Weaver1has's Blog

23^rd 10 2020

Humanity did not start at the bottom of the rung make its way up the animal and plant ladder.  This cannot be the case. Adam and Eve were created good.  Then the fall happened… generically or literally, a Fall took place and humanity fell into an Autumnal abyss.  Only through the second Adam (Jesus Christ) could humanity look to the Springtime again with the promise of eternal life which is a gift (cannot be earned).

Let us find out then how the Christian view is different to these worldly philosophical views. On pages 42 to 43 in Bavinck’s ethics we find the conclusion to this debate and reflection on what the standard of Ethics should be.  At the end of page 42 Bavinck writes;

 ”…that which is considered to be ‘normally’ human cannot truly serve as the standard of ethics”.

I think the word ‘normally’ is a defining word.  It may even be related to the sociology term ‘Norm’.  If this is the case that it means; ‘They are most commonly defined as rules or expectations that are socially enforced’. (www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780199756384/obo-9780199756384-0091.xml)

Durkheim a contemporary of Bavinck would think; Norms are a ‘social fact’ (Durkheim: 1982). These are the words from the famous French sociologist Emile Durkheim. He went on to explain that we are born into a pre-existing order, with rules and norms that have already been premade and set. And that if we want to live in this society we are born into, we must learn to abide by these ‘pre-determined sanctions’ (Durkheim: 1982/1895, p56-57). ‘’ (https://www.ukessays.com/essays/sociology/the-social-factual-norms-by-durkheim-sociology-essay.php)

This cannot be the standard then.  Herman Bavinck finds another and true centre for  the grounds of Ethics and takes ethics completely out of the hands of Humanity and puts our accountability to God because true ethics can only be done when we live and move as the ‘image of God;

’ According to Bavinck a lot of humanity got ‘dominion over nature wrong’.  ‘It is not enough to be a person exercising dominion over nature’.  We can only be truly good (ethics) at home, in the public square, and everywhere else, when we are the image of God.’ (Bavinck’s ethics volume 1 page 42)

So what sort of characteristics does God have that we ought to follow? 

This is a very important point because it takes the responsibility out of humanity and into God’s hands.  Jesus Christ is our standard and I don’t have time to write about this yet.  However, God certainly wouldn’t want his creation damaged after making it perfect including the beginnings of the human race in Adam and Eve.  The second Adam came to make things right.  Ecologically Christians following the standard of the image of God ought to fight the greed that is in the world that causes forests to be burned down.  Greed that destroys the fishing stocks of the world.  Hate that causes the deaths of countless and the building of atomic weapons. 

The most powerful weapon in the world is not the nuclear bomb, it is love; God is love; we ought to walk in love.  We need to share love to turn the hearts of people away from the destructive elements found at the individual level and social level since the Fall. Ghandi and Martin Luther King knew this.

We now move on to secular views of what a human being is and how he/she develops into the potentiality of what it means to be human.  Right from the start I have to say I don’t agree with these views and neither does Bavinck.  Bavinck is explaining what these philosophies are although he doesn’t agree with them.

Here are some names Bavinck mentions on pages 37 – 38

1.     J.G. Fichte; (1762 – 1814) Founding Father of German Idealism (Ideas developed from Kant’s writings)

2.     Schleiermacher; (November 21, 1768 – February 12, 1834) Father of modern Liberal theology

3.     R.Rothe;  Theologiische Ethik; (28 January 1799 – 20 August 1867) He saw himself as a theosophist.

4.     Hegel; 27 August 1770 – 14 November 1831); Fundamental figure of philosophy.

For more background information on some of these seminal figures you can read it on the wikis.

The Philosophy of the Age which contradicts the Biblical witness

Bavinck starts with; J. G. Fichte (1762-1814) taught with impressive

intellectual power that morality only comes into existence out of conflict.

The intelligent ego strives after freedom, self-sufficiency, and independence and wants to be absolutely autonomous but finds itself restricted by the non-ego.  The non-ego has to be conquered and pushed back; the ego has to dominate the non-ego; reason has to rule over nature, and spirit over matter. Morality, thus, is the result of conflict, struggle, and wrestling; it lies at the end of the road,it is not a point of departure but an end goal. The ego is born as restricted by the non-ego (which is sinful, because for Fichte sin is restriction). Paragraph from page 37 of Bavincks Ethics by John Bolt.  He goes through these thinkers and explains the ideas that they had. Man is created completely natural and evil. Overtime they take on nature and spirit and in the long struggle eventually break away from nature.  The goal is for nature to become reason and spirit. God is also the result of a process.

A Reflection

Forget about sin. In this scheme ‘morality is a goal, a result of a process an ideal…’ (page 38) I don’t think that much has changed since the days of Bavinck.  Idealism, evolution taught as fact, underpins a lot of the sciences even today. Even though this way of thinking is seen as secular, non-religious, independent.  Nothing is further from the truth; these ideas were found in the ancients in some form and in other religious systems. 

Empedocles; ( c. 494 – c. 434 BC, fl. 444–443 BC)

With his ideas, one can see a precursor to Darwin’s theory of natural selection.

Wikipedia explains in his Cosmogony

“Empedocles attempted to explain the separation of elements, the formation of earth and sea, of Sun and Moon, of atmosphere.[32] He also dealt with the first origin of plants and animals, and with the physiology of humans.[32] As the elements entered into combinations, there appeared strange results—heads without necks, arms without shoulders.[32][50] Then as these fragmentary structures met, there were seen horned heads on human bodies, bodies of oxen with human heads, and figures of double sex.[32][51] But most of these products of natural forces disappeared as suddenly as they arose; only in those rare cases where the parts were found to be adapted to each other did the complex structures last.[32] Thus the organic universe sprang from spontaneous aggregations that suited each other as if this had been intended.[32] Soon various influences reduced creatures of double sex to a male and a female, and the world was replenished with organic life.[32] It is possible to see this theory as an anticipation of Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection, although Empedocles was not trying to explain evolution.[52] ”(see; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empedocles#Cosmogony )

So, as we said earlier no modern idea is completely modern, it has probably had some religious background to it.  Modern philosophers knew this, and I suppose Idealism is an attempt to break away from a religious world view and walk the earth as independent beings not needing God or religion.  I think this has failed.  For the Christian, this is unacceptable although there are Christians and theologians who have drunk this teaching and have imbibed all of its falsehoods. 

The Bible teaches the opposite to this so let us continue with Bavinck at the bottom of page 38 in which the great Bavinck writes;” Directly opposing these pantheistic theories is the view of human beings as created in God’s image.  The moral and the good is not an ideal hovering far off in the distance from humanity and which we need to reach. The good (ethics/ morality) is not the end goal of life, a destination for humans, but the foundation on which we stand and the environment in which we stand”. (Last para, page 38 – page 39 para 1)

Reflection

The foundations of Christianity and Idealism are at opposite ends.  Next time I wish to go and look at the humanness of Adam and Eve who were created good.  Bavinck gives a clear description of the importance of Adam, the fall and the hope of eternal life in Christ.

So how does the image of God exist in us?

1.     In the essence of our humanity: with soul and body as substrate.

2.     In the capacities and abilities of that essence: knowing, feeling, willing and acting.

3.     In the properties and gifts of that essence and their capabilities; holiness knowledge and righteousness. Page 36

So we have three bullet points from Bavincks ethics.  At first I was confused with ‘body as substrate’ but now I understand that the soul and body coexist.  The conundrum seemed to be that the soul has a ‘forever’ dimension and the ‘body’ has a mortal dimension.  Bavinck touches on substrate in Bavinck Review 9 (2018) John Bolt translated Bavinck here and I am grateful that I was able to download it;   bavinckinstitute.org/wpcontent/uploads/2019/08/BR9_Foundations.pdf

I knocked the https:// off the front of the address so it won’t pickup in the html but that is the address.

So what of our human essence and what do scholars think about it?  This is an important question and Bavinck starts from religious perspectives not his own.

He says about the Flacians;

The Flacians say the image of God (thus also its properties, original

righteousness) belongs to the essence, the nature of human beings.

Bavinck refutes this;

This cannot be correct, because then humanity, on losing its original righteousness, would have lost and changed its essence.

So in layman’s terms what does that mean.  Simply put at the Fall human essence changed into an alien essence, something not human.  As you can see Bavinck’s mind is very sharp.

He then turns to Roman Catholic theology;

The Roman Catholics say that human beings were created with an unblemished nature’’—hence neither righteous nor unrighteous by nature—and that original righteousness was added as a “superadded gift” to curb the naturally existing disharmony between flesh and spirit”

Bavinck doesn’t agree with this either;

But this also cannot be correct because then the struggle between flesh and spirit would be natural and good, coming directly from God who would then be the cause of sin.

Obviously, Bavinck is right here as well.  It goes against theological principles of the Bible to say that God is the cause of sin.  One needs to remember that God for a moment allowed his Son to take on sin at the cross to save us.  Sin separates from God. Even the Son in his humanity. I still have to think about this moment, but Jesus did cry out “…Why have you forsaken me!”

As with Bavinck I also have problems with Roman Catholic theology with their use of Aristotelian Logic which in the Institutes of the Christian Religion has been dumped by John Calvin. If I am wrong, please feel free to contact me and correct me but I have checked Calvin’s Institutes.  Bavinck in the next paragraph explains there are two senses

Rather, Reformed theology understands the image of God in a broad sense to include the essence and capabilities of a human being, while a narrower sense of the image involves is

knowledge, righteousness, and holiness, as original righteousness it belongs naturally to a human being, so that human essence or nature can no longer be complete and right without it. The image of God therefore belongs to the essence of human beings, although not in the Flacian sense. (Bavincks ethics page 37)

Bavinck finishes above off with a Reformed view.  This is closer to my view as well. There was a Fall Man fell into sin and regeneration is now only possible through Jesus Christ.  This to me has Scriptural backing and Aristotle or other philosophies are not needed.  Let the Bible speak for itself.  Next time we are going to look at how Bavinck interprets modern notions of the human essence Such as  G. Fichte (1762-1814), Schleiermacher, Rother and so on et al.

09 10 2020

Essential Human Nature

The content

Bavinck starts by saying, “How we must live is determined by our answers to the fundamental questions of our origin, purpose and destiny.” Page 33

Obviously in his introduction he realises how non-Christian dogma look up, humanness as opposed to the creation Story.

Humanity was created good; There was a fall and through the second Adam (Jesus) we are provided with the gift of new righteousness and holiness.

The Christian confession directly contradicts the contemporary tendency, through the conflict with the ego which strives for autonomy from the restrictions of the external world and matter; Overcoming nature by reason and spirit.

At the end of Page 33 Bavinck says, “We believe that the image of God belongs to the essence of humanity: humanity apart from God.”

So, there are some pointers for us. Before we move on and look at the internal content of Reformed ethics Volume 1 let us look at the basic content of chapter 1 first part.

Humanity Before Conversion;

The main Title: Essential Human Nature.

Human Beings created in God’s image pages 35 – 43

The content of human nature pages 44 – 49

Human relationships

1.     Our relation to God pages 50 -60

2.     Our relation to other people pages 60 – 61

3.     Our relation to nature pages 61 – 62

4.     Religion and Morality pages 62 – 75

As a side word

It is interesting that he talks about our relation to nature.  In the present crises of the world such as Covid-19, Californian fires, the melting of the arctic regions and other catastrophes, I think it essential to look at the foundations of ethics and morality.  We need to discover from where human axioms went wrong and have led to this destruction.  We need to be humble enough to learn from these great theological giants.  Basically, there needs to be a return to an ethic from above rather than below.

Page 27 italics.

John Bolt and his team have done a great job of translating this magnificent script. Bavinck having looked at some earlier theologians chooses a traditional tripartite style;

1.     Humanity before conversion

2.     Converted humanity

3.     Regenerated humanity

So, let us start looking at pages 35 – 44 namely;

Human beings created in God’s image

For Bavinck origin determines direction and purpose.  To say whether humans originate from below (earth- evolution) or from above (God).

The Greeks regarded humans originating from the earth. Bavinck goes on to say that contemporary thinkers follow this same path.  I agree with Bavincks findings here.  Bavinck writes “under the influence of materialistic i.e. primates, missing links, and so on et al.” Bavinck goes on to say, “This was openly stated by Professor du Bois-Reymond in Berlin.”

The last paragraph of page 35 is very important; Bavinck and believers start from very different presuppositions to get to a different (other ετεροs; my interpretation) ethic.  I find the next sentence that Bavinck made very interesting; “Ethics in the true sense of the word does not exist within a Darwinian framework.” As Bavinck goes deeper his explanation of ethic will become clearer.

Bavinck goes on in the next paragraph and nothing has changed since the late 19^th and 20^thcenturies; “Every view of human beings start from an axiom, a point of departure, a proposition of faith or hypotheses.” (Page 35 para 2)

Darwin’s proposition was that a human being was an evolved animal.  For Christians this is not the case as we are “God’s offspring Acts 17²⁸.” For believers it is the contrary principle, presupposition with reference to humanity.

So how does the image of God exist in us?

1  In the essence of our humanity: with soul and body as substrate.

2.     In the capacities and abilities of that essence: knowing, feeling, willing and acting.

3.     In the properties and gifts of that essence and their capabilities; holiness knowledge and righteousness. Page 36

 TThis discusson will continue from page 36 of Bavinck’s ethics.   Bavinck was well aware that not all scholars accept the Biblical teaching but the opposite disengaging with God and going for an evolutionary line.  

My view:

Where does this lead? It leads ethics down the road of utilitarianism where human life becomes cheap.  ‘What matters is saving resources.’  We can see this in many ways; How in hospitals if there is a danger of having a baby that does not reach a ‘particular potential’ then it is ok to kill that particular life.  If one holds that life is relative and is based on some type of cost then killing through Euthanasia or abortion becomes a possibility in advanced societies.  This is where we need to listen to the clarion call of Bavinck and remember that there is a God and humans have been created in the image of God.  Even the vilest criminal was created in the image of God.  Life is too cheap nowadays; When will we learn  and as a society change our way of thinking about life and death.

What is essential human nature?

This is a very important question because how we answer it will drive the machinery of our services such as health, managing of national and world resources.  One interesting point I found in his writings is that he Bavinck doesn’t only talk about the nature of what it is to be human; He also says that God created all the animals and plants too.  At the most basic level we share basic needs such as food and air.  Then he goes deeper. What are some of the bench marks are our relationship to God first of all, our relationship to each other, our relationship to nature animals and plants.  

These are important questions and in that sense this week I am not saying much.  I will be digging deep into the first chapter as I think for Christians they can find answers to the ecological mess we find oureslves in in this world today.  We as humans have caused destruction in this world such as the fires in Calfornia even the Covid 19 in a sense came out of man made actions.   I have to also say that the clouds of smoke from the Californian fires reached even Finland.

My remit will be to go through this chapter. All I can say is that it is very rich.   Before I start I have a question for you; What is essential human nature from your point of view and how is this human supposed to act his life out in the world?

 Feel free to  write and express you points of view.