In his masterful 1937 book The Road to Wigan Pier, George Orwell charts the emergence of his political conscience. As a young man, Orwell spent five years in Burma as an Indian Imperial Police officer and witnessed the dark side of imperial rule. Remembering his time in Burma, he wrote: “In order to hate imperialism you have got to be part of it. Seen from the outside the British rule in India appears—indeed, it is—benevolent and even necessary…But it is not possible to be a part of such a system without recognizing it as an unjustifiable tyranny.”
That sentiment is perhaps true for many malign cultural forces. For those who are victims of such forces, tyranny is easiest to spot. For instance, America’s greatest civil rights leaders, ranging from Fredrick Douglass to Martin Luther King Jr., were entangled in the system of slavery and the Jim Crow South, respectively. Yet even those who are not victims, but placed innocently within such systems, have Orwell-like moments of awakening. The chief motivator for John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath, for example, was his extensive interviews of marginalized migrant families in California’s San Joaquin Valley.
In modern America, we are (thankfully) free from slavery or rampant poverty. But a different kind of “unjustifiable tyranny” lurks around every corner—in my view, political polarization—which, I think, is the principal challenge plaguing America today. And for those who occupy anywhere but the fringe, I am willing to wager that you hate it, like Orwell, because you are involuntarily part of it.
The dangers of political polarization are well-documented. Among elected leaders, polarization can result in gridlock (if party lines are split) or careening (if one side disproportionately controls governmental bodies). Among citizens, it craters social trust—as groups tend toward a battle of “us” versus “them”—and, in the worst cases, erodes democratic institutions and spurs violence. The Roman Empire, for instance, collapsed in no small part from partisan division.
I am not suggesting that America is on the precipice of collapse. Quite the opposite: I am a firm believer in our institutions, and, moreover, the virtue of those who occupy the center. Yet the data on polarization is growing troublesome.
In an analysis from 2003 to 2023, Gallup found that the partisan gap on key issues has widened to worrying degrees. In only 20 years, an additional 50 percent gap emerged over whether the federal government has too much power; an additional 33 percent gap over whether human activity causes global warming; an additional 30 percent gap over whether abortion should be legal in every circumstance; and an additional 29 percent gap over whether immigration should be decreased. Even among elected leaders, the center of each party has inched closer to the fringes between the 1980s and 2018.
Yet America’s polarization extends beyond policy issues. When social trust breaks down between neighbors who hold differing views, conspiracy theories can run rampant. Most recently, The Economist covered the partisan takes on the attempted assassination of former president Donald Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania. Some on the left speculated that the shooting was a clever ploy to boost Mr. Trump’s poll numbers, while some on the right speculated that it was an inside job by a “deep state” fearful of Mr. Trump’s reelection. Both sides, in their partisanship, chalked up what was almost certainly operational incompetence to malice toward the other side.
But for the moment, I plan to depart from the contemporary—lest readers be burdened with another dull think piece on today’s state of affairs. As an economic historian by trade, with a keen professional interest in theology, I am averse to new-age solutions to contemporary problems. Instead, I think most solutions to cultural woes have, in hindsight, been unearthed by our ancestors. To the question of polarization, then, I wish to detail an unlikely source: the book of Exodus. It provides us with eternal truths for navigating today’s plight that can be enjoyed by secular and religious citizens.
On Sacrifice
Exodus, the second book of the Torah, is deeply ingrained into the American canon. The Israelites’ escape from the Egyptians toward the promised land has inspired many groups who struggled for freedom. James Russell Lowell, a nineteenth-century American poet, likened the story of the Pilgrims to Exodus. The first proposed seal of the United States pictured Moses leading the Israelites to freedom. And the story of Moses was a prominent theme during the Antebellum period, as heroes like Harriet Tubman ushered African Americans out of slavery’s tyranny via the Underground Railroad.
As evidenced by the above groups, most analyses of Exodus envision the story as the eternal human battle between tyranny and freedom. Across the book, Moses frees the Israelites from the tyrannical might of the Egyptian Pharaoh—only to find that utter (and terrifying) freedom rests in the barren desert. For the next 40 years, the Israelites are tested on whether they can cope with their newfound freedom, and whether they can move toward a better sense of nourishment en route to the promised land. In the end, the Israelites learn that they must sacrifice their old, sinful ways for a better future.
For Muslims, Jews, and Christians, the religious significance is obvious: the spirit of God has the power and potential to pull one out of tyranny, but the test is not to die of spiritual thirst in the “free” desert; rather, it is to move toward ordered freedom, in which one sacrifices utter freedom for subservience to something higher—God—who is a better source of nourishment.
Yet secularists should find no less meaning in the story. Another equally plausible reading of Exodus might be that virtue or reason has the power and potential to pull one out of personal tyranny—say, in the form of immoral behavior or crippling addiction. But the tyranny of one’s mind is not simply bested and then left in the past. On the contrary: one must withstand the “desert” and continuously sacrifice old habits for a better future. Only in sacrificing old habits does one prevent the reemergence of personal tyranny.
For those even vaguely familiar with the Old Testament, the technical idea of sacrifice is strange—perhaps even barbaric. In Exodus 22:29-30, God commands child sacrifice:
“You shall not delay to offer from the fulness of your harvest and from the outflow of your presses. The first-born of your sons you shall give to me. You shall do likewise with your oxen and with your sheep: seven days it shall be with its dam; on the eighth day you shall give it to me.”
Although theological interpretations vary, the general view of the passage is that God did not specify how the sacrifice ought to be made—which indicates that the Israelites could instead “give up” their sons to God in a metaphorical sense. Put differently, an interpretation of sacrifice in Exodus might go as follows: for something to exist metaphysically, first fruits must be given up to something higher. That is, for God to continue to exist within the hearts of the Israelites, His tradition must be carried on through the firstborn sons. Firstborns must sacrifice their lives to God.
In this way, we can see how sacrifice might enable the existence of a higher moral order. For morality to thrive, vices must be sacrificed. Enlightenment scholars reasoned this to be true. As Immanuel Kant wrote in his 1785 book Metaphysics of Morals:
“When a thoughtful man has overcome incentives to vice and is aware of having done his often bitter duty, he finds himself in a state of contentment and peace of soul in which virtue is its own reward.”
This same principle of sacrifice can reasonably be applied to a modern discussion on polarization. In the public square, the highest moral order rests in true open inquiry, in which ideas are debated peacefully, rationally, and with enough humility to realize that one might, in fact, be wrong. At its core, true open inquiry is extraordinarily sacrificial. Just as the Israelites offered up their firstborns, a person who engages in perfect open inquiry first sacrifices his or her pride, and then offers up his or her perspective at the risk of being challenged or changed. This two-way sacrifice is in service to a higher good: by explaining one’s ideas, and listening to competing ideas honestly, both parties seek to sharpen their perspectives toward a more perfect truth.
But polarization thwarts the sacrificial process before it can begin. It divides us into like-minded echo chambers such as Fox News or MSNBC, right- or left-wing fringes on X, or even churches with different ideological positions. And when we are exclusively surrounded by like minds, we are unable to provide the sacrificial act that is the precondition for a more perfect truth. In other words, polarization incentivizes us to forgo humility for pride; we needn’t be humble about our views when we believe them to be infallible. It is no wonder that in America’s polarized culture we have no Kantian vision of “contentment and peace.” Rather, we are burdened with contempt for those with whom we disagree—precisely because we are resistant to sacrificing our pride for humility, and our ideas for something better, together.
Though difficult to practice, humility has remarkable benefits. In one 2016 study, those who tended toward humility—in that they were open to advice, honest about their flaws, and excited when their friends succeeded—scored lower on depression and anxiety, and higher on life satisfaction. In a separate study on professors whose experiments were flawed, those who insisted they were correct were viewed less favorably than professors who expressed humility by admitting they were wrong.
To fight polarization, the prescription is clear: like sacrifices, we should offer up our opinions and offer up our willingness to be persuaded. This will necessarily buoy up humility and in turn deflate the root of today’s polarization.
On Chaos
But still, a problem persists. Polarization, and thus remaining in like-minded camps, is easy because it is self-assuring; open inquiry is difficult because it decimates self-assuredness. In Adam Grant’s 2012 book Think Again, he outlines the many cognitive biases humans deploy to avoid the latter outcome.
One is “confirmation bias,” in which we favor information that conforms to our preexisting beliefs. Another is “anchoring bias,” in which we rely too heavily on information we received early in a decision-making process. The final bias is the “illusion of validity,” the process by which we overestimate our ability to make accurate judgments (imagine the professors in the study cited above, who insisted their experiments were unflawed). All three cognitive biases make us remarkably resistant to competing views or ideas, because new ideas might knock us off balance and challenge our deeply held identities. This should come as no surprise. Being proven wrong in the face of strong evidence, despite one’s biases, is no pleasant experience.
Yet on this front, I wish to advance a deeper idea: perhaps we fear competing ideas because, to us, they are the embodiment of chaos. Humans have long feared chaos, which is the antithesis of order. To the ancient Greeks, chaos was conceptualized as the “primeval emptiness” that existed before the universe’s creation—a terrifying abyss beyond all notions of orderliness. In practice, our cognitive biases provide order to a chaotic world, and if those biases are challenged, one’s self-imposed order might feel as though it is crumbling. This is indeed a frightening potential.
But again, the book of Exodus has answers to this problem. Consider this early encounter between God and Moses in Chapter 4:
“1 Moses answered, ‘What if [the Israelites] do not believe me or listen to me and say, The Lord did not appear to you?’ 2 Then the Lord said to him, ‘What is that in your hand?’ ‘A staff,’ he replied. 3 The Lord said, ‘Throw it on the ground.’ Moses threw it on the ground and it became a snake, and he ran from it. 4 Then the Lord said to him, ‘Reach out your hand and take it by the tail.’ So Moses reached out and took hold of the snake and it turned back into a staff in his hand.”
Here, we see order and chaos encapsulated perfectly. Moses’ staff, a symbol of order (as it is an object with which to herd animals), turns suddenly into a writhing snake, a symbol of chaos. Notice that Moses’ first instinct is to run from the chaos; but God, in His wisdom, instructs Moses to grasp the snake by the tail—which, as any zookeeper will tell you, is the most dangerous way to corral a serpent. At once, the chaotic snake is tamed and re-morphed into the staff, its ordered state.
In this story we arrive at a fundamental truth: to tame chaos, we mustn’t run from it. Rather, we must grasp it and make it known to us, notwithstanding our fear or the danger it presents. Therapists, for instance, know this to be true clinically. In one recent study on psychiatric patients, researchers proved that a precondition for patients gaining control of their mental state was understanding the perceived chaos in their lives. Similarly, psychologists writing in Cognitive Science have shown that infants and toddlers, in an effort to understand the chaotic world around them, literally grasp unfamiliar objects to develop a sense of order. Only in grasping does the world begin to make sense.
Modern America, then, has perhaps arrived at a paradox of chaos and order. By participating in polarization and remaining in like-minded camps, we only give ourselves the illusion of order. Anything outside of our echo chamber appears utterly chaotic, and thus a threat to our identity. The way to stymie polarization is not to run from the snake, as it were. No: it is to grasp its tail through the process of honest and open inquiry, whereby we can come to know, and understand, the other side. In this way, order will reveal itself.
Onward
The above lessons are easier said than done. The process of true open inquiry requires buy-in from people on both sides of the ideological line. And while it might take a leap of faith to believe our elected leaders are capable of this feat, I believe citizens of goodwill are more than up to the task.
In the end, religious and secular citizens in families, schools, and communities should remember Exodus whenever their cognitive biases flare up. When discussing politics, it would do us all well to share our opinions with sacrifice as a core virtue. By sacrificing our pride—and thus being open to change or challenge—we might move toward a higher moral order of humility in the public and private squares. Moreover, if you are resistant to engage with the other side, consider that your resistance itself might be inflaming your perceived chaos of the outside world. And as the best research and theology indicate, grasping chaos—not running from it—is the surest way to tame it.
It seems to me that a grassroots movement of humble open inquiry—informed by Exodus notions of sacrifice, chaos, and order—is what we need to reverse America’s polarization. We need only awaken to the idea that our current polarized culture is, indeed, an unjustifiable tyranny.
