Living with difference: hospitality and human nature
Hospitality is not just a religious practice--it's an aspect of human nature that brought philosophical liberalism to life.Or so argues one European economist.
Political theorists have long believed that capitalism, with its ideal of possessive individualism, and the Reformation are twin parents of philosophical liberalism, a school of thought imagined to be just 300 years old.
But Paul Seabright of the University of Toulouse argues--in a move that turns conventional wisdom on its head--that liberalism actually emerged 10,000 years ago, when the agrarian age forced humanity to develop codes of hospitality.
"Modern society is built on institutions that persuade us to treat strangers as though they were honorary friends," he writes in the British publication Prospect Magazine. "The capacity for abstract thought is required to see how strangers who do not share your language or religion may nevertheless behave in crucial respects just like you."
This capacity for reciprocity--and the value and practice of of hospitality--are what make it possible for human beings to live with strangers today.
Seabright's revision of the nature of being human--from the person as tabula rasa inscribed by the forces of capitalism/commercialism to the person as naturally inclined toward hospitality--is worth reflection as people of many different religious stripes struggle to live peaceful and tolerant lives in a world that brings strangers into ever-closer proximity.
.: Posted by Duane Bidwell on Monday, May 03, 2004
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