SOURCE: Drury, Shadia B. “Esoteric Philosophy and Ancient Wisdom.” In The Political Ideas of Leo Strauss, pp. 18-36. London: Macmillan Press, 1988.

[In the following essay, Drury traces the impact of Islamic philosophers, particularly Al Fârâbî, on Strauss's concept of the relationship between philosophy and science.]

Strauss begins with the assumption that there exists an inevitable conflict between philosophy and the political domain, or as Strauss says, ‘the city’. Understanding this conflict is the key to understanding Strauss's political ideas.

Strauss describes his Persecution and the Art of Writing as a ‘sociology of philosophy’. He distinguishes the latter from the sociology of knowledge. The sociology of knowledge begins with the assumption that there is a harmony between thought and the world; either thought ‘determines’ political institutions and social relations (idealism), or political institutions and social relations ‘determine’ thought (materialism). In contrast to the sociology of knowledge, Strauss's sociology of philosophy begins from the assumption that there is an irreconcilable conflict or disharmony between thought, philosophy or science on the one hand, and society, the world, the city, or the political domain on the other.¹ Strauss is therefore opposed to the contemporary fashion of regarding philosophers as men of their time. In Strauss's view, the greatness of a writer lies not so much in being a man of his time, as a man against his time.²

Writing in his own name, Strauss declares that there is a permanent antagonism between philosophy or science and society:

Philosophy or science, the highest activity of man, is the attempt to replace opinion about ‘all things’ by knowledge of ‘all things’; but opinion is the element of society; philosophy or science is therefore the attempt to dissolve the element in which society breaths, and thus it endangers society. Hence philosophy or science must remain the preserve of a small minority, and philosophers or scientists must respect the opinions on which society rests. To respect opinions is something entirely different from accepting them as true. Philosophers or scientists who hold this view about the relation of philosophy or science and society are driven to employ a peculiar manner of writing which would enable them to reveal what they regard as the truth to the few, without endangering the unqualified commitment of the many to the opinions on which society rests. They will distinguish between the true teaching as the esoteric teaching and the socially useful teaching as the exoteric teaching; whereas the exoteric teaching is meant to be easily accessible to every reader, the esoteric teaching discloses itself only to the very careful and well-trained readers after long and concentrated study.³

This is the heart of the Straussian philosophy. The passage contains several assumptions that need to be identified. First, Strauss begins with the assumption that philosophy or science is the ‘highest activity’ of man.⁴ Secondly, he assumes that the best political order must be one that makes the ‘highest activity’ possible.⁵ Philosophy or science is therefore the end for which political society exists. However, philosophy or science is the preserve of the few. Political society must therefore be directed to the highest activity of man which is the preserve of the few.

Philosophy offends the city because it questions the opinions on which the city is based. Those who offend the citizens are likely to be ridiculed, persecuted or destroyed. Socrates is a case in point. Philosophers must therefore be careful not to offend the citizens if they care for their lives. They must therefore ‘respect’ the ideas of the city, which Strauss tells us is ‘entirely different’ from thinking them true. In other words, they must cultivate an exoteric teaching that consists in paying lip service to the ideas of the city. Ironically, the raison d'être of the city must be hidden from it.

We would radically misunderstand Strauss if we thought that philosophy must be hidden in order to protect the philosopher from persecution. If that is all Strauss was saying, then he could not make the sort of sweeping statement that he makes about the permanence of the antipathy of philosophy and the world. For Strauss, the conflict does not apply only to those societies that cannot tolerate the freedom to dissent. Strauss is quite earnest about the permanence and universality of the conflict.

I will state more explicitly what Strauss expresses only with the utmost reserve, even in this most explicit of his statements on the matter. Esoteric writing is not necessary simply to protect the philosopher against harmful ignorance and bigotry. There is a deeper and more important reason that corresponds to a deeper and more important aspect of the conflict between philosophy and society: the esoteric art is needed equally for the protection of society. Philosophy does not only offend society, it ‘endangers’ it.⁶ There are two reasons for this. The simpler one is made explicit by Strauss, the deeper and more significant one is apparent only to one who understands the passage in the light of the corpus of Strauss's work.

The simple and obvious reason Strauss insists on the conflict between philosophy and society is that, in his view, society cannot withstand the questioning of philosophy. Society needs ‘unqualified commitment’ to its own opinions and beliefs.⁷ Strauss's position is diametrically opposed to the reigning liberal credo according to which depriving society of free expression is tantamount to ‘robbing mankind’.⁸ Unlike John Stuart Mill, Strauss does not worry that the ideas on which society rests will putrefy into ‘dead dogma’ if they are not perpetually challenged.⁹ Unlike Mill, Strauss does not believe that truth is salutary. On the contrary, for Strauss, the ideas on which society rests cannot withstand too much scrutiny without crumbling. Societies need myths and illusions if they are to survive.¹⁰ The deeper and more significant reason that philosophy endangers society begins to become apparent. The deeper reason is that the truths of philosophy are profoundly at odds with the sorts of pious myths and illusions on which any society must necessarily rest. The truths of philosophy therefore come into conflict not only with degenerate societies, but with all societies. Philosophy therefore undermines ideas that it recognizes to be necessary to the continued existence of the city. In writing esoterically, philosophers seek to protect not only themselves but their city. They recognize that far from being salutary, the truth is deadly.

Is there a truth so terrible that it threatens to wreak havoc on society unless it is kept secret? What is this deadly truth? Let me come straight to the point: in the course of this work I will show that for Strauss, religion and morality are two of the biggest but most pious swindles ever perpetrated on the human race. But paradoxically, there would be no human race were it not for these swindles. It is therefore of the utmost importance that they be sustained and nurtured. If this is true, then Strauss is right, philosophical truth is as deadly and as dangerous to society as he says it is. For surely, no society could survive in the absence of religion and morality. (As we shall see, Strauss believes that morality depends on religion.)

Strauss claims little originality for his ideas; he attributes them to antiquity, especially to Socrates, Plato and Aristotle. In view of this, it would seem that the most logical place to begin our understanding of Strauss is the classical philosophers Socrates, Plato and Aristotle; but this is not so. The logical place to begin is Strauss's commentaries on Al Fârâbî. There are several reasons for this. First, in Strauss's view, we cannot understand the classical Greek philosophers if we rely on the Christian tradition of Neoplatonism because the latter tends to Christianize pagan philosophy.¹¹ Instead, Strauss relies on Al Fârâbî and the Islamic philosophers.¹² This may account for Strauss's radically original, if not scandalous, interpretations of classical thought. Secondly, the Islamic philosophers, Avicenna, Averroes, Avempace and in particular Al Fârâbî were the first to bring to the attention of Leo Strauss the discord between philosophy and the city. Fârâbî is regarded by Strauss as the depository of the wisdom of antiquity. Strauss's view of Al Fârâbî is therefore essential in understanding anything about Strauss. Indeed, the ideas Strauss attributes to Fârâbî are repeated like variations on a theme in all of Strauss's commentaries on the ‘ancients’.

Whether Strauss actually ‘recovers’ the wisdom of antiquity or invents it is not of great consequence. What is important for my purposes is to understand the ideas Strauss attributes to antiquity, the ideas Strauss shares with ‘his’ antiquity.

The Islamic philosophers were the first to bring to the attention of Leo Strauss the precarious predicament of philosophy and of true philosophers in the world. The dangerous plight of the philosopher was particularly acute in the Islamic world where philosophy became a suspect pursuit and philosophers a suspect group of men. Indeed, the word philosophy of falasifa in modern Arabic still carries a derogatory connotation indicating empty talk full of false human pride setting itself up above divine wisdom. The falasifa were suspected of irreligion because of their praise of the pagan philosophies of Plato and Aristotle.

Strauss is reluctant to say explicitly that the suspicions of the world were true and that the falasifa were irreligious. He says merely that their opponents were instrumental in helping them conceal their thought because they ‘feared the harm which its publication would cause to those of their fellow-believers whose faith was weak’.¹³ The Islamic philosophers thought that the Islamic civilization could not sustain itself if the Islamic religion were undermined. Philosophy must remain hidden so that its irreligious nature does not threaten political order and stability.

The belief that religion is necessary for politics is not peculiar to the Islamic philosophers. The same view is expressed by Plato in the Laws. According to Strauss, the Laws is Plato's political dialogue par excellence.¹⁴ He gives by way of evidence for this the fact that it is the only dialogue that begins with the word ‘God’.¹⁵ We are to understand that if the political dialogue must begin in this manner, then politics must be absolutely in need of a belief in God or gods and in rewards and punishments in the next life, if not in this one. Because people are ‘not capable of virtue’,¹⁶ they must be made to believe that their laws have divine origin, that they were made by gods or men inspired by gods. But Strauss knows, as does his Plato, that the originators of law are not gods but human beings.¹⁷ The best laws have their source in wisdom, not gods.

For Strauss, the philosopher qua philosopher cannot believe in an afterlife.¹⁸ In his commentary on Aristotle's Nichomachean Ethics, Fârâbî declares that the only happiness is in this life, and that all divergent views are but ‘ravings and old women's tales’.¹⁹ He makes the same point in his commentary on Plato, where he denies that Plato believed in the immortality of the soul or in the life beyond. Strauss describes this as a ‘flagrant’ violation of the letter of Plato's teaching. He notes that Fârâbî makes this remark at the precise point where Plato maintains the very opposite. For Strauss, such flagrant violations of the text are indications that Fârâbî is expressing his own views. That is not to say that he misrepresents Plato, nor does Strauss think so. He is completely loyal to the intention, the aim and the spirit of Plato. Fârâbî sees in Plato an esoteric writer, a kindred spirit. Plato appeals to the immortality of the soul only because it is an expedient means by which to motivate the vulgar to act justly.²⁰

According to Strauss, the Islamic philosophers made two fundamental assumptions. First, they assumed that philosophy by its very nature is fundamentally irreligious or that philosophical truth can never be reconciled with the truth of revealed religion, whether Islam, Judaism or Christianity. Secondly, they believed that religion is necessary for the maintenance of a civilization in a condition of health, order and stability. The best legal system needs the support of religious doctrine to sustain it and secure strict adherence to law. Recognizing this, philosophers must keep philosophy hidden not only to protect themselves, but to protect the very political order that gives them nurture and makes possible the cultivation of philosophy. They must therefore espouse an exoteric ‘teaching’ in contradistinction with their esoteric philosophy. As Strauss says,

The exoteric teaching was needed for protecting philosophy. It was the armor in which philosophy had to appear. It was needed for political reasons. It was the form in which philosophy became visible to the political community. It was the political aspect of philosophy. It was ‘political’ philosophy.²¹

Political philosophy is therefore the garb in which true philosophy makes its appearance in the world; it is the exoteric face that philosophy uses to present itself to the world. Political philosophy is a salutary teaching that hides the true or esoteric philosophy. Strauss's famous essay ‘What is Political Philosophy?’ must therefore be read in the light of the preceding quotation.

Unless read very carefully, Strauss's What Is Political Philosophy? seems to tell us only what we expect to hear: namely, that political philosophy is a branch of philosophy devoted to acquiring knowledge of the good life and the good society which makes possible the good life. The essay appears pleasant, predictable and tame.²² However, it begins to take form when the meanings of the words are understood. The good life is the life of the philosopher, or the life dedicated to philosophy.²³ But philosophy ‘endangers’ the city, therefore the good for which society must be organized is one in which only the few can partake. These few must therefore exercise utmost discretion if they hope to prevent philosophy from destroying the city. They must ‘justify philosophy to non-philosophers, to ordinary citizens, to the political community’.²⁴ Strauss tells us that ‘they must follow the example of Odysseus’.²⁵ He leaves us in the dark as to what the example of Odysseus entails. Should they blind Polyphemus, the one-eyed cyclops? Apparently not. In another book, Strauss tells us that Odysseus was a ‘safe speaker’.²⁶ There, he explains that a safe speaker conceals the truth from the many while revealing it to the few.²⁷ This is the ‘deeper meaning’ of ‘political philosophy’:

the adjective ‘political’ in the expression ‘political philosophy’ designates not so much a subject matter as a manner of treatment; from this point of view, I say, ‘political philosophy’ means primarily not the philosophic treatment of politics, but the political, or popular, treatment of philosophy, or the political introduction to philosophy—the attempt to lead qualified citizens, or rather their qualified sons, from the political to the philosophic life.²⁸

Political philosophy is therefore the practical or political aspect of an activity that is not itself practical or political.²⁹ Political philosophy serves a practical function. It protects the world from philosophy and philosophy from the world. Keeping philosophy hidden not only protects society, it secures the freedom of philosophy because ‘society will always try to tyrannize over thought’.³⁰ Political philosophers must at the same time be careful not to bury philosophy in so much secrecy that it would never see the light of day.

Strauss is a political philosopher. That is not the same as being a liar. Political philosophy is not a bundle of lies. Like Fârâbî's pious ascetic, it tells the truth and nothing but the truth. This is precisely why one can interpret Strauss without perversely and arbitrarily reversing what he does say explicitly. Strauss tells the truth (or parts of the truth in different places), but he employs a great deal of ‘caution or thrift in communicating’.³¹ His intention is to lead to the truth those who are fit for it (i.e. potential philosophers). The process is a matter of dragging them out of the cave, or ‘liberating them from the charms which obstruct the philosophic effort’.³² These are the charms by which society attempts to ‘tyrannize over thought’.

Strauss provides the best description of this process of liberation in What Is Political Philosophy? The example is from Plato's Laws. Strauss explains the meaning of the fact that the political dialogue par excellence begins with an extensive conversation about wine.³³ He notes that the interlocutors are old citizens of communities famous for their laws and for their obedience to their old laws. These men therefore are loyal citizens in the grip of the social charms that obstruct the philosophic effort. If they are to engage in a philosophical dialogue with the Athenian, they must be ‘liberated’ from these ‘charms’. The Athenian therefore engages them in a conversation about wine-drinking, or a pleasure that is forbidden to them by their old laws. The idea is to remind the old men of ‘secret and pleasurable transgressions of their own’.³⁴ The conversation about wine is therefore a ‘vicarious enjoyment of wine’.³⁵ It has a similar effect to actually drinking wine, it ‘loosens their tongues; it makes them young: it makes them bold, daring, willing to innovate’.³⁶ In short, it makes sober, old, law-abiding men like Kleinias and Megillos much more fit for philosophy than they would normally be.

For Strauss, philosophy is ‘the very opposite of sobriety or moderation; thought must not be moderate, but fearless, not to say shameless’.³⁷ Nevertheless, all the talk about wine is not likely to make men like Kleinias and Megillos truly fit for philosophy. They could never be young potential philosophers to whom the truth should be fully revealed. It would be neither safe nor possible to ‘liberate’ them completely from the ‘charms’ with which society holds them captive. The Athenian will therefore allow them only a glimpse of the intoxication, madness, boldness, fearlessness and shamelessness that is philosophy. To give little more than a glimpse, he needs moderation, the very opposite of philosophy (‘moderation is not a virtue of thought’).³⁸ He needs something foreign to pure philosophy, he needs ‘political philosophy’. Political philosophy is therefore the exercise of moderation in speech. ‘Moderation is a virtue controlling the philosopher's speech.’³⁹ Political philosophy is the ‘mating of courage and moderation’.⁴⁰ In short, political philosophy is moderate speech about immoderate, not to say shameless, intoxicated thoughts.

Al Fârâbî was particularly sensitive to the dangers of philosophical intoxication. He understood the conflict between philosophy and the world, and so became exceptionally adept at the esoteric art of writing. Strauss's admiration of Fârâbî is undeniable. He is a master of the lost art of antiquity, and Strauss sets out to be his apprentice. The art consists in a variety of techniques meant to conceal the heterodox teachings from all but the few who could read carefully and who could think. Clues to this peculiar form of writing include the following: contradictions, principles frequently stated but silently contradicted by upholding incompatible views, inexact repetitions, pseudonyms, strange expressions, a frequent use of technical language, ambiguity of expression, and other infelicities of style. All of these must be assumed to be deliberate since it is foolish to think they would escape an intelligent man. The young men with intelligence who can read between the lines will be struck by these literary deficiencies and will understand their meaning.⁴¹ Writing between the lines does not, however, preclude stating important truths openly and unambiguously by using as his mouthpiece some disreputable character. Nor is this an indication that a philosopher disapproves of the ideas in question or thinks them false. It shows only, as Strauss explains, ‘how much they disapproved of pronouncing the truths in question’.⁴² For example, Strauss believes that Plato uses Thrasymachus as his mouthpiece.⁴³ (In what is to follow, I will show how Strauss uses Machiavelli as his mouthpiece.⁴⁴)

Strauss gives a vivid contemporary example of how a man of heterodox views would proceed to avoid persecution by writing esoterically. A philosopher from the communist block would do well to acquaint himself with this peculiar style of writing. (We should not be fooled by this example. Strauss thinks that every genuine thinker, every man against his time, had better acquaint himself with this style.) The imaginary writer from the communist block might declare that he has set out to provide a critique of liberalism when the contrary is his true aim. He would first have to state the liberal position he really wants to defend.

He would make the statement in the quiet, unspectacular and somewhat boring manner which would seem to be but natural; he would use many technical terms, giving many quotations and attach undue importance to insignificant details; he would seem to forget the holy war of mankind in the petty squabbles of pedants.⁴⁵

(A better description of Strauss's work could not be found.)

The bulk of the work would consist of ‘virulent expansions of the most virulent utterances in the holy book or books of the ruling party’.⁴⁶ (Strauss uses this technique very skillfully in Natural Right and History.) Only when he reaches the heart of the argument

would he write three or four sentences in that terse and lively style which is apt to arrest the attention of young men who love to think. That central passage would state the case of the adversaries more clearly, compellingly and mercilessly than it had ever been stated. …⁴⁷

In this way the philosopher can express himself while avoiding persecution. The only trouble is that there may be careful readers or ‘clever men’ who are not trustworthy, and having ‘found the author out’ would reveal all and denounce him to the authorities. Strauss raises this objection only to dismiss it, saying that thoughtful men are generally trustworthy and not cruel, and that the Socratic dictum that virtue is knowledge must be largely true or esoteric writing would not be possible.

One of the most powerful vehicles at the disposal of esoteric writers is to use the mantle of the history of ideas to express their own views. Not surprisingly, Fârâbî, a true master of the art,

avails himself then of the specific immunity of the commentator or the historian in order to speak his mind concerning grave matters in his ‘historical’ works, rather than in the works in which he speaks in his own name.⁴⁸

Fârâbî's commentary on Plato is therefore the clue to Fârâbî's own thoughts. As Strauss remarks, ‘we admire the ease with which Fârâbî invented Platonic speeches’.⁴⁹ In other words, what Fârâbî tells us Plato thinks we can safely take as an indication of Fârâbî's own views.

It would be a mistake to conclude from the fact that philosophy is so shrouded in secrecy that it has no political function to play. For Fârâbî as for the other esoteric philosophers, philosophy has a most significant role to play in political life, that is, if the opportunity presents itself. Indeed, Fârâbî thought, following Plato, that the key to the complete happiness of nations and cities is the rule of the philosophers. But since the rule of the wise is unlikely in the real city, we have two choices. First, we can give up worldly happiness altogether. We can resign ourselves to the fact that the good political order is unrealizable. Philosophers would then forsake politics altogether, or abandon the cave in favor of the sunlight, and consorting only with one another, attain personal happiness by engaging in the supreme human activity of contemplation. But such happiness is likely to be precarious. Man is a political being who cannot realize himself except as part of a political community. Ultimately, politics makes possible the philosophical life which requires leisure. Renouncing politics altogether is therefore not a reasonable option for one who, like Fârâbî, rejects the belief in a happiness different from the happiness of this life.

The second option is to find a way whereby the philosopher can rule in the real city. Fârâbî believed that Plato found the solution and follows him in adopting it as the most viable one available. The philosopher cannot rule openly in the real city. Plato has given us ample reasons why that is so. Both Strauss and Fârâbî regard these reasons to be valid for all time.

The alternative to the open or public kingship of the philosopher is a hidden or secret kingship of the philosopher. Strauss seems to endorse what is the only reasonable solution. He describes it as follows:

We may say that Fârâbî's Plato eventually replaces the philosopher-king who rules openly in the virtuous city, by the secret kingship of the philosopher who lives privately as a member of an imperfect society which he tries to humanize within the limits of the possible.⁵⁰

The ‘secret kingship’ of the philosopher depends on the ‘chance’ that there may be princes friendly to philosophy. This is what Strauss means when he says that the best political order can be realized only by chance.⁵¹ In other words, the best political order is not impossible, but only improbable. In Strauss's view, Marx's communist utopia is impossible; it depends on a radical change in the nature of human things. In contrast, Plato's ‘city in speech’ is only improbable. It depends on the chance coincidence of philosophers and princes friendly to philosophy who are willing to listen to their advice. The ‘city in speech’ becomes a reality when the philosophers win the ear of the powerful. In this way, philosophers can rule the city behind the scenes with no risks to themselves or to philosophy. The solution can be found in the difference between Plato's Republic and his Laws. The Laws fulfills rather than violates the intention of the Republic. When Strauss studies Plato's Laws for himself, he comes to the same conclusion as Fârâbî. The Nocturnal Council is cleverly introduced only in the twelfth book of the Laws where it is likely to be missed. It ensures the secret rule of the philosopher in the real city.⁵²

The actualization of the ‘city in speech’ is therefore highly probable. In the light of this we can understand Jaffa's remark that ‘No one who has experienced the magic of Strauss's teaching can doubt that the best regime not only is possible, but that it has been actual. Nor can he doubt that whatever amelioration of our condition is possible will come about by the influence of those who exercise political power by its spirit.’⁵³

Strauss believed that liberal democracy is good in so far as it is a kind of aristocracy in disguise.⁵⁴ There is little doubt that many of his students understand their task as one of establishing the secret kingship.⁵⁵

Fârâbî compares the secret kingship of the philosopher in the real city with the role of the prophet. Like the prophet, the philosopher does not and ought not rule the city openly by holding political office. He can rule only vicariously by the influence he is able to exert on the powerful. That wisdom is, however, not to be confused with the religious knowledge of the prophet. The similarity between the philosopher and the prophet is much more superficial than either Fârâbî or Strauss would have us believe. The philosopher's wisdom does not consist in religious knowledge, for the latter is according to Fârâbî ‘the lowest step on the ladder of cognitive pursuits’.⁵⁶ Neither Fârâbî nor Strauss makes clear what the wisdom of the philosopher is, but there is sufficient evidence here (and throughout the corpus of Strauss's work) to indicate that it dispenses with the sorts of limitations that the Sacred Law tends to impose on the affairs of men. The point of the secret rule of the philosopher is to replace the Sacred Law with his own wisdom. Strauss understands Fârâbî as a man who lays the foundation for the ‘secular alliance’ between philosophers and princes friendly to philosophy. In so doing, he ‘initiates the tradition whose most famous representatives in the west are Marsilius of Padua and Machiavelli’.⁵⁷ Strauss silently omits Plato. The implication is that the tradition that Strauss describes belongs equally to Plato as to Machiavelli.

In [other essays, I] argue that Strauss's moral philosophy fails to recognize any absolute limits on human conduct; and this to my mind explains Strauss's rejection of the tradition of natural law: a fact that is very ill-understood, if at all, and one that is obfuscated by all his polemics against the atheism and relativism of modernity. In what is to follow, it will become apparent that the philosopher who has the ear of the powerful will give advice that is not unlike the sort that Machiavelli gives his prince. Suffice it to say here that the irreligious character of philosophy facilities the sort of moral ruthlessness that the esoteric philosophers believe is required by politics.

Strauss describes Fârâbî's view of morality as ‘shocking’.⁵⁸ However, he commends him for expressing this shocking ‘truth’ with the utmost caution and restraint. By carefully unpacking the meaning of his terms, Strauss reveals to us part of his meaning. He notes that each of the words ‘virtue’, ‘nobility’ and ‘happiness’ has two meanings. There is true or real virtue, nobility and happiness, and apparent virtue, nobility and happiness.⁵⁹ The morally virtuous life is not the life of true virtue, nobility and happiness; it leads only to ‘apparent happiness’.⁶⁰ Moral virtue leads only to things that are ‘useful’, ‘necessary’ or ‘noble’ in the vulgar sense. The moral life is not truly the ‘desired way of life’.⁶¹ The truly desired and desirable way of life is the life of contemplation. The highest life is therefore not the morally virtuous life. The life of contemplation (the life of the philosopher) transcends the sphere of morality, just as it transcends the sphere of politics and necessity.⁶² It is a life that one might venture to describe, following Nietzsche, as beyond good and evil.

Strauss describes Fârâbî as a man who might have been attracted as a pupil of philosophy to what he ‘abhorred as a believer’.⁶³ His mind must have consisted of ‘two hermetically sealed compartments’.⁶⁴ It was the sort of mind that is ‘conveniently attributed to the Latin Averroists’.⁶⁵ (Similarly, Jewish Straussians have been regarded as Latin Averroists and described as ‘Hellenized Jews’.⁶⁶)

Let me summarize in more explicit terms what Strauss says only implicitly about Fârâbî's philosophy. There is no life beyond this life. There is no happiness but the happiness to be found in this life. There is no transcendent God. Philosophers are as gods among men. The only happiness accessible to us is through the rule of the philosophers. But the philosophers are neither loved nor recognized. On the contrary, they are despised and ridiculed. Instead, people wish to be ruled by the Divine Law. In their ignorance, they fail to recognize the shortcomings of law and its inability to accommodate the variable circumstances of human life. People are also ignorant of the absolutism of the Divine Law and hence of the sacrifices it will exact. If man is to be modestly happy, wisdom must replace law and philosophy must replace the dogged adherence to Sacred Law.

If the philosophers seem arrogant that should not surprise us; they are a sort of wounded aristocracy, a jilted deity. Nor should it surprise us that they are made a laughing stock by the world. They are rather awkward and their step is unsure in the darkness of the cave; that is not their domain. They belong to a domain outside the cave with the sun and the other heavenly bodies. If they attempt to openly take their rightful place at the helm, they will be thrown overboard as stargazers by the drunken sailors.⁶⁷ Yet despite the abuse heaped on them by a vulgar and ungrateful world, they will not take revenge. They should retreat, and consorting only with one another, live in a sort of Epicurian garden pursuing their own happiness through the activity for which they are supremely fit, namely contemplation of the intelligent heavenly bodies with whom they share a special kinship. But they do not. For love of the world, they find a way to rule in secret. If they say that there is no connection between philosophy and the world or between the ‘city in speech’ and the earthly city, that is only their exoteric philosophy; the means by which they protect philosophy and themselves from the ruthless persecution of the vulgar. The esoteric philosophy is about the secret kingship of the philosopher. If the philosopher is identified with the Imam, or the descendant of the prophet Muhammad, that is only a concession to public opinion; it is a ‘noble lie’, a ‘pious fraud’, a matter of ‘considering one's social responsibilities’.⁶⁸ Nor is it altogether false, since the role that the philosopher must occupy in the real city is not unlike that of the prophet who has the ear of a god-fearing king. The difference is that the philosopher is a prophet without a god. But that is his secret.

Esoteric writers share in common not only a certain style of writing, but certain assumptions about man, politics, religion, morality and philosophy that necessitate the cultivation of this special style. They believe that there is in the nature of philosophical truth something dangerous to political order and the stability of civilization. Strauss is reluctant to say this explicitly, but he apparently shares the sentiment of the esoteric writers of antiquity who considered philosophy and religion to be mutually exclusive and antagonistic, yet recognized that religion is a necessary foundation for human civilization. Civilization needs religion in order to flourish; but philosophy presupposes complete freedom from the restraints which religion must necessarily impose on thought. It was their belief in the permanent discord between reason and revelation, or Athens and Jerusalem, that enabled them to accept ‘persecution’ with such equanimity. They believed that the irreligious truth of philosophy is not one that the ‘vulgar’ can withstand. Only the philosophers have the fortitude to withstand such hard truths. One even gets the impression from Strauss that the philosophers delight in what may lead others to despair—namely that there is no God, no unchanging moral law and no support in the universe for justice.

The Jewish philosophers Helevi and Maimonides inherited the ‘art of Plato’ from the Islamic philosophers. They took it for granted that being a Jew and being a philosopher were mutually exclusive.⁶⁹ Strauss explains that the Jewish tradition emphasized God's justice and not his wisdom. This contributes to (although it does not explain) the lack of proximity of Judaism to philosophy. As Spinoza said bluntly, the Jews despised philosophy. More explicitly, the antipathy between philosophy and Judaism or Islam is coeval with the antipathy of true philosophy or pagan philosophy to revealed religion as such. In the light of this truth we must conclude that Christianity has for some time labored under a gross illusion.

Strauss explains that the difference between Christianity on the one hand, and Islam and Judaism on the other, is that the latter consider the sacred doctrine to be a legal interpretation of Divine Law (talmud or figh), whereas for the Christian the sacred doctrine is revealed theology. This is why Maimonides's Guide of the Perplexed, the Jewish equivalent to St Thomas Aquinas's Summa Theologica, never acquired the authority or stature of the latter. But Strauss is not to be understood as praising Christianity for its open-minded and unreserved love of wisdom. On the contrary, Christianity has done a disservice to philosophy. It drew it to its bosom only to impose upon it the yoke of divine supervision, which is tantamount to its destruction, since (as I will show below) the essence of philosophy is freedom from authority, particularly divine authority. Of course, Strauss does not say all this explicitly, but he does say that,

the precarious status of philosophy in Judaism as well as in Islam was not in every respect a misfortune for philosophy. The official recognition of philosophy in the Christian world made philosophy subject to ecclesiastical supervision. The precarious position of philosophy in the Islamic-Jewish world guaranteed its private character and therewith its inner freedom from supervision.⁷⁰

One of Strauss's current followers, whose speech is much less moderate than his master's, has expressed the matter as follows:

No, the bishops were correct, in their instinctive condemnation of Aristotle when he first appeared in Paris in the thirteenth century. But penetration was achieved, and as the intruding body was encapsulated and neutralized, the ichor began quietly to flow. And so the little pagan child was nurtured and fed and christianized [sic]. A diapered and tractable baby ape … is much less trouble than a naked squalling human infant; so even if he's not exactly ours, they must have felt, lets keep him!⁷¹

The message is clear. The exquisite, divine pagan philosophy was mutilated and disfigured by Christianity until finally the immortal ichor flowed out of its veins and it turned into a grotesque little ape. It is not so much charity that forced the Christian philosophers to keep the little one, they could not do otherwise; this disfigured shadow of what pagan philosophy once was, is their baby. Besides, who would want it?

For Strauss the antipathy between Islam or Judaism and philosophy is ‘identical with the issue of Jerusalem versus Athens’.⁷² (Strauss commonly uses Jerusalem and Athens as symbols of religion and philosophy respectively.) Judaism and Islam recognize the permanent conflict between philosophy and religion that is denied by Christianity. Although Strauss does not make the comparison, the belief in the harmony between philosophy and revelation in Christianity is akin to the belief in the harmony between philosophy and society characteristic of the sociology of knowledge. Just as the sociology of knowledge fails to see the permanent discord between philosophy and the world, so Christianity fails to recognize the permanent incompatibility between reason and revelation, Athens and Jerusalem. And this gives one reason to think that Strauss believes modernity to be the heir of Christianity.

In summary, I have in this chapter attempted to establish three things. First, that the esoteric-exoteric style is necessary not only to protect the philosophers from persecution in societies hostile to philosophy, but to protect society from the anti-religious and anti-moral nature of philosophical truth which endangers society. This style allows the philosopher to endorse the salutary myths necessary for the preservation of society while revealing the truth for those who are fit for it. In this way, the philosopher discharges his social duty, which is to lie nobly. The existence of God and His immutable Law is one of the most pious frauds that the philosopher can perpetuate. If the vulgar discovered, as the philosophers have always known, that God is dead, they might behave as if all is permitted.

Secondly, I have tried to establish that for Strauss, philosophy, although not itself political, has a political role to play. Nor is this role limited to the dissemination of salutary myths. The very truths that when made public endanger the city, are the city's only hope for happiness. The shameless, intoxicated ideas of the philosopher alone can deliver the city from the oppressive harshness of Sacred Law. This can be accomplished only through the secret kingship of the philosopher.

Strauss is mistakenly regarded as one who maintains that philosophy provides us only with transcendent ideas that are politically unrealizable, unattainable and impracticable.⁷³ Strauss has done much to perpetuate this kind of misunderstanding. He and his followers never tire of repeating that Plato's Republic, which they openly embrace as their political ideal, is a ‘city in speech’. This must be taken literally. It means exactly what the words say: the republic in which the philosopher rules openly is a ‘city in speech’, a city that is politically unattainable. In the real city, the philosopher can rule, but only in secret, by having influence over the powerful. The open rule of the philosopher in the ideal city is replaced by the secret kingship of the philosopher in the real city. The philosophical ideal can only be attained by chance. It depends on the chance occurrence of princes friendly to philosophy. It is by no means beyond reach.

Thirdly, I have tried to show that Strauss shares the assumptions of the esoteric philosophers. This is clear not only from the fact that he regards them to be wise, but also from the fact that he elaborates the same themes when he writes in his own name.⁷⁴ It is therefore not surprising to find him reluctant to make his ideas public or express them openly. Strauss too writes esoterically. He too avails himself of the immunity of the commentator. None of this precludes his saying anything lucidly and clearly in that lively style that is bound to ‘arrest the attention of young men who love to think’. Like his counterparts in antiquity, he is not foolish enough or cruel enough to utter dangerous truths lucidly and clearly in his own name. Like his counterparts in antiquity, he uses some disreputable character as his mouthpiece. Who could be more disreputable than the diabolical Machiavelli?

Following the example of his imaginary writer from the communist block, Strauss appears to attack that which he really intends to defend. I will show below how he does this in Thoughts on Machiavelli and in Natural Right and History.⁷⁵ What description of Strauss's work would be more apt than his own description of how his imaginary writer from the communist block would proceed? Does Strauss not frequently write in a quiet unspectacular and boring manner? Does he not give many quotations and attach undue importance to insignificant details? Has he not stated the case of Machiavelli and of Thrasymachus more compellingly and mercilessly than it has ever been stated before? Does not the bulk of Natural Right and History consist in the most virulent expansions of the most virulent utterances of the holy book of the ruling party? Does it not begin with the Declaration of Independence and its simple-minded belief that all men are created equal, its childish trust in God, and in the inalienable rights of individuals? And has Strauss not told us that the wise know better? And are we not entitled to think that Strauss shares the views of those he considers most wise? When Strauss attributes to Plato the thoughts of Thrasymachus, are we not entitled to attribute these same ideas to Strauss? For is he not by his own admission the guardian of the wisdom of antiquity? And was it not his unique achievement to have ‘single-handedly revived an interest in the classical texts and the knowledge they contained’ at a time when ‘classicists no longer took seriously the content of the books entrusted to their care’?⁷⁶

All this is not as preposterous as it may seem. For Strauss, the ills of modernity have their source in the foolish belief that there are no harmful truths, and that belief in God and in rewards and punishments is not necessary for political order. Strauss follows the esoteric writers because he is convinced that religion is necessary for the well-being of society. But to state publicly that religion is a necessary fiction would destroy any salutary effect it might have. The latter depends on its being believed to be true. The indignant tone Strauss adopts in the act of revealing the atheism of Hobbes and Locke or the anti-Christian philosophy of Machiavelli should not blind us to the fact that he shares their ‘modern’ sentiments even as he criticizes them. What he abhors is their lack of ‘social responsibility’, or their foolishness in thinking that the public dissemination of the truth will not harm the city.

Notes

1. PAW [Persecution and the Art of Writing], pp. 7, 8. It is important to note that for Strauss the terms philosophy and science are synonymous, as are the terms city, polis, society and the world. I will follow Strauss in using these terms interchangeably.

2. Nietzsche, Uses and Abuses of Hitory, trans. Adrian Collins (New York: Library of Liberal Arts, Bobbs-Merrill, 1957), sec. vi, p. 41; cf. OT [On Tyranny], p. 24; PAW, p. 159; NRH, p. 33; WIPP [What is Political Philosphy?], pp. 66, 101. In spite of the extent to which I am inclined to sympathize with this sentiment, admitting that no man can altogether transcend this time is a matter of honesty not historicism. Even Strauss was to some extent a man of his time. Many of his central ideas reflect his German intellectual milieu. For example, he was, like Heidegger, concerned with the idea of Bodenstandigkeit, or rootedness in the soil (see Chapter 8). Like his contemporaries Hannah Arendt and Eric Voegelin, he was enchanted by antiquity and disenchanted by ‘modernity’. Like Arendt he was concerned with immortality rather than eternity; he also shared with her views about politics that they both held in common with Machiavelli (with one difference: Strauss was reluctant to make these views public). The view that Western civilization is in ‘crisis’ is common to many writers after the Second World War. The similarities between Strauss's ideas and those of Nietzsche and Freud are also striking (see Chapters 3, 4 and 9).

3. WIPP, p. 221-2, my italics.

4. Ibid., p. 221; ‘Fârâbî's Plato’, in Louis Ginsberg: Jubilee Volume (New York: American Academy of Jewish Research, 1954) p. 393; ‘Political Philosophy and the Crisis of Our Time’, in George J. Graham, Jr, and George W. Carey (eds), The Post-Behavioral Era (New York: David McKay, 1972) p. 242. The latter is based on two lectures, ‘The Crisis of Our Time’, and ‘The Crisis of Political Philosophy’, published in Howard J. Spaeth (ed.), The Predicament of Modern Politics (Detroit, Mich.: University of Detroit Press, 1964).

5. WIPP, p. 10.

6. Ibid., p. 221, my italics.

7. Ibid., p. 222.

8. J. S. Mill, On Liberty (New York: Library of Liberal Arts, Bobbs-Merrill, 1956: first published 1859) p. 21.

9. Ibid., p. 43.

10. WIPP, p. 222.

11. Strauss, ‘Fârâbî's Plato’, p. 362; a shorter and less explicit version of this piece appears as the Introduction to PAW. It is understandable that the former is more explicit on the question of morality than the latter in view of the fact that it is less accessible and directed to a more limited audience.

12. PAW, p. 18. Strauss's interpretation of Socrates relies heavily on Al Fârâbî and other Islamic philosophers. For example, he follows Al Fârâbî in maintaining that Plato was an esoteric writer, in denying any relevance to the differences between Plato and Aristotle, and in believing that Plato did not believe in an afterlife, except as a useful myth. He follows Al Razi in maintaining that Socrates underwent an important change or conversion in the course of his life. See SA; cf. Muhammad b. Zakariyya al-Razi, ‘The Philosophic Way of Life’, in Paul Kraus, ‘Raziana I’, Orientalia, vol. 4 (1935) pp. 300-34.

13. PAW, p. 17.

14. WIPP, p. 29.

15. Ibid., p. 32.

16. I am borrowing the expression from SCR, p. 48.

17. WIPP, p. 33.

18. Leo Strauss, ‘Marsilius of Padua’, in HPP, 1st edn, p. 229.

19. PAW, p. 14.

20. Strauss tells us that the same is true for Fârâbî. Anything he might say about immortality must be regarded as ‘prudential accommodations to the accepted dogma’ (Strauss, ‘Fârâbî's Plato’, p. 375).

21. PAW, p. 18.

22. WIPP, p. 10.

23. Ibid., p. 221; Strauss, ‘Fârâbî's Plato’, p. 393; Strauss ‘Political Philosophy and the Crisis of Our Time’, p. 242.

24. WIPP, p. 93.

25. Ibid.

26. CM, p. 53,

27. Ibid.

28. WIPP, pp. 93-4.

29. Leo Strauss, ‘Philosophy as Rigorous Science and Political Philosophy’, in SPPP, p. 37; OT, p. 26.

30. OT, p. 26.

31. Ibid.

32. Ibid.

33. WIPP, pp. 31-2.

34. Ibid., p. 31.

35. Ibid.

36. Ibid.

37. Ibid., p. 32.

38. Ibid.

39. Ibid.

40. Ibid., p. 40.

41. PAW, p. 30; Strauss, ‘Fârâbî's Plato’, p. 382. When Strauss says that what a writer says most frequently or in the largest number of passages is not an indication of what he really believes, we must not take this to mean that what a writer says most frequently is the reverse of what he really thinks. He simply means to say that what esoteric writers say most frequently or in the largest number of passages must be interpreted in light of how they qualify it in the course of repeating it. Repetitions frequently include additions and qualifications which are very important for any interpreter, not just a Straussian one. In interpreting Strauss, I will certainly take into account not only what he says most frequently, but how he qualifies it and what he says in the course of repeating it throughout the corpus of his work. I will under no circumstances reverse what he says clearly and explicitly. I regard this as an abuse of what Strauss says about interpretation, although it is the sort of abuse to which his method readily lends itself.

42. PAW, p. 30, my italics.

43. Strauss, ‘Plato’, in CM.

44. In Chapter 6 I show how Strauss uses Machiavelli to utter ‘truths’ that he is reluctant to utter in his own name.

45. PAW, p. 24.

46. See discussion of the ‘crisis’ in Chapter 8.

47. PAW, p. 24.

48. Ibid., p. 14.

49. WIPP, p. 154.

50. PAW, p. 17.

51. WIPP, p. 34.

52. AAPL.

53. Harry Jaffa, ‘The Achievement of Leo Strauss’, National Review, vol. 25 (7 December 1973) p. 1355.

54. LAM, p. 24.

55. M. F. Burnyeat is the only critic of Strauss who seems to have recognized this fully. See his ‘Sphinx Without a Secret’, New York Review of Books, vol. 32, no. 9 (30 May 1985) pp. 30-6.

56. PAW, p. 13.

57. Ibid., p. 15.

58. Strauss, ‘Fârâbî's Plato’, p. 388.

59. Ibid., pp. 385-9; for other references to the dual meanings of justice, virtue and gentlemanliness, see CM, p. 115; OT, p. 105; XSD, p. 161.

60. Ibid., p. 385.

61. Ibid., pp. 385, 386, 387.

62. Ibid., p. 365.

63. Ibid., p. 374.

64. Ibid.

65. Ibid.

66. Frederick D. Wilhelmsen, Christianity and Political Philosophy (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1978) p. 211.

67. The metaphor is from Plato's allegory of the ship, Republic, 488ff.

68. OT, p. 26.

69. Leo Strauss, ‘How to Begin to Study The Guide of the Perplexed’, an introduction to Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed, trans. Shlomo Pines (Chicago, Ill.: University of Chicago Press, 1963) pp. xi-lvi, reprinted in LAM.

70. PAW, p. 21.

71. Joseph J. Carpino, review of Frederick D. Wilhelmsen, Christianity and Political Philosophy, in Interpretation, vol. 8, nos 2 & 3 (May 1980) p. 217.

72. PAW, p. 20.

73. See, for example, Edward Andrew, ‘Descent to the Cave’, Review of Politics, vol. 45, no. 4 (October 1983) pp. 510-35.

74. For example, see my discussions above of ‘What is Political Philosophy?’ and ‘On a Forgotten Kind of Writing’, both in WIPP, and the Introduction to OT.

75. See Chapters 6 and 5 respectively.

76. Walter Berns, ‘The Achievement of Leo Strauss’, p. 1347.