Logos Rising: A History of Ultimate Reality by E. Michael Jones, Fidelity Press
April 2nd, 2020
E. Michael Jones is a contemporary writer I’ve mentioned a couple of times on this blog including one post dedicated to an article he wrote on J.R.R. Tolkien. I mentioned in that post that I had been reading (but still not finished), the subject of this post. I bought it soon after it was published in 2020 and did read three or four chapters in before stopping for what I assumed would be a short time and which ended up being over five years. So long in fact, that I promised myself I would start the whole book again and work through it this year and finished reading it around a month ago.
I should hasten to add, that this was not because I found the book wanting but that I simply wasn’t in the mood for such a lengthy work partially given the strange reality of the world in 2020. Like many, I was seeking to escape this reality somewhat which I did by retreating into Robert E. Howard’s Hyborian Age and as a spectator in the Medieval Japanese Heian Court. On checking my reading list from that year, a lot of the non-fiction I did read were shorter works and usually with a Catholic focus. I will note that I did at least tackle Plato’s Republic that year too though one can see where my mind was in this post from late in the year.
Nonetheless, I finally got to Logos Rising this year and what follows is a short and largely positive review.
At the time this was published, Logos Rising seemed like it would be E. Michael Jones’ masterwork that brought all he had written together into a single volume though in the time since, he has published three new books and released an expanded second edition of one (or two?) of his earlier works. It still could somewhat be described as what I expected though. Especially towards the end when he arrives at more contemporary events, the narrative does become a lot more personal as he becomes part of the history of Logos.
It is perhaps best to get out of the way what is meant by ‘Logos’ which is usually mentioned in relation to the opening of St. John’s Gospel:
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
Word here is ‘Logos’ in Greek which Merriam-Webster gives two definitions; both of which are relevant:
1: the divine wisdom manifest in the creation, government, and redemption of the world and often identified with the second person of the Trinity.
2: reason that in ancient Greek philosophy is the controlling principle in the universe.
As Jones explains at the very end of his introduction:
Heraclitus, who said that ultimate reality was fire, put materialism on the road to its logical conclusion, when he proposed the term Logos as the common denominator which united the world of the gods and the world of matter. The end point of that journey came roughly five centuries later when St. John wrote his gospel in Greek and began it with the assertion that Logos is God.
This brings the two definitions above together with Jesus Christ as the Divine Logos. Ultimate reality then is God and more specifically: the Trinitarian God of Christianity as represented on earth by the Holy Catholic Church. As a Catholic myself, I have no problem with this conclusion and to say I agree would be an understatement — I believe it. This will however be an immediate point of contention for those that don’t share this belief though Roosh V (who is Russian Orthodox), was very enthusiastic about the book when he still maintained an online presence.
Logos Rising is largely a history of humanity’s discovery of Logos, the Logos incarnate in our Lord Jesus Christ and the ebb and flow of this reality through the centuries. It is divided into two parts with the first titled, ‘The History of Logos’ and the second reversing this with ‘The Logos of History’. In this history Jones focuses mainly on key thinkers from the Ancient Greeks through St. John and St. Augustine and through history to philosophers as diverse as Hegel and Foucault. As one may notice with the latter two, the enemies of Logos are also covered.
While there is certainly a unifying theme, the chapters often feel more like related essays than portions of a unified whole generally found in narrative history. A clear example of this is the first chapter ‘The Beginning of Everything’ which is a general criticism of the “New Atheism” movement’s arguments about God and the origins of the Universe from Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchens. The second chapter focuses largely on the Jewish writer Yuval Harari’s Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind. It is not until the third chapter where history is discussed without also focusing on contemporary writers and follows a more conventional structure. This structure then remains until the end which focuses on happenings at the once Catholic University of Notre Dame in Indiana.
Perhaps what I most appreciate in the book is that Jones adopts the method of looking at the lives of many of the thinkers he covers — especially those who reject Logos. As an example, Hegel is shown to have had a brief flirtation with Catholicism, motivated in part by a young Catholic woman named Nanette Endel who he was attracted to. This infatuation led to a passing and superficial interest in the church that did not last but which explains his poor understanding of its theology. He later also had an illegitimate child with his chambermaid as a young man which Jones argues also affected his moral outlook. Jones shows how these specific life experiences impacted beliefs and writings. One more example is Harari mentioned above who as a sodomite, wants to try and justify his disordered desires by removing God and his moral law from creation. This would no doubt get dismissed as ad hominem by critics but the lives public figures lead are inseparable from what they do and say. Jones’ discussion of Hegel also briefly jumps back to Martin Luther and the Reformation where Luther’s passions are also demonstrated to be linked with his theology.
The above is what I think is perhaps most important as discussion of many upheavals and revolutions throughout history are so often written as if inevitable in the process of history culminating in what we see today. Writing from a Catholic perspective, Jones shows how many of these events in reality derailed the train of human progress — at least with regards to philosophy, religion and man’s ultimate purpose for existing. Yet, as the title indicates, Jones sees the centuries of calamity now coming to an end as Logos rises again.
I don’t share the effusive praise that can be found on the rear of the dust jacket but I do think it is an engaging journey through the history of thought from a Catholic perspective. Were I asked to contribute a quote for a second edition, this is more or less what I would say and so it makes for a neat conclusion.