Harry M. Philpott - "Construction Fanaticism" (October 18, 1959)

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Preacher	One of the greatest privileges	0:19
	that I know a man can have,	0:20
	is the joy of teaching Old Testament	0:22
	in a college or a university.	0:26
	But like every one of life's great experiences,	0:29
	it also carries with it,	0:32
	those moments of torment and tribulation.	0:34
	From my former experience in teaching Old Testament	0:39
	The moment that I most dreaded,	0:42
	came when we were face to face	0:45
	with the necessity of interpreting	0:47
	and studying the book of Ecclesiastes.	0:50
	Because, while in the prophets	0:55
	and in the Psalms,	0:57
	you had ideas which rang with glorious implications	1:00
	of high spiritual principles.	1:06
	When you came to the book of Ecclesiastes,	1:08
	you faced something quite different.	1:11
	'Vanity of vanity it started out.'	1:14
	'All is vanity.'	1:17
	It apparently was written by an early Hebrew	1:20
	or honor of the modern beatniks because	1:23
	it saw nothing in life that had any meaning,	1:27
	any purpose, any rhyme, any reason.	1:30
	They author was way out and far gone	1:34
	in terms of our modern problems.	1:38
	And yet he wrestled with some great ideas.	1:41
	He found nothing but futility in life itself.	1:47
	He wondered as to why people should continue to live,	1:52
	but he concluded that a living dog	1:56
	was better than a dead lion,	1:58
	so existence might as well go ahead.	2:00
	He saw that for everything,	2:05
	there was a time and a season,	2:07
	a kind of a cyclical repetition about life itself,	2:09
	but all of it without meaning and without purpose.	2:14
	And then you came to that final chapter	2:19
	and you found your students taking great delight	2:21
	in that summary verse, where it says,	2:24
	'that of the making of many books, there is no end	2:26
	and much study as a weariness unto the flesh.	2:30
	And at least they found one passage over	2:35
	which there could be great rejoicing	2:37
	and you're anonymous concurs.	2:39
	In the seventh chapter of the book of Ecclesiastes,	2:43
	the author is wrestling with the problem of goodness	2:48
	and evil and having seen no meaning in anything else,	2:52
	he sees little meaning in this.	2:56
	He finds that there are good people	2:59
	who do not succeed according	3:02
	to all of the measures of success.	3:04
	And he finds that there are evil people	3:07
	who apparently are very happy in life.	3:09
	And he wonders if it makes any difference.	3:13
	So he comes out with the bit of counsel,	3:16
	be not over good, be not over wise,	3:19
	why expose yourself to trouble?	3:25
	But on the other hand, be not over evil either,	3:28
	do not play the fool.	3:33
	Why should you die before your time?	3:35
	The best way is to take the one line	3:38
	and yet not avoid the other,	3:41
	for he who stands in of God, shall avoid both extremes.	3:44
	Why should you try to be too good?	3:53
	Why should you try to be too intelligent?	3:56
	You're just going to get yourself in trouble.	3:59
	But on the other hand, let's play this thing safe.	4:03
	Let's not be too evil because	4:06
	you'll get in difficulty that way.	4:09
	And let's not be playing the fool	4:11
	because here again, there is nothing	4:14
	but tribulation awaiting you.	4:17
	And so we can interpret this in terms	4:20
	of our present situation in college,	4:22
	don't be a brain, shun this.	4:26
	Why do you want to stand out in this fashion,	4:31
	yet on the other hand, don't go around	4:34
	on probation all of the time,	4:37
	and don't be flocking out,	4:39
	because this is not very intelligent either.	4:41
	Let's shun these extremes,	4:45
	let's hit them at the medium,	4:47
	and let's all be C students	4:50
	because this is the most comfortable place,	4:53
	according to this particular interpretation	4:56
	that we can occupy.	5:00
	There isn't a certain intriguing character to this advice.	5:03
	It relates in some measure to the man	5:07
	who might've been a contemporary	5:11
	of the author of Ecclesiastes namely Aristotle	5:13
	and his golden means there is a great deal	5:17
	of value and worth in the concept of the golden mean	5:21
	as set forth by Aristotle.	5:25
	We should not be shameless,	5:28
	and yet we should not be bashful.	5:30
	We should try to find this middle ground of true modesty.	5:33
	We should not be overly ambitious,	5:38
	and yet we should not be lacking	5:41
	completely on ambition.	5:43
	We should search for this meet middle ground	5:45
	of right ambition.	5:48
	We should not be stingy and try	5:51
	to retain all of the possessions that we have.	5:54
	But on the other hand, we should not be wasteful	5:57
	and fiddle way that which is ours.	6:00
	But we should try to find the middle ground of liberality.	6:03
	So it is that you and I in the world today	6:08
	find a certain inclination towards this kind	6:13
	of interpretation of how to live.	6:16
	There are real values and real truth	6:19
	in the middle ground.	6:22
	There are real values to be found	6:25
	in avoiding the extremes of life itself.	6:28
	But somehow I have a feeling that today	6:32
	we have a tendency to overdo the middle ground.	6:35
	We are much too content with trying	6:39
	to be like everybody else,	6:42
	with trying to settle down into an average routine,	6:45
	we find this more comfortable,	6:50
	we find our adjustment as it were,	6:53
	more easily made within this context of life itself.	6:57
	There is a great deal of praise	7:02
	for the so-called balanced mind today.	7:04
	And we hear such things as harmonious development	7:08
	so that we become as it were,	7:12
	attuned to the happy medium,	7:16
	we trim life down to an average,	7:19
	and we find our contentment	7:22
	and our satisfaction in this.	7:24
	And yet it is obviously true that life	7:28
	can be so harmonious and so oriented	7:31
	that it canceled back to zero.	7:35
	That it becomes a life without meaning	7:37
	and without purpose.	7:42
	One of the tragedies of our day	7:45
	is that so many people are lacking in any kind	7:48
	of convictions whatsoever.	7:51
	They find it much easier to take a middle ground	7:55
	to say neither yay, nor nay,	7:58
	When asked about an opinion on a matter.	8:02
	To reframe from trying to make up their minds	8:05
	on any of the important issues of life,	8:10
	to be individuals lacking in convictions,	8:14
	lacking in faith.	8:19
	And they find sometimes that this is a much easier way	8:21
	to get along in life.	8:25
	I have no political ambitions,	8:28
	but I have a lot of friends who are politicians.	8:31
	And they tell me that the most exasperating thing	8:34
	about running for office today is the difficulty	8:37
	of getting commitments from people,	8:41
	that they go to a voter and say,	8:44
	"Will you support me?"	8:46
	And they get neither a yes or a no,	8:49
	they get a maybe, I'll think about it	8:52
	or I don't know, I haven't made up my mind yet.	8:55
	Take a look at any of the polls	8:59
	that are taken on the issues of importance	9:01
	in the world today and see the large number of people	9:05
	who respond, 'I don't know.'	9:08
	A political friend of mine says	9:12
	that he'd rather have 10 people tell him	9:14
	they disliked him and they would never vote for him	9:16
	than to have one person say,	9:20
	well, maybe I'm giving it consideration.	9:21
	He likes to know where he stands.	9:24
	But in this world it's difficult today	9:27
	to know where a lot of people stand	9:30
	on a lot of important things.	9:32
	And this is certainly true in the realm of religion.	9:35
	When it comes to the matter of religious convictions,	9:39
	there are many of us who feel where,	9:43
	we don't want to appear to be atheistic or agnostic.	9:45
	On the other hand, we don't want	9:50
	to appear to be fanatical about our religion.	9:51
	We want to be just religious enough	9:55
	to be like other people,	9:57
	so they won't talk about us.	9:58
	And yet we don't want to be so religious	10:01
	that they're going to comment about our queer side.	10:04
	And so we find a situation which has been true	10:10
	throughout the history of the Christian Church.	10:14
	There is nothing new about this.	10:18
	There are a few people who stand on the forefront	10:20
	of Christianity, who leads the advance	10:25
	of the Christian faith today, the large majority drifting	10:28
	as it were hearing they're on the safe middle ground.	10:34
	Comprise the bulk of the Christian Church	10:39
	and the Psalms we read in the 119 Psalms,	10:45
	where the author speaking for God,	10:49
	says, "I hate men of a double mind,"	10:53
	or I hate men who are half and half.	10:58
	Those who appear this way today	11:02
	and that way tomorrow,	11:03
	those whose allegiance is halfway	11:06
	and Jesus talked about a house divided	11:11
	against itself, cannot stand.	11:14
	There has to be a full fledged commitment.	11:17
	There has to be a full fledged adoption	11:22
	if Christianity is to be meaningful	11:26
	in the life of the individual.	11:28
	And so for many of us, the kind of condemnation,	11:31
	which is addressed to the churches	11:35
	that lay Odyssey in the book of revelation	11:37
	is appropriate because thou art neither hot nor cold,	11:40
	but lukewarm.	11:47
	I will spew thee out of my mouth.	11:49
	Because we have a measure of enthusiasm,	11:53
	but not enough,	11:57
	because we have a leaning towards conviction,	11:59
	but not a basic and a real and a motivating conviction.	12:02
	We are lukewarm in our faith.	12:08
	We've mentioned Aristotle a moment ago.	12:13
	Plato has something to say about people in this circumstance	12:16
	in this situation.	12:21
	In the dialogue with Phaedrus,	12:23
	he says that most of us seek out people	12:26
	who have very little to offer,	12:29
	who are well balanced,	12:32
	but that counsels us against viewing life	12:34
	as a good thing when it is an even balance.	12:39
	And he suggests that a bit of madness	12:43
	in every one of us would be a very good thing.	12:46
	Let no man frighten or flutter us	12:51
	by saying that the temperate friend	12:54
	is to be chosen rather than the inspired one.	12:57
	Many noble deeds have sprung from inspired madness.	13:01
	There are those situations and those circumstances,	13:08
	which demand a bit of madness in us	13:12
	rather than an even balance, than an even temper.	13:16
	Plato mentioned three.	13:20
	The first of these is prophecy.	13:23
	This is not the ability to foretell the events	13:26
	for the immediate future,	13:30
	but rather prophecy in the sense	13:32
	that the old Testament prophets represented it.	13:34
	The ability to read the signs of the times	13:38
	and to know the directions in which actions would tend	13:42
	to take us, to know the consequences of evil.	13:46
	And to know that our ultimate salvation	13:51
	lies in dependence upon God.	13:53
	There is a need in our day and our age	13:57
	for this kind of prophetic voice.	14:00
	For this kind of incisive vision,	14:03
	which can analyze the social situation	14:05
	as it exists today.	14:09
	And could point out clearly,	14:11
	and in all conscience the difficulties	14:13
	and the dangers that lie in certain practices	14:17
	that we follow.	14:20
	And which can point us toward a way of justice	14:22
	and the way of peace.	14:26
	In addition to prophecy, which spring says Plato	14:30
	from madness,	14:33
	we have our deliverance from guilt,	14:35
	dependent upon a certain madness.	14:40
	The man whose life is perfectly balanced,	14:43
	cannot feel a sense of guilt	14:46
	in wrong doing in the things that he is doing.	14:50
	But rather the man who feels a great sense of discontent	14:54
	with himself, with his life around him	15:02
	and with the world itself,	15:07
	is the person who realizes that he is a sinner,	15:09
	that he is in need of redemption,	15:14
	that he is one who is in need of correction.	15:18
	And so to know our shortcomings and our failures	15:22
	to know the ways in which we can truly improve ourselves	15:27
	call for a certain madness,	15:32
	which will help us to realize that	15:34
	this needs correction in our own lives.	15:37
	And Plato says finally,	15:43
	that love itself comes out of madness	15:44
	and not out of an even balance in life.	15:49
	Sometimes those of us who have	15:54
	perhaps passed the stages of college age,	15:57
	realize that a young person in love	16:03
	displays a certain madness.	16:06
	And we recall that a certain kind of madness	16:09
	was characteristic of our own love affairs.	16:12
	And it is true that in a world such as we have,	16:17
	love which is real and love which is genuine,	16:21
	must spring out of a certain kind of madness.	16:25
	The madness which first of all,	16:30
	helps us to deny ourselves,	16:33
	the madness, which places the wellbeing	16:35
	of the object of our love	16:38
	above the personal wellbeing itself,	16:42
	a kind of madness which enables a man in love	16:46
	to devote himself to great service	16:50
	on behalf of humanity.	16:53
	And on behalf of his God.	16:55
	It is not the person who is balanced,	16:59
	but the person who has the kind	17:02
	of divinely inspired madness in him,	17:04
	who makes this kind of contribution.	17:08
	The topic that I've chosen today comes from a line	17:14
	and an essay by Heywood Broun.	17:17
	In it he says this,	17:20
	it is better, I believe on occasion to be wrong,	17:23
	then to be forever and inquiring neutral.	17:28
	There can be such a thing as constructive fanaticism.	17:33
	It is better, I believe to be wrong on occasion	17:39
	than to be forever an inquiring neutral.	17:44
	There can be such a thing as constructive fanaticism.	17:48
	The term fanatic is generally applied	17:55
	to a person that you and I would avoid	17:57
	with the same order as though this individual	17:59
	had some deadly disease or the plague.	18:03
	We don't like fanatics.	18:06
	We don't like them for a variety of reasons.	18:08
	And yet in contrast to the mood	18:13
	of inquiring neutrality,	18:16
	which is all too prevalent today,	18:19
	at least one author underscored by the speaker	18:22
	believes that there is a great need	18:28
	for people who are constructively fanatical	18:30
	in the world today.	18:34
	And this need is more apparent in the religious life	18:36
	than it is in any other realm perhaps.	18:40
	It's needed though, in a university situation	18:42
	in terms of the intellectual enterprise	18:45
	and the realm of the mind,	18:49
	we have all too many people who truly fit	18:52
	the word scatterbrains.	18:55
	They're going here and there and everywhere	18:58
	without any kind of sense of being fanatical	19:01
	about something which is of tremendous importance in life.	19:05
	Overstreet points out that any student who would get	19:10
	to the truth of an object must surrender himself	19:13
	to that object.	19:17
	There must be a loss of the self	19:19
	in the endeavor,	19:22
	there must be a kind of commitment of the self,	19:24
	which truly becomes fanatical.	19:28
	If the intellectual enterprise, so far	19:31
	as the individual is concerned, will move forward.	19:34
	This doesn't mean that we are biased	19:38
	or bigoted in the sense that we usually describe fanatics.	19:41
	It doesn't mean that we close our minds	19:47
	to truth and that we're unwilling	19:49
	to examine our beliefs from time to time.	19:52
	But it represents a kind of commitment	19:55
	and the kind of enthusiasm which sends you	19:59
	constantly searching for that which has possessed you	20:02
	and claimed you.	20:07
	In the words of Pascoe,	20:09
	it is a good thing that a man deny well,	20:11
	that he doubt well and that he believe well.	20:15
	All of these things are of importance.	20:20
	We have cultivated the ability to deny,	20:24
	and we are pretty good at doubting,	20:28
	but we have not correspondingly	20:31
	become as adept at believing well.	20:34
	Our religious faith demands a kind of commitment,	20:41
	which makes this faith the most important thing	20:47
	in all of our lives.	20:51
	Jesus, in talking about those who would follow him,	20:53
	said that if a man would come after me,	20:58
	let him deny himself and take up his cross	21:00
	and follow me.	21:05
	If he is truly to seek out my way of life,	21:07
	it must have a primacy.	21:11
	It must have a first place.	21:14
	It must be the most important aspect of life itself.	21:17
	And this is why Christianity,	21:23
	as it is lived, most effectively	21:26
	demands a kind of fanatical conviction	21:30
	and a fanatical commitment.	21:35
	And the person who is lukewarm,	21:39
	who blows neither hot nor cold,	21:42
	in the faith makes practically no contribution	21:45
	to the ongoing of the Christian enterprise.	21:49
	When we consider those individuals	21:54
	who are described as religious fanatics,	21:56
	they are persons often that we despise	22:00
	because they have missed something,	22:03
	which is truly essential in the faith itself.	22:06
	And that is the undergirding of love.	22:10
	Those people who hold firm to their convictions	22:15
	must in all love, give the same freedom	22:20
	of conviction to other persons.	22:24
	And yet the need today is not so much	22:27
	for this type of tolerance, I'm convinced,	22:31
	as it is a willingness on the part of individuals	22:35
	to own up to the convictions that they have.	22:39
	Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick once, preached a sermon	22:43
	with the wonderful title	22:47
	'on seeming, as Christian as we are.'	22:49
	In which he pointed out	22:54
	that the tragic thing about Christianity	22:55
	is that many of us deep down believe more	22:58
	than we express either by word or by deed.	23:02
	That in truth, our innermost feeling is more favorable	23:08
	than our outer expression.	23:13
	We need more constructive fanatics	23:17
	who are concerned with the social application	23:20
	of our Christian faith.	23:23
	Who are not afraid to bear the Christian witness	23:26
	and the Christian ethics on those problems,	23:32
	which plague us as a civilization	23:35
	and as a nation.	23:38
	We find that sometimes think on the campus today,	23:42
	a certain shyness and timidity about expressing a conviction	23:46
	with regard to some of the social problems that we have.	23:52
	And certainly there is an even greater shyness	23:56
	in expressing our conviction which may spring out	23:59
	of the essential of the Christian faith	24:02
	and saying that this has an important relevance	24:05
	to the solution of the problem that we have.	24:08
	Constructive fanatics, who are willing	24:13
	to take a stand, grounded on a great faith	24:17
	and on great principle are a tremendous need in our world.	24:22
	And finally, our commitment in terms	24:31
	of our group expression of the Christian faith	24:33
	is often lukewarm.	24:36
	The individual who goes to church	24:40
	more than once a week,	24:41
	might well be termed a fanatic,	24:44
	or perhaps once a month in some communities	24:47
	might better fit the situation	24:51
	and the circumstances around us.	24:54
	But again, the Christian faith demands our participation	24:57
	and the fellowship of sharing and of mutual sustenance,	25:01
	a fellowship of like believers,	25:06
	who give to one another,	25:09
	the kind of encouragement and help	25:12
	that leads them forward in Christian living.	25:15
	It is better, I believe on occasion	25:21
	to be wrong religiously	25:25
	than to be forever and inquiring neutral.	25:29
	The task of the Christian Church	25:36
	and the ongoing of the Christian mission,	25:41
	are dependent today on our largest supply	25:44
	of constructive fanatics.	25:49
	Let us pray.	25:53
	Almighty and eternal God, our heavenly father,	26:11
	in the stillness of this moment,	26:16
	help us we pray thee,	26:19
	to re-examine the strength of our commitment,	26:22
	Help us to understand the centrality	26:30
	of that which we profess as Christians	26:37
	and grant that we may move forward from this place,	26:41
	determined in thought, in word,	26:47
	and in deed.	26:52
	To show forth the presence of Christ in our lives,	26:54
	in our heart dedication to his cause.	27:00
	And now may the Lord bless you and keep you.	27:04
	The Lord, make his face to shine upon you	27:08
	and be gracious unto you.	27:10
	The Lord, lift up the light of his countenance upon you	27:13
	and give you peace.	27:17
	(Soft music)	27:20

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Title:

Harry M. Philpott - "Construction Fanaticism" (October 18, 1959)

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https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r43r0tv6m

Date:

October 18, 1959

Speaker:

Philpott, Harry M.

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Duke University. Chapel

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UA.17.01.0003 RR-0081
ref5361_7sf
uachapelsermaud
duke:628436
dcrau002111
ark:/87924/r43r0tv6m
d7364ecc-6a33-4f2f-8453-d5e603342792

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Harry M. Philpott - "Construction Fanaticism" (October 18, 1959)

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1. Harry M. Philpott - "Constructive Fanatacism" (October 18, 1959)

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