Twelve Rules for Life

 

I have not read Peterson’s Twelve Rules for Life. I do not intend to read it. So it is no doubt iunfair of me to criticise it. But its subtitle to my mind tells the story: “An Antidote to Chaos.” This is why I will not read it, and surely I can criticize the assumptions implicit in that subtitle.

It is, in the end, a book on ethics—that’s what “rules for life” means. It therefore seeks to replace traditional ethical codes, like the Ten Commandments.

This already sinister, and this is the problem with psychology in general: it substitutes random thoughts for religion. This is dangerous. “Psyche” means soul; the real, tried and true, wisdom concerning the soul, developed and preserved over millennia, is religion. “Scientific” psychology, by contrast, is never going to be as reliable. It claims to be superior as “science,” yet it has no scientific basis. The soul cannot be seen through a microscope. It is always only one guy expressing his opinions. Religion, by contrast, is the accumulated wisdom of the best minds over many generations.

And the real attraction of psychology to those who subscribe to it is not that it is “scientific” or more reliable. No serious student of the matter could think so. Its attraction is that it promises to dodge the traditional ethical demands. It is not “judgemental.” It accepts and promotes free sex, for just one example, and considers any guilt feelings bad. So those with a guilty conscience will cling to it, and with a fierce devotion never seen among the religious defending their faith. 

The subtitle makes it clear that Peterson is doing this here. The goal of his rules, of his proposed ethics, is avoiding chaos rather than doing good or avoiding evil.

Avoiding chaos is not a worthy goal. It sounds good, but sometimes order is not desirable. New ideas emerge from and create chaos. Have you ever seen a photograph of Einstein’s desk at Princeton? Push order as prime directive, and everything comes to a dead stop. The garden dies.

Reputedly, Peterson also identifies chaos with the feminine, and order with the masculine. He refers to chaos as “the eternal feminine.” He claims, apparently, that this is not his idea; it is a consistent association in world myth.

But it is not. Peterson has apparently not studied world myth that deeply. As is typically the case with psychologists; their knowledge is superficial, and they latch on to one or two motifs that seem to them to confirm their pre-existing ideas. Freud’s complete inversion of the story of Oedipus for his “Oedipus Complex” being the most famous example. 

In China, the dragon, lung, masculine, represents the Emperor. The phoenix, feng, feminine, represents the Empress. The dragon is the unbridled forces of nature. The phoenix is the bridle: grace and order. The feminine civilizes the masculine energy.

The very personification of order, and the moral order, in Greek mythology, is Dike, and she is feminine. Conversely, Zeus, the principle male deity in the Greek pantheon, is the storm god: an image of chaos. Who, not incidentally, cannot keep his fly zipped.

In the legend of Gilgamesh, the world’s first known epic, Enkidu, the wild man, is civilized by his first encounter with a woman.

In the Jewish and Christian tradition, Logos, order itself, is identified with Sophia, wisdom—and Sophia is always personified as feminine. As she is in the Hindu tradition as well—as the goddess Sarasvati.

Reading psychology is generally a way to get lost in the weeds. It is perhaps the leading cause of mental illness. Arguably, mental illness is entirely a product of psychology. Peterson, although he seems to be taking baby steps towards a more religious view, is still a false prophet.

The tragic thing is that the popularity of the book, and of Peterson, shows there is a tremendous thirst for spiritual guidance. And Peterson and his book are leading these poor vulnerable souls astray.