Leonardo Marmo Moreira

Ernest Renan and the relevance of his legacy in the light of the Spiritist thought

Contrary to what many may think, the humanization of Jesus makes His followers more determined to work on their own evangelical change, because it makes these disciples more mature and aware. However, the "deification of Jesus," makes the Master an unreachable example and thus makes His teachings "less realistic", because they belong to a “god’s” life (with a small "g") or to a "God" (with a capital "G"). Therefore, the acceptance of that "mythological Jesus" opens precedents for other equally mythical conceptions about the life and the legacy of the Master, as well as the disciples, apostles, family and followers of Jesus. Such an approach levels the religious discussion "downwards", limiting the growth efforts of the understanding of the spiritual issue of life.

Indeed, the "magic absolution of sins without any inner reform"; "Easy Heaven", sectarian and clearly discriminatory; the issues related to the alleged virginity of Mary and the mystic vision and/or mythical created on the marvelous Spirit, who was the mother of Jesus on Earth; the condemnation to an eternal Hell, among other topics, are incomprehensible proposals under any philosophical and religious aspects, but, although they are bizarre ideas, they end up by being accepted as true, from the acceptance of questionable assumptions. 

Ernest Renan was a contemporary of Kardec 

The above mentioned analysis leads us indirectly to the Nazarene Master Himself, who had said: "No one puts a piece of new cloth on an old garment"; this meaning that correct ideas on a “binding”, and based on a concept with wrong proposals, tend to generate numerous equally misleading inferences. It also reminds us of Erastus in "The Book of Mediums", who taught us that it is "better to reject 10 truths than to accept a single lie, a single false doctrine". Therefore, the acceptance of distorted basic ideas favors the acceptance of subsequent ideas also erroneous, because it gives rise to an illogical thinking (although, in some aspects, it may look like as if it is logical), which can be easily identified in the studies on the Aristotelian syllogism. Or, on the other hand, the acceptance of clearly unreasonable proposals favors another very common proposition in our society that, on religious questions, "everything is illogical," creating the famous and irrational response "that is a mystery" or "they are mysteries of God, and there is no use trying to understand them”.

 “These types of findings limit the serious and productive exchange of ideas about spiritual matters, favoring a kind of absolute separation between religion and science, which, to some extent, exist in our society, in spite of the decisive contribution of Spiritism, a true "alliance between science and religion".

The above discussion reinforces the value of Ernest Renan’s contribution to religious growth of Humanity. In fact, when strongly questioning the irrational analysis about Jesus and His Gospel, Renan favored a broad debate on issues before very little analyzed. This is because only through a truly rational faith shall we solve a number of present problems in the religious culture on our planet.

Ernest Renan was a writer, a philosopher, theologian and a French historian, who became a major reference in the cultural thinking in the nineteenth century world. Born in Tréguier on February 28, 1823, Renan lived until October 2, 1892, when he passed away in Paris at the age of 69. Renan contributed significantly to the search for a rational analysis of religious issues, focusing especially on Christianity.

Joseph Ernest Renan was such a striking author in his time, contemporary of Allan Kardec, that he caused a great interest on the part of the Encoder himself about his "Life of Jesus", to the point that Allan Kardec interrogated the Falange Spirits of the Spirit of Truth about the real value of this work. Such questioning is in Kardec’s book "Posthumous Works". 

How Erastus defined Renan's book on Jesus 

Let's see what Kardec asked and what Erastus, responsible for the answer, clarified (Posthumous Works - Joao Teixeira de Paula’s translation and Introduction and J. Herculano Pires’ Notes - twelfth edition, LAKE, 1998):

P. (To Erastus): What will be the influence of the "Life of Jesus" by Renan?

A. It will be immense. Great is the rumor within the clergy, because this book overthrows the foundations of the building, where it lives for eighteen centuries. The book is not faultless; on the contrary, it offers wide margin to criticism, being the reflection of a unique opinion, which is limited to a narrow circle of material life.

Renan is not materialistic, but he belongs to the school that does not deny the spiritual principle, but also does not give it an effective and direct role in the things of the world. He is one of these intelligent blind, who explain in their own way what they cannot see; who, not understanding the mechanism of sight at distance, they imagine that one can only know a thing by touching it. So he reduced Christ to the proportions of the most common man, denying Him all the faculties, which are the attributes of the Spirit, free and independent of matter.

However, hand in hand with capital errors, especially when it comes to spirituality, that book contains very fair comments, which had so far escaped being commented and which are enlightening in some ways.

The author belongs to the legion of embodied Spirits that can be called the destroyers of the old world and whose mission is to level the ground, where a new and more rational world will be built. God wanted a famous writer to come along with his talent to cast light over certain obscure issues and shrouded in secular prejudices, in order to dispose Spirits to new beliefs. With no intention, Renan smoothed the way for Spiritism. (Italics are mine). 

J. Herculano Pires note (Reviewer of the translation): "Evolution is accomplished through a gear of combined actions and reactions. The work of Renan, not only in this book, was a parallel effort to Spiritism, in the religious field, powerfully contributing to ventilate the mental environment of the time ". (Italics are mine.) 

Renan: an intelligent blind?

As recorded in "Posthumous Works", the Spirits are of the opinion that Renan was a kind of "smart blind" and that his contribution indirectly would help Spiritism through the significant contribution in the "demolition of the old world" to foster the conditions for a reconstruction of cultural values ​​related to the religious area.

The explanation given to Allan Kardec by one of the major contributors of the "Phalange of the Spirit of Truth," such as Erastus, indirectly reminds us of the famous teaching of Master Jesus: “Those who are not against us are for us”.

According to Allan Kardec’s guiding mentors, Renan was an intelligent Spirit, who produced a clever and interesting work, but with several restrictions. Anyway, according to the Spirits, between positive and negative points, the balance of this work would be highly favorable to the French scholar. In fact, in several directly or indirectly related issues to Spiritism, we identify the contribution of non-spiritist scholars, who, researching spiritual issues, often have confirmed the Spiritist findings.

The idea of an ​​"intelligent blind" suggests someone who has a hard time perceiving some types of evidence, but that, despite these limitations, would have a great capacity for rational analysis from some angles of the issue. Indeed, such an analysis seems to be quite appropriate when we study Renan and his most famous book "Life of Jesus".

Renan developed a very objective rational analysis about the Gospel texts. He literally "humanized" Jesus, rejecting his supposed "divinity," as even the Catholic dogma of the "Holy Trinity" defends. With a large capacity for critical analysis, he defends that "Jesus of Nazareth" was "an incomparable man", highlighting the educational role of Jesus in human history. This appreciation was an independent analysis of labels and traditional religious concepts, in such a way that he strongly considers different the "Jesus of Nazareth" from the deified myth that would be the "Jesus of Bethlehem" (see the book "Review of Christianity" of J. Herculano Pires).

Ernest Renan, who had been appointed professor of Hebrew at the College de France, had his course suspended by the government of Napoleon III after his first class, just for calling Jesus an "incomparable man." In fact, the course was abolished until 1870. 

Renan and his rejection to "paranormal" phenomena

Although he prepared a work in which it is possible to see a good share of his personal opinions that could be questioned by scholars from various streams and also by freethinkers, Renan contributes to the cultural growth of humanity by proposing a truly rational critical analysis of the evangelical texts, as well as the work and legacy of Jesus of Nazareth, even considering that we disagree with many of his positions in the light of the Doctrine.

Renan rejected almost every episode (or at least the "supernormal" interpretations of their episodes) that reported some experience said "paranormal" attributed to Jesus. Therefore, he ignored any possibility of psychic phenomenology and/or emancipation of the soul and thus the so-called "spiritual healing". Ignoring the possibility of communicability of the soul and the influence of human and spiritual magnetism on human health, Renan rejects the idea of ​​the paranormal, because it is dissociated from the knowledge of the prerequisites that enable a rational interpretation of such phenomena. Indeed, the understanding, for example, of the reality of the perispirit was something very distant from Renan’s knowledge, thus favoring a "simplistic" interpretation of the Gospel texts.

Despite his mistakes at the light of the Spiritist Doctrine, the rejection of the dogma, especially the idea of ​​"Holy Trinity", with the consequent "humanization" of Jesus, is still a very important contribution so that many scholars were motivated to do a more rational and deep search on the life and work of the Master of Nazareth. In fact, the basic idea of ​​rejection of the "miracle" is consistent with the Spiritist thought. The difference lies in the fact that Spiritism studies the "communication with the Spirits" as a natural phenomenon, and gives numerous and compelling evidence of the reality of this type of communication. Such information was at that time far from the cultural horizon of Ernest Renan.

Anyway, the attitude of constant critical study by Renan before religious issues induces society to think about the meaning of true religiousness and the intrinsic problems regarding literal analysis focused on the so-called "sacred texts". These two items will always be important for the maturation of the immortal Spirit. Important Spiritist authors, such as J. Herculano Pires, mainly through his excellent work "Review of Christianity" and Herminio Miranda, studied Renan carefully realizing the value of the contribution of this French writer, in spite of his possible mistakes in the light of Spiritism. It is also worthwhile to mention Divaldo Franco, who prepared interesting seminars and lectures based on the analysis of the thought of Renan in the light of the Doctrine. 

Was Jesus really tempted by Satan?

If Jesus is also God, and a God who supposedly (in the opinion of Catholics and Protestants) may be tempted by the "devil" and hesitates before the trial, as allegedly occurred in the Garden of Olives (also according to the view of Catholics and Protestants), everything or almost everything can be admitted, for the above premises, previously admitted, are contradictory, illogical and totally inconsistent with the minimum common sense, paving the way for other equally absurd ideas. It would be appropriate to question: who ruled the Universe (assuming that Jesus is also God), when Jesus was tempted and/or when he faltered before the trials of his task?

If as Spiritists we do not accept that Jesus is God, it is unacceptable that Jesus has actually been tried and been hesitant regarding the task that he came to fulfill on Earth, would it not be more inconsistent to admit such assumptions for those who consider him (inexplicably) God?

By admitting such propositions, the religious issues go down the road of a "non-rational faith" or, at least, without any rational support logically acceptable. In this context, any proposal, however untenable as it may seem, may be allowed by the religious, who do not seek to cultivate a faith "that can face reason in all stages of humanity" as the spiritual guidance teaches as ideal.

This common sense of illogical religion, when taken to extreme degrees of fanaticism and incoherence, has given, both in the past and in the present, terribly sad examples of how harmful the religious ideal can be without minimum standards of ethics and common sense.

Even disregarding the possibility of authenticity of said "paranormal" aspects the actions of Jesus, the rational premises of Renan’s reflections were enough to generate a great controversy in the nineteenth century (and even in the XX and XXI centuries). The controversy in this case was very valuable, since in "matters of faith", even at that time, religious issues, especially those related to Jesus, could not even be raised (relative to the status quo associated with culture of the average man of that time, who was kept in a very low rationality level due, among other reasons, to the role of religious leaders of the nineteenth century) and much less refuted (at least with regard to the concepts considered "official" by dominant religious institutions, given the notorious "papal infallibility" which would be "enacted" in the First Vatican Council by Pope Pius IX, a few years later, on July 18, 1870).