of the natural fool
in that fear of death is considered a negative thing, as I shall go on to
discuss.
For instance, Schopenhauer points out just how irrational fearing death
is. This is based on a number of
observations. Firstly, the pain
that can often be associated with death is not actually part of death.
Death in its purest form is a simple ending.
It is the transition from a state of being to a state of non-being, or at
least of non-being in this world. This
shifting of state is, theoretically, instantaneous.
Pain is an experience that occurs within the confines of temporality.
Hence it cannot be tied to death, a process that is atemporal.
So if pain and death should be segregated, so too should be the fear of
pain and the fear of death. Consequently,
while it may be rational to fear the pain that often comes with dying, death
itself should not be feared on account of pain.
Death can even be seen as the release from pain, even more reason to
segregate it from the experience of pain. Schopenhauer
believes that a huge amount of human suffering is premised on our fear of death,
a fear that is, at heart, irrational.
It almost seems paradoxical, but the supposedly rational agent does not
often manage to succeed in overcoming their fear of death and is, according to
Schopenhauer, acting against the truths supplied by reason.
In contrast, the natural fool by being unaware of what most people fear
about death achieves something completely rational through not being rational
enough. Yet, what the natural
achieves is very different from what Schopenhauer is looking for.
Schopenhauer is looking for an overcoming of this fear.
Awareness of death still exists, but has been overcome.
In the natural fool that awareness is not even present and hence has not
been overcome. Were the natural to
become conscious of their own mortality, then they would begin to fear death.
Heidegger is even more extreme than Schopenhauer with regard to
mortality, saying that death is not only not a negative thing, it even has
traits that are philosophically positive. He
claims that most of what occurs in a person’s life does not belong exclusively
to that person. Almost everything
is strongly influenced by society at large, and hence cannot belong absolutely
to that individual. To take an
extreme example, that domain which is usually seen as being exclusively
personal, perhaps the most personal, a person’s thoughts and beliefs, is not
solely ruled by the person themselves. It
is strongly influenced by the people around them; from their parents, to their
friends, to the advertising on TV. Since
it is so strongly influenced by outside sources, how can they claim it is
exclusively their domain? Most
other aspects of life are similarly influenced, from how we choose to part our
hair to what career we end up pursuing.
The only aspect of existence which is not at all influenced by others is
the actual instance of one’s death. While
it may be the case that others can influence the manner of one’s death, death
itself is not something that can be shared.
Once we disassociate death from pain and the causes of death it becomes
clear that death itself cannot be shared, it is “the undiscovered country from
whose bourn/No traveller returns”.
Hence it cannot be shared, and is thus one of the few, perhaps the only,
thing that is truly personal. Because
of this, Heidegger says that we should embrace our “ownmost possibility”,
the occasion of our demises. This
is the only way a person can ever truly be an individual in the full sense of
the word while still being alive.
Heidegger’s account shows us that not only is death not necessarily a
negative thing, it can also be a very positive thing.
Heidegger, however, does not tie in as neatly as Schopenhauer with the
wisdom of the natural fool. By not
fearing death the natural achieves one of Schopenhauer’s goals, albeit not in
the fashion Schopenhauer was expecting. By
contrast, the natural does not achieve Heidegger’s goal.
The natural does not fear death because they are unable to conceive of
it, but for Heidegger to embrace one’s ownmost possibility one must be
intensely aware of it. While the
natural may be right in not fearing death, by being unable to embrace it they
cannot achieve Heidegger’s goal. Nevertheless, the natural possesses something the average
person has to strive to attain.
Yet the natural should not be dismissed so quickly from Heidegger’s
picture. Heidegger’s goal in
asking us to embrace our “ownmost possibility” is to allow us to be true
individuals in a world that is pervaded by the ideals inherent in society, in
popular culture and in the communitarian nature of human existence – as
Heidegger puts it, to escape Das Man,
or ‘the one’. Whilst it would
be a rare natural that is able to achieve individuality through awareness of
death, the natural may be very well suited to escaping Das
Man through their very lack of awareness.
The natural is not a creature that fits very well into society and is
also one who may be more unaware than most of the impingement of society into
the realm of human thought. Of
course this is not true for all instances of natural fool, but taking a generic
model of the natural, assigning this characteristic seems just.
Das Man has very little hold
over the natural fool and because of this the natural fool manages to achieve
Heidegger’s goal without following the path Heidegger prescribes.
Additionally, often fools are characterised as fools because they exist
outside the norms of society. A
person who wears clothes that do not match current fashions, or does not know
what is currently popular is seen as a fool.
So according to this reading of Heidegger, what is actually considered
foolish about these people is at the same time the origins of their wisdom.
Nevertheless, the natural fool’s wisdom is again lacking come the final
summation. While philosophers value
the fool’s relationship towards death, the natural has not come about that
relationship in the right way. They
lack fear through lack of awareness. This
could be of some merit, but Heidegger’s and Schopenhauer’s points are about overcoming
the fear of death, something the natural fool does not achieve.
Again we might have to turn to the artificial fool.
Imitating the natural fool’s lack of fear whilst possessing normal
reason is very much in line with the two philosophers just discussed, assuming
that their imitation is more than just mimicry.
Both Heidegger
and Schopenhauer wish the fear of death to be overcome.
The natural fool manages to avoid the issue of fearing death by not being
aware of it and in this way can be seen as wise.
Yet the natural fool does not overcome this fear.
It is a bridge they have not arrived at and have most certainly not
crossed. The wisdom of the
artificial fool would be more in line with the forms of wisdom Heidegger and
Schopenhauer propose. Artificial
fools would see that true wisdom lies in emulating the wisdom of the natural
fool, but because artificial fools are still rational agents the only way to
reach the position of the natural fool would be to cross that bridge and
overcome the fear of death.
There is an element
of common ground between the fool’s relationship with fear, shame and
mortality. By lacking awareness of these things the fool manages to live
a happier existence. As the
aphorism goes, ‘what you don’t know can’t hurt you’, and by not having
knowledge of shame, fear or the nature of human mortality, the fool manages to
avoid the causes of a great amount of human suffering.
Without these things it is reasonable to surmise that life would be a lot
more pleasant to live. As the poem
goes: “Where ignorance is bliss / ’Tis folly to be wise”.
In the historical study of the fool’s wisdom, the fool’s happiness
has been considered a major point in the fool’s favour.
It seems that the vast majority of our sufferings rest upon our knowledge
of the world around us. Without the
myriad troubles that stem from our reasoning nature we would live simpler,
happier lives. Erasmus describes
the dichotomy of those burdened with reasoning natures and those without in this
way:
You must have seen
those soured individuals who are so wrapped up in their philosophic studies or
some other serious, exacting affair that they are old before they are ever
young; I suppose it’s because their preoccupations and the unremitting strain
of their keen concentration gradually sap their spirit and vitality.
By contrast my morons are plump, sleek, and glossy, typical ‘Acarnanian
porkers’, as they say, and never likely to know of the disadvantages of old
age unless they pick up some infection from the wise.
Erasmus, In
Praise of Folly, Pgs 24 & 25.
The happiness of the fool reflects back to the almost nostalgic attitude
people have to pre-rational states of existence.
Since happiness often appears to be the driving motivation of people and
society, then claiming that the natural fool is happier is a powerful reason to
accept pre-rational existence as the most rational way of being, unless
nostalgia truly is the best way to describe it.
Yet embracing pre-rational existence is not a move that would be relished
by many. There are three instant
reasons that spring to mind why people do not voluntarily lobotomise themselves,
or even just renounce the trappings of civilisation and ‘go bush’.
The first is fear of the unknown. A
person could fear the loss of their reason just as much as they fear death, and
for similar reasons. Like death it
is not a state to which conscious reflection can be easily applied.
By its very nature pre-rational existence lies outside the realm of
rational experience and is thus hard to describe and analyse using rational
tools. While on the other hand, we
all may have experienced it, or at least those of us who were children at some
point may have, memories of this existence are unfocused.
Consciousness needs some degree of intelligence to occur at all and thus
pre-rational existence is unconscious existence and impossible to consciously
describe or experience. Hence fear
of this type of existence can also be the fear of the unknown and the
unknowable. An interesting point to note here is that due to its close
association with the pre-rational, the natural fool is best associated with, to
adopt Freudian discourse, the unconscious part of the human mind.
This part of the mind is not completely without rationality, but it
certainly is not totally ruled by reason.
One need not go so far as to say that the best way to be is to be
pre-rational. Perhaps a more
palatable view is to simply say that elements of the fool’s way of life are
desirable, and perhaps worthy of emulation.
If we take this attitude then some of the motivations of the artificial
fool become clearer. While they can
never achieve the state of innocence exemplified in the natural fool, they can
attempt to adopt those aspects of it that appear wise to them and without
rejecting the benefits of rationality. The
artificial fool may even be able to carry the wisdom of the natural further, as
shown in the path of the Gnostic sage.
As a final note here, it is justly questionable exactly how happy the
natural fool’s life is. Erasmus
may eulogise folly and claim that it will help grant youth, “folly is the one
thing which can halt fleeting youth and ward off the relentless advances of old
age” ,
and beauty “why does the beauty of golden Venus never lose its bloom?…
Surely because she is related to me [Folly].”
However, what Erasmus is specifically referring to in these sections is
not the life of the natural in its entirety, but rather adopting some of the
aspects of folly, namely the ability to laugh at trouble and the possession of a
light-hearted, care-free disposition. Old
age is averted through acting young and foolish; beauty is maintained by not
worrying overly about the cares of the world.
Erasmus has, quite fairly, identified aspects of folly and
light-heartedness that act to the benefit of people; it is a very different
thing to claim that being a natural leads one to happiness in all the parts of
your life.
One might wonder whether happiness without the benefit of knowledge is
truly happiness. Happiness informed
by knowledge can involve an appreciation of pleasures that are out of the reach
of the natural fool, pleasures such as art, literature and learning.
John Stuart Mill makes the point in his Utilitarianism that:
Any mind to which
the fountains of knowledge have been opened, and which has been taught, in any
tolerable degree, to exercise its faculties – finds sources of inexhaustible
interest in all that surrounds it.
The implication is
that the natural fool, not even possessing the capacity to enjoy these
pleasures, experiences a quantifiably lesser happiness than the person with
knowledge and the ability to use it. Happiness
could even be a richer notion than the way in which we usually think of it,
including more than just a balance of pleasure over pain, it could, for
instance, involve notions of personal development.
We might even question whether happiness is worth it if it comes at the
cost of our mental faculties. Mill
goes so far as to say that “it is better to be a human being dissatisfied than
a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied.”
Even when it comes to happiness it seems that there are good reasons to
say that the artificial fool exceeds the natural fool’s wisdom.
Natural fools may point the way towards wisdom here, but cannot
themselves achieve its full expression if that expression requires that one be a
fully rational agent.
I have before now
dealt with the issue of how the natural fool lacks both shame and a fear of
death. It can be claimed that the
reason the natural fool lacks shame and fear is because of the natural fool’s
indifference to the past and the future. Natural
fools does not linger over the mistakes of the past, nor do they worry and fret
about what the future may bring. Bacchus’
foolishness can be seen as characteristic of this – ‘eat drink and be merry,
for tomorrow we die’ is a motto that advocates existence in the present.
The future is totally uncertain and hence we should not be concerned by
it. For all we know this may be our last day on the planet, and
thus we should maximise our personal pleasure by ‘living in the moment’.
Living in the moment does not have to be about maximising pleasure.
It can also involve simply accepting the things that pass rather than
railing against the inevitable. It
can, in the simplest form, merely be accepting the burdens that are unavoidable.
I characterise living in the moment as an aspect of folly for a number of
reasons. To begin with, the natural
fool at least has a minimal awareness of the future.
A large part of foolishness can be being unaware of the consequences of
certain actions. Some of the
aspects of folly I have related before now are also related to living in the
present: a person who does not apprehend or fear death is, in a very strong
sense, blind when it comes to the future. I
have also said that the fool lacks fear in other ways than just the fear of
death. Again, fear is almost always
fear of what the future holds, so by lacking awareness of the future, the fool
manages to lack such fears. In
addition, the fool also lacks awareness of the past.
The fool is a person who makes the same mistakes over and over again.
They may possess a fine memory, but by no means do they dwell on it or
learn from it. So it seems
reasonable to say that without any serious apprehension of the past or future,
the fool is a creature of the now.
Living in the present has many strong points.
The obvious ones are those mentioned before: without thinking of the
future worry and concern is minimised. By
not remonstrating and lingering on the past one manages to enjoy the present far
more. By living for the now a
person is able to savour the present to the fullest extent.
Just like many of the other points about the wisdom of the fool, taking
the extreme is almost pure foolishness and not at all wise.
While living for the present is indeed a wise thing to do, and quite
possibly one of the easier things people could do to improve their ways of life,
there are of course problems with ignoring the past and future.
Yet even the extreme version, namely living in the present to the
complete exclusion of past and future, can be defended.
If a person truly lives in the present, totally heedless of past and
future, then very little can worry them. They
cannot be concerned that they do not learn from their mistakes because to worry
about this you need to be thinking about the past.
Similarly, why worry about the consequences of your actions when, for
you, there is only an eternal ‘now’? This
intentional blindness may be a bit extreme, but at the very least we can say
that this characteristic of the fool can have merit in its own right.
Nevertheless, even granted this account of the fool’s existence, one
wonders what the value is of someone living in the present because they are
unaware of past and future. It
seems a trivial type of wisdom. Once
again it seems that the artificial fool is able to surpass the wisdom of the
natural fool. A person who lives in
the moment whilst still being aware of the past and future appears to be far
wiser than someone who merely is unaware of the passage of time.
The artificial fool can, as before, surpass the wisdom of the natural
fool. Thus the natural fool may be
better suited to being a guide towards wisdom than the actual exemplar of wisdom
itself.
In this chapter I
hope to have shown that there are diverse ways in which the natural fool can be
shown to possess wisdom through lacking knowledge and/or reason.
These points, while diverse, are unified in that they stem from the
natural fool’s nature as a natural fool.
For some of the forms of wisdom the natural is able to attain it is
necessary to actually be a natural fool. For
example, to achieve the same type of innocent happiness the child, animal and
idiot possess a person necessarily has to be one of these things.
Similarly, to attain the ethical blamelessness of a person unaware of
moral law, one has to (rather tautologically) be unaware of moral law.
To this extent the wisdom of the natural fool must be instantiated to be
valid.
In spite of this it is still possible for the seeker of wisdom to adopt
elements of the wisdoms expressed by the natural fool.
It could even be said that whereas the natural fool possesses wisdom of
one sort, the artificial fool is able to surpass that wisdom through their
emulation of the natural’s wisdom. To
illustrate, consider a natural fool who lacks fear because he lacks awareness of
what there is to be fearful about. Now
consider an artificial fool who lacks fear because she has looked at the
happiness the natural fool has derived from his fearlessness and all the
unnecessary concerns he has avoided and has decided that she would be wise to
avoid unnecessary concerns and to not worry about what she can’t change.
Here the natural fool and artificial fool both seem wise, yet one is wise
because of her rational judgement and the other seems wise as a side effect of
his state. However, there will be
times when fear is an apt response to a situation and during this time the
artificial fool will prove superior to the natural fool.
Most of the points made about the natural fool’s wisdom end up pointing
in this direction, towards a wisdom that is different from authentic natural
wisdom, but is perhaps even more valuable.
The wisdom of the natural fool is limited.
It cannot move beyond a certain point – as long as the natural fool of
the previous example remains a natural fool there is no way that he would ever
be able to possess the wisdom the artificial fool of the example possesses, no
matter how little he fears death. The
wisdom to be gained through the pre-rational and through lacking knowledge is
necessarily limited and cannot progress further.
I think the artificial fool is able to learn from the example provided by
the natural fool and is able to go further than the natural fool ever could.
A question remains, however, as to whether the artificial fool is able to
capture the natural fool’s wisdom properly.
In most of the cases given, the artificial fool exceeds, but does not
manage to replicate, the natural fool’s wisdom.
I have said that this is because it is impossible to possess reason and
knowledge and still be a natural fool – their lack is what characterises them.
In the next chapter I will turn to the ‘mad’ fool: someone who lacks
proper reason, like the natural fool, but who has possibly possessed reason in
the past and may still possess some form of reason.
Insane fools may well possess more knowledge and understanding than
natural fools, but that knowledge has been perverted by their condition.
By analysing the insane fool it may be possible to find some way in which
the wisdom of the natural fool may be transferable to someone who does not
themselves lack reason.
