Talk about the philosophical troublers of the world

Cetshwayo Mabhena

All religions have a concept of the corruption and the fall of men and women from grace to grass. They have long narratives of the rise of evil and the triumph of sin, pain and suffering that will come before the victory of salvation and holiness.

The prophets and the messiahs prophesy and project on the coming victory of good over evil and the temporality of wickedness. Every religion has its narrative of the Armageddon, the ultimate battle between good and evil. The philosophers of liberation, amongst them liberation theologians, think of and talk about the fall of human beings in terms of conquest and domination of human beings in different geographic locations and social positionalities. They bemoan the ideologies of oppression and exploitation such as racism, sexism, ableism, ageism, tribalism, clanism, classism, xenophobia, hatred, prejudice, vanity and selfishness.

They bemoan the evil of speciesism and anthropocentricism where human beings think and act like the only form of life on earth forgetting animals, plants, the soil, water and the air as part of the planetary ecology of being and belonging. For the philosophers of liberation oppressions and exploitations, discriminations and marginalisations from mainstream political and economic life are the corruption, the evil and the fall of individuals, communities and societies.

In that fall and decline, and the scarcity of truth and justice, there will always be the usual false prophets, sophists and philodoxas that benefit from and defend such evils as slavery and colonialism, imperialism, robbery and idolatry. Power and privilege, no matter how temporary and evil, have defenders. That is why and how such evils as colonialism and slavery had poets, prophets, philosophers and preachers that defended them and some still defend them, in this late hour.

Ironically and also paradoxically, the philosophical troublers of the world, the philosophers of liberation, are actually like Elijah and Socrates. Like Elijah who could say “I have not troubled Israel” and Socrates who could say kill me if you want but I am the gift of truth and justice for Athens, the philosophers of liberation are not the problem but the solution to the problems of nations.

Unlike the sophists and the philodoxas who check the bread first and the side of the slice that is buttered before they think, speak and write, the philosophers of liberation ponder the truth and justice, and in thinking, speaking and writing they can risk life itself. Sophists and philodoxas pursue rewards and payments, recognition and affirmation.

The philosophical vocation
As it was true of the prophets it was, and it still is true of the philosophers. The example of Socrates looms large. He was the poor old man that walked around the streets of ancient Athens asking troublesome questions about things of the earth and that of the heavens. As Socrates asked stubborn questions about justice and truth in Athens there was a legion of other philosophers that he called the “sophists.”

These were actually philodoxas and pseudo-philosophers who told the Athenian rulers what they wanted to hear not the truth that they had to hear. If the Emperor was naked they would compose songs about the great but invisible clothes of the Emperor. And the weakness of all the people in power, emperors, kings, governors and administrators is vulnerability to flattery and sycophancy. That is why the foremost architect and technician of power, Niccolo Machiavelli, wrote a punchy essay: “why flatterers must be avoided?”

Elijah the prophet was lucky to escape the wrath of Ahab and Jezebel after he killed all the prophets of Baal; he was whisked to heaven in a chariot of fire. Socrates could not escape; the sophists and the philodoxas took him to court on charges of irreligion, spreading falsehoods, alarm and despondency, and of being a nuisance in the city.
He was forced to drink poison and died.

Yes, Socrates was crucified for philosophy, truth and justice, in Athens. As it is that for every prophet there are many false prophets it is that for every true philosopher there are multiple philodoxas and sophists.

Cetshwayo Zindabazezwe Mabhena writes from the Johannesburg Institute for Advanced Study (JIAS) in South Africa. Contacts: [email protected].