A Celebration of (Christian) Humanism,
Part I
by Edward Chandler, Ph.D.,
Geneva School, Winter Park, FL.
Among Christians, the concept of “humanism” can have the
character of a hand grenade. Toss it into a conversation among
Christians of various backgrounds, and one is bound to see a
reaction. Some Christians flee the concept as they would flee a
grenade, seeing in it the essence of all the godless traits of
our society tied up into a tidy little package. Those who take
that attitude toward humanism certainly have good reason for
their reaction, since, for a long time now, ideas, laws, and
cultural practices that are celebrated as “humanist”—but that
are essentially godless—have gained ascendancy in our culture.
The way I have written the title of this article implicitly
acknowledges the existence of nonchristian versions of that
thing that we call humanism.
Further, we must acknowledge that the label itself has been
pretty much co-opted by self-styled “humanists” who profess
agnosticism if not outright atheism.
But
it was not always so. The English word-family of which
“humanism” is a derivative has an honorable history, being
itself derived from the Italian word
umanista (“humanist”), which occurs in
texts as early as the late 1400’s, where it was used as an
epithet for those who knew and studied the classics (sound
familiar?). This being the medieval period, secular humanism as
a category of thought did not exist, as all humanists in that
day were Christian theists,
i.e., believers in God. The word “humanist” entered the English
language no later than 1589 with essentially the same meaning.
As the Oxford Dictionary puts it, a humanist was “one versed in
the humanities; a classical scholar.” Again, this was a period
during which theism was ascendant.
It
is true that the particular word “humanism”
has a somewhat checkered history in English. It was first used
in the early 1800’s, and it must be confessed that the majority
report on the usage of this word since then has been in
association with those who would emphasize “mere humanity,”
typically to the exclusion of most if not all religious
connotations. This, of course, was in the wake of the so-called
Enlightenment, a pivotal period during which belief in God began
systematically to be abandoned in favor of skepticism and
atheism.
So
why use such a word with such a questionable history, and risk
identifying ourselves with beliefs and practices that are so at
odds with what is otherwise stated in the mission and vision of
The Geneva School? I will answer that question initially with a
question of my own: must that identification necessarily be so?
And I will answer my own question “no,”
and for a very simple reason: God
himself is a humanist. That may seem
like a radical statement, but it seems to me that it is an
affirmation that logically proceeds from at least two very
important areas of orthodox Christian theology, specifically
Christology
and anthropology.
Christology is a fairly transparent word, even for those with no
background in theology or classical languages. As, e.g., geology
(geo-logy) is the study of the earth, so Christo-logy is the
study of Christ. Anthropo-logy is probably less transparent: it
is the study of man (anthropos
in Greek means “man”). There are anthropology departments in
many modern universities, but most of them study man from a
modern, evolutionary perspective. They often make useful
observations about man as a “species,” but are philosophically
not particularly friendly to orthodox Christianity.
Nevertheless, anthropology is a necessary category of Christian
theology since, as we all acknowledge, God’s entire work is
focused on man and his salvation.
As with most storytelling, if we
are going to tell the story of man from an orthodox Christian
perspective, we do best if we begin at the beginning. And doing
so we are immediately confronted with an amazing fact about us
as humans: that we are absolutely unique in God’s creation,
surpassing all save God himself. At creation, God infused man
with an immense dignity by making him in his own image and
likeness. No other creature, not even angels, it appears,
possesses that characteristic. Put in its proper context (i.e.,
a Christian one), this inherent dignity of man cannot be
overemphasized.
All
men are God’s image-bearers, no matter what their faith (or
nonfaith) looks like. Theologians throughout the centuries have
pondered what “image” fully means in this context. Many ideas
have been tossed around, and I certainly cannot settle the
subject here, but I would like to point out one thing: Paul in 1
Corinthians 11:7 (following the language of the Greek Old
Testament at Genesis 1:27) speaks of man as an
icon of God. There is
no qualification of human nature associated with this. It is not
limited to our spirit, to our rationality, or to any other
immaterial aspect of our being. Neither is it limited to our
material nature. Just as a religious icon represents its subject
as flesh and blood, but also suggests that he or she is much,
much more, so the Scriptures seem to represent man as flesh and
blood, spirit and rationality, material and immaterial, the two
bound together as one. To be human, to be the image of God, is
to have both a body and a soul. How can it be otherwise?
Of course, this is not to suggest
that God as he is by nature has a body. Rather, it is that man
in his compositeness of spirit and flesh reflects or represents
God in a way that God himself endorses, indeed, in a way that
God effected. This seems to follow from the commonalities of our
daily experience, since so much of it has an inseparably
material and immaterial aspect. For example, our senses, which
have to do with both material (our bodily organs) and immaterial
(rational, perceptive) aspects of humanity; our emotions, which
produce physical effects (like blushing when we are
embarrassed); our relationships with other people, which have
both immaterial (emotional, volitional) and material (a
handshake, a hug, a pat on the back, or more) aspects.
The point is that our very
creation and existence as flesh-and-spirit beings in God’s own
image indicates that God himself takes a special, humanistic
interest in us as the pinnacle of his creation. There is no
aspect of our humanity that is not of utmost importance to him,
and so ought not be of utmost importance to us: our bodies as
well as our minds and souls.
To
skip to the other end of history, but to stay within the area of
anthropology, we see that our destiny is even greater. When we
consider our destiny, the reality of man’s inherent dignity is
resoundingly affirmed, because, in a nutshell, the destiny of
the faithful is glorification.
Those who put their faith in Christ will on the last day be
crowned with glory and honor. And that glory with which the
faithful will be crowned is God’s own glory, not something
separate from it. St. Peter puts it most strikingly when he
tells us that we will be made partakers
of the divine nature (2 Peter 1:4).
St. Athanasius, the great defender of orthodoxy, following
Peter, himself said that the Son “assumed humanity so that man
might become God” (On the Incarnation,
54.3). Eastern Orthodoxy speaks of this as deification, and
while some object to the term, in its essence it is accurate. It
doesn’t erase the Creator-creature distinction, but rather
indicates the radical nature of union with God and human
transformation in Christ. While there is already—and will always
be—a union of the divine and the human in the person of Jesus
himself, a union we participate in by faith and by the
sacraments of Baptism and Holy Communion, the union that we will
experience in the last day will be of an entirely different
order (though not of a different kind). Scripture is clear on
this, as the Church fathers. Our human nature is superior even
to that of angels (1 Cor 6:3; 1 Pet 1:12; Heb 1:13-14), and can
and has been and will be united with the divine nature.
So
we see that humanity, by virtue of its origin, being, and
destiny, is given a place of unique honor by God. But the real
clincher when we consider whether God himself is a humanist or
not is found in our Christology, and it begins with what we
affirm about Christ himself as a being: that he is fully divine
and at the same time fully human. Recall that we spoke of the
dignity conferred on mankind at creation. Was it not in the
person of Christ that that initial conferring was resoundingly
affirmed, increased, and extended when God himself became fully
human, uniting divinity and humanity in a way no one could ever
have conceived? It is this fact alone that makes it possible to
affirm that God is the consummate
humanist: at the incarnation he became
human, and will always be one of us. He emptied himself and took
on our human nature for our sake. The biblical passages in
support of this notion can easily be multiplied, but you get the
point.
If
this is true, then as Christians we should recognize that the
concept-group of “humanism” and “humanist” finds its natural
resting place in an orthodox Christian context; it is most
agreeable with a Christian worldview. Of course we will define
the concept a bit differently than secular humanists. But the
point is, far from fleeing the idea, we ought to embrace it and
make it our own. We ought to take it away from the secular
humanists, plundering the Egyptians, as it were, since Christian
humanism is anchored so clearly in Christian doctrine. We can
and we must acknowledge the problematic nature of the word
“humanism.” But let us also remember that the concept
belongs to the church.
We should not be afraid to appropriate it, to use it, and to be
identified by it. It is only a true
humanist who can affirm the words that Bach appended to all of
his works:
Soli Deo Gloria!
Read
part 2 of this series here.
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