If you want to understand today's culture wars, study the moment when pagan Rome became Christian.
Then read Nietzsche and Kierkegaard as two ways of dealing with the cognitive dissonance of being both an imperial power and a self-perceived victim.
whatiscalledthinking.substack.com/p/constantines…
Then read Nietzsche and Kierkegaard as two ways of dealing with the cognitive dissonance of being both an imperial power and a self-perceived victim.
whatiscalledthinking.substack.com/p/constantines…
If Nietzsche thought Christians needed to become unChristian, Kierkegaard thought they needed to become truly Christian. If Nietzsche thought the problem was Christianity, obstructing a pagan truth, Kierkegaard thought the problem was paganism, obstructing a Christian one.
An imperial victim remains an emperor. The early Church Fathers who fasted in the desert found solace in the trials of their marginalization.
The invocation of victimhood in the name of the right to rule has proved a successful move in the playbook of history, but it is an open question whether it has brought more flourishing.
Of course, Constantin only funded Christianity when it was already a series D. Yet who knows what would have happened in the course of history without his activist hand.
Of if you prefer a different analogy, Constanine is Sheryl Sandberg to Jesus's Zuck.
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