Apostasie

Why betrayal? It seems today that the idea of betrayal has lost its grip. After all, infidelity as a breach of sexual monogamy is relegated nowadays, in liberal countries, to the private sphere of personal relations. Apostasy is rendered, in liberal societies, not as an act of betrayal, but rather a basic human right. Avishai Margalits concern with apostasy is not a concern with theology, namely with God but with philosophical anthropology, namely with human beings. He believes that the main challenge to anyone who believes in the project of ethics, and in the importance and viability of the notion of betrayal, is to disentangle the notion of betrayal from its feudal underpinnings. In his concept of a decent society, Margalit succeeds in incorporating into any political pragmatism an indispensable ethical and moral dimension which is constitutionally and consistently orientated to the basic principle of human dignity.