Christ's philosophy was one of complete resignation of self-interest, but only in the face of outward aggression and not for mere sake of one's own misery. Christ said, "Love your enemies" but he did not say, as the ascetic interprets him, "Hate yourself"--and he obviously had no problem with pleasures of eating and drinking to excess.

It is often thought that Christ's message was to the poor, the outcast, the miserable of the world. He said to them, "Rejoice" and meant to comfort them and inspire the world to kindness toward them. I do not believe this is the case. Christ not only said to the poor and miserable, "Rejoice"--but he as often said to the rich and powerful, "Mourn." Who is likely to take greater note of this? If a college professor said to any student in passing, "You're doing great," it would be nice to hear certainly; but if he said, "You're in real trouble here" the student is likely to take much greater note of this. And Christ's message to the rich and powerful probably wasn't merely, "Mourn", as a way to spite them for no reason. I believe he probably meant, "Mourn, or render yourselves desolate--then rejoice."

Christ not only said, "Do not return evil for evil" but he said "Do not even resist an evildoer." He not only said, "Do not strike back if a man strikes you," but he said, "If a man strikes you, offer to let him strike you again." (I.e., "offer the other cheek.") This would be impossible or extremely rare for anybody to do consistently, given that if he did so he would merely perish in misery at the expense of even evil people, who would only despise him the more.

It is also often thought--more I think as an excuse for us rather than based on the Gospels--that Christ's philosophy was meant to make individuals good and "Do not resist an evildoer" was never meant for world leaders to apply to their policies in facing dangers to their nations. Had Roosevelt followed Christ's advice, and been truly Christian, the only thing for him to do would be to let Hitler roll over Europe, go on with his genocide, and not lift a finger even at invasion of our borders.

But apply this philosophy to the tragedy of the commons, and we see that this is precisely what would be good for nations to do--stop acting in their own self-interest, even if it means their desolation. If all did so, the problem of history would begin to be solved. However, it would not be sufficient or even touch the problem for a single nation to do so. Had Roosevelt done the truly Christian thing, not only would the world's suffering had been worse giving Hitler reign all over Europe, but it would not even have impacted the problem. Even if Roosevelt made his Christian feelings clear and were not regarded as insane, and were respected as noble in his feelings worldwide, nobody else would have followed suit, nor ought they. The United States and its allies would have been destroyed and the world would go on with its war and its problem of history, because it requires much more than one or two examples of a willing nation to stop it--it requires a majority of nations to do so, and to do so consistently for a long while.

But imagine this--imagine a world where a given philosophy gets spread out universally in every nation. Imagine that this is Christ's philosophy that it is better to face desolation before even evil nations than to resist. Imagine that this philosophy is believed by all the people and therefore the ruling authority. This is all it would require to solve the problem of history in my estimation. It would eliminate the need for there to be a ruling authority to enforce a mutual agreement not to make war or prepare for it. So long as every nation can be sure that all the others hold this philosophy, and therefore have reason to believe it is extremely unlikely any nation in fact will break this non-aggression agreement, it is no longer required for it to be an enforceable agreement. It is now rational to expect no one else to break it whether they can or not, it becomes rational for all nations to neither prepare for nor to wage war, and the tragedy of the commons dynamic is utterly solved.

Whether this is what Christ intended or not, it didn't work, and obviously, at least with the Christian philosophy, it won't. Not only would it be impossible for the Christian religion to ever be universally believed, but not even Christians themselves believe in non-aggression to enemies or evil nations, nor have they really ever. Nietzsche held that Christ's philosophy glorified everything weak and feeble and condemned everything powerful, healthy and able, and that this obvious absurd philosophy has ruined our civilization for more than a millenium. Even if Nietzsche did not have a totally inaccurate view of what Christ was about, I find it absurd that this philosophy could possibly have ruined anything for us, since the world obviously didn't listen to these things. Christians may have begun giving significantly more to poor and miserable people, but did many rich men make themselves desolate? Did the world even for a moment start dishonoring the powerful, opulent and famous? Did any nation anywhere ever consider forgiveness and mercy to enemies any more than they had before Christ came? Perhaps if the world had listened at all to Christ on these points Nietzsche may have a leg to stand on in his contention that he ruined our culture, but obviously in these points of his philosophy very few have ever taken him seriously.

In any case, it is obvious that the Christian solution to the problem of history--if it was ever intended as such--will never work unless it is some other, non-religious philosophy of non-aggression that becomes universally believed, and I do not think this is solution is likely to come about anyhow.