Terror and Civilization: Christianity, Politics, and the Western Psyche [Hardcover]

In Part I Drury gives a critical account of the religion of Jesus. She argues that from its earliest and supposedly most idealistic beginnings, Christianity betrays a bleak austerity behind the apparently genial personality of Jesus. She focuses on faith, salvation, sin, death, and damnation. She explains why the religion of Jesus is zealous, immoderate, and unwise, and thus why Jesus cannot be totally absolved of the savage history of the Church.

In Part II Drury argues against Christianity in politics. She maintains that Christianity cannot be vested with political power without courting disaster. The political success of Christianity invites the worst tyranny - tyranny which seeks dominion not only over the actions of the body, but over the thoughts, dreams, and longings of the mind.

Part III is a critical examination of the moral teaching of Jesus, the "ethic of love." In contrast to Nietzsche, Drury argues that the morality of Jesus is rich in tragic gloom. Moreover, far from coming into conflict with what Drury in Part I calls Christianity's "metaphysics of terror," the morality of Jesus is intimately connected with it.

In Part IV Drury argues that the ethic of love has unwittingly fostered a conception of conscience as an inner state of siege. She maintains that both psychoanalysis and postmodernism are the heirs of Christianity: both are trapped within the its horizon. Indeed, she argues, Freud has provided Christianity with scientific justification! Likewise, it is alleged that Foucault is not free of the yoke of Christianity. He assumes that there is a deep conflict between human nature and civilization, and that the latter depends for its success on psychic terror. But, Drury contends, this understanding of civilization and terror has the effects of deprecating morality, inviting a Promethean revolt, and romanticizing evil.

In Part V Drury pulls her argument about civilization and terror together. She maintains that ideals and their zealous pursuit are at the heart of both the sweetness of civilization and its terror. Christianity and Islam are both examples. What makes the conflict between Islam and the West so deadly is not the radical difference between the antagonists but their similarity: Both live in the shadow of Biblical religion, which accounts for the radical and polarizing nature of the conflict. Transcending the Biblical horizon is, Drury concludes, the first step in the quest for genuine political life, which aims at peace and order in a climate of freedom, and is marked by moderation and an acknowledgment of the plurality of ideals.

The book includes extensive endnotes and a richly annotated bibliography.

This is an immensely thought-provoking work, especially, for me, the vigorous and informed critique of Christianity in Part I. The book is well-argued throughout and readily encourages sustained reading. It is a necessary antidote to the imprudent, ignorant, and sanctimonious rhetoric surrounding the Bush administration's "war on terror," but Drury's arguments ought to give many critics of Bush pause as well.

My only strong complaint about the book is its outrageous price. One hopes the publisher will issue a reasonably priced paperback edition soon, so that this timely and important work will get the wide circulation which it so clearly merits.