The Gospel According to an Atheist -- Ayn Rand

There is no escape from justice, nothing can be unearned and unpaid for in the universe, neither in mater nor in spirit -- and if the guilty do not pay, then the innocent have to pay it.

-- Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged

Pretty profound for an atheist who believed that man is an end unto himself. It's weird and sad that someone could have this kind of a grasp on justice and reject the work of Christ on the cross.

Here is Ayn Rand's philosophy in a nutshell (this is taken from www.aynrand.org):

My [Ayn Rand's] philosophy, Objectivism, holds that:

1. Reality exists as an objective absolute—facts are facts, independent of man's feelings, wishes, hopes or fears.

2. Reason (the faculty which identifies and integrates the material provided by man's senses) is man's only means of perceiving reality, his only source of knowledge, his only guide to action, and his basic means of survival.

3. Man—every man—is an end in himself, not the means to the ends of others. He must exist for his own sake, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself. The pursuit of his own rational self-interest and of his own happiness is the highest moral purpose of his life.

4. The ideal political-economic system is laissez-faire capitalism. It is a system where men deal with one another, not as victims and executioners, nor as masters and slaves, but as traders, by free, voluntary exchange to mutual benefit. It is a system where no man may obtain any values from others by resorting to physical force, and no man may initiate the use of physical force against others. The government acts only as a policeman that protects man's rights; it uses physical force only in retaliation and only against those who initiate its use, such as criminals or foreign invaders. In a system of full capitalism, there should be (but, historically, has not yet been) a complete separation of state and economics, in the same way and for the same reasons as the separation of state and church.

Translated simply:

1. "Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed" or "Wishing won't make it so."
2. "You can't eat your cake and have it, too."
3. "Man is an end in himself."
4. "Give me liberty or give me death."

Rand states,

"If you held these concepts with total consistency, as the base of your convictions, you would have a full philosophical system to guide the course of your life."

Let's look at this from a Biblical worldview:

Look at point one:

"Reality exists as an objective absolute—facts are facts, independent of man's feelings, wishes, hopes or fears."

As Christians we know that reality is the revealed will of God, and that in Christ our very existence is maintained by His power.

"He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of His nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of His power." - Hebrews 1:3

Despite our feelings, wishes, hopes and fears that God not exist, or that Christ not be Lord, or that some other arrangement be made between God and humans, the facts are facts, independent of our feelings, wishes, hopes or fears. God is who He says He is in the Bible, we must deal with that.


Consider point two:

"Reason (the faculty which identifies and integrates the material provided by man's senses) is man's only means of perceiving reality, his only source of knowledge, his only guide to action, and his basic means of survival."

For the man without Christ this reasoning is limited to his own cognitive ability. He is trapped inside His own mind and left to grapple with the heavy issues of life with ultimately only his own spirit to counsel him.

"For who knows a person's thoughts except the spirit of that person which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. - 1 Corinthians 2:11

The company of many friends and advisers can offer little solace as he is left alone with his thoughts, unable to fully communicate them given the faculties naturally available to us.

So if our only means of perceiving reality is through reason, and reason is limited to our own cognitive ability, then we truly are each an island, and possibly and end unto ourself, but the Bible goes on to reveal to us something peculiar about our cognitive abilities within the body of Christ:

"12 Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God. 13 And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual.
14 The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. 15 The spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one. 16 “For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ." -- 1 Corinthians 2:12-16

So we can affirm Rand's premise that reason is the means by which we perceive reality, however we must realize that as a Christian our ability to reason is supernaturally expanded by the work of the Holy Spirit enabling us to accept and understand the truths of God. And we can also see how a great mind like Ayn Rand could cognitively develop a very solid philosophy based on reason and yet totally miss the importance of the Cross and regard it as foolishness.

In her own words:

"Philosophy is the goal toward which religion was only a helplessly blind groping." -- Ayn Rand

Look at point three:

"Man is an end in himself."

From the viewpoint that reality is objectively determined solely based on your ability to cognitively interpret it (which is actually pretty subjective), then it only makes sense that this cognitive interpretation in its purest sense would and must seek to preserve and enjoy the self.

The Westminster Catechism says that the chief end of man is to "glorify God and to enjoy Him forever". John Piper in the book Desiring God would only change this to say that the chief end of man is to "glorify God BY enjoying Him forever". Both see man experiencing joy forever. Rand states:

"The pursuit of his own rational self-interest and of his own happiness is the highest moral purpose of his life."

The key phrase being "rational self-interest". If we remember that the Christian has the cognitive ability of the Holy Spirit, it is not hard to see then that the rational self-interest of the Christian would be to pursue joy through the method that we have discovered to provide an infinite supply of it, the Glorification of God. It is what we were created and are commanded by our creator to do, there is no more reasonable rational self-interest than this.

"You make known to me the path of life;in your presence there is fullness of joy;at your right hand are pleasures forevermore." -- Psalms 16:11

Finally, to the politics:

"The ideal political-economic system is laissez-faire capitalism."

This should be simple enough to understand, it's simply the Golden Rule,

"So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets." -- Mathew 7:12

I still like reading Ayn Rand, and it is sad to me that she was not a Christian. I suppose that the comfort and logical soundness of her philosophical system can become a sort of trap because it seems to work so well, however it collapses on itself with the simple realization that the Bible is true.

[below added 03/30/2010]
I can perfectly relate to John Piper's reminiscing as he marked the 50th anniversary of Atlas Shrugged:

I was attracted and repulsed. I admired and cried. I was blown away with powerful statements of what I believed, and angered that she shut herself up in what Jonathan Edwards called the infinite provincialism of atheism. Her brand of hedonism was so close to my Christian Hedonism and yet so far—like a satellite that comes close to the gravitational pull of truth and then flings off into the darkness of outer space.

Rand particularly impressed upon me the reality of Justice in the universe, yet she rejected God. Ultimately her definition of Justice was subjectively based, although she didn't see it that way because her premise for reality was wrong. Ayn Rand said in Atlas Shrugged:

Contradictions do not exist. Whenever you think you are facing a contradiction, check your premises. You will find that one of them is wrong.

I wish she would have taken her own advise and checked her premises on her description of reality and realized that without a Holy God to stand apart and the standard for Justice and righteousness then objective truth is ultimately not attainable. The ultimate stumbling stone in coming to this conclusion is that the only way for the justice of a sovereign God to be satisfied would be through the execution of an infinite punishment for sin. Since it would be impossible for us to bear this punishment and live, most simply reject the idea of a just God, or the idea of human beings short of God's glory, instead of embracing the truth of the work of Christ on the Cross.