Why Traditionalists Can Never Agree, and a Solution

There is a scandal of traditionalists, like the scandal of the philosophers. Philosophers say that they are the ones who really want truth, but philosophers can never agree on what this is; they disagree more than most. Similarly, traditionalists say that they are the ones following the wisdom of the past, but they can never agree on what that is; they disagree quite a lot as well. Both sets of arguments are often apparently interminable.

There are at least two reasons I can see for why this happens.

1. Because of aspects of traditionalist epistemology.

Through individual reasoning, traditionalists often come to the conclusion that tradition is an extremely important part of human practice and thought, a part that is essential for acting and thinking correctly. There is no contradiction in doing so--but our own theory, surely, predicts that we will disagree with each other on other matters because human reason can come up with very different, very random answers when trying to figure things out for itself. We disagree because, outside of any particular tradition, humans are doomed to disagree.

2. Because of our lack of orthopraxy.

Advocates of traditionalism, I would wager, tend not to be in communities practicing the things of which they speak. Conversations not thus grounded in reality, when the things of which one argues will not necessarily influence the world at all, tend to become frivolous, random, and unreal--the sort of thing philosophy students begin to bat around when they talk about being a philosopher king. When speaking about practical matters, you need a practical context; otherwise what you are speaking about tends to float off into the skies. Thus we can jaw and jaw and jaw all day, and not do much of anything--this is the perfect catalyst for pointless arguments.

Additionally, traditionalists not only are not in communities and traditions--we are not in the same communities and traditions. Being in the same community both provides the incentive to not argue stupidly about unessential details, but also provides the context of the argument and clarifies details that would otherwise be obscure. Without this context it is hard even to know what one is arguing about, or whether one actually agrees with one's opponent, or would agree with one's opponent if one knew their circumstances fully.

The solution to all of the problems above, of course, would attack the root of all of them: the fact that we are not in a community and not in a tradition. Sadly, this is difficult. The good is difficult. But it is the only solution that a rigorously traditional traditionalist can accept, so far as I see.