Friday, July 21, 2006

Never more free

Iranian liberals today do not deny that the liberties appropriate to a liberal society can be derived from a theory or stated in a system of principles, but their view of a liberal society is related to a view of humanity and truth as inherently unfinished, incomplete, and self-transforming. The principles of Iranian liberalism cannot be grounded in religious truth, because the very idea of free agency, as it is understood today by Iranian liberals, goes against any form of determinism (religious or historical)
-- from an interview with Ramin Jahanbegloo by Danny Postel. Danny once again enriching our lives by bringing this to us.

[Reminded of Furtwangler (was it?) when asked how he could conduct Fidelio, the tremendous hymn to liberty and conscience, in Germany under the National Socialists. He replied "Where else?"]

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