CONCORDIA ST. CATHARINES CONCORDIA

CONCORDIA

ST. CATHARINES

CONCORDIA a

LUTHERAN THEOLOGICAL REVIEW published jointly by the faculties of

Concordia Lutheran Theological Seminary St. Catharines, Ontario

and Concordia Lutheran Seminary

Edmonton. Alberta

EDITORS John R. Stephenson Norman J. Threinen

FACULTIES

Edmonton St. Catharines Milton Rudnick, Th.D. Jonathan F. Grothe, Th.D.

Prcsident Presidcn t Steven E. Harold, Th.D. E. Edward Hackmann, M.Div., Ph.D. Edward G. Kettner, Th.D. Rodger J. Humann, S.T.M. Norman J. Threinen, Th.D. John R . Stephenson, Ph.D. Ronald W. Vahl, Th.D. John R. Wilch, Dr. Theol.

Lutheran Theological Review is published by the seminary faculties of Lutheran Church - Canada. The periodical exists for the discussion of theological issues within the frame of reference of Confessional Lutheranism, but the views represented by the individual writers are not necessarily those of the faculties.

Changes of address, paid subscriptions, and other business matters should be addressed to:

LUTHERAN THEOLOGICAL REVIEW P.O. Box 1117 St. Catharines, Ontario L2R 7A3

Annual subscription rate: $7.00

LUTHERAN T

Volume I11 SvrindSummer 199 1 Number 2

Editorial Forcword . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

. . InTraining . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Jonathan F. Grothe

Augustine and the Concept of Person . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 E. Edwal-d Hack m a n 11

Self-Esteem and the Christian Ethic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 Colin M. Liske

Self-Love:What Some Theologians Have to Say About It . . . . . . . . . . . 37 Mark C. L0 bitz

Giving a Twofold Response to the Ancient Errors of the "New Age" . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

John R. Stephenson

Belief in Life After Death in Genesis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57 John K . Wilch

Concordia Lutheran Seminary Edmonton, Alberta

EDITORIAL FOREWORD 5

EDITORIAL FOREWORD

The issue of LTR hereby given into the hands of our readers focusses on "the human person." In an age when Marxist and Nazi ideology have combined with purely this-worldly explanations of the origin of the universe to deny the unique personal dignity of man and to see in him no morc than a passing physical phenomenon, it is well to marvel how each human person mirrors his Creator in transcending the world of time and space as one made in God's image with the lofty vocation of living to His glory and sharing His very life.

Our pearly remembrance of Holy Week and Easter prompts us to rejoice that bewildered and wounded human persons, in whom the divine image has been so horribly defaced by original and actual sin, may and do receive superabundant pardon and healing through the taking up of our nature into the Person of the Son of God Who has offcrcd an all-sufficient sacrifice to the Father for the sins of the whole world. Johann Scheffler's glorious hymn, which doesn't come over at all well into English in Catherine Winkworth's rendition Found in TL13#397, puts it unsurpassablp well. A rough a n d qu i t e i nadequa t e t rans la t ion might r u n as fol lows: h v e , You madc me in Lhe image of Your Deity Love, You restorcd me fallen creature so sweetly Love, I g ive myse l f t o Y o u Y o u r s t o a b i d e f o r e t e r n i t y ! We trust that the essays printed in this issue speak cdifyingly to the timely theme of "the human person."

Greal events have been under way at Edmonton, with the dedication of the new building of Concordia Lutheran Seminary. Dr . Milton Rudnick exprcsscs a president's sentimen~s on this happy occasion.

Dr. Jonathan Grothe's sermon for the opening Vespers of the new academic year at the St. Catharines scminary struck us as worthy of being shared with a wider audience. The St. Catharines scminary president puts in a nutshell important truths concerning the nurturing of the Christian person.

Dr. E. Edward Hackmann's olfering on the concept of person in the thought of St. Augustine, originally given as a paper to the Philosophical Society of Brock University in St. Catharines, brings the wisdom of a great churcli father to bear on our theme.

Candidate Colin Liske examines certain aspects of the much-touted yet in certain respect equivocal concept of self-esteem and finds thcm wanting. The human person's dignity is rooted in grace, not self.

Is the Augustinian idea of a rightly ordered self-love to be dismissed hook, line and sinker'? Young Professor Luther followed Gregory the Great on this point and unambiguously exorcised this notion in the 95th of the 97 Theses of September 4th 1517 (L W 35, p. 15). Pr. Mark Lobitz, a 1990 graduate of the Edmonton seminary, takes a thoughtful sccond look at a worthwhile question.

6 LUTHERAN THEOLOGICAL REVIEW

In an cssay originally prepared as a paper for the fifteenth anniversary reunion of the St. Catharincs alumni in the spring of 1991, the undersigned seeks to cover the roots and essence of thc new agc worldview of which we hear so much. Christian personalism is more solidly founded and docs a better job than the counlerfeil new age, which is but the deathly old age gaudily paintcd.

"If for this life only we havc hopcd in Christ, we are of all men most to be pitied," wrote St. Paul (I Cos. 15: 19), but much modern cxegcsis fancies that the ancient people o r God were vouchsafed precious little insight into the final dcstiny of the human person. Dr. John Wilch launches a spirited defence of Luther's finding thc fillness of hope already in the early chapters of Genesis.

JR S Monday in Holy Week 1992

CONCORDIA LUTHERAN SEMINARY, EDMONTON

DEDICATES NEW FACTLTTY

Thc theme of Concordia Lutheran Seminary, Edmonton, in this year o r the dedication of our new building is "NO Other Fozmdatioa, " bascd on 1 Corinthians 3:11 and referring, of coursc, to Jcsus Christ.

We need to remember, especially this year while our awareness of this building is so strong, that the seminary is no more made of bricks and mortar than the church is. The seminary, like the church, is people - a living structurc of redeemed human beings who derive thcir valuc, thcir purpose and theis strength from the Crucified and Risen Son of God.

That is not to say that the building is unimportant. I t is very important. I t provides us with an attractive, comfortable, functional environment in which to do our work. I t makes a statement to both the church and the community about the importancc of God's work and thc pastoral office. I t suggests a substantial and long-term con~n~i tment to the mission which has been assigned to us.

The building was constructed during the 1990-1 991 academic year a t a cost of $1.6 million including furnishings and equipment. By Dcdication Day, September 2, 1991, all costs had been covered by gifts and pledges from nlembers of Lutheran Church-Canada and some from members of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod. Peter Hemingway and Associate was the architect and Eton-West the builder.

Thcrc arc 12,250 squarc feet of spacc on two Icvcls. It houscs a chapel seating 105, a library which will hold 35,000 volumes, four classrooms, ten offices and a lounge. I t could accommodate a student body of more than 100. The present enrolment is 35 rull and part-time students served by Sive full-time and four part-timc professors. Students come to Concordia Lutheran Seminary, Edmonton, from as far east as Quebec as well as from the Western provinces. Others come from throughout the United States and from Asia.

Established in 1984, Concordia Lutheran Seminary, Edmonton, has as its primary purpose to preparc pastors for Lutheran Church-Canada. In addition, it provides graduate theological education for both clergy and laity. I t is an associate member of the Association of Theological Schools in the United States and Canada.

Founded on Jesus Christ and on Him alone this seminary is devoted to preparing pastors who will serve people for His sake. That service is carried out as we preserve His Word in its truth and purity and communicate its saving and transforming power to the church and to the world.

M.L.R.

Jonathan F. Grothe: IN TRAINING!

IN TRAINING! Jona than F. Grothe

A Sermon on Heb. 5:13-14

''For everyone who partakes of milk is unaccustomed to mature discourse, for he is an infant. But solid food is the food of the mature, those who, for the sake of thc habituated virtuous character, are having their faculties of perception exercised and trained for the distinguishing of that which is good and true Srom that which is evil and false."'

"I am the handmaid of the Lord," Mary said, "Lct it bc unto me in accordance with your Word." Oh the faith, oh the trust of that Judaean maid! The angel told her that she would bear a child. She has a question: "How?", not a question o f doubt, but of curiosity: "How shall this bc, seeing that I know not a husband?" When the angel explains about the miraculous conception through the Holy Spirit, Mary accepts it in pious humility: "Behold, I am Lhe handmaid of the Lord, let it be unto me in accordancc with your Word."

How straightforward. How simple. How automatic. I t almost seems easy. That kind of sincere and trusting response comes from deep within. There is neither calculation nor hypocrisy about it. It comes from one for whoill faith and trust and humility are a habit of the heart. False teachers, St. Peter warned, are people with a heart trained for greed. They are so well-practised in this vicc that the desire for personal gain is their constant motivation. "But you," St. Paul wrote to Timothy, "Let yourself be trained in piety."

We are gathered here in Jesus' name as recipients of grace. In Christ God was at work reconciling the whole world to Himself through the forgiveness of sin. Baptized, converted, each of us has been incorporated inlo Jesus Christ and so stands righteous and blameless before God, declared worthy, for Jesus' sake, to rcccive life cvcrlasting. That does not depend on anything we do or feel or are trained in.

Along with that declaration of righteousness in God's sight comes an upward calling, a calling to stop letting ourselves be conformed to this world and to start letting ourselves be transforn~ed by the renewal of our mind. Each one of us ~ ~ n d e r God should be growing in thinking God's way and automatically responding as Mary did, in trust and obedience. This is the case especially for those among us who aspire to follow in the footsteps of Timothy and bear oSficial responsibility for teaching and leading in the household of God. Yes, above all wc pastors and future pastors need to let ourselves be trained in piety.

"Piety" is not a widely-loved word these days. But by it 1 d o not mean the smug appearance of the self-rightcous nor thc surface religiosity of the zealotic extrovert. I mean loyalty, godliness, the quiet trust and reverence that believes, receives and obeys.

(1) Preacher's translation


The word "training" is not too popular either. We like to talk more about "theological education" and "growth." Those are processcs which sound more natural and lcss painlul than "training." But Scripture does indeed talk about training, about exercises and work-outs with pain for gain. about the shaping up of abilities and the development of habitual responses that arise autoniatically from within a mind bcing transformed.

Today we begin another academic year. I invite all those involvcd in M. Div. and M.T.S . studies, all participants in the Adult Education programme, and all their fanlilies and friends to see this ycar as a time when, together, we arc in ti-aining, Let us get ready to roll up our sleeves and put on our sweatbands, and let us thus come to this holy gymnasium and so study, worship, and live together that our hearts may be trained in picty.

Our text suggests how it all works. Nourished by the right food, we practise repeatedly the necessary skills of discrimination so that our ability to tell good from bad grows strong and we become accustomed to speak rightly and have shaped within us the inner wisdom and inclination to speak and act as a child of God. It is quite a process; the whole image is analogous to what is done by an athlete or a performing artist.

Consider a pole vaulter or a figure skater preparing for performance. Hc watches out for personal health and dict, lifts wcights 10 strengthen certain muscles, runs or skates to increase speed, repeats particular isolated actions until they are automatic, lcarns to recognize and adjust to variable factors like wind speed or ice conditions; and then he does it. Just do it ... and then do it again and again and again. In this way the body is shaped, knowhow beconies instinctive and responses gct to be automatic. Now he is ready, willing, and able. When the moment of performance comes, as wc are watching and dazzled by the beauty of it, we say to ourselves, "It looks so smooth, so natural, so simple, as though it's easy!"

Education, Alan Paton wrote, is preparation for that moment when responsibility shall be entrusted to a person. Your training regimen now prepares for appropriate service when the call to serve, to perform, shall come. Study, worship, fellowship and thc sustaining grace thro~lgh life's trials, in short theology and doxology in this community lead you to God who renews your mind and shapcs your heart. So eat the right diet, that is, the solid food of the Word of God. Wrestle with divinc revclation on an adult Icvel. Keep a childlike trust, but don't undertake leadership with a child's level of understanding of thc Word. Excrcise your abilities to dis- criminate. Practise telling the difference between what is good and true and noble and what is evil and falsc and worthless. This means not just making moral judgment along the lines of "killing is wrong," "charily is good." It means forming theological judgments. God's word of Gospel, Baptism, Faith, the Holy Spirit - these arc precious and valuable. Human works, feelings, notions, and o r g a n i z a t i o n s these are chaffwhich will blow away. Learn to know what to rcly on. This is a most critical lesson. Then you will become "accustomed to mature speech" and right talk, indccd to "thc Word of Righteousness." For you will know that our right relationship to God

Jonathan F. Grothe: IN TRAINING! 11

depends not on what we do or how we feel! but on what God has done Tor us in Christ Jesus and on our reception of the benefits of'that work through faith. In this way there grows within that habituated character, that is, the wisdom and the will to think, spcak, and act in accordance with God's will, as a child of God. Then, whcn the call to serve comes - whether it be as parent, friend, officer in a church organization? pastor, or pastor's wife among God's people in some particular place - then may your heart, traincd in piety, respond with simplicity and casc: Behold, I am the servant o f tAe Lord, bc it rln to me in accordance with yo ul- Word. Amen.

Jona than F. Grothe is Presiden t and Professor of Exegetical Theology at Concordia Lutheran Thcologica l/ Seminary, St. Ca tharikes, On tal-io

E. Edward Hackmann: AUGUSTINE AND THE CONCEPT OF PERSON 13

AUGUSTINE AND THE CONCEPT OF PERSON E. Edward HLxkmann

The concept of "person" has long been a topic of interest in philosophical as well as theological circles. Within recent times, amid the "abortion debate," it has becorne a contentious issue also in medical and legal circles. In view of the rccent concern which oftcn gcncrates more heat than light on the issue, it might be helpful to pcrusc some of the thoughts of one of the profo~lndest minds in Western theology on the concept of "person."

Before turning to the thoughts of Augustine, however, perhaps a few preliminary remarks regarding the perennial philosophical discussions of "person" might be hclpful in understanding some of the ideas exprcssed by Augustine. In philosophical circles, of course, it is also true that "person" is by no means an univocal concept. But as one tries to find the common ground Srom which the bewildering variety of philosophical discussions concerning "person" arises, what seems to emerge is that "person" is commonly used as a metaphysical category in contrast to "thing"; and it easily becomes closely associated with the conccpt of "sclf."' Also, commonly associated with the concept of "person" is that it denotes a self-conscious being wi th powers of reasoning , m o r a l j udgmen t , a n d self-determination. From this basic concept, further theorizing about "person" seems to develop in either of two directions. On the one hand, if "person" is understood as essentially an enduring being having powers of intellect and will, some type of thcory of the self as substance results. This has been the dominant theory of the self in Western philosophy, advanced by such diverse thinkers as Aristotle, Aquinas, Descartes and Locke. On the other hand, if "person" is understood as essentially a construct of the intellect and will, then since knowing and willing are relational, the result is some type of theory of the self as relational. According to such theory, to be a self is to be related to somc othcr. Relational theorics have become much more prominent in nineteenth and twentieth century philosophy: particularly among idealists and phenomenologists. Thus one can find various forms of relational theory in such men as Hegel, Buber, and Jaspers.

Now often involved with both of these types of metaphysical theories about "person," is another conccpt of "pcrson" which is linked with what William O'Connor has called "the ethical use of'the term.""his is a concept of "person" which has been generated within philosophical circles particularly since the time of Kant. Kant is perhaps the most important and influential modern philosopher to formulate in explicit terms ideas which had a long prior history, but which became the object of respectable philosophical rcflcction and discussion with Kant's asscrtion that "pcrsons," as contrasted with "things," are of an unconditional worth; that respect is an attitude which is applicable to persons only and never to things.

(1) This discussion of philosophical positions is indebted to William R. O'Coimor: "The Concept of the Person in St. Augustine's DC Trinhte." Augustint. Studies 13 (1982), pp. 133-1 35.

(2) O'Connor: srtcit, p. 134.


Consequently, persons should never be regarded as means to an end, but rather are "ends-in-themselves and sources of value in their own right." '

In tracing the roots of this ethical concept of person which has become so prominent in so much of the philosophical discussions concerning "pcrson" since the time of Kant, it is commonly recognized that thc Judeo-Chris- tian tradition played no small part in the inception and propagation ol'si~ch ideas with respect to the human person. And since Augustine stands as a giant in the expression and influence of Western theology, it is natural to turn to the writings of Augustine when searching for significant contribu- tions to the modern concepts of "person." A number of thinkers have carried out such investigations bul have arrived a t divcrsc conclusions. While each seems to agrcc that Augustine was influential in the development of thc concept of "person" in the history of thought, there is no consensus concerning the exact nature of Augustine's concept nor on the consequent influences on later thought. Assessn~ents vary from that of Paul Henry, on the one hand, to that of A.C. Lloyd, on the other. Henry writes that:

"T11 the history of thought and civilization, Saint Augustine appears to me to be the first thinker who brought into prominence and undertook an analysis of the philosophical and psychological concepts or person and personality."2

In setting out the aims of his essay on St. Arzgzlstiile oil PersooaJityHenry declares:

I shall show that this doctrine of the person, though highly tentative and perhaps incomplete, serves to bring Augustine's creative genius and originality to the fore. Nowhere is hc more imprcssivc than in this area. I shall make the further point that this doctrine has been a decisive [actor in lashioning the modern world. Indeed, it is precisely this which makes him belong to the world of today and of tomorrow.' N o philosophy before Saint Augustine and none independent of him in his own time and in subsequent ages, has ever elaboratcd so satisfying a concept of personality.4

On the other hand, A. C. Lloyd maintains that what Augustine had to say about the concept of person emerges indirectly from his

discussion 01 the being of God in De Trir~itate, and therefore any claim to find a philosophical theory of the person in Augustine is probably an exaggeration and in need of considerable qualification.5 And in the final analysis, Lloyd maintains, it is questionable whethcr Augustine really cn- visaged his trcatisc on the Trinity as making any contribution to the subject of human personality at

(1) Immanuel Knnr, F i ~ ~ ~ d r n e n i P r c p e o f the ~c(et;~piiy.~ic o f Mor;ik, (lr. Thornas K . A bhntt, N em York: The Liberal Arts Pres?, 1949), pp. 45,46.

12) S1. Augusline OII Per,~onnlif~ (New York. Macmillan Co., 1 YhO), p. 1. ,3) (>p.cil., p. l . 14) (>p.cil., p. 2. , S ) A.C. Lloyd: "On Augustiar's Concept of the Person" in Augusf ne: A Coliectiof~ of C~iticr?lEssaj~s

(R.A. Markus, ed., Garden City. New York: Doubleday. Anchor. 1972), p. 191.


The position of this essay is that while Henry's evaluation of Augustine's philosophy of the person and its imporlance in the history of thought is exaggerated. Lloyd's evaluation does not seem to be sufikiently apprccia- tive of the insiglits which Augustine expresses nor or the full implications of Augustine's view. We agree that what can be formulated as Augustine's concept of "person" is not a rigorous philosophical exposition laid out by Augustine himself, but must be derived indirectly from his theology. Con- sequently, it is more later thinkers rather than Augustine himsell who consider his thoughts as gcrminal for a philosophy of "person."

T o undertake a discussion of Augustine's concept of "person" immediately calls for somc delimiting of the thought of Augustine to be discussed. It is common knowledge that Augustine's thought, his philosophy and theology, was in a process of continual change as his intellectual and rcligio~ls world changed over the coursc of his life. The same must be said regarding Augustine's concept of '"erson" as it can be cullcd from the full span 01 his voluminous worlts. It too underwent a radical change as his thought and theology matured. However, since it is commonly agreed that it was not until 396 in De Agos~e Chrishno that Augustinc cmploycd the term "person," and that it becomes a crucial term in his De Trinifatcwritten between the years 400 to 416, it is the concept of "person" as it is conceived in the later writings of the mature Augustine which will be the primary focus of this essay. His mature understanding of "person," it will be maintained, is derivcd from his struggle with the Christian doctrine of the Trinity as well as that of the Incarnation of the Christ; and his thinking in these areas is determinative for his view of the human person, which involves aspects of all three views of "person," the substantive, the relational, and the ethical.

Turning first of all, then, to Augustine's reflections on the Persons of the Trinity, his relevanl conclusions are found primarily in the fifth book of De ~rinitate.' In this book he is concerned with the Arian denial of the full divinity of Christ. The Arian argument was basically this, in the framework of Aristotle's Categories: God is pure substancc. In God there are no accidents or qualities. Consequently, everything which is said or undcrstood of God is said according to His substance. Now the Father is said to bc unbegotten, while the Son is said to be begotten. Unbegotten and begottcn arc clearly different; and since these terms must apply to Their substancc, the Son is in His substance different from the Father and His substance. Consequently, they are not of the saine substance or homoousion as the Council of Nicca had decided.

Augustine first counters this argument by pointing out that according to the Scriptures, Jesus Himsclf declared: "I and the Father are one." There- fore, even according to thc Arian argument, these words too must apply to substance and, therefore, the Father and the Son must be of one substance.

(6) Op.cit., p. 198. (1) St. Auguutinc: DC Trinitaafe(tr Stephen McKenna, Washinyluo, D.C.. The Catholic University of

f\mericaPrcss, 1970), pp. 177, 178.


Furthermore, the Scriptures say of the Son, "He did not consider it robbery to be equal to God." So here again i l what is said of the Father and the Son is said of substance, then They must be equal in substance. On thc other hand, if the Arians want to say that these statemcnts d o not refer to substance, then they must admit that somcthing can be said about God which does not refer to substance.' But since Augustine maintains that the Fathcr and thc Son are one in substance, how are we to understand that the Father is said to be "unbegotten," while the Son is "begottcn?" First of all, Augustine agrees that these terms are not accidents of God's substance, because accidents can be lost by change or separation; and God is unchan- geable and so nothing can be lost from God. So it is true that nothing can be said of God according to accident. But, on the other hand, Augustine contends, this does not necessitate that everything that is said of Him must be said according to substance. I t is also possible, Augustine maintains, to speak of God according to rclation. It is in regard to relation that one can speak of the three Persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. These terms are used in relation to each other. The Father is "Father" in rclation to the Son; the Son is "Son" in relation to the Falher; and the Holy Spirit is "Holy Spirit" in relation to the Fathcr and the Son. So these terms are used not in reference to themselves, but in reference to the relationship of one to the other. Similarly the term "begotten" designates the relation of generation: the Son generated from the Father. The term "unbegottcn" is a negative relational term designating that the Father is not generated from any other. And so these terms, too, do not refer to substance. Neither do they refer to accidents, however, for these relations are not changeable nor can they be separaled from God. Thus the divine Persons are one in substance, but threefold in relatioa2

I t is in discussing these non-accidental relations, which later Scholastics were to refer to as "subsistent relations" or "transcendental relations," that Augustine employs the term "person." But it is evident in this context that Augustine does not have a formal definition of a "person"; for when he considers the question as to what it incans to say that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are three, he acknowledges that human language is at a loss to say three what. Consequently, he says:

But the formula three persons has been coined, not in order to give a complete explanation by means of it, but in order that we might not bc obliged to remain ~ i l e n t . ~

As a result, Bernard Lonergan maintains that in this context the term "person" is simply a heuristic concept for Augustinc meaning just what there are three of in the ~ r i n i t ~ . ~ It must be said, however, that in under-

(l) Opcit., p. 178. (2) Opcit.., pp. 179- 180. (3) St. Augustinc: Opcit., V 9; p. 188. (4) Bernard Loncrgan: "The Dchcllenizntion of Dogma," A Second Collection (W.F.J. Rpan and B.J

Tyrell, eds , Phjladclphia: Thc Westminster Press, 1975), p. 25.


standing the Persons of the Trinity in terms of relations Augustine took a significant step toward entertaining a relational view of the human pcrson.

As a corollary t o his exposition of the doctrine of the Trinity, Augustine comes to the doctrine of the Incarnation. His summary statement in On Catechizing the Llninstructed is:

God in His mercy, desiring to deliver men from this destruction (i.e., from cverlasting punishment) if only they be not encmics to themselves and resist not the mercy of their Creator, sent His only-begotten Son (i.e., His Word) equal to Himself, by which Word He created all things. And He, though abiding in His Godhead and neither departing from His Father nor being changed in anything, yet by taking upon Himsclf human naturc, and appearing to men in mortal flesh, came unto men; that as death entered into the human race by one man who was first created (i.e., Adam) because he consented to his wife, who had been led astray by the devil, so that they transgressed the com- mandmcnt of God - so also through one man, who is also God, the Son of God, Jesus Christ, all who believe in Him, after their past sins had been utterly blotted out, might enter into eternal life. '

In explaining the nature and manner of the Incarnation Augustine again was confronted with the idea of the Person or Persons

in Jesus Christ. If the second Person o r the Trinity became incarnate and lived as a man on earth, He must be acknowledged as true God and true man. But does this mean that there were two Persons in Christ, a divine Person and a human Person? Augustine's answer is, "No." His invariable position is that in the Tncarnation the Divine Person assumed, or took upon Himself, a complete human nature. But He did not thereby become a human person. The Person of Jesus Christ is divine. This does not contradict the truth that the Son of God assumed a specific and individual human nature. For Augustine maintains that Christ's human nature is that o f a whole, real, individual man who in all respects was like all other human beings, in His humanity, only that He was without sin. Bu t this does not entail that He was a human person as we are persons. I t must be remembered that the notion of "pcrson" in Augustine denotes a relation of distinct subsisting elements in unity. Thus in the human person, this personal unity relates togcther a rational soul and a physical body. To be a human person involves basically to have this kind of psychosomatic relational unity. This does not exhaust the meaning of "human person" for Augustine, but it forms a part OS the fundamental conccptual framework in terms of which thc human person is to be understood. Now a personal unity is also present in Jesus Christ, but in a divine way. The Person of Jesus Christ is in this union of the divine and human natures; hence Christ's "Person" mnst always be understood to involve this perfect union instantiated in His Incarnate

(1) St . Augnstine: On Catech1z21g the Ul~ii~stmctedXX\fl, 52


existcnce. Christ unites in o ~ ~ e Person the divine Logos and a human naturc, namely a rational soul and body. Thus Jesus Christ is true God and true man.

It is interesting to notc that in Augustine's discussion of the Trinity (the one essence or substance and the thrcc Persons) "Person" is understood in terms of the relationships within thc one substance. Each OS the three Persons has a distinctive relationship within the onc substance. In his discussion ofthe Incarnation, "Person" is understood in terms of thc unified relationship of three substances. In the Trinity there is one substance and three Persons. In the Incarnation there are three substances in one Person. In the Trinity, the onc divinc substance is constituted by the threefold relations - the Persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. In the Incarnation the one Person holds in unified relation thrcc substanccs: the divine Logos, the rational soul, and the physical body.

The identity oS the Person of Jesus Christ, however, is understood explicitly as the divine Logos, the second Person of the Trinity. This enables Augustine to constantly emphasize that this keeps Jesus in continucd relationship with the Fathcr and the Holy Spirit, which again was intended as a direct refutation of the Arian dcnial of the full divinity of Jesus Christ.

In his struggle to adequatcly exprcss his theology of the Incarnation, Augustine matured into this emphasis on the unity of Person in Christ. I t was not until 41 1-412 A.D. that Augustine seemcd satisfied with his con- ceptualization o l the Incarnation. His mature formulation sccms to adumbrate the Chalcedonian Iormula of 451 A.D. Characteristic of Augustine's formulation is his use of the analogy of the union of body and soul in human beings to illuminate the union of the two natures in the one Person of Jesus Christ. It is in thc use of this analogy that a more traditional view of "person" as substance emcrges.

Perhaps the most we can say then is that Augustine's discussion OS the Trinity proposes a theory of the human person involving a relational view of the sell because the human being is made in the image of God. At the same time his discussion of the Tncarnation leads him beyond the Platonic notion of the sclf simply as a substance, and yet it leads him to continue 'to view the human person in a substantial way. The resultant of these two ideas leads him to emphasize various relations to God, to lellon7 human beings, and within oneself as essential to the human bcing as a person. In summary, then, we might say that for Augustine, "person" is a complex integrated unity oS being, relationships, and activities.

To see that this is the case, let us turn to selected instances of Augustine's discussion. Returning Sirst of all to his discussion of the Incarnation, in a letter from 412 the analogous way in which Augustine was thinking of the Person of Christ and the human person is evident. He writes:

But there are somc who rcquest an explanation o r how God is joined to man so as to become the single person OS Christ, as if they themselves could explain something that happens every day,


namely how the soul is joined to the body so as to form the single person of a man.'

Tt is only around this time that Augustine used the expression "one person" to include both the two distinct natures in Christ as wcll as the unity o[person. Augustine had come to an understanding of "person" as a unified conlplex. This is a rcsult of his crucial distinction between "nature" and "person." Tn the same letter, he writes:

For as the soul makes use of the body in a single person to form a man, so God makes use of man in a single Person to form Christ. In the former person there is a mingling of soul and body; in the latter Person there is a mingling of God and man; but the hearer must abstract from the property of material substancc by which two liquids are usually so mingled that neither retains its special charactcr, although among such substances light mingled with air remains unchanged. Therefore, the person of man is a mingling of soul and body, but the Person of Christ is a mingling of God and man, [or, when the Word of God is joined to a soul which has a body, it takes on both the soul and the body a t once. The one proccss happens daily in order to bcget men; the other happened once to set men free.2

Also in De Trinifate IV, 21,30 he says: Man was unitcd to, and in some way, commingled with the Word o r God into the unity of the person, when thc f~dlncss of timc came, the Son of God, made of a woman; was sent into this world, in order that Hc might also bc the Son of Man on account of the sons of men.'

Augustine's mature view of the Incarnation had very direct and immediate implications for his vicw of the unity of body and soul in the human being. It led him away from the view of the Platonists that the soul was a prisoncr incarcerated within the body, and that the soul was constantly longing to escape and to be lree of the body. Through his pious awc of the Son of God assuming a human body for the sake of human beings, he moves to a more positive evaluation of the body and a greater emphasis upon the unity of body and soul in the individual human person. He consequently described thc body and soul as being united by a "natural appetite," and their separation at death as a "tearing" or being "wrenched asunder." Thc relationship of thc soul and body he compared to the marriage relationship of husband and wife.

We shall return to further implications or Augustine's understanding of the Incarnation for his concept of the human person. However, understanding the human person as a unity of body and soul, we next might note how Augustine's concept of the person is enriched by his introspective

(1) St. Augustine: Lcttc~s(Washington, D.C.: The Catholic Univeristy of America Press, 1965) No. 137, p. 26.

(2) Ihid (3) St. Augusti~~c: DC 16jnjtate(IV, 21, 30), Q. 16%'

LUTHERAN THEOLOGICAL REVIEW

analysis of the soul. And this is done in the contcxt of his understanding of the Persons of the Trinity. That this holds implications for his conccpt of the human person is due to the fact that he takes as fundamental that Scripture tells us that man was made in the image of God. Therefore if one carefully analyses human being, it should provide us with clues regarding the essence of God. And if one's mind is illumined by God's truth to catch some vision of the mystery of Divine Bcing, that, in turn, should give some insight into the nature of human being and the human person. This is the procedure which Augustine adopts, and so to understand the embellishment of the concept of "person" in his reflections one needs to note the ways in which Augustine finds the human person to bc an imagc of God and specifically an image of the divine Trinity.

God is the triune God, one in essence, three in Persons. Therefore, if there are images OS triune personality, they simply rellect the Trinity of God in unity. Now thc bcing who is expressly madc in thc imagc of God is thc human being, and Augustine suggests that the image of God would be reflected most accurately in the soul. Furthermore, in the soul, the clearest image of God is found in the mind, for this is the highest part OS the human being and the one nearest to God. The image of God discovcrcd thcrc is triune in character. Thc thrcc primary images Augustine identifies are the triads of, first, mind, knowledge, and love; secondly, memory of the self, understanding, and will; and thirdly, memory of God, understanding, and love. They all have the following in common: first, they are all found in the mind, or the spiritual eye of thc soul; secondly, they are all esscntial qualities of the mind in subsistent relation to each other; and thirdly, the relative consubstantiality of these qualities constituting these created trinities gives us some idea of the real consubstantiality of the three Persons ofthe Trinity.

In thc first mcntal trinity, the mind lovcs itsclf as a natural affirmation of itsclf. Thus thc thing that loves is exactly equal to the object loved. Now it is impossible to love oneself without knowing oneself. Therefore the mind cannot love itself without knowing itself. Knowing itself is an easy thing for the mind, because it is incorporeal and therefore csscntially intclligiblc. Now just as the mind's love for itsclf is exactly cqual to the mind, so thc knowledge it has of itself is exactly equal to the mind. Thus the mind, love, and knowledge are three, and these three are one; and these three that are one are equal.

Thc distinctivc fcature of this first image is that it appears entirely within the substance of the mind, before it appears in actions. The thing which guarantees the substantial unity of the mind with its love and knowledge is also the basis for the substantiality of its knowledge and love. If self-love and self-knowledge werc in thc mind as accidcnts in a subject, thc mind could only know or Iovc itsclf. but the fact is that it can love and know anything else. Therefore it is not a mind which has knowledge or a love of itself; it is a mind which is love and knowledge suh,skmtia/ly and thererore naturally capable of knowing and loving itself pending the timc when it will love and know everything else. And vicc versa, the love and knowlcdgc the

E. Edward Hackmann: AUGUSTINE AND THE CONCEPT OF PERSON 2 1

mind has of itsclf arc substances in virtue of their being its substance. Their substantiality is born of their consubstantiality, and this is the reason why these three terms constitute a trinity.

The second mental trinily is memory, inlelligence, and will. The memory Augustine portrays here is the mind's memory of itself. I t often happens that the mind does not think of itself, or see itself, even though it is always present to itself. T o denote this imperceived presence Augustine uses the same word which can be used Tor recollections or knowledge we have but are not using at the moment. The situation is the same in both. T know something but I am not thinking about it, so Augustine says it is present in my memory; my mind is always present but I am not thinking of it, so I say that I have a memory of myself when the memory recalls the mind. Under the influence of the eternal reasons the mind can discover itselr as it truly is, and it produces a true knowledge or undcrstanding of itself. I t expresses itself. It says itself, as it were, and this self-expression is what we call a word although unforrned and unvocalized.

In this, namely in the act whereby the mind expresses itselr, we have an image of thc Son's generation from the Father. For as the Father eternally conceives a perfect expression of Himself which is the divine Word, so the human mind, made productive by the eternal reason of the Word, produces a true knowledge o r itself within itself. Since all true knowledge and understanding is of necessity a knowledge of the Word's eternal truths, the very act of conceiving truth is but an image within us of the Word's conception by the Father within the Trinity.

However, the generation of the word within the mind implies a third clemcnt also. The mind recalls itself, even though it is always present to itself, through a desire to know itself, and so willing is also involvcd in this second mental trinity. Thus memory in the second trinity corresponds to mind in the first trinity, understanding corresponds to knowledge, and will corresponds to love.

Thc third mcntal trinity portrays not simply relations of substance within the soul as the first two do, but reveals relations between the soul and God. This image makes ils appearance in lhe mind when God is sought through season and will, and the mind is illuminated with understanding and wisdom. If the soul does not engage in this effort, it can still remember and lovc itself, but its life is folly. If it, on the other hand, turns toward God who made it and thereby becomes aware of its character as a divine image, then remembering itself, expressing itself in a word, and loving itself will be the same as recalling God in the way He expresses and loves Himself. By this a wisdoin is born in man, a wisdom that is nothing less than a participation in God's Wisdom and that restores the bond between creature and Creator which was broken in the Fall. I t is true that God is always with man since His power, light, and love conlinually bestow being, knowledge, and life on him; but it is not true that man is always with God because we constantly forget Him though we have from Him everything we have. To be with God m a n s precisely to remember Him, to know Him through understanding,


and to love Him. Thus the third mental trinity is the memory 01 God, understanding of divine wisdom, and love of God.

These mental trinities portray the human person as he is in himself; but as the trinity which relates the human mind to God already indicates, there arc triadic relationships which also rcflcct the image of God in the human pcrson, but disclosc thc individual as a pcrson in relation to others. This becomes evident in Augustine's analysis of the phenomenon ol' love. In Book V111 of his treatise on the Trinity he discusses love at length. Love too is analyzed as a triadic relation involving the lover, that which is loved, and the love that unites then?. This, of course, reflects the relations among the Persons of the Trinity. The Father loves the Son and is loved by the Son; the Son loves the Father and is loved b17 the Father; and the Holy Spirit is the principle of unity within the Trinity. Furthermore, the Holy Spirit is also our Spirit, since He is given to God's people. And so the Holy Spirit is the principle of unity both within the Trinity and among those who follow God. Thus Augustine asserts that we are to imitate the unity of the Trinity both i n relation to God and among ourselves. In Book VI, 5,7, he writes:

... the Holy Spirit also subsists in the same unity and equality of substance ...( namely of the Father and the Son). Through Him both are joined together; through Him the begotten is loved by the begetter, and in turn loves Him who begot Him; in Him they preserve the unity of spirit through the bond of peace, not by a participation but by thcir own csscncc, not by the gift of anyone superior to themselves but by their own gift. And we arc com- manded by grace to imitate the unity, both in our relations with God as well as among o u r ~ e l v e s . ~

True love, which unites us with God and our fellow human beings in peace, also brings joy, which also pertains especially to the Holy Spirit, who is the joyful union, the love of the Father and the Son. It is through the Holy Spirit that we are able to participate in the joy that true love brings. Thus Augustine's analysis of the intcrior relations of the Persons of the Trinity lays the foundation for his view of the ideal relations among all creatures.

Now since true love allows us to participate in the joyful community or the good, whose principle o r unity is God Himself, the Person ol' the Holy Spirit, Augustine embarks on an investigation of true love. He lirst of all emphasizes that only true love may be called "love," otherwise it is simply desire.

But this is true love,[hc writes,] that while holding fast to the truth, we may live justly, and thcrcforc, may despise everything mortal h r the sake of the love of men, whereby we wish them to live justly. For in this way we can be prepared cvcn to die with profit for our brethren, which the Lord Jesus has taught us by His example.'

(1) VI, 5,7; op.cir., p. 206. (2) VIII, 7; 10; op.cit, p. 260.


Love cnables us to know God because God is love. The vcry cxperiencc of truly loving another human bcing united to us in the bond of love is the experience of God working in us. Our knowledge of that love is a knowledge ofGod. Since this love is entirely present within us it is known more clearly even than the other human being whom we love. Our experience of this love binds us together wilh all the good angels and servants of God for it is itself an experience of God. Augustine writes:

Let no one say: 'I do not know what I should love.? Let him love his brother arid he will love the same love [namely, God]. For he knows the love by which he loves more than thc brother whom hc loves. And so, God can now become more known than his brother, actually more known because more present, more known because more within him, more known because more certain. Embrace love, God, and embrace God by love. It is love itsclf which unites all the good angels and all thc servants of God by the bond of holiness, and unites us and them mutually with our selves and makes us subject to Himself. Therefore, the more we are cured of the swelling of pride, the more we are full of love, and of what, if not of God, is hc full who is full of lovc'!'

This lovc of lovc, namely thc love of God, intimately binds all togethel- who share in it. I t unites all the objects of love t h e self, our fellow human beings, and God. Tn order to love true love, we must love something truly. But we are only able to love something truly through the love of God. The two loves commandcd of us in thc New Testament, the love of God and the love of neighbour, are really one. Tf we love our neighbour truly it is only because that love has been given to us by God. The desire for God, given to the soul by God, unites the soul to all those who dcsirc God. Thus Augusline treals truc love as an objective subsistent which unites the lover and the belovcd. This third subsistent which is true love is God's gift of Himself, for God is love. And so he writes:

Therefore, when we love our brother from love, we love our brother from God; nor can it happcn that we do not love above all clse that samc love by which we love our brother. Fro111 this wc conclude that these two comniandnients cannot be without one another. For since 'God is love,' he who loves love, surely loves God; but he must needs love lovc who loves his b r o t h ~ r . ~

For Augustine, then, no one can truly love another person unless he is given the gift of true love from God. Augustine consistently stresses that our end is a communal one; that human life is a journey whose irllimate dcstination is the vision of God enjoyed in con~munion with othcrs. The social, unitive nature of love is unmistakable in De Trinitate. God Himself is a love unity of distinct Persons. The Trinity is reflected by all other unions wrought by true love. In our earthly experiences of love, we take delight in


being united to another pcrson. What we experience in such lovc is a finite reflection of the loving Unity that is the Triune God. It is a temporal anticipation of the cternal communion we are to experience when we enjoy the vision of God togethei- with all the good angels and the saints. Thus, all true love is from God and this is why Augustine tells u s that in loving our brother we see the Trinity.

In his analysis of love, then, we again see Augustine going beyond a purely formal concept of person, as well as the traditional concept of person as a substance. A person is a human being who loves, but to love puts him into relation with another being either human or divine who is also capable of love. And if it is true love, it brings lovc, lover, and loved into a divine- human triadic unity.

Augustine's theory of knowledge in De Trinitate takes him in the same direction, namely, a vicw of the human being in terms of personal relations. This expresses itself in the theory of illumination, according to which human knowledge involves a special activity of God. Augustine defines wisdom as the intellectual cognition of eternal things. He makes it quite clear that wisdom is given to the soul by God, who is Wisdom. Augustine himself summarizes his position in a passage that displays the inter-relation of his theory of love and theory of knowledge.

Whoever, then, is being renewed in the knowledge of God, and in justice and holiness of truth, by making progress day by day, transfers his love from temporal to eternal things, from visible to intelligible things, from carnal to spiritual things, and constantly endeavours to restrain and to lesscn the desire for the former, and to bind himself by love to thc lattcr. But he does so in proportion to the divine help that he reccivcs, for the saying of God is: 'Without me you can do nothing."

With this analysis ol' love and knowledge, we can now return to Augustine's understanding of the Incarnation, for to Augustine the suprem Model and Example of personal being is disclosed in the Second Person o the Trinity. In His Incarnation, which is an expression of God's love on th human level, Christ's divine pcrson relates Him, not to some single human person, or even group, large or small, nor exclusively to a ccrtain time o place, but as the divinc Person who comes to man as a Man for th redemption of the world, all human beings arc brought inlo selationship with Him. It is [or this purpose that the Second Person of the Trinity became incarnate that He might renew in human persons the lost image of God a reconstitute their true nature and existence.

Wi th this extension of thc significance of the human person into the suc and ethical dimension, we have ranged over the germinal thoughts regar ing the conccpt of a person in Augustine's mature writings. It is evident th Augustinc docs not present an explicit theory of the human person. I t a1 scems evident that Augustine's understanding of the human person always controlled by his own grcatest personal experience, namely h

(1) XIV, 17, 23; op.& p 444f.


collversion. And so he expounds a view which understands the human person as the image of God and consequently as of infinite worth. In accordance with this understanding human beings are constituted as persons by their relations to God and to other human persons.

Tf we try to summarize Augustine's view in a formal statement, we might say that "person" is a being imaging the essence of God, of unconditional worth, characterized by a complex of internal and external relationships, which are integrated into a unity of being, relation, and activity.

Of course, the inferences which tnay be drawn from such a view can be very far-reaching and wide-ranging. The range of inspiration which some have found in Augustine's thoughts is eloquently expressed by Paul Henry when hc writes:

Augustine teaches us lhal the person, while being an absolute, ... is also and essentially a being ... related to others, and defined as person by this very relativity. We are so by our birth, not born alone but procreated by our parents, themselves created by God and linked togcther in a spiritual and physical love. Our very being is gcnetically constitutcd in a living relation to others, to our parents, to God. Augustine teaches us thc fundamental truth that we are really persons only inasmuch as we recognize thc full status of other persons as related to us; that personality is not egocentric but altruistic; that its natural moveinents and richness are not centripetal but centrifugal, that the more we are ourselves, not only as individuals but as persons, the more we exist with and for othcrs and arc drawn to others and othcrs drawn to us. He teaches us that personality expresses itself in giving and rccciving; in 'communicability,' rather than 'incommunicability,' in sharing rather than in possessing, i n togetherness and closeness rather than in proud isolationism, whether this be intellectual, cultural, cconomic or political. When we have learned these truths, then, and only thcn, shall we bc ablc to build up between men, in law and in life, an l-Thou relationship transccnding thc I-It relationship of mere Subject and Object. We shall recognize in the 'other,' beyond all qualities and delects, beyond even his expressed needs, the unfathomable depths of his being and of his essence and of his very esse, existence, which springs from God's infinite Being. We shall comc to scc that which is unique in Him and yet is also ours by right because he wills to share it with us and wc with him. ... We shall understand that to be persons we have to accept and receive and not be content only Lo give, and that between persons the one is just as indispensible (sic) as the other.' Today when there is such selfishness and strife, let us recall and rcvivc these precious intuitions of Saint Augustine on person and personality. Lct us realize that as individuals and as nations we

Paul Henry. op cit., p. 23f.


can achieve maturity and fullness, not independently and alone but only by interdependence and cooperation, by giving and receiving. We are, it is true, little absolutes, and yet at the same time always related, correlated and interrelated with other persons and personalities. We are not meant to live in a depersonal- ized world. May we, inspired by Augustine's own personality, discover person and personality.'

E, Edward Hackmsnn is Profissor olsystema tic Theology at Concordia Luthzran Theological Semi~za r-y, St. Ca th arin es, 0 1 1 ta no.

Colin M. Liske: SELF-ESTEEM AND THE CHRISTIAN ETHIC 27

SELF-ESTEEM AND THE CHRISTIAN ETHIC Colin M. Liske

6GSelf-esteem" is a concept that has arisen out of humanistic psychology during the last half-century. It has been widely disseminatcd and has received broad acceptance among academics, government departments, and the public at large. It has also found its way into the liberal churches and some evangelical circles.

What is not usually understood is that self-estccm is the central concept of a contemporary version of natural religion and as such completely anti-Christian in character.

There are indeed many aspects of the conccpt of sclf-csteem which seem appealing to everyonc. Self-csteem promotes confidence in one's ability to do and accomplish things, to dress respectably and be well-groomed, to get to work on time, to get rid of irrational fears, and to believe that difficult and cven desperatc circumstances can be overcome. T o this extent, the concept of self-esteem could be quite acceptable to all.

However, mosl educators and advocates of self-csteem hold that it means something much dccper than this. Self-esteem fundamentally means self- worth, the self-assertion of one's innate goodness. It basically means, "I am worth something because I say it is so," or "You are human. That is all you need. Your worth is dctermincd by you."'

The wide popularity of the concept of self-esteem would appear to dcrive from inan's very positive sell-valuation, even in situations of the deepest degradation. No matter how miserable a condition in which man might find himsclf. sclf-esteem asks the individual to think o r himself as basically good. It is thus important that such unfortunate individuals acquire a good self-concept, a good self-image, by way of self-esteem in order to improve their lot. Self-esteem thus appears as a most noble concept, trying to bring out the basic goodness it is convinced exists in everyonc.

Historically, this high valuation of oneself as fundamentally worthy or good seems to stcm from an eighteenth-century Enlightenment view ofman as represented by philosophers such as Condorcet and Jcan-Jacqucs Rous- seau. In the latter half of this century, it has been advocated by psychologists like Erich Fromm, Abraham Maslow, and Car1 Rogers. Maslow in particular promotes the relation o r such basic goodness in man to self-esteem by placing selr-esteem near the pinnacle of his well-known hierarchy of needs.

Many other philosophies and religions reject such a view of man's basic goodness, with perhaps the exception of some Eastern philosophies like Confucianism. This view of man as basically good is opposed as illusory not only by Christians, but also by Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, Horace, Hob- bes, Marx, and Fredd. It is also rejected by thc vast majority of the

(1) Wllliam Kirk Kilpatrick: Ps~ichoIogicalSeriucfion (New York. Tho~nas Ndson Publishers, 1984), p. 43.


existentialists who sec evil as the core or each individual. Heidegger could possibly bc an exception.

The central reason [or the Christian's opposition to self-esteem is his rejection of this notion of the individual's natural goodness. To assert by oneselr that the self is worthy and good is thc essence of sin, or sell'-centredness. As such, Martin Luther defined sin as "man curved in upon himself." Similarly, Regin Prenter in Spiritus Creator. notes that sin in Luther's view is saturation with sclfishness, or concup~sccntia.' Paul Althaus writes, "Luther can, however, also follow Augustine in describing egocentricity as the 'beginning of all sin'."2

If Christians thus consider man's nature as essentially self-centred or sinful, how can they esteem such a self'? Thcre must rather be repentance for this self.

The Christian certainly does hold that people, though unworthy berore God, are of thc highest importance to God. God loves them so much that He sent His only Son to suffer, die, and rise agam for their sin, their sclf-centredness. For Jesus' sake God forgives them and counts them righteous.

SELF-ESTEEM and the BIBLICAL PERSPECTIVE

The concept or self-estecm viewed as self-centredness seems identical to the problem In thc account of the Fall in Gcncsis 3. There the problem is essentially Adam's assertion of hi~nsclf as autonomous, regardless of what God commands. Adam resolvcs that he can by himself decide from which tree he can eat, thus opposing God's command. As such this sell-centredness and sclf-assertiveness, this assertion of his own autonom y, is a rebellion against God. It is a robbery of God, as Althaus says. This consideration of oneself as worthy without reference to God is to make oneself one's own god, to worship the self. It is to fall prey to the serpent's temptation, "Ye shall be as gods." Man becomes his own creator rather than a creature made by God.

The fundamental difference between self-cstcem and the Biblical view of man can also be illustrated by the story of the Prodigal Son in Luke 15. From the point of view of humanistic psychology. thc Prodigal Son's problem in squandering his life would be onc of low self-esteem. Thc solution would be more or hlgher self-cstcem, a greater valuation of one's own worth. By contrast, the Christian view holds, in the Prodigal Son's own words, "Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you and am no more worthyto be called your son." Thc Christian solution Tor the son here 1s the son's repentance and thc father's forgiveness, not more self-esteem, not more of the natural self. The self the son had was the problem and needed changing.

( I ) Regin Prenter: Spii-itrrs Cr-edol-(tr. John M. Jenscn; Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1953), p. h. (2) Paul Althaus: Thc Thcoiogy ofMa11h Lu(her(tr. Robert C. Schultr; Ph~ladelphid: Fortress Press,

I9G6), p. 145.

Colin M. Liske: SELF-ESTEEM AND THE CHRISTIAN ETHIC

By contrast? self-esteem seems quite willing to accept almost anything in the self. No matter how bad one's actions, one is still basically good. Lindsey Hall and Leigh Cohn say in their recent book Self-Esteem: Took for Recovery

Self-esteem is rooted in your unconditional acceptance of yourself as an innately worthy being, regardless of niistakes. Feeling good about yourself is not something you do aftcr all mistakes have been corrected - it's something you do in spite of misla1tes.l

It appears that the Prodigal Son should have felt good about himself rather than having repcntcd.

Adani's proble~n and the problem for the Prodigal Son was self-ccntredness, or sin. It is difficult to distinguish between such self-centredness and self-estccm. Webster's Third New International Dictionarydefines self-esteem as "a confidence and satisfaction in oneselc onc's good opinion of oneself." How can a concept that holds the self to be of such prime importancc ultimately be anything other than self-centredness? Can self-esteem include the Christian concept of self-dcnial, the opposite of self- centredness? It would not appear so.

SELF-ESTEEM AS NATURAL RELIGION

There seems little doubt that what is being proposed by self-esteem is in fact natural religion. Like Adam in Genesis 3, self-esteem puts thc sclf in the place of God, becoming its own autonomous creator and unconditionally acccpting self. Thc sclf worships itself.

That such self-worship is at the hear1 of the conccpt of self-estccm is virtually explicitly admitted by Hall and Cohn when they say, "...we are at our corc, not flawed, but divine .... We realize that we are truly worthy of self-e~teem."~

Linda Tschirhart Sanford and Mary Ellen Donovan in their book Women andself-Esteem in a similar manner bury the self in pantheism by favourably quoting Shug in Alice Walker's novcl The CoionrPurplc whcn she says, "Here's the thing, says Shug. The thing I believe. God is in you and insidc cverything else."3

Dorothy Corkille Briggs in her book Ccfebrate Your Self Enhancing Your Own SelfiEsteem likewise portrays her pantheism by repeatedly identifying the self with some sort of euphemism for God. She says:

As you caplurc the flavor of thc awesome and miraculous Essence of You, you experience an At-Onement-with-all-life. You have a bone and muscle knowing of relatedness to the Family of Humankind and beyond that to the Universal ....

(1) Lindsay Hall and Leigh Cohn: SelfiEstreix Ybo/sfo1-Kecove~~v(Ca1'1bbad~ GUI-LZ Books, 1990), p. 6R

(21 Up.cil,,p.115. (3) Linda Tschlrhart Sanford and Mary Ellen Donown: Women andSdf:Eslerm(New York. Penguin

Rooks, 19X4), p. 175.


The Real You does not live for thc moment, but flows in thc newness of the Cosmic. The Real You - the Big "I" that is part of the Eternal Creative Force - needs to be central to your awareness.. .. Those who survive impossible pressures are invariably committed to, grounded in, and identified with a larger Whole .... The Eternal is both without and within.'

Pall1 Tillich, one of the world's best known mid-century theologians, held that everyone has a form of religion and that one's religion is that which is one's ultimate concern. I t seems obvious that the sell is here the ultimate concern. The self is thus God.

It is no accident either that self-esteem, self-love, and related concepts are embraced enthusiastically by New Age thinkers. Psychologists Car1 Rogers and Elizabeth Kubler-Ross are only two examples ofthosc who have made the relatively easy transition from humanistic psychology to natural and New Age r e~ ig ion .~

LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOUR AS YOURSELF

Sometimes it is contended that the Bible, while not speaking explicitly of self-cstcem, nevertheless champions self-esteem by promoting the parallel notion of self-love. After all, did Jesus not in His own words say that you must "love your neighbour as yoursell?" And this, it is held, means that one must lovc oneself first in order to love others. This is the view advocated, for example, by Erich Fromm in his book Man For Himself; even though he specifically states and acknowledges that this is not the traditional view held by ChristiansP3

The statement "love your neighbour as yourself' does indeed occur in Scripture, at least once in the Old Testament (Lev. 19:18), and at least eight times in the New (Matt. 5:43; l9:l9; 2:39; Mk. 12:31; Lk. 10:27; Rom. 13:9; Gal. 5:14; and Jas. 2:8).

The first of these latter references is in Jesus' well-known Sermon on the Mount. However, at no point does the Bible indicate that the meaning of this statement is that one must love oneself first in order to love others. The opposite is always true.

One of the first rules of hermencutics, the science of interpretation, is that proper interpretation of any text must pay attention to thc immediate colllext of the statement bcing considered. When looking at the context of this statement, for exaniple, in Matt. 19, wc sec Jesus responding to a young man who has asked what he must do to inherit eternal life. Jesus says, "If You wo~lld enter life, keep the commandments." Thcn He goes on to cnulnerate them, concludii~g with the summary of the second table, "You


shall love your neighbor as yourself." When the young man responds to this by saying, "All these I have observed; what do I still lack?", Jesus rejoins, "1f you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give it to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven, and come, follow me."

Taken in context, Jesus' point in this whole encounter is that the young man still lovcd himself too much in spite of his many apparent good deeds, and that hc ought now to concentrate himself fully on loving others by selling everything he has and giving to the poor. Jesus' point is that the young man is still far too concerncd with himself, should not be concerned with himself a t all, and ought instead to be wholly concerned with others. The young man's evident concern for himself and impression of his own goodness is precisely the problen~.

Another basic rule in herlneneutics is that one must lct Scripture interpret itself, that is, allow one saying to be interpreted by another similar or parallel statement in the same or related documents in Scripture.

Thus, St. Paul also explicitly says that the self is not to be one's primary concern. In discussing food offered to idols in I Cor. 10:24, hc says "Let no one seek his own good, but the good of his neighbour." Again in his pastoral letter in I1 Tim. 3:2, he writes, "For men shall bc lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthank- fill, unholy."

Nowhere does Scripture suggest that one ought to love onesell'. In fact, it consistently says the opposite. One ought to deny oneself, not love oneself. In Matt. 16:24 and similarly in Mark 8:34 Jesus says, "If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and takc up his cross, and follow me." By contrast, the Humanist h Chnada in its definition of humanism says, "It (Humanism) says to evcry human being: Take care of yourself so that you may be able to help others..."'

Of such a vicw, political philosopher and neo-Enlightenment rationalist Allan Bloom says in his Closi~ig of the American Mind, "If you can believe that, you can believe anything."2 Bloom is worth quoting a t length:

Modern psychology has this in common with-what was always a popular opinion, fathered by Machiavelli - that selfishness is somehow good. Man is self, and the self must be selfish .... The ambiguity of human life always requires that therc be distinctions between good and bad, in one form or another. The great change is that a good man used to be the one who cares for others, as opposed to the man who carcs exclusively for himself. Now the good man is the one who knows how to care l'or himself, as opposed to thcman who does not .... For us the most revealing and delightful distinction - because it is so imconscious of its wick- edness - is between inner-directed and other-directed, with the

Helen Kiperchuk, ed.: HumanBt in Canada (Ottawa: Canadian Huillanist Publications, May, 1989.) Allan Bloom: The Cllosing ofthe Ame~-rcaii Mmd(Nea York: Sirnon and Schuqter, 1987): p. 178.


former taken to bc unqualifiedly good. Of course, we are told, the healthy inner-directed person will really care for others. T o which I can only respond: If you can believe that, you can believe anything.

That such self-esteem which loves itself first, before its neighbour, is essentially anti-Christian in character is, however, not something that needs to be deduced. Some of thc well known people who writc on self-esteem themselves make this most explicit by their clear rejection of thc basic Christian doctrinc of sin, or self-centredness. Nathaniel Braden says in his b o o k Non oring the Scif

The concept of Original Sin - of guilt where there is no possibility of innocence, no freedom of choice, no alternatives available - is anti-self-esteem by its very nature. It is, therefore, antihuman.'

Similarly, Hall and Cohn ask, "What chance is there for high selC-esteem if our churches tcll us we are born sinner^?"^ Sanford and Donovan say:

One of the most unfortunate aspects of the doctrine of original sin is that it allows for no distinction between who one is and what one does: original sin means not that a child has done anything bad, it's that she herself isbad and not by hcr own doing.3

SELPlSHNESS AND RATIONAL SELF-INTEREST

Yet another objection raised by most writers on self-esteem is one alludcd to abovc. They contend that self-esteem is most certainly not selfishness or self-centredness, but is rather a getting in touch with one's true or higher self, one's good and real self which rejects selfishness in favour of a rational self-interest .

There is indeed a sense in which rational self-interest is different from a kind of blind, irrational selfishness. This has been recognized by philosophers since at least the beginning of the Enlightenment. It might be simply described in the following way.

There is a natural tendency for irrational, selfish desires in pcoplc to manifest themselves in brute force. The group that wishes for more land to serve its own physical needs for food simply goes to war with neighbouring people, kills them, and seizcs control of their land for its own purposes.

However, the application of rational self-interest in such a situation is differcnt in that it envisions the likcly possibility of getting killed oneself in such a war, and that of course is not in onc's own self-interest. As such, rational self-interest deems it far more sensible to cooperate with its neighbours in devising contractual ways of getting more food, perhaps with the help of new technology, and doing it peaceably. In the former scenario there is a fifty percent chance of getting oneself killcd in war. In the latter approach of rational self-intcrest, there is a one hundred pcrcent chance of

(1) Nathaniel Bmdcn: IIonor~ng fheSei/.(Roston: Jcrcmy P Tarcher, Inc., 1983), pp. 67,68 (21 Hall and Colin: np. cit , p.13. (3) Salifod and Donovan.op, c;?.., p.167.


staying alive and one still has the possibility of achievmg the good goal. The latter view is of course considered more rational since it greatly enhances the chances of survival. Bloom describes John Locke's view of such a rationally self-interested man when he says:

Zucke's rational and industrious man partakes, as a prototype, of the charm of the sincere man who acts as lie thinks and. without fraudulent pietics, seeks his own good. Beneath his selfishness, of course, lies an expectation that it conduccs more to the good of others than does moralism.'

Nathaniel Braden adopts this view. H e says, "IPman's/women's life is thc standard, a pcrson properly exists for his or her own sake, tlrithcr-scicvificing self to others nor sacrificing others to self." Again he says, "A person must first value him or herself- and only then valuc others." And again:

Enjoining such people to beless "selfish" will accomplish nothing. They need to learn, not to set aside their own interests. but to expand thcir undcrstanding of where their interests lie.2

Onc wonders what Mother Tcresa might think of all this. What if she were to love herself first? Woi~ld we then still give hcr the Nobel prize? Sociobiologists like Edward 0. Wilson will of coursc wish to say that Mother Teresa herself is acting in her own interest, for her own group survivaL3

The temptation to compare such self-esteem which presumably results tn love of others to economics 1s irresi~tible. One thlnks of thc self-interested capitalist who makes money for himself first, and thereby automatically influcnccs the economy positively for others as well. This has at tmes been cclllecl the "Trickle Down" theory of economics. One might similarly speak of a "Trickle Down" theory of aelf-esteem. The more one lovcs oneself, the more one loves others.

As noted earlier, there is a way in which rational self-interest makes sensc. But while early Enlightenment philosophers may have discovered a moderately success1~11 political idea in proposing rational self-interest as the basis of a democratic, political contractualism, later thinkcrs were quick to pcrceivc problems in this approach. Men seemed to have cons~lerable difficulty in contracting with each other. Thus, Rousseau, himself a believer in the basic goodness 01 individual human nature, ncvertheless envisioned that virtually any sort of civilization corrupted man. In other words, it seemed that sclf-interested, good men did not often treat their neighboim particularly well, and Rousscau hoped that a complete return to the state of nature, or as near as possible, would somchow solve the prob1em.l

Everyone knows what happened after Roi~sseau. The attempt to imple- ment these ideals of rational self-interest i n the French Revolution of 1789 led to the Reign of Terror and the supposedly rational identification of

(1) Bloom: np. rrt., p. 176. ( 2 ) Rradcn: op. cit , pp 241, 220, 222. (3) Edward U. W~lson: 011 Himull Nuiirt1u.e (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1978). p 165 (4) L(loo111: op. a l . , y.177.


virtue with terror by Robespierre. But surely this was the height of ir- rationality! Friedrich Nictzsche a century later saw the problem too and proposed that individuals should remain aloof and alone, away from socicty. Sigrnund Freud, early in this century, also saw the problem clearly and pointed out that the reality-principle (civilization) would always be in conflict with the pleasure-principle (self-id).

But cven if we were to allow for the moment that this rational or higher self is not really selfish and can accomplish good in the manner proposed by self-esteem, the fact remains that self-esteem still views this "good" or "rational" self as the centre of its existence, as the centre of concern, as the ccntre, period. This "good" or "rational" sclf is thus still the ultimate concern, even IS it does not operate blindly and selfishly like an Irrational child. No matter how one says it, this still puts the self a t the centre, makes onc centred on the self. In the Biblical view, centring on the self in even this manner is sin.

Thus the rejoinder to the objection that rational self-interest is not the same as sclf-ccntredness must be that it indeed still is. Rational self-interest does not necessarily lead to the good of others, as later history and some later thinkers have shown, and it still places the self at the centre. Rational self-interest remains self-centredness.

THE CHRlSTlAN AND RATIONAL SELF-INTEREST

Aside Srom the philosophical and historical arguments against an overly simplistic distinction between selfishness and rational self-interest, it should be clear from evidence presented earlicr that the Bible itself knows of no such distinction.

Martin Luther had a healthy respect for all secular uses of reason, traditionally called the ministerial use of reason. However, he did not think that reason was able to grapplc with the relation of self and God (magisterial use of reason) precisely because fallen reason itself was corrupt and selfish, curvcd in upon itself. That is why, and only why, he called reason a "whore." In other words, it is reason itself that is self-centred and asserts its own autonomy in rebellion against God, just as Adam did in Gen. 3. As such, rational self-interest is at the heart and core of sin.'

It might still be objected, however, that the Christian too is inconlrover- tibly caught up in the problem of such a rational selSishness. Do not Christians, in a mere act like that of eating, rationally prcscrve their own cxistence in a self-interested manner? No. The Christian does all to God's glory, not to his own. As St. Paul says in I Cor. 10:31, "Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God." And again in Rom. 14:8, "For whether we live, we live unto the Lord; and whether we die, we die unto the Lord: whether we live therefore, or die, we are the

(1) Fraiicis Pieper: Ch~istih Dogmatic.s(St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House. 1950) I, pp.197-200; and Martin Lull~er: TheBondage of the Will(ttr J . I. Packer and O.R. Johnslon, Westwood: Fleming H. Rcvcll Co., 1Y57), pp.46-47.

Colin M. Liske: SELF-ESTEEM AND THE CHRISTIAN ETHIC

Lord's." For the Christian, the preservation of one's life or anything else, is a matter left entirely in God's hands.

Nevertheless, even here, it is true that thc Christian inevitably and all too often docs not live up to his ideals and indeed acts out of selfishness and rational self-interest. Because he invariably does so, he remains a sinner, although pronounccd righteous by God for Jesus' sake. He is thus at the same time both saint and sinner, simuljustus etpeccator.

CHRISTIANS' USE OF SELF-ESTEEM

11 might be even further objected that some Christians themselves use the concept of self-esteem prolifically. Examples are Jarnes Dobson, Paul Meier, Frank Minirth, William Backus and Marie Chapian. This is unfor- tunately true. Many Christians do not perceive, or at least not to their full extent, the basic inconsistencies between Christian premises and the humanist premises behind self-esteem. By contrast, secular writers on self- esteem have been quick to notice the contradictions and reject Christianity.

Nevertheless, it must also be noted that when Christians do use this concept, they invariably redefine it and give it a completely different meaning. Christians usually say that people are worth very much, not because they themselves say so, but because God made and redeemed them. Aside from serious problems in this view itself, Christians who promote self-esteem do not generally propose that we ought to love ourselves: but that God loves us. One major difficulty with this is that secular writers usually condemn this Christian approach because they say that this need for God lowers self-esteem. This redefinition of the concept by Christians has of course led to much equivocation and confusion. The situation would be far clearer if Christians simply stopped using the term.

CONCLUSION There is little doubt then, that self-esteem is completely opposed to thc

traditional Christian ethic. Nor is there any doubt that the proponents of self-esteem are advocating a spiritual view based on a particular view of nature, on the notion of the natural goodness of thc self and its unity with God. The notions of self-assertion, self-love, and rational self-mterest also run dircctly contrary to the Christian ethic. For all of these reasons, Christians would be wcll advised to reject this concept entirely.

Candida tc Colin Liske is a member o f lhe l992 gradzza ting class o f Concor- dia Lutheran Seminary, Edmonton, Alberta.

Mark C. Lobitz: SELF-LOVE: WHAT SOME THEOLOGIANS HAVE TO SAY ABOUT IT

SELF-LOVE: WHAT SOME THEOLOGIANS HAVE TO SAY

ABOUT IT Mark C L0 bitz

INTRODUCTION

The conccpt of self-love has been much debated within Christian circlcs. Some writers think that the idea is not a wholesome one for Christians. Others consider self-love as having a biblical basis and as being a necessary part of an individual's view of personhood. This articlc takes a look at what some noted Christian dogmaticians and ethicists have to say about self-love, and poses some questions concerning their comments and positions.

SELF-LOVE VIEWED SYSTEMATICALLY

Noted Gcrman theologian and systematian Karl Barth thought that self- love could not be dcnied, but that the idea of self-love nceded to be restrained. To Barth self-love is something so inhercnt in human beings that it does not need to be encouraged. He wrote, "God will never think of blowing on this fire, which is bright enough already."' Barth did not deny the mention of self-love in Christ's command "to love your neighbour as yourself," but considcred this to limit self-love rather than to encourage it. He commented:

It is true that this self-love is the visible and tangible reality of thc one who loves his neighbour. The commandment itself recognises and establishes it to be tsue. But the commandment, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, is not a legitimation but limitation of this reality.'

Although warning against too much love of self, Barth encouraged Christian love in general, as well as the idea that the sclf must bc involved in love as a response to God's mercy. On the self and love Barth acknowledged: -

h v e is the epitome or the obedience of the sinner saved by grace .... We forfeit ourselves if our action is not the answer to the counter- love that follows and precedes us in the mercy of God, if we will not love in return.'

It appears that Barth has room in his thinking for an increase in love among Christians in response to God's love, but is hesitant to include self-love in thc picture.

One might ask the question of Barth, "What if thc love in sclf-love were the same kind of Christian love he encourages? Is that possible?" If so, then self-love too might have Barth's approval and encouragement.

(1) Karl Barth: Church Dogmat~csIlZ (Edmburgh: l. 8~7'. Clark: 1956), p.388. (2) Op. cif., p.387 (3) Katl Barth: Elhics, (tr.Genffrey W. Bromiley, Ncw York: Seabury Press, 1981), p.454


Barth briefly mentioned the idea of love and coininunion between God and others and the self. To some writing on the idca of self and love, this triadic con~n~un ion is where real self-love occurs. In that vein Rarth wrotc, "Our actions thus correspond to our love, i.e., we do not want to be without God and therefore without our neighbour in what we will and do."' Barth also considercd all love to be gift-love, a gift from God. The love that we must give is itself girt-love. "We cannot take to ourselves the decisive thing that has to take place; i t has to be given to us."2

Although Barth described what love is and where and why it should take placc, he stopped short of applying those principles concerning love to the self in encouraging self-love.

Another German theologian, Hclnlut Thielicke, was much morc defini- tive in his judgcrnent of self-love. He considered sclf-love to be synonymous with eros. He wrote, "Ems ... is always self-love."' He went so far as to call all human love a kind of self-love. "Human lovc, that is, eros, is dependent upon what is worth loving in the other person .... Hence it is based upon what is perhaps a highly sublimated self-love."4 Thiclicke considered self-love as operating possibly in a highcr realm of the eras, in st spiritual amor sui a love of the higher self, the authentic self, in the same sense that Augustine's idea of sell-love is to be understood. This amor suiinvolved the ideas of sclf-interest and self-fulCilment,

Since self-love to Thielicke has to d o with eros, it cannot be connected with agape, with Christian love. Erosis based upon the valuc of the object loved. Thielicke wrote:

But the love of God, which we imitate in agape, is not based upon the calculable value of the other person for me. For God does not love us because we are so valuable; rather we are valuable because God loves us.'

We might ask, however, if God loves us no matter what our worth or value, and we are to imitate that agape love, could we not love ourselves with that same agape love that loves without regard to our intrinsic value?

The martyred theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer did not mention the idea of self-love specifically. H e spoke of our love as being a response to being loved by God, as a product of "the willing acceptance of the love of God in Jesus C h r i ~ t . " ~ Its origin is in God, especially in the person of Jesus, and it accomplishes the reconciliation of man with God. In one brief statement Bonhoeffer connected the sclf with this love from God. He stated, "Love means the undergoing of the transformation of one's entire existence by ~ o d . " ~ In this process of transformation, God is involved and also the self, with love being an important ingredient.

( l ) Op. CA. p.455 (2) On. cif. .. 0.456 (3) Hkl~nut Thielicke: ThcologicalEti~~cs, Vol. 3 , (tr. John W. Dobcrstein, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans,

19b4), p.30. (4) Op. cit.., p,97 ( 5 ) Ibid. (6) Dietrich Bonhoeffer Ethics, (ed. Eberhasd Uethge, New York: MacMillan, 1961), p.175.


Ernil Brunner in his book The Divine Imperative briefly mcntioncd self-love in dealing with how God sees each individual.

He (God) sees in mc, what none of us can see, His original creation. Bccause Hc sces us thus, we also - but only through Him - ought to look at ourselves also in lhis light, and should thus "accept" ourselves as from Him. God does not rcquire us t o throw ourselves away; no, He requircs us t o rcspect ourselves, to use our wills, indeed, even - in view of His gift of life - to have a grateful love of ourselves.'

To Brunner the value of an individual, although very important, is not intrinsic to the self. I t has its basis in God. He wrote, "The value of our life is thus an ultimate value, but it is not a self-value ... Our high standing is due to the fact that God has rated us so highly."2

H. Richard Niebuhr, a North American ethicist, has written on thc self from a Christian moral perspective. Although hc did not speak about the idea of self-love directly, hc did consider two components that are imporlant in the discussion of self-love, the self in relationship to others and in coniinunion with God.

To Niebuhr the self arises out of the social expcrience much in the same way that Martin Buber spoke of the I-Thou relationship. Interaction with others is a t the heart of Niebuhr's view of self. T o Niebuhr the self "is the acknowledgment of my existence as the counlerpart of another self."3

The primary relationship however is with God. Whcn a person's selfhood interacts with God, both thc self and relationships with others benefit. This is the foundational cxperience for interrelatedness. Niebuhr wrote:

To the monotheistic believer for whom all responses to his com- panions are interrelated with his responses to God as thc ultimate person, the ultimate cause, thc centrc of universal community, there seem to bc indications in the whole of responsive, account- able life of men of a moveinent of self-judgment and self-guidance which cannot come to rest until i t makes its reference to a universal other and a universal community which that other both represents and makes his cause.4

In this interaction with others and with God the sell" is not unimportant or ignored. Niebuhr considered the idea of self being totally disintcrested as vague and unrealistic. When a person understands and knows the reason for existence through and because of rclationship with God and others, the selfis enhanced and strengthened by realization of purpose for life. Niebuhr concluded that "when a person is able to say, 'For this cause was I born, and therefore came I unto the world,' he has arrived a t maturc self-hood."5

(7) Ibid. (1) 1:mil B runne~ : The Divine Impnmlive, (tr. Olive Wyon, Philadelphia: Westminster Prcss, 1957),

p.171. 2) Op, cjt.. p.173. (3) H. Richard Niebuhr: The Responsible Self A n Essay in Chrkt~an ~MorailT~iIosopl~~~(Nasli~~ille:

Abingdon Press; 1967) p.71. (4) Op. cif, pp.86-87.


Purposefulness in life is an important factor of mature and healthy selfhood for Niebuhr. I t could thcn bc considcred an important component of self-love.

One theologian who has had considerable influcncc on Lutheran thinking as well as on broader Christian opinion on self-love did not think the concept valid as a part o r the goals of a Christian life. In his book Agape a n d Eros, Anders Nygren stressed the importancc of agape in the life of a Christian. H e described what agapeis and what it is not. Specifically on the idea of sell-love he wrote the following, "agape recognizes no kind of self-love as legitimate."' To Nygren then all self-love is simply a subtle form of eros.

We may take it then that according to Nygren God's lovc is in opposition to any form of self-love. The love in self-love can never be agape. Nygren confirmedthis when he wrote, "But one form of love has absol~~tely no place in the context of the agape motif, and that is sclf-love."2 Nygren chose to picture agape and eros as black and white concepts, as distinct opposites. Since he considered self-love to be erns, it can have nothing to do with agape. Nygren, however, fails to back up this idea with subsequent Scrip- ture references or with illustrations. He simply considered the whole nature of love of self to be at variance with agape.

Nygren's position is open to question. He clearly considered Christian love toward neighbour to be agape, as he also did a Christian's love response to God. Sincc thc Scriptural imperative for the Christian is to "love your neighbour as yourself' and since our Christian love toward neighbour is agape, then should not our love of self also be agape? I t appears that for thc most part Nygren dismissed the equation of agapewith self-love because he could only view self-love as a selfish love and a possessing love, i.e., eros. If his system of viewing self-love was taken one stcp furthcr, thc proccss of sanctification whereby a Christian desires t o grow to be a stronger andmore mature Christian could be considered as eros. Yet followers of Christ are encouraged to grow in Christian staturc and maturity in Eph. 4:13ff. and other passages in the New Testament for the good of their own personhood and for the strengthening of their service to others.

In at least two places in his book, however, Nygren left the door open for a kind of self-love that was different from his usual concept of self-love. In a footnote, Nygren sccmcd to allow for "a 'self-love' that is different in kind from all ' eg~ i s rn ' . "~ Nygren thinks that this self-love is a species of act in the realm of the spiritual person in connection with God and other men. He must bc rcfcrring to the lovc of a rcgcncratc pcrson. Late in his book, Nygrcn again allowed for a kind of self-love in connection with Augustine's ideas. N ygren noted:

(7 ) Op. cif., p.83. (1) Anders Nygren: Agc~peandEros(London: S.P.C.K., 19531, p.217. (2) Ihd,


Besides this perverted self-love, Augustine speaks of a right of self-love, which sccks its satisfaction in God I-limself. This sort of sell-love is so far from being opposed to love for God, that it is fundamentally equivalent to it.'

If this is thc case, one may ask why Nygren seemed to lump together all self-love as opposed to agape throughout most of his book. Would it not have been more helpful to talk of a self-love based in cros, and also of a s e l f - l ~ ~ ~ groundcd in agape?

One Christian writer and ethicist agrccs that Nygren has been too one- sided in his discussion of self-love. Gene Outka w d e s :

The condemnation of self-love (Nygren's) is unqualifiedly sweeping and applies exhaustively to all 'natural' possibilities. Any distinction between a culpable selfishness and evcn a morally indiffercnt sclf-regard does seem e~ imina t ed .~

It appears that a more balanccd approach in dealing with the pros and cons of the notion ofself-love would be in order. Outka in his consideration of self-love attemptcd to do just that. Most of his discussion of self-love has to do with the thoughts or other theologians such as Karl Barth and Anders Nygren. But in the midst of describing what others think of the concept he also gavc some of his own views. For example, in questioning Nygren's sweeping consideration of self-love as opposcd to agapc, Outka appealed to Luther who questioned self-love because of ab~lses to which it could lcad, but who also spoke of a positive self-love from God in his Comme~zlta~y on ~,a/ati,ans.~ I11 the same way OuLka considered thcre to bc a nefarious self-love which he labelled acquisitiveness. H e also thought that there is a kind of natural sclf-love that is not necessarily culpable nor laudable. He wrote:

I t has minimally to do with a certain unreflective and vital energy which the agent brings ... One might formally regard it as part of the spontaneous self-love which is not blameworthy but not particularly praiseworthy, taking care, however, not to miss the positive importance attachcd to it.4

Rut Outka continued by warning that "natural vitality casily becomcs inordinate and de~t ruc t ive ."~ Nonetheless, Outka considers self-love to be normal, reasonable, and prudent in cthical and philosophical terms, even on the natural level. He believes that as the neighbour is regarded as a particular and unique human being, so also the self must value itself. The self does not exist only to servc God and othcrs in Christian terminology, but it too has worth. The self then to Outka is not just a means to an end, the end being service of othersS6 The self is taken into account in its proper

(1) On. cif. .. 11710 2 , A

(2) Gcne Outka: Agape. An L.'thcalAaaiyss(New Haven, Conn.: Yale Umversity Presa, 1972), pp.57-58.

(3) IZ1V27, p.57. (4) Outka. GP. at., pp 287-288 ( 5 ) Op. cii., p.288. (6) Op. at., p.291.


position, but it does not place itself above others. Outka asserts, "Each person ought to count hirnsclf as one but not more than one and ought never to accord himself a privileged position."'

Outka is conrident in his assertion that self-love is an important ethical consideration not only in terms of taking individual personhood into account, but also in the actual process O S loving the neighbour. Self-love and neighbour-love go hand in hand. Outka applauds thc connection of the two loves.

Those who actually love their neighbours will be found on ex- amination always to lovc themselves as well. This kind of self-love is expansive, rather than ~es t r ic t ive .~

Outka added that there may be instances when self-love and ncighbour- love are in conflict in which case cach situation has to be dealt with according to the larger picture of what is the best path to follow. This does not immediately mean that the self must not be taken into consideration in dcfcrence to ncighbour. Both must be considered. Self-love and neighbour- love are both coincidental and obligatory. He concluded, "Self-love is a manifest obligation, yet its enlightencd pursuit is never an alternative to neighbour-love, being rather correlative with it."' In that tension between consideration of self and others Outka gave a vote of approval to self-love.

One theologian who is less guarded in his approval of self-love is Paul E. Johnson. In his book entitled Cl~ristian Love he states, "To accept oneself as a child of a heavenly Father who loves, carcs, and valucs him is a significant e ~ ~ e r i e n c e . " ~ God then is the source of self-love. As this love from the heavenly Father works in an individual's life, it begins to draw the self from the inside out. Johnson asserts, "Christian love pulls affection outward from self to others. Self-love moves out to love or brothers and sisters. ""

Often the idea of love of God and neighbour without mention of the self has taken preeminence in Christian thinking. Johnson believes that, even if the above is stressed, self-love accompanies love of God and neighbour as a matter of course. "Love of neighbour and love of God are not free of self-love because the self rightly enjoys such a privilege."6 Thus God, neighbour, and self form a triad that coopcrate and communicate in love. In this triad, self-love not only leads to a proper love of neighbour but also learns from neighbour love and others. Johnson also alludes to Martin Buber's I-Thou concept whcn he points out the following: "Self love is a reaction to other persons who teach him to love and reveal the value of a person by their attitudes toward him."7 Thus, a proper self-love leads to

( 1 ) Ibid. (2) Op.cit.,p.288. (3 ) Up.cit.,p.289. (4) Paul E. Johnson: CErist~an Love(Nas11ville. Abi11gdoi1-Cokesbury Press, 1951, p.38. (5) Op cjt., p.32. ( 6 ) Op. c i~ , , p.37. (7) Op. cit., p.7 1.


ne ighb~ur - l~ve , but the process of interaction with the neighbour can lead to a fuller self-love.

Johnson also appreciates the importance of balance in the working of ~h r i s t i an love as it shows itsell'from God, self, and others. He warns of the danger of thinking too highly of the self. He maintains, ''It is vanity to think more highly of oneself than the truth allours, but it is also folly to have an inferiority complex in anxious misery and scornful rejection of self."1 The

then has its appropriate placc in the sphere of Christian love. Theologian and ethicist Stephen Post takes note of a frequently

concept that has to do with the self. I t is an idea that appears at first to be connected with love and service of others, namcly, the idea of disinterestedness in connection with the self. He does not find the conccpt of disinterestedness in the writings of the early Church Fathers such as Augustine, but points to the theologian-philosopher Abelard of the Middle Ages as the source of this idca. To him, this concept seems to have imbedded itself in Christian thinking ever since the time of Abelard. Post writes.

Frequently selfless love, a love utterly heedless of self and entirely one-way in its movement rather than circular, is thought to be ethically superior to communion and alone worthy of the desig- nation of ' ~ h r i s t i a n ' . ~

Post, however, points out that what is thought of as disinterested love may in effect have its basis in pride, in the idea of being able to love with a higher and purer love that does not even depend on or emanate from the love received from God. On disinterested love Post asserts:

The ideal of disinterested love smacks of a false sense of inde- pendence and self-sufficiency which issues in the vain presumption that one can pass by the invitation to be with God in mutual exchang.

Post thinks that the idea of self-love must be considered in the triadic con~munion which includes God, self and others. The self plays an important part in that three-part interaction. He agrees with C.S. Lewis who states that only "silly creatures" say "I love you disinterestedly.""

To Post self-love does have a place in Christian ethics. I t does not automatically allude to an unhealthy self-centredness. The key for him is the rclating of self-love to the interaction of love in the triadic communion of God, self, and others. Hc concludes:

Proper self-love defined as the pursuit of one's own good within the context of triadic communion can be distinguished from both selfishness (the pursuit of one's own separate interests) and self- i n f a t ~ a t i o n . ~

(1) Op. ci t , p.40. (2) Stephen Post: "Communion and TrueSelI-Love." The Journal of Religious E t h m (Fall, 1988),

p.345. (3) Art. cit., p.349. (4) CS. Lcw~s: irheFozu.loves (NW York: Harcourt, Bracc & World, 1960), p.14. ( 5 ) Post: op. cit., p. 345.


According to Post. self-love can no longer be dismissed by a lofty and unrealistic idea of disinterestedness.

Although we see that some theologians have accepted self-love as a valid Christian ~ d e a , some denominations have taken a negative new of the concept. Two ethicists from differing backgrounds agree on the usefulness of some form of teaching on self-love, but note that their particular branches of Protestant Christianity have historically not done so.

Anthony Hoekema, a Christian Reformed theologian, had this to say about his tradition's ideas on the self-love:

In Kelbrmed or Calvinistic circles, we often have a self-image that ovcr-acccntuatcs thc ncgativc ... WC tcnd to believe in total depravity so strongly that we think we have to practice it, while we hardly dare to beheve in our newness.'

Wcsleyan theologian F. Franklin Wise noted the following about his denomination's general view of self:

Perhaps the Wesleyan position is summed up best in the postulate that sin and sclf arc frcqucntly sccn as synonymous terms.2

Lutheran ethicist and theologian Milton Rudnick agrees that some evangelical theology and piety has leaned toward an excessively negative and cven destructive view of self, while he notes that a t the other end of the spectrum popular psychological philosophy seems to be promoting narcls- k m . Speaking specifically of the Christian, Rudnick pomts out that all that a Christian is and has is a gift from God. Hc goes on to note:

Until and unless he (a Christian) accepts himself, he is seriously handicapped in his attempts to accept and serve others. A shrivcllcd, dcjccted, and lovc-starvcd sclf is too distracted by its own needs, and desperate to try to meet them, to be able to concentrate on others and to do much for them. There is a sense in which it is true that before a Christian can love others, hc must be able to love himself ... Only the person who has been loved can love self and other^.^

It appcars that whilc individual theologians have been wllling to grapple with the concept of self-love, church bodies have not, perhaps for fear of misinterpretation of the concept by their own people. This may be all the more reason for somc Protestant denominations which have a doctrinal and confessional foundation to take a careful look at self-love for the purpose of coming to some clear teach~ng on the subject.

CONCLUSION

One sees then that some Christian dogmaticians and ethicists oppose the idca of sclf-love because they connect it with cros love and thereby in its

(1) Anthony TIoekema: "The Christian Self-lmage: A Reformed Perspcctivc," Y m r AefterSdf; (Cralg W. Ellison, ed., San Francisco: Harpcr & Row, 19R3), p. 25.

( 2 ) F. Franklin Wise: "Wesleyan Perspectives on Self-Valuing," YourBetterSelf; p. 40. (3) Milton Rudnick: Christ~an Ethicsfb~' To&j/(Grand Rapids. Baker Book House, 1Y79), pp. 69-70,


extreme form with narcissism. This is the presupposition with which they the subject. The end result is a negative view of ~ e l f - 1 ~ ~ ~ . several

theologians confirm that there is a Christian concept of self-love that is both natural and God-given, but which in its natural state must be pa rded and possibly held in restraint by Christians. They hold to a cautious "ie~v of self-love. Finally, some theologians promote self-love in a more unrestrained manner, seeing it as an important part of the Christian's life when the love of selr that is involved is agape, the gift-love from God. They think that self-love has been held in suspicion for too long a time. The difference thcn in thinking on self-love among these theologians is based in large measure on the meaning ofthe "love" involvcd in self-love and whence it originates. If it is generated only within the self, it is always suspect. When the source of self-love is located in God, it may be acceptable even to some who seem catcgorically opposed to it.

Mark C. Lohilz, a 1990grgduatc o f Concordia Lutheran Seminary, Eclmon- ton, Alberta, is pastor of three parishes ill the Hudson Bay area..

John R. Stephenson: GIVING A TWOFOLD RESPONSE TO THE ANCIENT ERRORS OF THE "NEW AGE" 47

GIVING A TWOFOLD RESPONSE TO THE ANCIENT ERRORS OF THE "NEW AGE"

.John R. S fephe~~son

During three and a half years ofparish ministry, the present writer ventured several times to address from the pulpit thc challenge posed to the Christian Faith by the so-called new age movement. Such occasional treatment of this contemporary phenomenon aroused a variety of responses from the sheep of Christ committed to his charge. Some found the subject-matter timely and appropriate, while others found it irrelevant and beside the point. Among the latter was a dear eldcrly woman, who opined, "Oh, Pastor, the new age movement is just a passing fad which will be completely forgotten about in a I'cw years' time." In respectlul dissent from this judgment, it will be argued here that the new age movement which has increasingly been making itself felt since around 1975 is closely connected with two interrelated phenomena. On the one hand, we are in the throes of a massive apostasy from the Faith within Christcndom which is perhaps the major eschatological sign of our times. At the same time, the background to this falling away from the Faith is supplied by the spectacular collapse of western culture among whose debris we are currently living. Having been long in preparation, the ncw age movement dovetails with certain powerful cultural and religious trends that will not easily be reverscd. Should this analysis be correct, then Douglas Groothuis' judgement merits assent:

This multifxetcd phenomenon poses a ~rcmcndous challenge to Christians. Thc Ncw Age is more than a passing fad - although it is not without faddishness; it is a deep cultural trend attracting scores of people from all walks of life. It claims to offer spiritual rcality, fulfillment and world harmony. Yet its promises spring from what turns out to be a spiritual counterfeit.'

While the new agc movement betrays some marks of continuity with the ideology of secular humanism which has enjoyed grcat vogue throughout the twentieth century.2 its major source of inspiration is to be found in the quasi-religion of theosophy, whose major spokesmen have bccn Helena Petrovna Blavatsky (1851-1891), Annie Besant (1 847-1933), and Alice A. Bailey (1880-1949). Blavatsky and Bailey authored many volumes whose contents were allegedly dictated by "spirit guidcs" (or "ascended masters") mainly located in Tibet. Thcir version of old-fashioned spirltistic mediuin-

(1 ) Douglas Groothuis: C m h ~ ~ t ~ n g The New Age, How To Resist A C;r.uw~g R I I Movmicnt (Downers Grovc, Illinois: Intervarsity Press, 1988), p. 19.

(2) See Philip H . I,ochhaas: How to Respond fa.. ~HENEWA(;EMOVEIMEIVT(S~, Louis, MO. Concordia Publishing Housc, 1988), p. 141 The mosl ~nlluential expression thus far of hamanistlc-oriented new age thinking is to be found ~n Marilyn Ferguson's The Aqmrjan Conspiracy. Persoi~aIa~idSuLjdj Trmrform8tion in the 1980s(Los Angeles. C A . .l. P. Tnrchcr, Inc., 1987). Ferguson's chapter on religion (Ayuar-ian Conspiracy, pp. 361-386) unmistakably park compaliy wilh the atheistic materialism of Hu~i~amsr MmifisloesI & 11. Fcrguson's rellgion 1s a mystical panlhelrm which displaces authority and doctrme, slmding and falling with the individual's dircct perception of the realily underlying thc world of appearances (Aquar~an Conrpiracy, p. 373).


ship is what nowadays is known as "channcling." Alice Bailey is crcdited with labeling the theosophical epoch of bliss to come the "new age."' Her books were published by the significantly named Lucis (originally ~ u c i f e r ! ) ~ Trust of New York.

Christian writers of a variety of confessional backgrounds have subjected the doctrinc and spirituality of the new age movcmcnt to the scrutiny of Sacred Scripture. At least three areas have been discerned in which new age teachings of theosophical provenance stand in massive contradiction to divine r e v e l a t i ~ n . ~

First, new age thought reduces Almighty God to thc status of an impersonal Absolutc which is indiscriminately identified with rcality as a whole and in all its parts. While "God" continues to be spoken of, His transcen- dence collapses into sheer immanence in such a way that He is identified with this-worldly processes. The new age worldview is both monistic and pantheistic, and the resulting eclipsc of the transcendent pcrsonal God opens up a vacuum filled by thc idolization of man, who is encouraged to predicate divinity of himself. All is one, God is all, we are God. Bearing in mind that already three centuries ago Raruch Spinoza regarded "God" and "Nature" (Deus she aatura) as interchangeable terms, it would be unwise to regard new age pantheism as much of a novelty. The distinctively modcrn quality of new age monism may pcrhaps bc located in its dogged adherence to the now tottering theory of macro-e~olu t ion .~

( l ) On Alice A. Bailey and her w~itings, see T11e NeivAgc Cafaiuguc Access 1uIIlfbr111af1ur1 and Suu~ces/By the Editors ofBody Mind Spirit Magazine (New York: Island Publishing Company. 1988), p. 116f. This encyclopedic volume is to be recommended to all pastors and theologically litcrate layfolk secking to become acquainted with thc various phenomena that gather together nndcr the "new age" umbrella.

(2) see Douglas R. Groothuis. U~~lnaskir~g the NewAge (Downers Grove, ILL: Intervarsity Press, 1986), p. 120.

(3) Elliolt Miller brings together ihe "basic beliefs" of new age advocates under no fewer than nine headings, hut his categories tend to overlap and blend into each other, most of them hcing rcducihlc to the first two characteristics of new age thought set forth here. A Crash Course on T/IC NcivAge Moveme~zt(Grand Rapids, MI. Bakcr Book House, 1989); pp. 16-18. The same can be s a ~ d of the six distinct new age theses identified by Douglas R. Groothuis: op.cit., pp. 18-31

(4) see Groothuis: upcil., pp. 29-31. A glance a1 the slielvzs ol'altnost any new age bookstore will demonsirate how great a role is played in the though1 of this movemenl by the writings of Teilhard de Chardin, the Jesuit paleontologist and advocate of macro-evolution at whom Pins XTI fired some stern but unheeded warning shots in his encyclical Humnni Generkof 1950, which would seem to he the last document issued by the papal magisterium that takes the Inerrancy of lloly Scripture with deadly seriousness. See Himanr Geneus. Coi~cwnl~g some fdsr opi11i011s wd~icij threaten to undermine file lurmtla~iuns uf Ciihuh docfri~~e (Boston, M A : Printed by the Daughtzrs or St. Paul, n.d.), paras. 5, 6, 36, and not least 37: "For the faithful cannot embrace that opinion which maintains either that after Adam there existed on this earth true men who did not take their origin through natural gcncration from him as from the first parent of all, or that Adam represents a certain number of first parcnts Vow it is in no way apparent how such an opinion can bc reconciled with that \vluch the sources oi'revealzd truth arid Lhe docu~nenla or the Teaclling Authority of the Cliurch propose with regard to original bin. which proceeds from a sin actually committed by an individual Adam and which through generation is passed on to a11 and is in everyone as his own." One wonders to what extent this position remain the public doctrine of the Church of Rome. The rcccnt officially prornulgatcd Gcrman Roman Catholic Catechism markedly backs away from the mouogenisni still upheld by Pins X11. A LZtholic C'atecfr~sm for Adults. TAe Church's Cbr~fession of' Isaith (tr. Stephen Wentworth Arndt, ed. Mark Jordan. San Francisco, lgnatius Press, 1987), p. 111L


Secondly, allegedly divinc man is considered immune from death in the sense of personal extinction. Death is detached from any association with penalty for sin and interpreted in neutral terms as but a transition from one plane to another, if not as a mcrc illusion. "Perhaps our belief in death is the greatest unreality of all," urges Shirley ~ a c l a i n e , ' echoing Mary Bakcr Eddy beforc her. Be it noted that the new age conception of the human person's survival of dcath has nothing to do with the notion of the immortality of the soul as a divine endowment which necessarily implies accountability to Almighty God. Instead new age spokesmen ll-ankly have in mind an innate divinity of man, a godlike status which man possesses by intrinsic right and not at all as created gift. The transcendent Creator is reduced to an impersonal forcc as man is exalted to take His place. Accepting as they do the law of karma as the factor vouching for the ultimate justice of the universe, new age thinkers have done much to popularize in the west the related concept of reincarnation. Having renounced the sovereign unique- ness of Almighty God, the ncw agc movement fails to appreciate the personal distinctiveness and unrepeatability of each human creature made in His image.

Thirdly, the unlimited man who has usurped God's place is one who "creates his own reality." It comes as no surprise, then, that new age man is encouraged to rewrite the script of traditional morality. No acts may be considered intrinsically good or evil, the distinction between right and wrong being sublated in the sovereign decision of the autonomous human consciousness. New agc pantheism and its consequences for ethics are set forth in the following sentences taken from an ex-Evangelical adherent of the movcment:

What you choose will not matter to anyone, least of all to God. God allows. God does not judge, God does not get damaged, God does not go off in a corner and huff and puff and blow the house down to show you who is boss. God allows. God allows because God is That Which Includes All. God allows because God is not a being, God is That Which Includes All Beings. God is thc All of it and the Everything, and God cannot be apart from any of it in any way. What you choose will matter only to you, and only to the degree that you care who you are.2

The befuddled sentiments summarized in the three foregoing paragraphs amply demonstrate that, whatever else may be said concerning the new age movement, its ultimate roots are to be traced back far behind Spinoza and the early European Enlightcnrncnt. Papering over the ontological gulf between Crcator and creature and encouraging man to takc the place of his Maker were part and parccl of the serpent's spurious promise back in Gen. 3:5, "You will be as God." The prcceding verse imparts a similarly un-

(1) Shirley Mac1.nme. Out on a LimbiToronto: Bantam, 1983), p. 351. (2) The New Agc L'alnlogue. p. 44, quoting from Tcrry Cole-Whittaker: The I I I I IC~ Palh JI(iom Where

Yoil are fo Where You Want to Be. A Spi~iluai Udywy


founded psomise which recurs today in new age advocacy of reincarnation: "You will not die." Moreover, the serpent's propaganda against the divine command not to cat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was ccrtainly, among other things, an invitation to Adam and Eve to "create their own reality," a suggestion which led to the first outbreak of antinomianism. The new age movement is, then, among other things, an updated variant of the pagan religiosity that came to birth a t the Fall. Its appeal to the flesh stems from its purporting to offer the consolatiolis of religion without any corresponding demand for the rigours of repentance. Man is pledged spurious dignity and hope while being emancipated from the chains of responsibility and accountability to his Maker.

A brief testing of new age tenets against the yardstick of the third chapter of Genesis thus indicates the sheer inconlpatibility of this movement with the revelation of God in Christ. Occultist Ruth Montgomery, a former Washington journalist who now majors in "automatic writing," was there- Core justified in fearing "ostracism from the religious community" when she first presented her mediumistic wares before the reading p~tblic back in the 1960s. That she can boast of having been received with open arms by ostensibly Christian communities bears witness to an accelerating erosion of dogmatic substancc within Christendom itself.' Both in reducing our Lord Jesus Christ to the level of a mere man and the Bible to just another collection of ancient documents, and (as we shall soon see) in deflecting man from the ob-jectively knowable world to a nauseating infatuation with himself as the autonomous knowing subject, the Enligliteninent acted as the Trojan horse through which the ancient heresies of the new age have been able to pcnctratc thc bounds of holy Christendom.

The new age worldview might appropriately be described as a saucy Satanically-wrought doppe&enper intended as a mischievous parody of Christian truth. But should a Christian's reaction to the new age movement be restricted to proving its incongruence with Sacred Scripture? And would such proof in fact be sufficient to break the spell of the new age movement across the whole spectrum of its influencer? The Christian, after all, operates in two kingdoms, o r realms; he is not only a churchman formcd by thc means of grace, hut also a citizen influenced by and influencing the many organs of earthly government; his mind is shaped not only by the Church in her subjection to the Word of God, but also by the course offerings of the educational institutions in which he is enrolled for a sizeable portion of his existence, not to mention the propaganda unremittingly sent forth by the media of communication. T o speak with Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the Christian's concern is not only with the ultimate, but also with the penultimate, and not least with the proper relation between the two. In the closing pages of DeServo Arbitrio, Luther reminds us that the Christian is informed

(I) "When I reluctantly wrote A Search for the li-ot11 in 1965 1 feared ostracism by the religious cornmunit).. Instead, I was flooded \ \ i ~ h invilations from protestant ministers to speak from their pulpits, and from Catholic academia to address their student bodies." The NewAge C~talogue, p. 9. quoting from Ruth Montgomery: AliemAmong Ilr


by both the light of grace and the light 01 nature, that is, that he walks by faith and also by reason.' Should the new age movement be attacked only when it infringes on the domain of Bonhoeffer's sphere of the ultimate or Lutlier's kingdom of God's Right Hand, then it will still be able to mislead with impunity not only unbelievers but also Christians as it remains impreg- nably ensconced in the territory nl'God's Left-Hand kingdom or the sphere of the penultimate. A two-pronged campaign against the errors of the new age movement is in order; the Christian slrugglc should be waged in the kingdom of the Left Hand as well as in thc kingdom of the Right Hand; battle should be joined in the area of the penultinlate as well as in that of he ultimate; and Christians should fight with all the weapons that God provides, those of right reason as well as those of devout faith. The Christian's calling is not abjectly to cower in the kingdom of the Right Hand, but rather precisely as a subject of the kingdom of God boldly to attest His lordship and His truth in the Left-Hand realm also.

In one of her books popularizing the new age movement, Shirley Mac- h i n e observes that:

... truth as an objective reality doesn't exist ....y ou can make the truth anything you want it to be[,12

while in another she remarks that: ... more and more I am convinced of the truth of Flaubert's statement: 'There is no such thing as reality. There is only perccption.'3

Miss MacLainc doubtless lives in blissful ignorance of the fact that her vacuous statements are footnotes to a sorry chapter in the development of western thought that dates from at least the time of Immanucl Kant (d. 1804) to our own day.

Kant was born into the milieu or eighteenth-century Koenigsberg Pietism, going on to retain Pietism's moral earnestness while rejecting such aspects of Christian dogma as Pietism still preserved. During thc first part of his career, Kant supposed that the existence of God, the soul, and the natural moral law were truths apprehcnsible by the human intellect. Once "awakened from his dogmatic slumbers" by reading the works of the infidel English philosopher David Hume, Kant came to believe that the essence of external reality (thc Ding an sich, the non~menon) is in fact unknowable by the human mind. Deeply concerned that life should still make sense despite the collapse of traditional philosophy and natural theology brought about bp Hutne, and convinced that while external reality is not knowable with certainty we can nevertheless have sure knowledge of the human process of cognition itself, Kant reintroduced the old truths of natural theology by the back door under the guise of the postu/afes of the practical reason, which were basically coterminous with the Enlightenment's religion of God, moral freedom, and immortality. Even though thc serious-minded Kant con-

(1) WA18.785~26ff.(Dc,~ervoArbit1'1'0,1525);LW33,p.292(TheBondi?gcofthcW,/I). (2) The New Age Catalogue. p. 40: quvling from Shirley MacLaine, Itk AIIIII the Pia-vi12g. (3) TheNewAge C~lalogue, p. 41, quoting from Shirley MacLaine: Dancingin the Light


sidered that he had saved religion from Humc's all-corrosive scepticism, a dreadlul spiritual debasement had (perhaps unwittingly) occurred in his thinking. A mere pos t~~ la l e has none of the inhcrcnt dignity and sclf-evident beauty that pertains to truth. Kant's human subject forfeits none of his autonomy in positing the postulates of the practical reason. This is a far cry from the reverent, humble acknowledgement o l truth which stands in analogy to and is inseparable from the creature's worshipful awe before his Maker.

Kant's "Copernican Revolution" in philosophy from the knowable object which governs thought to the all-determining autonomous knowing subject led to a decisive change in the nature of philosophy itself which has had a dramatic effect on the whole conception of truth in western culture. Lutheran ethicist Gilbert Mcilaender takes sharp issue with the relativist approach to truth adopted by contemporary philosopher Richard ~ o r t ~ . ' According to the latter, there are two basic modes of practising philosophy, which he labels "systematic" and "edifying" philosophy respectively. The roots of "systematic" philosophy go back to Plato and are to be more precisely identified as the understanding of knowledge as a vision of the true. Such philosophy, according to Rorty, is an arrogant attcmpt to play God and stifle dialogue. By way or contrast to any such claim to know the truth, Rorty proposes the model of "edifying" philosophy, which considers itself assigned the more modest task of "participating in a conversation" in which no man's opinion is intrinsically better than anyone else's.

Rorty's model of dialogue-oriented edifying philosophy invites com- parison with Lessing's (in)famous statement that he would prefer the infinite striving after truth over the possession of all of truth.2 Beneath the surface humility of both Lessing and Rorty lurks the seething rebellion o r the old Adam set on securing his immunity from divine supervision at all costs. The post-Kantian development in western philosophy has been set forth by one writer under the rubric of "The Dethronement of Truth."?he brushing aside of Plato's intention reverently to submit to truth has opened the floodgates to our culture's immersion under a tidal wave of false religion introduced partly under the auspices of thc new agc movement. Truth's being trodden under foot in ~ a v o i ~ r of the passing whims of fallen man also has much to do with the permissive society's costly attempt to bid farcwell to the natural moral law, and with the vogue enjoyed by so-called process, feminist; and liberation theology in wide circles of Christendom. Subjectivc

(1) Gilbert Ivleilaender: The Theoryand Practice of Virtue (Notrc Damc; Indiana: University of Notrc Dame Press, 19R4), pp. 62-68.

(2) Lessing's statcmcnt is quoted in Karl Barth: Protestant Theologyin the Nineteenth Century,. Its Backg~o~md&flistory(Lo~~doi~: SCM Press, 1972). p. 265: "If God were holding all the truth that exists in his right hand, and in his lel'i jusl Lhc one erer-aclive urge to find the truth, even if attached to it uele the condition thaL I should always and forever be going astray, and said to me, 'Choosc!' 1 should humbly fall upon his left hand and say: 'Fathey, give! Pure truth ip surcly only for thee alone!"'

(3) Dictrich von Hildcbrand: "Thc Dethronement of Truth," The A'ew 7owerofBabel Ma~jifestatioils of'Man's Escape fiom God(Chicag0: I'ranciscan Herald Press. 1Y54), pp. 57- 100.


consciousness now customarily takes precedence over evidence, which is a far cry from the human mind's bowing, however unwillingly, to truth, thereby submitting to reality as an extcrnal authority which radically un- dercuts crcaturely autonomy.

Modern philosophy's devaluation of truth is starkly evidcnt in thcse words from Williain Jamcs' Pragmatism:

Truth happensto an idea. Tt hecomestrue, is madet r~ le by events.' The relativist debunking of truth has, alas, become almost universal in our media of comnlunication and in our secular educational institutions a t all levels. The dethronement of truth in lavour of coldly utilitarian considcra- tions does much to explain the acccleration of doctrinal and moral apostasy within Christendom in recent generations, and it also accounts for thc spiritual vacuum in society as a whole which thc new agc movement is now attempting to fill.

Informed Christians ought, then, to respond to the new agc replaccmcnt of truth with self-serving illusion in both kingdoms and with the weapons of both faith and reason. As far as the kingdom of the Left Hand and thc sphere of reason are concerned, with its defcncc of a knowable objective world o l value in gcneral and of the natural moral law in particular, C. S. Lewis7 precious little book Tfie A b o l i h n o f ~ r n ~ can serve as a twenticth- century updating o r St. Paul's address on Mars Hill. The deep connection between Christian Theism and right reason is indirectly attested by what the August 1991 issue of Scientific American rcports conccrning the career of Soviet Academician Alexander Spirkin. Having risen to fame as the author of the standard textbook on atheistic dialectical materialism, Spirkin has in the era of gfasnosi becomc well known for his systematic support of ESP, witchdoctors, clairvoyance and other modern pseudoscientific stuff.3 Christian Theism secures the necessary lebensraun~ within which the precious divine gift of common scnse can operate.

The starting point and enduring motivation of all resistance to new agc encroachments in the sphere of the Right Hand is thc realization that the Christian religion commends itself to us not on account of any supposed pragmatic usefulness it may have for human society but supremcly (ultimately exclusively) in virtue of its truth. Sociologist Reginald W. Bibby begins his most recent work Mosaic Madness by labelling contemporary Canada as a nation with a fixation on (1) "frccdom," (2) "the individual," (3) "pluralism," and (4) "rc~ativism."~ Concerning the last-named of these [our traits of Canadian life in the present, Bibby obscrves that:

( I ) Rohcrt T Handy: art. "Pragmatism," in John Macquarrie ed.: DIcDu~~iiry o f Ch~ifjziin EEicCr (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1967), p. 267

( 2 ) C. S. Lcwis: Thc Aboijtion ofMan; or Keflectio~~s o~i Educalim wilh SpccialReference to the Teachilg ofb'11glish in lhe UppcrFurms ofschooir (New York: Macmillan Publishing Company, 1955).

(3) Scientific Amencan (August 199 l), p. 35. 4) Keginald W. Bihhy Mo.wic Mao'ncss. ThcPovcrlyandPotentialofLifeiil Canada (Toronto:

Stoddart Publishing Company, 1990). p. I f .


Truth and best are not listed in the pluralism dictionary. The only truth is that everything is relative.'

Amid today's spectacular cultural collapse, the Christian Church is divinely commissioned to open men's eyes to the fact that human frccdom, personal dignity, and legitimate variety among peoples have their proper subsistence only in the truth concerning God and man as given in the mystery of the Word made flesh. Truth and freedom are inextricably rclated (Jn. 8:32). Our Lord overturns the flippant relativist casting down of truth adumbrated in jesting Pilate's famous question with His majestic declaration, "1 am ... the Truth" (Jn. 14:6). Christians rejoice in the truths that Jesus is scated at the Right Hand of God thc Almighty Father, that the Scriptures give reliable tcstiinony to Him, and that the means of grace authentically communicate His righteousness and grace to us. Christianity is a celcbration of truth because the Hypostatic Union of divinity and humanity in the Person of the Son of God corresponds to reality. Once truth is subordinated 10 pragmatic considerations, Incarnation, Scripture, and doctrine degenerate into mere playthings, and the martyrs changc from bcing the noblest to become the most foolish of Christians. Luther's testimony against Erasmus, resounding as it does with a solemn awareness of the primacy of truth, has much to say to our time:

Thc Holy Spirit is no Skeptic, and it is not doubts or mere opinions that he has written on our hearts, but assertions more sure and certain than life itself and all cxperiencc.

The theosophical errors of the new age form no exception to the rule that all formidable heresies contain a grain of (albeit massively distorted) truth. "You are God," call out the new agers to mankind already swollen in its pride. Such blasphemy not only contravenes the First Coinmandlnent but also stands a t odds with the finite fallen creature's unsuppressible sense of the holiness oSGod and of his own sordid sinfulness. And yet even in these their worst blasphemies new age spokesmen parody Christian truth. While man will never become ontologicallydivine even after countless ages spent in beholding the face of God, and while the sheer ontological gulf between God and man is not blurrcd even in the communion of natures within the Person of Christ, it is nevertheless the case that through Holy Baptism Christians are incorporated by adoption and gracc into the relationships that subsist belwccn the Pcrsons of the Blessed Trinity. While salvation is by no means to be construed as "ootologicaldeirication," it may without impropriety be labelled "re/;itionaldeification." St. Peter is bold to speak of Christians' becoming "partakers of the divine nature" (I1 Pet. 1:4), a remark which, since the apostle was no pantheist, must be understood

(1) Reginald Bibby: op.d., p. 2. (2) LW13, p. 24 (On tlteUondage ofthe Will, 1525); WA 18. 605, 32-34: "Spisilus sanclua non est

scepticus, nec dubia aut opinioncs in cordihus nostsis scripsit, sed assestiones ipsa n t a et o n ~ n i experientia certiores et firmiores." cf. also Augustinc's cxclamation, "Truth! Tmth! IIow the very marso\\ oC ray aoul wilhin me yearned for it...'' Contkions III:6; quoted from The Confessions of St. A~~gi i~r t iw(t r . with mtroduction by K. S. Pine Coffin. London: Penguin Books, 1961). p. 60..

John R. Stephenson: GIVING A TWOFOLD RESPONSE TO THE ANCIENT ERRORS OF THE "NEW AGE" 55 "relationally" rather than "ontologically." "Eternal life" is twice used by St. John in his First Epistle as a title or description of God Himself (I Jn. 1:3; 5:20); "eternal life" is no created gift, but rather God's impartation of Himself lo His elect, its consummation a knowing of Him even as we are known by Him (I Cor. 13:12). Our gracious adoption into sharing Jesus' Sonship of the Father is an infinitely higher status than that involved in the self-idolatry urged on us by thc new age.' The people of God's participation in our Lord's divine Sonship is, moreover, something now enjoyed by faith and not as the object of immediate experience. While the new age worldview claims outright "ontological deification" for man already in the here and now, Christianity speaks of the "relational deification" of the blessed as a divine gift and eschatological promise: "we know that when He appears we shall be like Him, for we shall see H i m as He is" (I Jn. 3:2). God will remain God and the saved will stand in awe of His holiness, evcn at the eschaton.

St. John's statement "God is love" could never be predicated of the impersonal Absolute called God in new age thinking. Two comments may be offered on the new age movement's drastic reduction of Almighty God to the level of an impersonal Absolute. First, since personality is the being of loftiest moral worth that comes within the range of our immediate experience in this life, any conception of God along impersonal lines necessarily involves thc elevation of man far above God. Secondly, the glorification of inan by his exaltation above Deity tliought of as impersonal Absolute in fact brings about man's complete debasement. Human dignity consists in thc person's being created in the image of the three-personal God. New age monism and pantheism, which blend divine and human reality into one and thoroughly fudge the differences bctween created realities, can leave no room for the respect due human personality created in God's image. New age error begins with its hostility to the first article of the creed.

Two further grains of truth show up in other aspecls of new age theosophical doctrine also. First, whcn new age publicists deny the reality of death, they parody the Eastcr faith of the Church, which, in the words of ous Lord Himself, assures belicvers that

I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me, though he die, yet shall he live, and whoever lives and believes in Me shall nevcr die (Jn. 1 1 :25f.).

Be it recalled, though, that these Dominica1 words which triumphantly resound at services of Christian burial presuppose the universal bitter reality of Adamic death and build on the Lord's victory over death which took place through His tasting God's punishment of man's sin. Secondly, new age antinomianism can be seen as parodying the truth of believers'

l

1 (1) The equnrocal con~ep l o r selkaleem would seem most often to be used w~thm the parnmcterr of the tlcw age'$ encouragement of human self-idoldtry A grdln oi L~utll is to be fouud even m the notlon of self-esteem, howclcr, whlch 14 employed, m the wntlngs of Jdrne, Dubaon, 101 t-xample, to connole a pe~son's fittmg self-respect Thcrc can be no cxcusc for deymmg God's good ~ i e d l ~ o n ds 1 s u ~ h


deliverance from the power of the Law. This truth of revelation does not, however, annul the Law in itself, but is founded on the cancellation of the Law's just accusation by the sacrificial Blood of Christ and aims at the fulfillinent of the Law's demands in Christian lice under the renewal of the Holy Spirit.

Finally, the very expression "new age" is itself a saucy parody of the true new age that has dawned in Christ the Second Adarn (Roin. 5:12-21). Against the counterfeit "new age" which is but an unconvincing gaudy decoration of the lnelancholy reality or the old age of sin and death, Christians are to bear witness to the true "new age" which has begun in the Church and which will be consummated when the kingdom comes in fullness. Our life in the genuine "new age" must include as a prime concern thc recovery of the primacy of truth in both kingdoms, realms, or spheres. What indeed could correspond more perfectly with the nature of God Himself than "speaking the truth in love" (Eph. 4: 15)?

John R. Stephenson is Associate Professor o f Hislnrical Theology a t Con- cordia Lutheran TheohgjcaJ Seminary, Sl. Ca lharines, Ontario.

John R. Wileh: BELIEF IN LIFE AFTER DEATH IN GENESIS 57

BELIEF IN LIFE AFTER DEATH IN GENESIS John R. Wilch

Martin Luther, in his Genesis Lectures 456 years ago [1536], interpreted Adam's giving of the name "Eve" to his wife (Gen. 3:20) so, "that he believed in life ... If Adam had not been aware of the future life, he would not have been able to cheer his heart" by this name. Thus "the Holy Spirit had cheered his heart through his trust in the forgiveness of sins by the Seed of Eve," so that he should "remind himsclf of the Promise through which he also receivcd new life, and pass on the hope of everlasting life to his descendants."' This is a diametrical contrast to higher critical scholars who ordinarily deny that there is any evidence of belief in life after death in either the patriarchal traditions or ancient ~ s r a e l . ~

This denial is generally based on theories of development in religion, but it practically makes Israel an exccption among ancient religions. For belief in life of somc kind after death is well attested among the old Egyptians, Babylonians, Ugaritcs, Canaanites, Chinese, Celts, Teutons and Greeks, as well as Hindus, Jains and ~ u d d h i s t s . ~ Indeed, cven all the evidence from burials of palaeolithic, mesolithic, neolithic and contemporary animistic cultures betrays belief in life beyond death.4 Should then the Israelites comprise the only people of aniquity who lacked this concept?

Luther interprcted Gen. 3:20 Christocentrically and spokc of faith and hope in the Promise of Gen. 3:15 and of salvation through this faith. With his thoroughgoing Christocentric exposition, could Luther have overinter- preted, reading something into the text that is not there, employing eisegesis instead of exegesis? Or might he have had another of his many inspired, ingenious insights?

A. b g i c in Scripture for Life Beyond Death

The Protcvangcl of Gen. 3:15 is the essential Promise of God to Adam and Eve, in fact, not only to all the other antediluvian patriarchs, but also for the entire Old Testament era. So Luthcr declares, while commenting on Gen. 4 : l : "Through this faith in the future Seed all the saints were justified and sanctified."' Let us here present afivefoldlogical sequence: First, Satan utilized the serpent to tempt Adam and Eve into the death-bringing sin of rebellion against God (3:l-6; cf. 1Chr. 21:l ; 2 Chr. 18:19-22; Job 1:6-2:lO; Zech. 3:1-4; Jn. 8:44).

Secondly, Adani and Eve must suffer thc punishment of death (Gen. 2: 17; 3:3, 19, 2 2 ) , which presumes at least a physical death. Not even the faithful

(1) LWI, p.220. WA 42, p.165. (2) E.g., J. Hempel in I~~te~prcicrr's Didionary of the R2dc /IDB/III, p.951; J. Jereiluas in 721eoIogicd

Dictionasy of the New Testame~~i ,Cl Uh'TJ 1, p. 1 47. (3) See, e.g., Alfrcd Jcrcinias: Das Alte Testan~e~~t iix Lichk des Alien Or~entn (2nd cd., Lcipzig:

Hiarichs, 1906) pp. 27, 86-91, 100, 115, 118,586; John B. Noss: Ma1'sKcI1giu17.\, (7th ed., New York: Macmillan, 1Y84), pp. 51-52,61-65, 89-92; 98-99, 114-117,241-243,256-259.

(4) Noss: pp. 5-9, 19, 23-28. (5) L WI:242, WA 42:180.


believer Abel, whose olfering was favourably received by God (4:4), was spared dcath. How much more, then, must Adam, Eve - ycs, and all the others - cxpcct to cxpcriencc dcath according to the judgment of God (Gen. 2:17; cf. PS. 90:7) as "the wages" of their sin (Rom. 6:23)!

Thirdly, God promised that this Tempter would be "crushed" by the "Seed" of the woman (Gen. 3:15). Jesus proclaimed Himself as the One to vanquish Satan (John 12:31; 16:ll) . He is the "Seed" of the woman because, as the Son born of the Virgin (Tsa. 7:14): His conception was made possible by the intervention of the Holy Spirit (Matt. 1 :20). This solved the mysteries of both Gen. 3.15 and Isa. 7:14, for neither can a woman have seed nor can a virgin become pregnant. So, as we read in Hebrews 2:14, Jesus by His death "destroyed him who holds the power of death, that is, the devil" (cf. Rom. 5:19; 1 Cos. 15:56-57; 2 Tim. 1:10). Thus thc axiom holds that, though a promise may be unclcar, its fulfilment clarifies it.

Fourthly, this defeat of Satan must mean the essential victory over sin and the reversal of the punishment of death. Jesus proclaimed Himself as "the Resurrection and the Life" and as the "Bread of life," for "in Him is life ... the light of mankind" (Jn. 1:4; 6:35; 11:25; cf.14:6). By His death, "death has been swallowed up in victory" (1 Cor. 15:54). Because He laid down His life, He gives everlasting life to whoever believes i n Him (Jn. 3:36; 10:15, 28; cf. Rom. 5:lO).

And fifthly, if Adam and his fellow-believers must die in this life but are promised the victory over Satan, sin and death, God shall surely provide them with life beyond death. This is the crux of the matter. Can this be substantiated in Genesis?

B. Evidence with Adam and Eve for Belief in Life Beyond Death

Literally, Gen. 3:20 reads: "Then the man called the name of his wife 'Life' [or 'Life-Giver,' i.e., Eve], for she became the mother of every llving one." The name "Eve" (chawwah) is etyrnolog~cally related to "life" (chayyah), for it probably preserves an archaic form of the root chayah,' and thus indicates the meanmg of "life" in some way. Indeed, as C . F. Kcil points out, the doubled w in chawwah may well indicate a Pi'el form, and may thus refer to one who gives life,2 "Llfe-Giver."

It appears incongruous that Adam, immediately after receiving the punishments of pain, toil and death from the LORD (Gen. 3:16-19), should respond b y giving his wife such a positive name of promise.3 Of course, we have no firm reason to conclude that this name-giving was immediate. There may have been a passing of some time that was sufficient for Adam to reflect

(1) See G Gerleman, "chavah Hih leben." Theolomches Handworterbuch mm Altcn Testament

(2) Gencsjs, tr. J. Martin: Commentary on the Old Testament/COT/(repr.: vol. I, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. 1978). on 3:20.

(3) Claus Westermnnn connects 3 2 0 with 4:l to overcome the seeming incongruity; Gene.ci,s: A Pr;rcticn?l Commcntwy, Tcxr and Intcrprctation(tr. D Grccn: Grand Rapids: Ecrdmans, 1987).

John R. Wilch: BELIEF IN LIFE AFTER DEATH IN GENESIS 59

upon their sin and God's previous and recent words of Promise and judgment.

Adam's name of Eve was a celebration of life. This he could do in the post-Fall situation only il; in Faith, repentance and forgiveness,' he realized that God's punishmcnt upon him and his wife did not cancel out His original plan that mankind should "be fruitful, multiply and fill the earth" (Gen. 1:28). Although the punishment of death because of sin must stand (Gcn. 3:19), Satan has been thwarted in his attempt to bring death to Adam and Eve right away, bcfore they have any offspring: and thus finish off the human race from the start. But God proves that He is cleverer than the clever devil (Gen. 3: 1): Death shall surely come, but only after the man and woman have produced offspring. Satan has "seed," his "offspring" of lesser dcmons, but the woman, too, shall have offspring.

Indeed, the woman shall have a certain "Secd" (Gen. 3:15), a singular Descendant who shall appear in order to crush Satan and, thercfore, his powcr. Now, if the LORD promised that Satan should someday be crushed, that means that thcrc will bc an eventual end to the temptation to rebel and disobey God. Although Satan alone is not the only source of temptation, if there is a t least an end to temptation from him, there arises thc hope that therc may be an end to all sin -- that is, a return to the situation of Paradisc before thc Fall. Therefore, there may be a cancellation of divine punishment, primarily of death.

Furthermore, the Tree of Life symbolized for Adam and Eve the potential of life with God as long as they ate from it (Gen. 2:9). Therefore, it is quite possible that, after receiving God's new Promise in the Protevangel, they could not only conceive of the continuation of human life on earth but also the eventual cancellation of the death sentence. But, to convince thcm of the eventuality of their death, the LORD drove them out of the Garden of Eden and stationed chcrubim and a flaming sword to prevent them access to the Tree of Life (Gen. 3:22-24)."rom then on, the continuation of life in any form was purely by God's grace.

If, on the onc hand, Adam and Eve must one day die, but if, on the other hand, the LORD has promised thcm victory over temptation, sin, punishment and death, what conclusion does that lead to? If there must be death, but if there will also be the victory over death, this must mean that there shall bc life beyond death - at least for those who believe in God's Promise.

Further, we read in Gen. 4:26: "As for Seth, also to him was born a son, and he called his name Enosh. Then it was begun to call on the Name of thc LORD." In the light of this passage, is it possible that this earliest corporate

(Ij 1T.C. Lcnpold F~pnv't~on ofGenesis(Columbus: Wartburg, 1942), on 3:20. (2) Keil (np.cit., p. 107) stresses that the banishment from Eden was for Lheir own good, to prevent

them from living forever in the rnlsery of the state of sin. Leupold (op.cit., p. 187) point5 out that, as 'Yhe living ones" (Ezek. 10:17), the cherubim "rcprcsent the highcst type of living beings." The Tree of Life w t h guardians camc to he a popular motif in the ancient world (see John Strange, "The Idea of Afterlife in Ancient Israel: Some Remarks on the Iconography in Solomon's Temple," Palestine E-ploration Qu.zrterlyll7, London: 1985, pp. 36-38). Cf. also PS. 1:3 and ~ t s l'aradisal ovcrtoncs (see Mitchell Dahood: Psaljm /:I-.fO, Anchor f3ihicjABJ New York: Doubleday, 1965).


worship had anything to do with belief in life after death? Luther exposited that Adam, as "high priest" of the household of the godly, exhorted his "descendants to wait for their redemption, to believe the Promise [3:15], ... and through that hope to overcome" hate and persecution and "not to despair about their salvation but rather to thank ~ o d ..."l

Besides Abel, who had been killed, Cain, who had been banished, and Seth, Adam and Eve also had other sons and daughters (5:4). But the implication of Gen. 4:26a is that, apart from Cain's children, Enosh was Adam's lirst grandson. It is apparent that when a person bccomcs a grandparent, his perspective on life entcrs a new phasc: His child is now himself a parcnt; the family has become a "greater family;" the new generation promises hope for ever continumg life. For true bclicvcrs such as Adam and Evc, this means the bcginning of the fulfilment of God's original promise to them in Gen. 1:28: "Be fruitful, multiply and fill the earth ..." Therefore, God's curse of the ground, His punishing them and their banishment from the Garden of Eden - even the ugly flowering of their sinfulness in Cain's disbelief, inurder of Abel and banishment by G o d did not cancel out that promise. Therefore also, they could believe all the more surely and fervently in the Promise of the Protevangelium, that the Seed of the woman shall crush the head of the serpent and bring salvation from the banishment of death. For "seed" continues to bear [suit through women in the progeny of the third gener a t' ion.

C. The Evidence of Enoch and Elijah Living beyond Dcath

Luthcr's statement that Adam believed in everlasting life is therefore on good logical footing. But can it be substantiated contextually?

We do not need to range far afield in Scripture before we find our best evidence already in the next chapter, Gen. 5:22-24. Here we read that "Enoch walked with God." This expression is rather unclear until we also note about Enoch that "he was not, for God took him" (Iaqnch, Qal perf.). The traditional interpretation of this potentially ambiguous report2 is presented in Hebrews 11:5: "By faith Enoch was taken up [meletethe, 1 Aor. pass.,mefafitheml] so that he should not see death: ... bcforc hc was taken up [metetheken, 2 Aor. pass.], he was attested as having plcascd God." That God's "taking" a person refers to life in contrast t o death 1s found also twice in the Psalms: in a psalm of the Sons of Korah, 49:15 (HT: v. 16): "But God

L WI, p. 327; WA 42, p. 241; aee also Keil, op.cil. See Kell: op.cjL, and Leupold: op.ci/. Higher critics range in interpreting 5:22-24 all the way from

"removal into otherworldly sphcrcs of cxistencc" (Gcrhard van Rad: Gcncsis, Oid Tc~~Imcnt Librar,v(OTLj, tr. J . H . Marks, rev ed., Philadelphia: Westminster, 1972, p. 10; cf. R. Bowie: "Expusi~ion ol' Genesis." Inft~preferk BibIe[IBj, vol. 1, New York: Abingdun, 1952, p. 530; Robert Dabidson: Gene.~ls 1-11, Chbridgc Rihlc Cirmn~cnrary[CBC Cambridge: Univcrsity Prcss: 1973) to "nothing can he made of it" (Waltcr Brucggcmann: Genesis, Ii~~terpretation, Atlanta: John ICnox, 1952; cf. J. C. L. Gibson: Ge~iesis, Uar!r .S fndjBi , Edinburgh: St. Andrew Press, 1981) and "nu presentiment of~mrnortality" (John Skinner: Genesis, 2nd ed., Interi~otjond C~iticd Commenta~y [TCCJ Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark; 1930; cf Claus Wcntcrmann Genesis 1-11, tr J . J . Scullion, Minncapolis: Augshurg, 1954).


Enoch was not obedient, but that, already in this life, he enjoyed the most intimate possible communion with God - as Leupold put it: "living one's lire in such a way that in faith onc remains uninterruptedly conscious of the nearness of the almighty God and so walks as the thought of that presence determines."' Thus, God chose the man for this singular miracle who most exempliried to his contemporaries dot just firm faith, but what we would call justification and sanctification. We may also compare here what Moses in the following chapter reports of the only other person of whom it is said in Scripture that he "walked with God," namely, Noah , who was "righteous," "blameless," and "found favour in the eyes of the LORD" (Gen. 6:8-9).

D. Belief in Life beyond Death with Lamcch and Noah

Further evidence in Genesis is more implicit. Thrce generations after Enoch, after there have been a number of further deaths among Adani's believing descendants, Lamech also exhibited his faith in the Promise of the Protevan- gel in a way similar to that oSEve (4: 1). He gave exprcssion to his faith when he named his son "Noah" [noach], meaning "rest." For he used an assonan- tal word when he explained: "This one shall bring us relief [yenachmem] from our work and from the toil of our hands because OS thc ground which the LORD cursed!"(5:29). This declaration is significant, first, because, although now at the tenth generation since the psonouncement OS the punishment against Adam: Lamech so accurately refers to it that it manifestly must have been passed down as recorded. Secondly, if Lamech not only lamcnts the punishment but also expresses a certain hope in "relief," then this implies his faith not only in the Protevangel but also in its logical consequences for faith, including lifc beyond death. For the consequences of sin wcrc not only thc "work" and "toil" but also death. Relief from work and toil, then, is also relief from death full life, as it had been given two generations earlier to Enoch.

Noah thus sharcd this faith in life bcyond death. On the one hand, he is similarly described like Enoch in his faith and piety - and also in obedience (e.g., 6:22). On the other hand, he is also, like Abel, an cxarnple to believers as one who sacrificcd to the LORD on his own initiative (8:20), not in obedience to a divine ~ o r n m a n d . ~ Except for his own immediate family, all other contemporary human beings perished in the Flood - what a remindcr of the punishment of death! But in sacrificing up innoccnt animals to the LORD, Noah, like Abel, expressed his faith in God's mercy. He believed that God forgave his sin and would fulSill the Promisc of the Protcvangel, thal is, actualize the victory ovcr sin and death. In other words, He would grant him full lifc with Himself, if not according to the example of Enoch, at least after death.

( l ) Op.cit., on 5:21-24; cf. the injunction In MK. 6 3 (2 ) See Leupold, O ~ . C I L . , on 4:3.


Thus, Adam, Evc and all their believing descendants believed, first, that Abel enjoyed life after death, secondly, that Enoch had been translated into everlasting life without death, and. finally, that all those who must succumb to death in this earthly lile will live beyond dcath with Abel and Enoch.

E. Furthcr Evidence in Genesis

Some further contextual evidence is more implicit. When we observe Cain's desccndants, we find them making dramatic advances in culture, technology and what we call civilization. The same phenolnenon is later repeated under Nimrod and the builders of the Tower of Babel (Gen. 10:8-12; 11: 1-4). This latter event clearly shows that such people are preparcd to disobey and defy God, for they refuscd to "fill the earth." Instead of believing and trusting in His promises, they manifestly believed in themselves, aiming to "make a name" for themselves.' The same holds true for the Cainites, who became noted for itnproving their culture and technology, that is, in doing all they could for themselves. Their prime concern was not service to God and to others, but to themselves. Thcy exhibited Cain's lack of faith in God, lack of rcpentance, tendency to violence (see Gen. 4:23-24; 6:l and lack or faith in life after death. They were obsessed with the life here and now, with this life on this earth.

By contrast: the Sethites, Adam's bclieving dcsccndants, "called on the Namc of the LORD" (Gen. 4:26). That is, they believed in God and they expressed this faith in praise and prayer, i n thanks and petition, in repentance and trust. They believed in the LORD'S promises, in continuing fellowship with Him, and in what His promises and fellowship cntailed as a necessary corollary: The living, eternal God grants everlasting life after death to His faithful whom He forgives.

Proceeding to Tsrael's patriarchs, we find God promising to Abraham: "you shall go unto your lathers in peace," and Abraham eventually being "gathered to his kinsmen" (Gcn. 15:15a; 25:8). Although burial is referred to in the contexts (Gen. 15:15b; 25:9),3 something more than that must be indicated by the above statements. For-, as most commentators point out, such phrases are often used when the deceased was buried ncithcr with "fathers" not "kinsmen" (e.g., Abraham, Aaron, Moses and avid).^ When it is said about such apostates as Jcroboam I, Rchoboam, Abijam, Baasha and Omri, "he slept with his fathers," it at least means that the soul of the deceased is united with the souls of his ancestors in some kind of alterlife'e.5

(1) SceKeil,op.cit. ,onll:l-4. (2) See Leupold, op. c k , on Gen. 4:23-24. (3) See G. von Rad (op. cit.) and Rruce Vawter (On Ge~jcsis: A NewRcading, Garden City:

Doubleday, 1977) on 15: 15. (4) Num. 20:24,26; 27:17; 31:2; Deut. 3l: l h; 2.50; 2 Sarn 7'12: 1 Kings 121; 210; see Ke~l (op. cif)

and Lcupold (op, cif.) on 25% Ciaus Westeril~a~ul suggests that the deceased will be remembered by his descendants anlouy the deceased ancaslurb (Genesis: Practicai, and Genmis 12-26> tr. J. J. Scullion, Mirn~eapolis: Augsburg, 1985, on 252).

(5) 1 Km 14:20, 31; 15.8: 16:6, 28; see Keil (op cjl.) and B . Jacob (Genes~s, tr. E. I . &W. Sacoh. New York: KTAT7, 1974) on Gen. 25%


This is evidently a neutral reference, indicating that the soul of the deceased is reunited with the souls OS his relatives and ancestors, regardless whether they arc rightcous or wickcd, rcwardcd or punished. But when used with such righteous persons as Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (Gen. 35:29; 47:30; 49:29, 33), this may well presume that the afterlife Sor the deceased is the everlasting reward in the divine presence.' This afterlife may be identified as "Shcol," which is usually understood by commentators as a vague term for the nether-world where the souls of all deceased humans go.2 However, Sheol is always presented negatively (see 2 Sam. 22:6; PS. 16:10; 31 : lX) , Sor example as the antithesis of heaven (Job 1l:X; PS. 139:8) and as punishmcnt for the wicked (Num. 16:30, 33; Job 24:19; PS. 9: 17; 49:14-15 [HT: 15-16]; Isa. 5: 14; 14:9, 1 l , 15). In this light, Hezekiah's fear of descending into Sheol (38:lO) could indicate that his mortal illness meant to him that the LORD was punishing his sins (38:1,17-18). Likewise, Jacob may be understood as presuming that Joseph's death by the wild beast was punishment from God (Gen. 37:33, 35).3 Most frequently, however, Sheol is used synonymously with death and burial, parallcl to thc grave of "pit," where worms feast on the corpse."t may thus be concluded that the bodies of all people "descend to Sheol" at death, that is, are buried. This does not prevent different destinies for human souls, namely, that those of the wicked will be punished but those of the righteous reunited with their awakened and resurrected bodies to everlasting life (2 Kings 4:31,35; Job 19:2h; Isa. 26:19; Dan. 12:2).

F. Further Evidence in the Old Testament

The foundation thus appears clear and firm for faith in life after death beginning with the earliest chapters of the Old Testament. As a further proof of life beyond dcath, this time roughly midway in Israel's history, the LORD "took" Elijah to everlasting life without death (2 Kn. 2:10). Before this, we have Saul's presumption to be able to speak to dead Samuel's spirit -which he did (l Sam. 28:14-20). His successor, David. expressed the bclief in life beyond death in respect to his deceased infant son in terms that Adain and Eve might have used about Abel: "Now he is dead: ... I shall go to him, but he will not return to me!" (2 Sam. 12 :23) .~ As referred to already above, the sons of Korah in Psalm 49, after dwelling on the fate of the wicked in death and Sheol (vv. 13-14, S . also vv. 7-12), declare in confident faith an opposite destiny: "But God shall ransom my life from the power of Sheol,

( I ) Scc Lcupold (op. at.) on Gcn. 15:15 & 25:R. (2) See Keil (op. cir.) and Leupold (op. cit,) on Gen. 37:35; Joachim Jeremias, "hades," TDNTI, pp.

146-147; T. H. Gasier. "Dead," IDBI, pp. 787-788; G. Gerlernan, "she Wse'ol Tolenreich," THAT 11: cols. 839-840.

(3) Scc Alcxandcr:op. cif; p. 44. (4) See Num. 16:30-33; Job 17:13-16; 24:19-20; PS. 5515 (HT: 16); 8 8 5 6 ; (HT:4-7); Isa. 14:ll-20; Ezek.

31:14-18; 32:18-29; R. L. Harria: "she'ol," Theologicai Wordbook o f the Old Teslarnent. 2892-893. ho te that PS. 9:17 (HT: 181, "let the wicked return to Sheol," recalls Gen. 3.19, "return to the ground;" see 1~ahood:Psaims /, p SR.

( 5 ) See Sawyer: op. cit., p. 224.


for he shall take me!" (v. 15 [HT: v.l(,]).' Well-known is Job's faith: "After my skin has been destroyed, yet without my flesh I shall behold God, whom 1 shall behold for mysclf ... !" (Job 19:26-27).~ There follow the inspired insights of Isaiah: "The LORD ... will swallow up death for eves ..." (Isa. 25:8); "Thy dead shall live, their bodies shall arise ..." (Tsa. 26:19); and, linked with the New Creation: "For, as thc ncw heavens and the new earth which I will be making will be remaining beforc Me, ... so your offspring and name will be remaining!" (Isa. ~ 6 : 2 2 ) . ~ Although Ezekiel's vision of the "resurrection" of dry bones foretold the restoration of the people of Israel (Ex. 37:l-14), it could have been well appreciated by him and his contemporaries against the background of faith in life beyond death.'Finally, the clearest statement for resurrection to everlasting life was given to Daniel: "Many of those sleeping in the ground shall awake: some to everlasting life, but some to everlasting disgrace and contempt" (Dan. 12:2).5 Indecd, rather than speak of a scarcity of Old Testament references to life beyond death, it would be well worth the study to investigate a plethora of passages which may well presume everlasting life, for example, the frequent cxclamations in the Psalms of being delivered from death to life.6

G. Conclusion

There are, therefore, sufficient clear indications in Genesis for the belief in life beyond death, and they are supported by many other similar passages in the Old Testament. Indeed, we should realize that, if the earliest believers did not believe in life beyond death, there would scarcely have been any point t o worship the LORD at all. Why not rather live like the Caiuites, enjoying, improving and defending one's material existence on earth to the best of one's human potential? But to make God's will and promises one's guide here in this earthly life - to sacrifice many potential worldly comforts in order to serve God in piety and worship - that demands snore than merely gratitude for God's earthly blessings. That rather demands the realization that there is much more to life than obviously meets the eye here on earth. The eternal, living God mercifully grants the repentant His grace by forgiving their sins. Therefore, He lovingly extends the Promise of

See Psalm 7324; Dclitzsch (op. cit) and 1.eupold (Exposition o f thePsa1ms. Columbus: Wartburg, 1959) on PS. 49:13-14; Dahood PsalmsZI~ pp. l-li; Sawyer: op. cit., p. 226. See Job 14.12; Sawyer: op. c& pp. 232-233; Alexander: up. cif., p. 45. See Delitzsch (Isaiah, Is. James Martin. COT, vol. VIT) and Leupold (Exposition of Lsxiah, vol. 1, Grand Rapids: Bakcr, 1971) on Isa. 25% & 26: 19; Leonard J. Greenspoon: "The Origin of the Idea of Kesurrectlon," in Tr-adftioi~sm Traos/LTnaiior~ (eds. B. Halpern & J. Levinson. Winona Lake: E~senbrauns, 1981), p. 269; Sawyer: op. cit., pp. 225, 234; Alexander: o p cit., p. 45. Scc Kcil (Ezckicl, tr Jamcs Martin, 0 7 ; Vol IX, pp. 121-128), who cites Jerome and Calov Cf.

Strange: op, cjt., p. 38; James M. Lindenberger: "Daniel 12:l-4, " I ~ ~ t e ~ p ~ e t a t l o n 39.2, 1985, p. 186; Rudiger Bartel~nus: "Ez 37,l-14, die Verbrorm weqatafund die Anfange des Auferstehungshoffnung," Zcihhr i f i f i ~ r die AlttestamcnfIichc Wisscnschafi 97.3, 1985, pp. 388-389. Keil: Danief(tr. M. G. Easton, COT, vol. IX); Leupold: Lixpostro~~ of'Dai~ie/(repr.: Grand Rapids:

Baker. 1969). See Pss. 165-11; 17:14-15; %:l3 [HT v 141; 7326; R6:13; 1 1 6 9 , 15; Delitxsch (Psalms) on I6:1l, 17:15 & 73:26; 1.eupold (Psalms) on 16:11 & 17:15; Dahood (Psalmsl) on 16:11 Sr 17:15; ibid. (Psalms ZL 51-100, AB, 1968), on 73:26, i b d (Psafms 114, on 1 l6:Y. 15 and pp. xli-lii.


everlasting life to repentant believers and gladly "takes" them to Himself, to life beyond death!

.John R. Wilch Professo~- o f Exegetical Theology at Coacordih LZI theran T/?eo/ogical Se~ninasy, St. Cathari~~es, Oi~tario.

CONCORDIA ST. CATHARINES CONCORDIA

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