[MF] MoQ and theism

[MarshaV]

Kevin,

Here is a response to you from DMB written in November.

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Kevin and all MOQers:

Kevin asked:
Is the MOQ an anti-theistic system?  Please support your answer with 
an appropriate citation from ZMM and/or Lila.

dmb replies:
The following Pirsig quotes have been extracted from chapter six of 
Anthony McWatt's book. They are also known as the Copleston annotations.

180 "The MOQ supports religion but does not support many Christian traditions."

193 "Quality is nature. The MOQ says there is no spiritual principle 
in man that makes knowledge possible. Nature does the whole job."

208 "The MOQ would add a fourth stage where the term "God" is 
completely dropped as a relic of an evil social suppression of 
intellectual and Dynamic freedom. The MOQ is not just atheistic in 
this regard. It is anti-theistic."

216 "Faith is not required for an understanding of Quality. Here 
Quality succeeds where Bradley's Absolute and Hegel's Being and the 
Buddhist Nothingness and the Hindu Oneness and the theists' God and 
Allah and you-name-it, all of them fail. For Quality, no faith is 
required because there is no way you can disbelieve that there is 
such a thing as quality. You cannot conceive of or live in a world in 
which nothing is better than anything else."

228 "The MOQ does not rest on faith. In the MOQ faith is very low 
quality stuff, a willingness to believe falsehoods."

235 "When you hear the words 'spirit' and 'faith' always look for a 
traditional religionist trying to sneak his goods in the back door. 
...like the positivists, the MOQ drops spirit and faith, cold."

Thanks for asking,
dmb