“of”是一个最简单的英语单词，可能任何一个认识10个以上英语单词的人都认识它。但是即使具有相当英语水平的人也还是可能在某些情况下误解它的意思，例如在商务印书馆2010年出版的《为什么我不是基督教徒》一书中， 就有一处因误解“of”一词而导致的比较严重的误译。这类误译的一个后果是会让读者养成一种不求甚解的不良习惯。

贝特兰·罗素的《为什么我不是基督教徒》(Why I Am Not a Christian)一书，在他自己于1927年所作一个讲演的基础上写成，初版于同年，是一本有近百年历史的经典小册子。英国卢德里奇出版社（Routledge)2004年重新出版该书时，由当代英国哲学家、剑桥大学教授西蒙·布莱克本（Simon Blackburn)写了一个再版前言。布莱克本先简单回顾了罗素当年作同名讲演的时代背景，然后就开始回顾讨论当年T.S. 艾略特就有关基督教徒的争论对罗素的批评，商务印书馆中译如下：

将罗素的那篇演讲以及后来关于宗教的著作斥为肤浅、鄙俗、不能达到论题的深处，一直是件时髦的事情。其实，罗素那屈尊俯就的傲慢态度就表明，如果宗教只是迷信的话，那么罗素的话大概应该是中肯的。但宗教不是迷信，罗素的话并不中肯。最早的这种抨击来自同年8月刚刚成为宗教徒的T. S. 艾略特，见于他主编的杂志《标准月刊》。

从中译看，似乎“其实，罗素那屈尊俯就的傲慢态度就表明，如果宗教只是迷信的话，那么罗素的话大概应该是中肯的。但宗教不是迷信，罗素的话并不中肯”是来自艾略特对罗素的批评。令人不解的是“罗素那屈尊俯就的傲慢态度”怎么能“就表明，如果宗教只是迷信的话，那么罗素的话大概应该是中肯的”？这两者之间怎么看都毫无逻辑联系。艾略特也并非等闲之辈，他的思维会这样混乱吗？

对照下面的原文，我们就能看见“其实，罗素那屈尊俯就的傲慢态度就表明”完全是误译：

It has been fashionable to decry Russell’s lecture, and subsequent writings on religion, as shallow and unspiritual, inadequate to the depths of the subject. The high-minded patronizing of Russell says, in effect, that if religion were mere superstition, Russell would be relevant, but it is not, and he is not. The first such attack came in August of the same year, from the newly religious T. S. Eliot, in his journal The Monthly Criterion

“patronizing of Russell ”意思是“傲慢地教训罗素”（更准确地说，应该是“居高临下地对待罗素”或“像主子对仆人一样对待罗素”。“patron”一词，曾经意为“主子”，即“master”，例如在丹尼尔·笛福的著名小说《鲁滨逊漂流记》中，鲁滨逊就以“patron”一词来指代他被掳为奴时的主人）。这段文字的意思不是说罗素对别人傲慢，而是他被别人傲慢对待了。

关键就是这“of”一词。商务印书馆的译者误以为“of”一词在这里的作用跟在“bike of Russell”里一样，于是把“patronizing of Russell ”误解为“罗素的傲慢”，进而把前面的“high-minded”（高尚的）曲译为“屈尊俯就的”，把后面的“says”曲译为“表明”。

“The high-minded patronizing of Russell says, in effect, that if religion were  mere superstition, Russell would be relevant, but it is not, and he is not. ”这段话的正确翻译是：

那些对罗素的高尚的、居高临下的批评实际上这样说：如果宗教只是迷信的话，那么罗素的话大概应该是中肯的。但宗教不是迷信，罗素的话并不中肯

“如果宗教只是迷信的话，那么罗素的话大概应该是中肯的。但宗教不是迷信，罗素的话并不中肯”是艾略特对罗素的批评，而“那些对罗素的高尚的、居高临下的批评”是布莱克本对那些批评的看法。“高尚”一词用在这里，是出于布莱克本对那些批评者的嘲讽，对应于“将罗素的…著作斥为肤浅、鄙俗”。无论是艾略特还是布莱克本都没有认为有所谓“罗素的傲慢”。“傲慢”的不是罗素，而是他的论敌。商务印书馆的译文跟原文恰恰相反。

简单地说，当“of”在两个名词A和B之间，与A和B组成词组“A of B”时，其意思通常是“B的A”， 如“bike of Russell”，意思是“罗素的自行车”；但当A是一个由及物动词而来的名词时，该词组的意思常常是“对B的A”,如在“patronizing of Russell ”中，patronizing是及物动词patronize的动名词形式，所以这个词组意思是“对罗素的傲慢”。“of”的这后一种用法的一个明确无误的例子是“the Assassination of President Kennedy”。显然，其意思只能是“对肯尼迪总统的刺杀”，肯尼迪总统是被刺杀的人，而不是去刺杀别人的人。Assassination是一个名词，但来自及物动词assassinate。“the Assassination of President Kennedy”这词组如果译为“肯尼迪总统的刺杀”，会让对肯尼迪一无所知的人误以为是肯尼迪去杀人。当然，肯尼迪名气太大，没人会对他一无所知，所以不会发生这种误解。但如果把“patronizing of President Kennedy”译为“肯尼迪总统的傲慢”，只会让人误以为是肯尼迪有错。

剑桥在线英语词典将“of”一词这种用法解释为：done to (对)

并给出三个例句：

the massacre of hundreds of innocent people

the oppression of a nation

the destruction of the rain forest

显然，按剑桥在线英语词典的这解释，“patronizing of Russell ”意为“patronizing done to Russell ”；正如“the Assassination of President Kennedy”意为““the Assassination done to President Kennedy”。

至于更多的实例，我们也可以看看著名翻译家傅雷先生是怎样翻译这种“of”词组。以下三个例子，都出自罗素的另一本书《幸福之路》（The Conquest of Happiness），由傅雷先生翻译。

例一

The wise man will be as happy as circumstances permit, and if he finds the contemplation of the universe painful beyond a point, he will contemplate something else instead.

傅雷先生的译文：

智慧之士可能在环境容许的范围内尽量快乐，倘他发觉对宇宙的冥想使他有超过某种程度的痛苦时，他会把冥想转移到别处去。

（按：“contemplation”，名词，出自及物动词contemplete, 所以“the contemplation of the universe”不是“宇宙的冥想”而是“对宇宙的冥想”。“宇宙”在这里是“冥想”的对象，而不是主体。)

例二

This view leads to an undue cultivation of the will at the expense of the senses and the intellect.

傅雷先生的译文：

这种观点使人牺牲了理性和思悟，去过度的培养意志

（按：“cultivation”，名词，出自及物动词cultivate, 所以“cultivation of the will”不是“意志的培养”而是“对意志的培养”。 “意志”在这里是“培养”的对象，而不是主体。)

例三

There is a comfortable doctrine that genius will always make its way, and on the strength of this doctrine many people consider that the persecution of youthful talent cannot do much harm.

傅雷先生的译文：

有一种安慰人心的说法，说天才终归会打出他自己的路，许多人根据了这个原则便认为对青年英才的迫害，并不能产生多少弊害。

（按：“persecution”，名词，出自及物动词persecute, 所以“the persecution of youthful talent”不是“青年英才的迫害”而是“对青年英才的迫害”。“青年英才”在这里是“迫害”的对象，而不是主体。)

这篇短短的再版前言中，各种程度不同的误译还很多。看来近二十年来，即使是商务印书馆这样的名牌出版社出的译书质量也很成问题了。

附录一 《为什么我不是基督教徒》再版前言原文

In London The Times reported quiet days at the beginning of March, 1927. In the shires, hunting was only moderate, but in London, following an anonymous telephone call, there was hope that the stolen £20,000 necklace belonging to Mrs Bruce Ismay might be retrieved. For seventy-three pounds and ten shillings the Church Travellers Club would take you to Palestine, Egypt, Athens and Constantinople. There were a lot of advertisements for parlourmaids, but few would be on the Church trip, since the modest-sounding sum represented a good year’s wages. Many letters to the Editor concerned a proposed reform to the prayer book; indeed the Bishop of Norwich gave a special meeting about this reform (‘Brigadier-General H. R. Adair, who presided, said that what was wanted was not a new prayer book but a book of discipline’). Church events were extensively reported.

About the only event The Times did not announce was the Sunday lecture of the South London Branch of the National Secular Society in Battersea Town Hall on 6 March, and neither did it report it afterwards. The lecture was ‘Why I am not a Christian’, the most famous and most forthright of Bertrand Russell’s many writings about religion.

It has been fashionable to decry Russell’s lecture, and subsequent writings on religion, as shallow and unspiritual, inadequate to the depths of the subject. The high-minded patronizing of Russell says, in effect, that if religion were mere superstition, Russell would be relevant, but it is not, and he is not. The first such attack came in August of the same year, from the newly religious T. S. Eliot, in his journal The Monthly Criterion.2 Since Eliot anticipates most subsequent criticism, I shall concentrate on the issues as he raises them. 

Eliot seizes upon Russell’s words ‘I do not think that the real reason why people accept religion is anything to do with argumentation. They accept religion on emotional grounds’. ‘What he does not remark explicitly, though I am sure he would admit it’, says Eliot, ‘is that his own religion also rests entirely upon emotional grounds’. Eliot disdainfully cites the emotional rhetoric with which Russell winds up his lecture, quoting the peroration ‘We want to stand upon our own feet and look fair and square at the world . . . Conquer the world by intelligence, and not merely by being slavishly subdued by the terror that comes from it . . .’, remarking contemptuously that Russell is very keen on standing up rather than sitting down, and his words will ‘stir the hearts of those who employ the same catchwords as himself ’.

Eliot’s short counterblast goes on through three phases. He agrees with Russell that fear, which Russell sees as the force that propels religion, is generally a bad thing. But he urges that a skilled theologian would distinguish good from bad fear, and insists that a proper fear of God is a very different thing from fear of burglars, insolvency, or snakes. He does not specify any farther, but we can suppose him to have had in mind fear of God as some kind of remedy for existentialist fear, fear of rootlessness, the loss of bearings in an amoral and meaningless world.

Eliot goes on to point out that Russell’s arguments are all quite familiar. This is in a sense true, given that we have read Hume or Kant or Feuerbach, although few would claim to remember, as Eliot says he does, that the problem of the regress of causes, that Russell says he learned from Mill, ‘was put to me at the age of six, by a devoutly Catholic Irish nursemaid’. But if Eliot is right that Russell’s essay is not philosophically original, he is wrong to imply that arguments are any the worse for being familiar, as if they thereby lose their title to control our beliefs.

Finally, and far more importantly, Eliot claims that in these matters Russell ought to agree that it is not what you say, but how you behave, that counts, and hence that ‘Atheism is often merely a variety of Christianity’. There are many varieties of Atheism, Eliot says, such as the ‘High Church Atheism of Matthew Arnold’ or the ‘Tin Chapel Atheism of Mr. D. H. Lawrence’. Eliot winds up: ‘Just as Mr. Russell’s Radicalism in politics is merely a variety of Whiggery, so his non-Christianity is merely a variety of Low Church sentiment. That is why his pamphlet is a curious, and a pathetic, document’. Eliot’s polemic may seem perversely beside the point to the many humanists, agnostics, liberals and atheists who have been fortified by Russell’s essay for more than seventy-five years. But it deserves attention, not only because it heralds the vicissitudes Russell’s essay has had to undergo, but because in a number of respects it takes us closer to the modern world than does Russell. This does not mean that Eliot wins any intellectual argument—far from it—but that he well suggests the cultural atmosphere that would force Russell’s Enlightenment rationalism to struggle for air, and in some peoples’ minds would snuff it out for good.

So consider Eliot’s popular strategic point that if emotion leads people to religious belief, similarly emotion underlies rejection of it. At first sight this seems a neat rejoinder, hoisting Russell on his own petard. But on a second glance it is not quite as neat as it looks. We all of us believe countless propositions of the kind ‘there does not exist any . . .’: we believe that there does not exist any tooth-fairy, or any such person as Santa Claus, or Sherlock Holmes. Indeed, a belief in such things would be so outlandish, so contrary to what we take as central to our understandings of the world, to count as a delusion. And then, in the absence of a longer story, perhaps our only way of ‘getting inside’ the mind of the deluded would be to suppose them gripped by strong emotional forces, unconscious determinants of belief that speak only about the mind of the deluded, and not at all about what there might be in the world. It does not follow, and is not true that the ordinary state of mind, believing that there are no such things as those mentioned, requires a similar emotional explanation. On the contrary, it is entirely and satisfactorily explained by our sensitivity to the way of the world, in which there are no such things.

Although this is right as far as it goes, it does not take us to the heart of the matter. For given a consensus on what is obviously true, we will also find a consensus on whom to diagnose as victims of strange forces: those who believe otherwise. When Christianity was the consensus view, it was atheists who were put down as the victims of strange forces. The text ‘the fool hath said in his heart that there is no God’ was frequently taken to show that atheism was not so much an intellectually driven state, as a state of corruption, caused by the libertine atheist’s desire to escape his conscience. Given no consensus, but a debate between Christians and atheists, each side will advance the mechanism as an explanation of its opponent’s blindness. So the introduction of emotional diagnoses cannot advance the debate either way, unless, indeed, one side has what should neutrally be regarded as better diagnoses than the other.

However, Eliot hints at something much more radical. He seems to think that being a Christian is not a question of believing anything at all (that would make it mere superstition). He implies that it is purely a matter of having a certain emotional stance towards the world, and possibly towards some texts. At one point Eliot says of his old teacher at Harvard that ‘being a real Atheist (he) is at the same time essentially a most orthodox Christian’. This sounds merely paradoxical, for why not substitute ‘Buddhist’ or ‘Hindu’ or ‘Shi’ite’ or ‘Sunni’? Eliot must be talking of some shared emotion, a lowest common denominator of humanity that might be common to just about anyone, of whatever creed they claim to be. It is as if you could say: all religions (and atheism) preach Love, so let us identify them. This soggy ecumenicism is also part of the modern world. It would be nice as a solvent of religious conflict, but apart from anything else, it makes it impossible to understand the history of Christianity, where people cheerfully burned each other over whether there was any such thing as transubstantiation, an identity of substance between God and man, redemption by deeds or predestination.

For Russell it was a fairly simple matter to identify what Christians believe. At the minimum, they believe in God, and immortality, and believe that Christ was the best and wisest of men. It can be run through like a checklist. Where Russell takes pains to say what he means by a Christian, Eliot is wilfully loose about it. Eliot’s defence is that not your words, but only your behaviour counts. For Eliot, someone might say that they believe these things, or say that they do not. But the real question comes next, in seeing what they make of whichever words they choose. Russell, who at the time was certainly sympathetic to the view that a person’s mental life was wholly exhibited in their behaviour, is not very well placed to disagree with this. But it opens up the whole problem of interpretation or hermeneutics, for where, in the swirl of a person’s linguistic and non-linguistic behaviour, are there fixed points that tell us whether to interpret them as believing something or not? If, in spite of his victim’s strenuous denial, Eliot interprets Russell as a Low Churchman, what is to show that he is wrong? Again, a modern chord is struck, as determinate meaning disappears under a welter of conflicting interpretations.

But like the game with emotion, this is a game that two can play. If in turn Russell chooses to interpret Eliot as a cardcarrying atheist, who happens to take pleasure in reciting various words or visiting various buildings, what is to show that he is wrong? If indeterminacy rules, we can reverse Eliot’s paradox to describe him: like all orthodox Christians, he is at the same time essentially a real atheist. Russell distinguished three elements in a religion: a Church, a creed or set of doctrines, and religious feeling. It is well known that while he relentlessly attacked the Church as an organization, and maintained that religious creeds were simply unbelievable to any rational person, he himself not only admitted to religious feelings, but at various times of his life made them absolutely central to his sense of the world and his place in it. Well into old age he would lament the distance between what his intellect told him, and what emotionally he desired to believe:

I have always ardently desired to find some justification for the emotions inspired by certain things that seem to stand outside human life and to deserve feelings of awe. And so my instincts go with the humanists, but my emotions violently rebel. In this respect the “consolations of philosophy” are not for me.

Russell wrote of two reasons for which he entered philosophy: ‘The desire to find some knowledge that could be accepted as certainly true . . . and the desire to find some satisfaction for religious impulses’.5 Russell’s daughter, Katharine Tait wrote that ‘He was by temperament a profoundly religious man’.6 In his earlier years he wrote to his first wife Alys of his admiration for Spinoza, who preaches a ‘rich voluptuous asceticism based on a vast undefined mysticism’. 

In admitting to the feelings and their extreme importance, but denying the creed and condemning the organized Church, Russell opens himself to attack on another front. Why should not religious language be the best expression of religious feelings? That is surely what it is for. So the poet and literary critic in Eliot is bound to oppose the separation of feeling and expression that Russell innocently imposes (although that means that Eliot is inconsistent in championing the soggy ecumenicism identified above, since atheists certainly express themselves differently from Christians and the rest).

If feeling and expression are one, religious feelings just are the feelings about life, fate, memory, and loss, that get expressed in the finest religious writings. And if behaviour gives meaning to words, the continued life of those writings is just the life of the Churches which disseminate them and keep and refresh their meaning by investing them with due continuity with the past, due solemnity and ritual. If religion is seen as a seamless practice, Russell’s analytic distinctions cannot stand. They betray the essential unity of feeling, words, and rituals that make up a religious stance towards the world. On such a view the words ‘I know that my Redeemer liveth’ do not so much say anything true or false, but have whatever meaning is invested in singing them, or singing them in church, at Christmas. Neither Russell nor any atheist before him foresaw such an account. However, even if it were a correct account of what religious ‘believers’ are doing, Russell would still be able to deploy his genuine, and severe, moral reasons for opposing them. The rituals and words are not self-contained expressions of feeling, but also the harbingers of prohibition and persecution.

We can see Eliot’s quarrel with Russell as a foretaste of modernity’s long problem with the Enlightenment. Russell stands on reason, belief, truth, science, and analysis, with feeling and emotion being only unfortunate, if strangely important, outriders. Russell thinks religious beliefs are simple beliefs, to be tried at the bar of probability, science, logic, and history, and when tried they are to be found wanting. Eliot classes them with poetry, feeling, emotion, expression, and tradition, while rationality and science, analysis, and probability, are exiled to the margins.

The battle over interpretation is still being fought in our own times, as religious ideologies again contest for the minds even of the educated West. One of the glorious things about Russell’s lecture is the clarity with which he took up one position on the battleground. Anyone taking a different position has to meet him head on, which will require better arguments than Eliot managed to muster.

Simon Blackburn

University of Cambridge, 2003

附录二 《为什么我不是基督教徒》再版前言商务印书馆译文

《泰晤士报》曾在伦敦报道过1927年3月初的那些平静的日子。在英国中部诸郡，追猎只不过是件普通的事情，但是在伦敦，追查匿名电话，却有希望找回属于布鲁斯·伊斯梅夫人的那条被人偷走的价值2万英镑的项链。花73英镑10先令，教会旅游者俱乐部就会把你带到巴勒斯坦、埃及、雅典和君士坦丁堡。有许多招聘客厅侍女的广告，但几乎没有关于教会游的广告，因为不算豪华的教会游的价格相当于整整一年的薪水。许多给《泰晤士报》主编的信都谈到有人所提议的对祈祷书的改造；的确，诺里奇的主教举行了一个关于这种改造的专门会议（“主持会议的H. R. 阿代尔准将说，人们要的不是一本新的祈祷书，而是一本戒律书”）。一些教会事件被广泛地报道。

《泰晤士报》唯一没有公之于众的事件大概就是3月6日全国世俗协会南部伦敦分会在巴特西市政厅举行的星期日演讲，而且它后来对此也没有报道。这篇演讲就是《为什么我不是基督教徒》，它是伯特兰·罗素关于宗教的许多著作中最著名、最率直的著作。

将罗素的那篇演讲以及后来关于宗教的著作斥为肤浅、鄙俗、不能达到论题的深处，一直是件时髦的事情。其实，罗素那屈尊俯就的傲慢态度就表明，如果宗教只是迷信的话，那么罗素的话大概应该是中肯的。但宗教不是迷信，罗素的话并不中肯。最早的这种抨击来自同年8月刚刚成为宗教徒的T. S. 艾略特，见于他主编的杂志《标准月刊》。因为艾略特几乎预料到了后来的批判，我将像他提出各种问题那样集中精力探讨这些问题。

艾略特抓住罗素的话：“我认为，人们接受宗教的真实原因同论证根本没有什么关系。他们接受宗教是由于情感的原因。”艾略特说：“尽管他没有明确地说他自己的宗教也完全是以情感为基础，但是我确信他会承认这一点。”艾略特鄙夷地援引罗素用以结束其演讲的那番动情的话，引用结束语“我们应该自立，客观公正地观察世界……用智慧征服世界，而不是一味奴隶般地慑服于世界……”，轻蔑地说，罗素很喜欢站起来而不是坐下，他的话会“打动使用和他本人相同的时髦语的那些人的心”。

艾略特短暂的强烈反对经历了三个阶段。他同意罗素的看法，认为恐惧（罗素把它看作是推进宗教的力量）一般说来是件坏事。但是他强调，有经验的神学家会把好的恐惧与坏的恐惧区分开来，并坚持认为，对上帝的适当畏惧是一件与对盗贼、破产或蛇的畏惧大不一样的事情。他没有作任何进一步的详细说明，但我们可以猜想到，他把对上帝的畏惧当成了消除存在主义的恐惧，亦即对无限性、在一个没有是非观念且毫无意义的世界里迷失方向的恐惧的某种方法。

艾略特进而指出，罗素的论证全都很常见。这在某种意义上是真实的，如若我们读过休谟、康德或费尔巴哈的著作的话，然而几乎没有人会宣称，自己也像艾略特所说的那样，记得原因倒推问题（罗素说，这个问题他是从穆勒那里获知的）“是我六岁时一个虔诚地信奉天主教的爱尔兰保姆向我提出的”。但是，即使艾略特是对的，因为罗素的文章没有哲学上的原创性，艾略特暗示论证因为常见而有一点儿不太好，好像它们因此丧失了支配我们的信仰的权利似的，却是错的。

最后，更为重要得多的是，艾略特宣称，罗素应当承认，重要的不是你说些什么，而是你是怎么做的，因而“无神论往往只是各种基督教教义”。艾略特说，有许多种无神论，例如“马修·阿诺德的高教会派无神论”或“D. H. 劳伦斯先生的马口铁壁龛无神论”。艾略特最后说：“正如罗素先生政治上的激进主义只是各种辉格党党义一样，他的非基督教精神也只是各种低教会派感情。这就是为什么他的小册子是一个古怪而又乏味的文件的原因。”艾略特的抨击似乎可以反常地与在长达七十五年多的时间里受过罗素的文章鼓舞的许多人本主义者、不可知论者、自由主义者、无神论者无关。但是艾略特的抨击值得关注，这不仅是因为它预示罗素的文章不得不经历的变迁的来临，而且还因为在许多方面，它比罗素更使我们接近于现代世界。这并不意味着艾略特在任何一场理智辩论中赢得了胜利（远非如此），而是意味着他令人满意地暗示了这样一种文化氛围：它会迫使罗素的启蒙理性主义为空气而斗争，而且在某些人看来，它会使罗素的启蒙理性主义永远灭绝。

所以考虑一下艾略特的那个通俗的重要论点：如果情感使得人们接受宗教信仰的话，那么情感同样也为拒斥宗教信仰提供根据。乍看起来这似乎是个巧妙的回答，使罗素搬起石头砸自己的脚。但是看第二眼时它就完全不像初看上去那样巧妙了。我们大家都相信“不存在任何……”这种多得不计其数的命题：我们相信，不存在任何牙仙子，或者，任何像圣诞老人或福尔摩斯这样的人。的确，对于这种事物的相信也许非常稀奇古怪，在很大程度上同我们视之为我们对世界的理解的主要部分相反，可算得上是一种欺骗。另外，在没有长篇小说的情况下，我们“进入”被骗者心灵的唯一方法就是假定他们为各种强大的情感力量，即信仰的各种无意识决定因素所控制，信仰的这些无意识决定因素只讲被骗者的心灵，根本不讲世界上会有什么。因此不能得出以下错误的结论：相信不存在像上面所提到的那些人物这样的事物的普通心态，需要一种类似的情感解释。相反，它完全而且令人满意地为我们对世道常情的敏感性所解释，世界上不存在这样的事物。

虽然就目前情况来说，这是正确的，但它并没有使我们认真考虑事情的实质。因为有了对于显然是真实的东西的一致意见，我们也会发现对于可将其诊断为奇特力量受害者的那种人的一致意见：他们相信其他的东西。当基督教是那种一致意见时，被认为是奇特力量受害者的就是无神论者。“愚顽人心里说：‘没有上帝’”这句经文常常被用来证明：无神论与其说是一种理智上的不得已状态，还不如说是由于持自由思想的无神论者想要逃脱自己的良心而造成的一种堕落状态。假若没有一致意见，但却有基督教徒与无神论者之间的辩论，双方都会用机械论来解释对方的愚昧。所以，情感诊断的引入并不能对任何一方的辩论有所促进，除非一方确实拥有那种应当被不偏不倚地看作是比另一方更好的诊断的东西。

然而，艾略特暗示某种更为激进得多的东西。他似乎认为，做一个基督教徒根本不是一个相信什么的问题（那会使相信什么只是成为迷信）。他的意思是说，这纯粹是个对世界，而且可能是对一些经文持某种情感态度的问题。有一次，艾略特在哈佛大学谈到他那年迈的老师时说：“（他）是个真正的无神论者，同时实质上也是个最正统的基督教徒。”这听起来绝对荒谬，为什么不用“佛教徒”、“印度教徒”、“什叶派教徒”或“逊尼派教徒”来代替呢？艾略特准是在谈论某种共有的情感，亦即可能是几乎任何人——不管他们声称具有什么信念——都共有的一种人性的最低共同点。似乎你们可以说：一切宗教（以及无神论）都宣扬爱，所以让我们对它们加以辨认。这种乏味的普世教会主义也是现代世界的一部分。它也许像解决宗教冲突的方法一样讨人喜欢，但是除了其他什么事情以外，它使得了解基督教的历史成为不可能，在基督教的历史上，人们曾因是否有圣餐变体、上帝与人之间的实体同一、行动救赎或命定这种事情而情绪激奋地相互处以火刑。

对于罗素来说，辨认基督教徒所相信的东西是件相当简单的事情。至少，他们信仰上帝、灵魂不朽，相信基督是最优秀、最有智慧的人。它不像清单一样可以浏览。罗素耐心地解说他所说的基督教徒的含义，而艾略特在这方面偏偏很随意。艾略特辩解说，重要的不是你的言辞，而只是你的行为。在艾略特看来，某个人可能会说他们相信这些东西，或者可能会说他们不相信这些东西。但是接下来在察看他们对自己选择的那种言辞所作的解释时，则出现了真正的问题。那时候，罗素肯定是赞同这样一种观点的：一个人的精神生活完全展现在其行为之中。现在人们并没有非常清楚地看出他不同意这种观点。但是它揭示了解释或解释学的整个问题，因为在一个人的语言行为和非语言行为的旋涡中，哪里有叫我们或者把他们看作是相信某个东西，或者把他们看作是不相信某个东西的那些固定点？如果，不管其受害者竭力否认，艾略特还是把罗素看作是低教会派信徒，那么，什么可以证明他是错的呢？当明确的意思消失在一大堆相互抵牾的解释之中时，现代之弦再次被敲响。

但是像情感游戏一样，这是一种两人能玩的游戏。如果反过来，罗素想把艾略特看作是一个彻底的无神论者，而这个无神论者刚好喜欢背诵各种各样的话语，或者喜欢参观各种各样的建筑物，那么，什么可以证明他是错的呢？如果不确定性规则可以证明他是错的，那么，我们就能把艾略特悖论颠倒过来描述他：像所有正统的基督教徒一样，他同时实质上是一个真正的无神论者。

罗素曾区分宗教中的三个要素：教会、信条或一套教义、宗教感情。众所周知，虽然他毫不留情地抨击作为一个组织的教会，并坚持认为宗教信条对于任何一个有推理能力的人来说简直是不可相信的，但他自己却不但承认宗教感情，而且在其一生中的许多时期都使它们成为对于他的世界观念和他在世界中的地位来说乃是绝对重要的东西。完全进入老年后，他总是悲叹他的理智所告诉他的东西与他在情感上想要相信的东西之间的距离：

我总是非常想为由某些似乎存在于人类生活之外，而且似乎应当有敬畏感的事物所激发的情感，找一些正当的理由。所以，我的直觉与人本主义者相同，但我的情感却激烈反抗。在这方面，“哲学的慰藉”对我并不适用。

罗素曾撰文叙述他从事哲学研究的两个缘由：“希望找到某种能够被公认为无疑是真正的知识……希望找到宗教冲动方面的某种乐趣”。罗素的女儿凯瑟琳·泰特写道：“从秉性上说，他是个极度虔诚的人”。他早年曾写信给他第一任妻子艾丽丝，说他很钦佩斯宾诺莎，因为斯宾诺莎宣传一种“建立在一种广泛的、未下定义的神秘主义基础上的富有的、骄奢淫逸的禁欲主义”。

由于承认感情及其极端的重要性，但却否定信条并谴责有组织的教会，罗素使自己易于在另外一条战线上招人抨击。宗教语言为什么不应当是宗教感情的最好表达？那确实是它所适合的东西。所以，艾略特著作中的诗人和文学评论家必然会反对罗素幼稚地强行将感情与表达割裂开来的做法（尽管那意味着艾略特并不是一贯拥护上面所辨认的那种乏味的普世教会主义，因为无神论者表达自己思想的方式无疑与基督教徒以及其他的人不一样）。

如果感情与表达是一回事，那么，宗教感情就是最好的宗教著作中所表达的关于生命、命运、记忆和丧失的感情。而如果行动使得言辞具有意义，那么，这些著作的持续生命只是散播这些著作并通过赋予它们以适当的历史连续性、适当的庄严和仪式来保留和更新它们的意义的那些教会的生命。如果宗教被看作是一种天衣无缝的实践，那么，罗素的那些分析区别就站不住脚。它们显示出感情、言辞和构成对世界虔诚的态度的仪式本质上的统一。根据这种看法，“我知道我的救赎主活着”这句经文并不是完全说真话或说假话，而是具有在圣诞节唱这句经文（或在教堂里唱这句经文）时所赋予它的任何意义。无论是罗素，还是他之前的无神论者，都没有预见到这种表述。然而，即使它是关于虔诚的“信徒”所正在做的事情的正确表述，罗素也许还是能够使自己反对他们的真正而又严肃的道德理由发挥作用。仪式和言辞不是感情的含蓄表达，但却也是禁止和迫害的预兆。

我们可以把艾略特与罗素的争执看作是预先探讨现代性的那个关于启蒙的长期争论的问题。罗素怀着只是不幸的（即便是异常重要的）前导的感情和情感，强调理性、信仰、真理、科学和分析。罗素认为宗教信仰是简单的信仰，要受或然性、科学、逻辑和历史的审查，而审查后，它们可能会被发现不合格。艾略特把它们与诗歌、感情、情感、表达、传统归为一类，而合理性、科学、分析和或然性却被放逐到边缘。

因为宗教思想再次甚至争夺有教养的西方的有才智之士，所以在我们所处的这个时代，关于解释的论战仍然在进行。罗素的演讲有一些值得称道的东西，其中之一是他在战场上采取一种态度时所表现出来的那种明确性。凡是持不同立场的人不得不与他正面交锋，这往往需要比艾略特设法搜集的更加充足的论据。

西蒙·布莱克本

2003年于剑桥大学