ANTHROPOLOGY

THE PROBLEM OF NATURE OF MAN

1. STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM.
   The problem of the nature of man may be stated simply as follows: What is man?

2. ANALYSIS OF THE PROBLEM.
   Historically, there have been the following solutions proposed to this problem.
   Western thought and culture, as we know it today, had its origin not only among the Greeks but also among the Hebrews; it may be said to have two-roots or sources: the Greek-Roman and the Hebrew-Christian.
   Each of these two roots involved a fundamentally different and mutually exclusive ultimate commitment. And associated with each of these ultimate commitments is a characteristic world view or view of reality which is grounded in and implied by these two distinctive ultimate commitments.
   We shall summarize here these two views of reality in order to bring out their differences and incompatiblity which arise from the mutually exclusive ultimate commitments:
   Greek-Roman world view and the
   Hebrews-Christian world view.
   1. The Greek-Roman view of reality.
      1. The Eleatics.
      2. Platonism.
      3. Neo-Platonism.
      4. Aristotelianism.
   2. The Hebrew-Christian view of reality.

   3. The Attempted Synthesis in the Middle Ages.
      As Christianity spread thoughout the Roman world, the Biblical view of reality came into conflict with the Greek view of reality. Attempts were made to resolve this conflict by trying to synthesize these two views of reality.
      There were two major attempts at this synthesis:
      the Augustinian synthesis by Aurelius Augustine (A.D. 354-430) in the 5th century and
      the Thomistic synthesis by Thomas Aquinas (A.D. 1225-1274) in the 12th century.

      	Hebrew-Christian	Medieval Synthesis	Greek-Roman
      God	Creator	Supernatural - Grace	The rational
      World	Created	Natural - Nature	The non-rational
      Man	spirit (person) & body	spirit (moral) & soul (rational) & body (animal)	mind (rational) & body (non-rational)

      1. The Augustinian Synthesis (5th to 12th centuries).

      2. The Thomistic Synthesis (A.D. 13th to 15th centuries).

   4. The Disintegration of the Medieval Synthesis in the Modern Age.
      Because of the basic incompatibility between the Greek and Biblical view of God and man, the two syntheses of these divergent views of reality attempted by Augustine and Thomas Aquinas disintegration in the Modern Age.
      The disintegration took the form of two revolts.
      1. First Revolt (15th to 19th century).
         1. Renaissance (15th & 16th century) -
            attempted to get back to the Classical Greek view before and apart from the Biblical view.
         2. Reformation (16th century) -
            attempted to get back to the Biblical view apart from the Classical Greek view. Luther turned against Scholastic Philosophy.
         3. Modern Physical Sciences (16th to 20th centuries) -
            rejected Greek view of physical world.
            • Pre-Newtonian (16th & 17th) -
              there was a revolt in astronomy against Aristotelian- Ptolemaic view of the universe by Copernicus, Kepler, and Galileo
              and against Aristotelian physics by Galileo and Isaac Newton.
            • Newtonian (18th) -
              the Newtonian physics lead to the reign of mechanism.
            • Atomism (19th) -
              the development of atomic theory in chemistry was a revolt against Aristotelian continuous view of matter.
         4. Modern attempts at synthesis (17th to 19th century)
            1. In religion:
               • Protestant Scholasticism (17th & 18th centuries).
               • Pietism - reaction to Protestant Scholasticism.
               • Deism (18th & 19th century).
               • Protestant Liberalism (19th & 20th century)
               • Fundamentalism - reaction to Protestiant Liberalism.
            2. In philosophy:
               • Modern rationalism (17th century)
               • Modern empiricism (18th century)
               • Common Sense Realism (18th & 19th century)
               • Kantian critical idealism (18th & 19th century)
               • Absolute idealism (19th century)
            3. The Enlightenment or The Age of Reason (18th century)
               reasserted the rationalism of Greek view of reality combined with Newtonian science.
               • Modern rationalism (17th century)
               • Mechanism
               • Determinism
               • Materialism
               • Atheism
               • Moralism
            4. Idealism reasserted the Greek view of reality.
      2. Second Revolt (19th - 20th century).
         1. Romanticism (19th century) - revolt against rationalism and mechanism of the Age of Reason.
         2. Darwinian Evolution (19th century) - revolt against Biblical view of the world as God's creation.
         3. In the Physical Sciences - revolt against mechanism and determinism.
            • Maxwellian Field Physics (19th) -
              the rise of field physics and the decline of mechanism.
            • Relativity and Quantum Mechanics (20th) -
              revolt against mechanism and determinism.
         4. Pragmatism (20th) - rejected modern versions of the Greek view for a practical test for truth.
         5. Naturalism (20th) - rejected modern versions of the Greek view and also the Biblical view for the evolutionary view.
         6. Logical Empiricism or Positivism (20th) - rejects modern versions of the Greek view for a empirical test for meaning or truth.
         7. Existentialism (20th) - rejects modern version of Greek view
            1. Christian Existentialism - and for the Christian view.
               • Soren Kierkegaard.
               • Neo-Orthodoxy - Barth and Brunner.
               • Neo-Protestantism - Niebuhr and Tillich.
            2. Non-Christian Existentialism - rejects the Christian view.
               • Martin Heidegger.
               • Karl Jaspers.
               • Jean-Paul Sartre.

3. THE SOLUTION OF THE PROBLEM.
   
   1. Personism.

   2. Personism and God.

   3. The Image of God.

   4. The Biblical View of Man.

   5. The Biblical View of Reality.