Jordan Peterson on the Logos in Ephesus
Okay, I bit the bullet and finally watched Jordan Peterson’s lecture on The Logos in Ephesus. To my surprise, it was genuinely interesting, albeit verbose and even abstruse in parts. People might ask, “Why watch anything by Jordan Peterson?” To which I say, I think Peterson is an interesting cultural and intellectual phenomenon and I’m interested in what he says and why he garners such a massive international following.
So, Peterson on the Logos in Ephesus, what do I think?
First, I have to admit that the topic is fascinating, and the setting was sublime. The Logos, a philosophical and theological subject, is a great idea for a lecture, bringing together Greek philosophy and Christian confessions of Christ. Plus, Ephesus is a beautiful and historic place, an important location for Lydian, Greek, Persian, Roman, Christian, Arabic, and Ottoman civilizations. The lecture was delivered on the steps of one of the greatest libraries of classical antiquity, a fantastic idea too. My first thought is envy, I sincerely wish I could lecture on the Logos in Ephesus!
Second, Peterson provides a fairly accurate account of the Logos in Greek thought going back to Heraclitus as the “intrinsic order of the cosmos.” He waxes about interesting facets such as the reality of ideas and their empirical expression.
But on the whole, I found the lecture a bit ranty, almost inchoate, as Peterson shifts between topics from the nature of reality, to pain and suffering, to differences between psychology and cosmology, to theories of perception, the nature of consciousness, the dichotomy between being and becoming, people as their own embodiment of the Logos, how our eyes work, and even Christ’s passion.
Even so, some aspects of the lecture are quite captivating, many points were thought-provoking, not the least in Peterson’s aggravated protests and even his creative if somewhat strange deployment of biblical imagery.
Peterson was the most animated when he spoke against postmodernism. Peterson argues that postmodern philosophers claim that everybody distorts their perceptions by imposing narratives of power and dominance. He rejects such a view as both unnatural and untrue. The implication of the alleged postmodern view of reality as reducible to contours of power and domination embedded in all ideas and language is that it makes the goal of human existence to replace resident structures of power by becoming the most powerful one of all. To which Peterson retorts that “Being the biggest devil in the worst hell is actually the most cataclysmic failure not a mark of the success of your ethos of power and dominance. … The Logos is the antithesis to the Luciferian presumption of dominance and power.”
Now I tend to think that postmodernism is far more complex, diverse, and intricate than Peterson lets on. Postmodernism has pros and cons as an epistemology, sociology, and eschatology (see my Evangelical Theology, pp. 14-21). However, in Peterson’s favour, I will say that he is right that an alternative to the quest for power, the power to determine truth, even against reality, because nobody’s reality is real for everyone, is the ordering of virtues in a way that enhances the human condition and promotes human flourishing. On that note, I think Peterson is onto something, rather than deconstruct power we should cultivate virtue, rather than pursue the power of our tribe, we should curate a civilization into something that promotes a moral order that maximizes goodness for each and every participant.
On the whole, Peterson’s lecture is Jesus-lite, but Peterson does get to Jesus in his conclusion where he wonders why western civilization has been so obsessed with Jesus’s passion and crucifixion. If religion is a delusion, as Freud and Marx alleged, then why did the western world make a figure of suffering and dread the central symbol of all its values and virtues? The reason, Peterson avers, is that truth is attained by wrestling with tragedy and Christ’s passion forces us to confront tragedy as we all face injustice and death. Peterson sees the cross as valuable because it forces us to address the “catastrophes of life” and drives us towards “the spirit that occupies the pinnacle of the hierarchy of intentional priority.” Peterson refers to “the cloud of myth that surrounds the characterization of the embodied Logos and that’s Christ” who enables us to confront our own innocent sacrifice and our own harrowing of hell. The cross means we face the problem of evil by recognizing our own capacity for evil. A point that I think is undoubtedly true, in fact, it is crucially important to remember, but it does not require his allegorical reading of the passion story.
My biggest complaint about Peterson is with his understanding of “the divine” which he defines as “that which is the deepest.” This reminds of John Hick’s definition of God as “The Real,” the reality which is immanent and permeates our world. As if to say that God is the source of all we consider to be real. Such a view, to my mind, reduces God to an impersonal monad that effuses order, not the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, who became flesh, who creates and legislates, who judges and redeems, and who makes all things new. For Peterson, Christ is a symbol of facing and triumphing over evil even as one cannot escape suffering from it. In addition, to be filled with the Spirit, for Peterson, is to attain a union of imagination and virtue, which has nothing to do with the Spirit given by Jesus Christ to believers.
This is not a doctrine of God that I can commend. For, in the Petersonian Trinity, God is the source of reality, the Logos is the manifestation of that reality, and the Spirit is how we embody the reality of hierarchically ordered virtues. “God” then is what drives us to fight chaos by tethering ourselves to the Logos who is the ultimate synthesis of love (our orientation towards the highest good) and truth (the coherence of our perception with the highest good). Peterson calls his audience to soberly recognize “the catastrophe of valuelessness in our own soul” and attain an ordered way of goodness as a riposte to the forces of dystrophy and destruction around us. It is because humans are in the image of the Logos, that humans are “the locus of divine value.” We can choose to live as a society that believes that, or we can live as a society that does not. The Logos, then, provides a framework in which moral values can be logically sustained and our duty is to live in accordance with the Logos. We need then to “wake up” and accept “our moral burden to bear in the adventure of life.” To me, this sounds like a theory of religion somewhere between Hegel and Hannity.
Peterson’s lecture was a mixture of the philosophy of psychology, anti-postmodern polemics, and a Jungian allegorical reading of the Torah. Some bits were extravagantly esoteric, other parts were poetic and even poignant. My biggest complaint is that for a lecture on the Logos in Ephesus that Peterson never got around to discussing the Logos according to John of Ephesus! He needed less on “the Highest Good” and more on “The Good Shepherd.”
Have you listened to Peterson’s lecture, if so, what did you think?
Many thanks. This was a treat to read and I really appreciated your insights.
Some initial thoughts: I managed to watch Peterson's lecture and, on the whole, I agree with what you have said. Peterson would really benefit from these insights and he seems as though he would be amenable to them. Nevertheless, I keep thinking that Peterson’s messages, though from a psychologists’ perspective, may serve to bring a very wide audience (perhaps mostly secular) to a belief in God, and may act as a kind of apologetic. No doubt it could be done in a way that is more faithful to core messages of the Bible. Despite this, at least he is putting the Bible back on the radar of a much wider audience, and hopefully people will want to explore this treasure in a faithful manner.
Peterson’s lecture certainly tried to cover a lot with the broad sweep of subjects and his attempt at connecting them. I have not read his book “Maps of meaning: the Architecture of Belief” which may have also provided some insights into his way of thinking. Despite this, him not at least taking the time to discuss the Logos of John was a glaring gap.
Thanks again for your insights.