THE DOCTRINAL FOUNDATIONS

In the previous chapter we argued that a teleological orientation was necessaiy for the development of an adequate Christian theological anthropology (with its resultant ontology of work). Having established this orientation, the question now becomes which doctrines does one look to to develop this anthiopology? What aie the questions and issues which need to be raised? A brief critical evaluation of the history of Christian anthropology with an examination of current trends in the field will provide us with both the boundai'ies of a theological context, and an introduction to the central issues and questions.

All doctrinal constructions in some way touch upon, and affect one’s theological anthropology. However, three areas of doctrine especially stand out as foundational. The first involves doctrine associated with the initial creation (protology). Here the anthi’opological questions include the origins of humanity, humanity’s created nature / essence and God given purposes, the image of God in humanity, humanity’s “original” state, and then the fall and the results which follow from it. Following from the question of the fall, a second area of doctrine has proven to be central in the Church’s quest for understanding what it is to be human. This is soteriology, with its related counteipart, eschatology. Soteriology looks to the questions of human salvation, (whatever this is understood to be) and restoration. Eschatology proves to be important

ill as much as questions of salvation include aspects of humanity’s future or final state and destiny. The third area of doctrine which has proven to be essential to a Christian anthropology involves Chiistology and the related doctrine of the Trinity. Concerning Christology, the issue since the New Testament has been how Jesus has become the true man in God’s image, and how a subsequent understanding of what it means to be human must start with Him.^ Concerning the Trinity, it has been suggested that intra- trinitarian relations provide the basis for understanding what humanness or human essence is. As we will examine, there has recently been a trend to look to a social understanding of the Trinity as model for understanding the human and personhood.^

In developed formulations of Christian anthropology each of these three areas of doctrine has found some place. Questions of origin (creation) and then the end (salvation), however conceived, have been unavoidable. Further, and as a consequence of this, essential too have been questions of how persons relate to, and are understood in light of, Christ and the triune God. However, the ways that these three areas of doctrine have been interrelated, and the emphases placed upon each have varied depending upon the particulai' tradition and the formulation’s unique context; that is, its social - cultural, philosophical, apologetic and theological settings.

TH E IM AGE OF GOD

Integral to most traditional Christian anthropologies has been a discussion and some formulation of the doctrine of the image of God in humanity. This does not mean that all constructions of Christian anthropology are formulated exclusively around the image concept. However, most have given the image symbol prominence in their overall

Cairns, (1973), pp.40-60.

This idea that the image of God in humanity might be understood with reference to the Trinity is not new to contemporary “social” trinitarians. It was explored previously by Augustine, albeit, using what has been termed the psychological model of the Trinity rather than the social model. See: Cairns, (1973), pp.99-107.

constructions. Given this centrality of the imago Dei concept in the history of theological anthi’opology, much of our following discussion will necessarily consider it, and the views of the human which stem from it.

What the image (and likeness) means or might imply has been and continues to be the subject of much speculation and debate. Millard Erickson in Christian Theology

(1983-5) suggests three basic and divergent ways to approach and understand the image concept. He suggests three distinct views; the substantive, the functional, and the relational, (pp.489-510.) We will here borrow this threefold nomenclature for each of these three categories provides us with a way to emphasize the particularities found in often diverse approaches to the topic. However, we will present the categories more loosely and less restrictively than has Erickson since by using these as separate categories we do not mean to imply that the various views are always or necessarily mutually exclusive of each other. Indeed, they are not. For as we shall see, as well as sometimes being formulated into a distinct view, aspects of the functional view have also been incorporated into some substantive and some relational views. However, having allowed for possible overlap, we have nevertheless chosen to present these three categories separately for by doing so we are better able to demonstrate the three fundamental differences in approach to Christian anthropology.

The Substantive View

The substantive view incorporates many views which argue that there are basic characteristics, qualities, or faculties, within a person which either in themselves correspond to God, or, which constitute that person as in the image of God. These capacities or endowments are the keys for understanding what it means to say that the person is in God’s image. These qualities, for example, may be understood to be the capacities of reason, will, or, more narrowly they may be construed as “spiritual” capacities such as consciousness or an awareness of God.

Basically, substantive views stem from and are dependant upon substantive 166

ontologies. This means that “being”, and thus a human being, is defined as - and is essentially understood to be - a combination or complex of various substances / qualities. The person is a person because he or she has a body, soul, emotions, will, intellect and so on. This approach to metaphysics (a metaphysics of substance) means that substantive views tend to emphasize the image of God in terms of and with reference to the individual, or, the single person. It follows then that substantive anthropologies have tended to focus upon questions of constitution; questions concerning the constituent parts of the individual person.

Substantive anthropologies, in so emphasizing the individual and his or her constitution, have usually been formed in connection with two types of interrelated questions. Colin Gunton refers to the questions usually asked in Christian anthropology as ontological and comparative.^ According to Gunton, the ontological question concerns the kind of entity that the human is. It is a question of what, rather than who, is the person? Throughout the history of the western Church in particular, this ontological “what” question has taken center stage and has most often been answered along the lines similar to a rather radical Platonic, and later Cartesian version of dualism which has started with and stressed the distinction between the body and spirit / soul. Matter and spirit aie here perceived as separate substances which make up, or are “in” a person, rather than simply being viewed as two aspects of a single person.^ In the Eastern Church, and also in some recent Western theology, the ontological type of question has been answered quite differently by starting with and emphasizing the composite unity of the person. Only after this unity is posited is attention given to the distinction between the spiritual and bodily aspects of the

Gunton, “Trinity, Ontology and Anthropology” in Persons. Divine and Human (1991), pp.47-49.

Examples of this dualistic view in the history of the Western theological tradition will be suggested shortly. However, for a discussion which offers an up to date philosophical grounding for tliis type of dualism see: Swinburne, (1986), and, (1987), pp.33-55.

Here however, it should be noted that Swinburne argues for a version of dualism which, although emphasizing two distinct components, nonetheless allows that these are combined in an intimate unity in the human on earth. (1987), p.33.

person.^

The other question, the “comparative” according to Gunton, concerns the way or ways that the human being is understood to be different from other non-human beings. This first involves a comparison and contrast between God and humans. Then, it proceeds to a comparison and contrast between humans and non-human entities. Using this approach, it became common to argue that a person is in the image of God by virtue of fact that he or she, like God and unlike the animals, is rational or has a free

w ü l.

The results of these ontological and comparative questions include both the development of an individualistic understanding of the human being, and an atomized understanding of human “being” which focuses on individual substances, qualities or characteristics more than on the whole person. These qualities have mainly been those of the will and the intellect.

This substantive view of the image of God in humans, including both questions of kind and contrast, has been the dominant approach in Western Christian anthropology.^ Irenaeus was the first of the Church Fathers / theologians to pay particular attention to the imago Dei concept and he inextricably framed his discussions of the person within the structure of a substantiative metaphysic. In the very way that he formulated his argument against gnosticism, that a person’s body and soul (as two distinct substances) are destined for salvation, he introduced into the tradition a substantivist way of describing the person and thus, the image.^ Irenaeus’

Concerning the Eastern view of a composite unity see: Ware, (1987), pp. 197-206.

Concerning contemporary Western theology, we will see an example of this composite unity view later in this chapter when we consider the anthropology of Jürgen Moltmann.

Further, it should be noted that there is a strand of Christian theology which wants to move even further away from dualistic concepts. See for example: Thatcher, (1987), pp. 180- 196. Although Thatcher is not a monist in the same way that a reductionistic materialist would be, he does tend (more than the Eastern Church and Moltmann) toward the monistic end of the continuum. He favors a “broad materialist position” ontologically, but does nonetheless allow for distinctions conceptually, (pp. 182-183.)

For a good survey on the views of the image of God in persons, particularly as it developed in and throughout Western Christianity, see: Cairns, The Image of God in Man. (1974).

basic approach was adopted and then systematically developed by Medieval Scholasticism. This tradition firmly embedded the substantive view of the image into the Western tradition. On Aquinas’ view for example, the image became directly equated with a person’s qualities or chai'acteristics. Specifically these were his or her intellectual capacities or rationality.^

Further, even though they were reacting to Scholasticism, Luther and Calvin also framed their discussions of the image of God according to the grammar and stmcture of substance. In opposition to Catholicism they reformulated their views of the image, but continued to understand the questions mainly in terms of the individual and his or her constitution. That is, they still thought of the image of God as “in” an individual person, and with reference to his or her constituent par ts.

Douglas Hall in his book Imaging God (1986) adds a slight challenge to this view. He argues that with the Reformers of the sixteenth century there was a break from the classical substantialist view, (p.98.) He suggests that stemming from their focus upon the biblical testimony, Luther and Calvin introduce into the Western tradition the beginnings of a relational ontology. He acknowledges however, that their views were still somewhat entangled in substantialist thinking, and he finally concludes that these Reformers provided mostly the initial resources, and set the stage, for a new direction toward a relational ontology, (pp. 106-107.)

This view that the Reformers, at least for the Western tradition, initiated a relational ontology and view of the person is also suggested by C. Stephen Evans.^ He states that “a strong case can be made that relational anthropology is really the fulfillment of a trend begun by the protestant Reformers, who rejected the scholastic equation of the

imago with rationality and instead views the imago as the original righteousness

We need to emphasize that Irenaeus did not develop his view of the image o f God in persons into a mature doctrine. Rather he simply offered reflections, mostly secondary, which were only later taken up and more fully developed. See: Cairns, (1974), pp.79-88. Cairns, (1974), p. 120.

Evans, C. Stephen.“Healing Old Wounds and Recovering Old Insights: A Christian View of The Person for Today.”, in Noll, and Wells, (1988), pp.68-86.

people possessed by virtue of their relation to God.”^^ However, he finally concludes that Reformation theology purposefully, “did not go all the way toward a relational anthropology but preserved, whether consistently or inconsistently, the substantial category of the soul, and even the view that sinners possess a ‘relic’ of the image of

God.” l^

We recognize the ambiguity and questions here as to whether the Reformers should be considered as representatives of the substantive or relational view. While not rejecting the analysis of Hall or Evans we nonetheless believe that since they continued to work within a substantive grammar it is better to consider them as part of the substantive tradition. We acknowledge however that they may be said to offer the beginnings of a new direction.

In summary, Irenaeus, Aquinas, (and also others like Clement of Alexandria, Athenasius, and Augustine,) - those who by and large established the tradition, - as well as the great Reformers Luther and Calvin, each fundamentally viewed the image of God in human beings substantively with respect to specific chai'acteristics or qualities. As we shall now see, this does not mean that other functional and relational elements were not present within the developing Christian tradition. These other elements however, were not the primai*y categories used to describe the concept of the image of God in the person.

The Functional View

Another approach to Christian anthropology, one which sometimes forms a distinct view and at other times is simply a part of either the substantive view or the relational view (which we will latter discuss) can be described as functional. The functional view like the substantive actually incorporates many sometimes diverse views. The common characteristics of functional views however, are that they focus upon and emphasize that the image of God and the person in that image are best understood through the

Ibid., p.73. 11 Ibid., pp.73-74.

conceptual grid of God’s call upon humanity to specific activity. Particularly, this means that persons and the image are best perceived in tenns of what humans do, or, are supposed to do according the call of God, (rather than something they are, have, or experience relationally). Essentially, the content of this call is understood to be dominion or the stewardship of creation (human work), and often following from this, the call to develop culture.

Now the functional view, with an emphasis upon the primacy of performance / action may initially seem strange to contemporary Western culture which, through the pervasive influence of existentialist and personalist philosophy among other things, has become accustomed to hierarchically value existence over function. Also, given its emphasis upon dominion and cultural development, especially at this time when these very concepts are reckoned to be the culprits in the ecological crisis, some may immediately consider the functional view suspect. Might it be a theological perversion, reflecting not biblical teaching but rather the modernist triumphalist spirit which has optimistically attempted to dominate nature in an oppressive way? Might it be that a Hegelian or Marxist notion of progress has co-opted this theology? Or, might the functional view not simply be a contemporary reaction against the speculation of substantive views and the trendiness of relational views? Although one might be able to argue these points to a degree with reference to some formulations of the functional view, we contend that for the view as a whole the answers to these questions are no.

G. C. Berkouwer in his classic book Man: The Image of God (1962) highlights two important observations about the functional view. The first is that it is a longstanding position found within the tradition of interpreting the image. He suggests as an example that it surfaces in the Socinian Racovian Catechism (1605). (p.70. note. 11.)12 Admittedly, this theologically suspect document was composed at a time when the influence of Renaissance humanism (not yet the Enlightenment) would have been present. This notwithstanding, what it demonstrates is that, at the very minimum, the

^ ^ See also: Pannenberg, (1985), pp.74-75.

basic idea of the functional view existed prior to the Enlightenment and modernity. Further, although it is possible, it is not evident that its understanding of the image was more influenced by the emerging spirit of the age than by biblical insights and the exegesis to which it appeals. Indeed, this leads us to Berkouwer’s second observation that the functional view has been essentially derived from biblical exegesis, and particularly from an exegesis of the Genesis 1:26 account of the image, (pp.70-71.) Our reading of various other functional views concurs with Berkouwer on this point that the functional view is primarily an exegetically derived position. Of course it could be argued that the exegesis behind functional interpretations has been tainted, in the earlier document by certain humanist assumptions, or in the case of more recent formulations by modernist assumptions concerning the world. Doubtless it is true that all exegesis is to some degree affected by its particular context; to some degree either embracing or rejecting it. Nonetheless, if one examines the exegetical ai’guments used to support the view, especially as found in some contemporary and very thorough scholarship, it becomes apparent that there exists an ancient precedent for arguing that the idea of function and stewardship is meant to explain the content of the image concept as found in Genesis 1 and elsewhere in the Old Testament.

Having considered, admittedly briefly, some of the initial and possible reactions to functional views, we now return to consider another chief characteristic associated with them. It is generally the case that when function becomes the orienting point from which to understand the person and image, the questions of individual versus social understanding of being, as well as of individual constitution, begin to recede into the background. These types of questions ai*e not ignored, nor do they become inelevant or unimportant. Rather, they simply cease to be “the” central concern and assume a new and subordinate place within the overall conception. For example, within functional