Young Heretics

By Spencer Klavan

Society & Culture Education

What's Young Heretics about?

The classical education you never knew you were missing. Join scholar and writer Spencer Klavan on a tour through the great works of the West. In a world gone mad, we're not alone: the great men and women who went before us have wisdom to guide us. With their help, we can recover truth, beauty, and the stuff that matters.

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Interview: Stephen C. Meyer...

12.08.2023

Does science disprove God, or reveal his handiwork? My guest today, Stephen C. Meyer, makes some of the most powerful contemporary arguments that the "God hypothesis" is becoming increasingly necessary to make sense of science and of human life. Stephen ...

Young Heretics episodes:

12.08.2023 Interview: Stephen C. Meyer, Wizard of Sciences Natural and Divine Does science disprove God, or reveal his handiwork? My guest today, Stephen C. Meyer, makes some of the most powerful contemporary arguments that the "God hypothesis" is becoming increasingly necessary to make sense of science and of human life. Stephen ...
12.05.2023 Like, Literally. Literally, though, how do we read stuff? It's a question we rarely ask seriously, but it's an ancient one with profound implications for art, faith, and morality. This week I'm presenting an ancient distinction between literal and allegorical reading that ...
12.01.2023 Interview: Faith Moore, Christmas Elf Faith Moore is BACK to kick off the Christmas season with a moving meditation on faith, loss, and the meaning of the nativity. We discuss how the characters in her new novel took shape, why Christmas always comes associated with ...
11.28.2023 Was Atlantis Real? All your questions answered! This week, as the Thanksgiving daze settles gradually over us all, I dig into the mailbag and pull out three juicy questions I haven't had time to answer yet in the course of the show. Did ...
11.24.2023 Interview: Lexi O. Hudson, Defender of Civility "Civility" is almost a dirty word these days on both the right and the left. But Lexi Hudson has written a book to defend it, arguing that being civil--being a good fellow citizen--doesn't mean being nice or tiptoeing around disagreements. ...
11.21.2023 Rejoice Evermore What's to be thankful for? This Thanksgiving, the answer is: everything. Gratitude is a virtue we didn't cover during our series, but Cicero calls it the mother of all virtues and Aquinas files it cheek by jowl with justice. Spencer ...
11.17.2023 Interview: Michael Martin, Modern-Day Druid Does not Wisdom cry out? Michael Martin joins me to discuss how and why God prepares our reading lists. Michael traces an alternate stream of modernity that flows quietly alongside the decadent materialist one. From Jakob Bohme, to Coleridge and ...
11.14.2023 The Glorious Deeds of Men Do you want to see the world as it is, or as it ought to be? This difficult question is at the heart of the millennia-old debate over morality and art. Pulling back the camera to ask how we got ...
11.10.2023 Interview: Andrew Klavan, Kingpin of the Klavan Literary Mafia What does it mean to be a man in a fallen world and a degraded age? Crime novelist and professional person-I-have-never-heard-of Andrew Klavan joins the show to discuss his brilliant new novel The House of Love and Death. We discuss ...
11.07.2023 Art for Art’s Sake? “There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written. That is all.” So wrote Oscar Wilde in his preface to The Picture of Dorian Gray, defending himself against charges of ...
11.03.2023 Interview: Mary Harrington, Reactionary Feminist Digital alienation, material politics, and the re-enchantment of the world: this week, reactionary feminist Mary Harrington joins Spencer to discuss the disorenting transformations wrought upon human societies and psyches by the advent of digital technology. The discussion ranges from Mary's ...
10.31.2023 Ghosts of the Old Gods At the turning of the year, as fall passes into winter, the world hovers for an instant between past and future in the "otherworld," the space between life and death. And that is where we meet the Aes Sidhe, fearsome ...
10.27.2023 Interview: Teresa Mull, Professional Woke-Proofer Do you even pray, bro? Teresa Mull is the assistant editor of The Spectator World. Her book, Woke-Proof Your Life, offers practical and concrete suggestions for opponents of the woke revolution to put their money where their mouths are. Spencer ...
10.24.2023 Love versus the World Divine love: the most natural, and the least natural, thing in the universe. In this conclusion to his series on virtues, Spencer walks through the history of Christian love from its earliest origins in the church to its extremes in ...
10.20.2023 Interview: Helen Roy, Matriarch in the Making and Peacemaker Between the Sexes What is going on with men? For that matter, what is going on with women? The war between the sexes has entered a new phase, as whatever wave of feminism we're currently surfing produces its own backlash. Helen Roy--mother, writer, ...
10.17.2023 The Seven Loves It's been years since the days when we Young Heretics discussed Plato's Symposium. But now we've come back around a second time to that fundamental question: what is love? (Baby, don't hurt me.) This time, Spencer takes a thousand-year look ...
10.13.2023 Interview: Joshua Herring, Archon of the Milesian Renaissance A revival in classical education is sweeping the nation. But where are we going to get good classical educators? In this interview, Josh Herring of Thales College discusses how he and his colleagues are equipping teachers to rise to that ...
10.10.2023 Oh Israel, Hope in the Lord If faith is the substance of things hoped for, what is hope? Reaching back into Jewish history and the Hebrew Bible, Spencer explains the gritty determination that saves us from despair in the valley of the shadow of death. As ...
10.06.2023 Interview: Emmet Penney, Nuclear Barbarian What does it look like when people who don't hate humanity build technology that doesn't suck? Emmet Penney is one of the most original thinkers when it comes to industry, energy, and the long history of human stewardship on earth. ...
10.03.2023 What Do You See? A voice comes down from heaven--or was it thunder? Your answer will depend on what you believe, and what you beleive will change the way you see. In this episode, Spencer explores the twisted paradox of faith, and the Christian' ...
09.29.2023 Interview: Erik Rostad, Marathon runner of the canon Today's guest is someone whose life has been transformed by classical literature. Erik Rostad has reorganized his life around reading, with remarkable effects. We discuss how he was called to seek truth and beauty in the canon, which books have ...
09.26.2023 Cyril of Jerusalem at Al-Anon "Man of the worldly mind, do you believe in me or not?" That's what Jacob Marley's ghost asks Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol. In this episode, Spencer points out that everyone believes in something they can't see--the question is, ...
09.19.2023 You Are Not Enough Everyone wants to be happy--so why are so many people miserable? That's the simple question that the early Christian bishops posed to the canonical authors of the Greco-Roman world. It's also the question that kicks off Spencer's new series on ...
09.12.2023 The Day With No Yesterday Today on Young Heretics, a minor topic: the origins of the universe. Very casual. New details and images from the James Webb Space Telescope have called into question the standard model of cosmology in Physics, leading Spencer into a series ...
09.05.2023 Office Hours! In the interval between finishing the cardinal virtues and starting on the Christian virtues, Spencer takes some listener questions in a special Office Hours episode of Young Heretics. Topics include: Getting kids interested in the classics, differences between Judaism and ...
09.01.2023 Interview: Drew Weatherhead, Black Belt in both Physical and Mental Jiu-Jitsu There's a movement afoot--and its coming from the ground up. All around the internet and the real world, there's a spirit moving people to reconsider the nature and purpose of consciousness in creation. Drew Weatherhead is one of those people--a ...
08.29.2023 What Justice Ain't From the Ballad of Ye and the Kardashians to the Hatfields and the McCoys, there are a million ways to get justice wrong. Straight is the road and narrow is the gate: in this final installment of the cardinal virtues ...
08.25.2023 Interview: Alex Priou, Persian Satrap of the Kallipolis Why isn't every book on philosophy like this one? Alex Priou, classicist and co-host of the New Thinkery podcast, has written an exploration of Plato's Symposium that is both readable and profound. It's a text we've talked a fair bit ...
08.22.2023 Gee, Officer Krupke We hear the word "justice" and immediately think "punishment." But justice in the truest sense isn't only a set of rules: it's also a virtue. From Plato to Dante by way of Stephen Sondheim, Spencer explains the last of the ...
08.18.2023 Interview: Faith Moore, Hostess of Storytime for Kids Young and Old For this week's interview, Spencer is joined by Faith Moore, relation, to discuss her upcoming novel Christmas Karol. The two siblings discuss the power of storytelling to change hearts, how to truly recognize the value of motherhood, and why Charles ...
08.15.2023 Observe, Orient, Decide, Aristotle How do you decide whether to start a side hustle? Who to vote for in 2024? When to pop the question? These moment-to-moment decisions, large and small, are the stuff character is made out of. Spencer discusses decision-making tactics in ...
08.11.2023 Interview: Shane Sorensen, Professional Gym Bro and Renaissance Man How does a wandering mind find its way to the classics? How do you cultivate renewal in a world of ruin? Spencer interviews Shane Sorensen, author of Renaissance Wisdom, about his self-instructed entry into the great conversation, and the pursuit ...
08.08.2023 News You Can Use What's the point of all this obscure knowledge? Spencer turns from contemplative wisdom to phronēsis, practical wisdom or the knowledge of how to do what is good for you as a human being. Subjects covered include free will, determinism, and ...
08.04.2023 Interview: Peachy Keenan, Mother of Dragons and Right Wing Body Builders Welcome to Young Heretics: Conversations, a new series of specials devoted to living out high ideals in the modern day. Spencer talks with Peachy Keenan, author of Domestic Extremist, about how to break the spell of latter-day feminism, what it ...
08.01.2023 Things Get Trippy This week on the show, Spencer takes the study of wisdom to the very foundations of the world, where existence came into being and human consciousness came online. This is the virtue of the soul that allows us to understand ...
07.25.2023 I Know Kung Fu Some ideas are so stupid only an intellectual could believe them. But some wisdom is so profound only an old man can pass it on. In this new installment of his series on the virtues, Spencer introduces a form of ...
07.18.2023 Spartan Moms for Liberty This one's for the girls. The ancient Greek word for courage is andreia--manliness. But whereas physical courage on the battlefield is a picture of something essential to manhood, there is also a womanly moral courage that no civilization can do ...
07.11.2023 Rooting for the Anti-Hero It's the age of the anti-hero, and Machiavelli can help explain why. Talking through the life of Agathocles, tyrant of Syracuse, and discussing the portrayal of him in The Prince, Spencer probes deeper into the uneasy line between recklessness and ...
07.04.2023 Saddling Up (Independence Day Special) This 4th of July, it's hard to feel confident that everything is gonna be just fine. But that's the point: nobody said it was easy, and it may be you were born for such a day as this. Continuing a ...
06.27.2023 The Many-Headed Beast Gather round, one and all, and learn from Plato about how to get a date. Or start a workout routine. Or really...do anything good. Spencer embarks on a catalogue of the cardinal virtues--the principal forms of human moral excellence--beginning with ...
06.20.2023 We're So Back At long last, the people's cries have been heard--Young Heretics returns! Every day seems to bring some new catastrophe, and it's easy to see all the things that have gone wrong. But what would it mean to go right? You ...
01.03.2023 Ep. 138: To See the Face of God For the penultimate episode of the show, Spencer Klavan is joined by friend and Dante expert Catherine Illingworth to approach the Commedia's beatific vision. Tying together threads from the whole series, and the whole podcast, Spencer and Catherine discuss the ...
12.27.2022 Ep. 137: Where Matter Meets Flesh In this middle portion of his series on Dante, Spencer Klavan outlines the lay of the divine "land" in Dante's Commedia. Traveling from the lust of the damned up to the longings of the saved, Dante the pilgrim meets Beatrice ...
12.20.2022 Ep. 136: Eat Your Heart Out In this final series of Young Heretics, Spencer Klavan charts a map of Dante's career and the structure of his greatest work, the Commedia. Walking through the politics, metaphysics, and artistic background of the poem, Spencer approaches the beginning of ...
12.13.2022 Ep. 135: Quality and Quantity When the Devil visits Ivan in the Brothers Karamazov, he looks at first like a rather unimpressive gentleman. But lurking under his seemingly distracted conversation is a sinister depiction of the world broken down into infinite matter, formless and void. ...
12.06.2022 Ep. 134: Guilty "Everyone is guilty for everything before everyone”: This week, through the mystery of Father Zosima's life and sermons, Spencer Klavan unfolds Dostoevsky's answer to Ivan, to Nietzsche, and to modern skepticism and scientism. The words of Zosima are at the ...
11.29.2022 Ep. 133: Everything Is Permitted Ivan, the most brilliant and also the most tormented of the brothers in Dotoevsky's "Brothers Karamazov," saw something that few others could see: if there is no immortal soul and no God, then everything is permitted. It's something that Nietzsche ...
11.22.2022 Ep. 132: Heart Truths Dostoevsky was the kind of artist who peers so deep into the heart of the present that he becomes a prophet of the future. His last and greatest novel, The Brothers Karamazov, can be difficult to get into—but if you ...
11.15.2022 Ep. 131: Give All for All What do you want? In this final episode of his series on Thomas Traherne, Spencer Klavan explores Traherene's daring suggestion that you might not want enough. The 17th-century mystic argued that God gives us the world anew each time he ...
11.08.2022 Ep. 130: The Hard Question How can we retain a sense of joy in the teeth of suffering? What does it mean to forgive? These hard and painful questions are the subject of the second installment in Spencer Klavan's series on Thomas Traherne and Matthew ...

Older episodes

Young Heretics

What's Young Heretics about?

Download our free app to listen on your phone

Young Heretics episodes:

Interview: Stephen C. Meyer, Wizard of Sciences Natural and Divine

Like, Literally.

Interview: Faith Moore, Christmas Elf

Was Atlantis Real?

Interview: Lexi O. Hudson, Defender of Civility

Rejoice Evermore

Interview: Michael Martin, Modern-Day Druid

The Glorious Deeds of Men

Interview: Andrew Klavan, Kingpin of the Klavan Literary Mafia

Art for Art’s Sake?

Interview: Mary Harrington, Reactionary Feminist

Ghosts of the Old Gods

Interview: Teresa Mull, Professional Woke-Proofer

Love versus the World

Interview: Helen Roy, Matriarch in the Making and Peacemaker Between the Sexes

The Seven Loves

Interview: Joshua Herring, Archon of the Milesian Renaissance

Oh Israel, Hope in the Lord

Interview: Emmet Penney, Nuclear Barbarian

What Do You See?

Interview: Erik Rostad, Marathon runner of the canon

Cyril of Jerusalem at Al-Anon

You Are Not Enough

The Day With No Yesterday

Office Hours!

Interview: Drew Weatherhead, Black Belt in both Physical and Mental Jiu-Jitsu

What Justice Ain't

Interview: Alex Priou, Persian Satrap of the Kallipolis

Gee, Officer Krupke

Interview: Faith Moore, Hostess of Storytime for Kids Young and Old

Observe, Orient, Decide, Aristotle

Interview: Shane Sorensen, Professional Gym Bro and Renaissance Man

News You Can Use

Interview: Peachy Keenan, Mother of Dragons and Right Wing Body Builders

Things Get Trippy

I Know Kung Fu

Spartan Moms for Liberty

Rooting for the Anti-Hero

Saddling Up (Independence Day Special)

The Many-Headed Beast

We're So Back

Ep. 138: To See the Face of God

Ep. 137: Where Matter Meets Flesh

Ep. 136: Eat Your Heart Out

Ep. 135: Quality and Quantity

Ep. 134: Guilty

Ep. 133: Everything Is Permitted

Ep. 132: Heart Truths

Ep. 131: Give All for All

Ep. 130: The Hard Question

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