The values assumed by the author of this essay are so far removed from my own that it would be useless to attempt to engage it on its own terms in this forum, but I do find this piece interesting from the perspective of an anthropological study of language. Graham's criteria for heresy are :
"(1) that it takes priority over the question of truth or falsity,
and (2) that it outweighs everything else the speaker has done."
This obviously has nothing to do with the classical conception of heresy most pronounced in the Christian tradition, which is well-defined and well-documented. Anyone with intellectual honesty can discover on their own that "heresy" simply denotes teaching that is markedly false in virtue of being contrary to dogmatic teaching, almost the opposite of what is implied in point (1).
Based on many of the underlying assumptions in this piece, I think it would be entirely fair to describe Graham as some kind of liberal. This is evidently something he would bemoan me doing (see: the bit about "x-ism" in discourse), but the ideas expressed, the value-judgments made, and the characterizations of medieval Europe made in this piece are by no means original or historically-unprecedented.
The liberal or perhaps whiggish historiography (a conception of history, in this case, in terms of the degree of negative liberty allotted to individuals not only by the state but the body politic as a whole) implicit in this piece appears at least prima facie to lead to its author's either mistaken characterization or perhaps purposeful recharacterization of the notion of "heresy". Liberalism ad absurdem would, in performance, consider a classical conception of "heresy" nonsensical, because it assumes the truthhood of a dogmatic teaching which isn't immediately obvious to everyone. However there is something that, at least if pushed on it enough, no one will deny without performative contradiction, and that is that certain things are good and true, and others not. No systematic thought can be non-dogmatic, because the dogmatic rejection of dogmas is a dogma (it is, in truth, only the dogmatic rejection of dogmas existing in some form on the present world-stage). Of course, the dogmas of the varieties of liberalism are, more or less, incompatible with orthodox Christianity, which popularized the term "heraese" in the Latin West, and this accounts for the different notion of "heresy", which appears to me now as a corpse of a term, once mostly denoting false teaching, now emphasizing the persecutory aspect of espousing teaching contrary to certain dogmas. Similarly, "paganus" once referred to a rural, bucolic person in the Roman Empire, and through pejorative use by Christians simply began to denote those who practiced the religion common among the rural Romans. Now, the so-called "neopagan" movement self-identify as such, appropriating the term entirely. I have also witnessed the phenomenon of some "far-right" people I know crying about being labeled "fascists" because they were not "fascists" as defined in the doctrinal document ghost-authored by Gentile, but then years later willingly adopted the term, accepting that the nuanced differences between their worldview and the IFP's were negligible from the perspective of people who use the term "fascist" pejoratively. I think a similar thing is going on here with the use of "heresy". The author clearly believes that the dominant thought-forms during the middle ages are "antiquated" (his word), and because the differences between traditions with different declared dogmas probably appear to him negligible from the perspective of his values and historiography, the only thing the word "heresy" signals to him is the mere existence of socially-imposed consequences for expressing this or that belief.
Quite fascinating how we, as a species, use language.
"(1) that it takes priority over the question of truth or falsity, and (2) that it outweighs everything else the speaker has done."
This obviously has nothing to do with the classical conception of heresy most pronounced in the Christian tradition, which is well-defined and well-documented. Anyone with intellectual honesty can discover on their own that "heresy" simply denotes teaching that is markedly false in virtue of being contrary to dogmatic teaching, almost the opposite of what is implied in point (1).
Based on many of the underlying assumptions in this piece, I think it would be entirely fair to describe Graham as some kind of liberal. This is evidently something he would bemoan me doing (see: the bit about "x-ism" in discourse), but the ideas expressed, the value-judgments made, and the characterizations of medieval Europe made in this piece are by no means original or historically-unprecedented.
The liberal or perhaps whiggish historiography (a conception of history, in this case, in terms of the degree of negative liberty allotted to individuals not only by the state but the body politic as a whole) implicit in this piece appears at least prima facie to lead to its author's either mistaken characterization or perhaps purposeful recharacterization of the notion of "heresy". Liberalism ad absurdem would, in performance, consider a classical conception of "heresy" nonsensical, because it assumes the truthhood of a dogmatic teaching which isn't immediately obvious to everyone. However there is something that, at least if pushed on it enough, no one will deny without performative contradiction, and that is that certain things are good and true, and others not. No systematic thought can be non-dogmatic, because the dogmatic rejection of dogmas is a dogma (it is, in truth, only the dogmatic rejection of dogmas existing in some form on the present world-stage). Of course, the dogmas of the varieties of liberalism are, more or less, incompatible with orthodox Christianity, which popularized the term "heraese" in the Latin West, and this accounts for the different notion of "heresy", which appears to me now as a corpse of a term, once mostly denoting false teaching, now emphasizing the persecutory aspect of espousing teaching contrary to certain dogmas. Similarly, "paganus" once referred to a rural, bucolic person in the Roman Empire, and through pejorative use by Christians simply began to denote those who practiced the religion common among the rural Romans. Now, the so-called "neopagan" movement self-identify as such, appropriating the term entirely. I have also witnessed the phenomenon of some "far-right" people I know crying about being labeled "fascists" because they were not "fascists" as defined in the doctrinal document ghost-authored by Gentile, but then years later willingly adopted the term, accepting that the nuanced differences between their worldview and the IFP's were negligible from the perspective of people who use the term "fascist" pejoratively. I think a similar thing is going on here with the use of "heresy". The author clearly believes that the dominant thought-forms during the middle ages are "antiquated" (his word), and because the differences between traditions with different declared dogmas probably appear to him negligible from the perspective of his values and historiography, the only thing the word "heresy" signals to him is the mere existence of socially-imposed consequences for expressing this or that belief.
Quite fascinating how we, as a species, use language.