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© J. Glenn Friesen |
Herman Dooyeweerd: De Wijsbegeerte
der Wetsidee The Dutch Academy of Sciences has made all three volumes of De Wijsbegeerte der Wetsidee available online (in Dutch). These three volumes can also be downloaded here in .pdf format from the website of The Association for Reformational Philosophy. The text below is a provisional translation. Copyright is held by the Dooyeweerd Centre, Ancaster, Ontario, and publishing right is held by Mellen Press, Lewiston, New York. A definitive translation will be published in the series The Collected Works of Herman Dooyeweerd. Conclusion [Volume III, pages 627-630] Man's place in the cosmos
is really the basic The theory of the individuality-structures of temporal reality, and their mutual enkaptic interlacement in the cosmos has certainly not been completed by the results of the philosophical investigations set out in this third volume of De Wijsbegeerte der Wetsidee. On the contrary, apart from the fact that in this third volume we have only given an introduction to the theory of the enkaptic structural interlacements, now that we have developed up to this point the first three themes of our systematic plan, a question arises that should really be answered as the conclusion of the theory of individuality structures, but because of its broad reach, must be left until later for a more detailed discussion. The question is this: Does man as an individual personality also have a temporal individuality-structure, comparable to that of natural beings, or is man's temporal existence enclosed in an enkaptic intertwinement of various individuality-structures, and is his individual unity only guaranteed by his supratemporal selfhood in the religious root of his existence? The answer to this question belongs to the task of philosophical anthropology, whose theme has been formulated by Scheler as concerning “man's place in the cosmos.” Already in the point of departure of the Philosophy of the Law-Idea, the whole theory of the law-spheres and of individuality-structures has really been continually set against the background of this central theme. And in this regard, complete clarity must be obtained on at least one central point of true Christian anthropology. Man as such has no temporal qualifying function such as is possessed by temporal things and societal structures; man transcends all temporal structures. Because of this, any search for a “substantial form of being” of human nature, in the sense of Aristotelian-thomistic metaphysical anthropology, cannot be reconciled with what Holy Scripture has revealed to us about created human nature. According to the divine order of creation, man, in his relation of coherence with the human race, is not qualified as a “rational-moral being,” but primarily through his kingly position as the personal religious-creaturely center of the whole of the cosmos. In this center, the rational-moral functions first find their concentration point, and all of creation stands in a covenantal relation with God the Creator. All structures that are qualified by a temporal qualifying function, including the “rational-moral” temporal social structures, are perishable [vergankelijk]. But man is destined for eternity, not in an abstract, speculative rational existence, but according to his full personality in its rich concrete individuality. In connection with this, it is in any event certain that the distinguished concepts of “body” and “soul” –or of “body,” “soul,” and “spirit”–which have been developed from out of the immanence standpoint, are fundamentally unusable in a Scriptural, Christian anthropology. Man's all-sided temporal existence, his “body” in the full Scriptural sense of the word, can only be understood from out of its supratemporal religious center, the “soul” or “heart” in Scripture's sense. Every conception of “immortal soul” that seeks its supratemporal essential center in rational-moral functions remains rooted in the point of departure of immanence philosophy. But with all of this we have still only determined the only possible point of departure for a Christian anthropology. Whoever supposes that from our standpoint, human existence is merely a complex of modal temporal functions, which find their center in the “heart,” has made a very simplistic and erroneous notion of what we understand under “anthropology.” Only after firmly setting our Christian standpoint do the scientific questions arise for this area. And the problems that arise here can in no way be viewed as already having been solved. What is evident from the whole development of our research in this third volume is that in man's temporal existence, and also in his life of thought and feeling, we can point to a most complicated system of enkaptic structural intertwinements, and these presuppose a whole series of individuality-structures. And what is also evident from our standpoint is that man's temporal existence cannot be explained or set out as two or three abstract complexes of functions (under the name of “body,” “soul,” and “spirit”). We have seen that such theoretical abstractions come into collision with the temporal structures of individuality and that in essence they depend upon a hypostatizing of isolated functions. In this way, the problem concerning the temporal relation of “soul” (as the complex of psychical and logical functions) and “body,” in the sense of separate “substances,” is recognized as a self-created pseudo-problem of immanence philosophy. In due time, I hope to demonstrate this in a detailed way in the further development of the Philosophy of the Law-Idea. Finally–and this is of primary importance–we need to fundamentally reject every notion of the human “ego” [ik] which makes human personality independent, or which is understood as an immanent “psychological” or “spiritual” “Act-center.” Only the divine Word revelation in Christ Jesus can disclose to us what the human “selfhood” is. Not philosophical speculation, not “act psychology” or “spiritual metaphysics.” The question “What is man?” cannot be answered from the immanence standpoint. It remains a problem for the immanence standpoint, which time and again with its oppressive force will continue thrust itself on apostate thought, as a symptom of the inner unrest of an unrooted existence, which no longer understands itself. Translator's note: Dooyeweerd never completed his work on philosophical anthropology. But he did set out his ideas in his article “De leer van den mensch in de Wijsbegeerte der Wetsidee”, Correspondentie-Bladen VII (Dec. 1942), translated as “The Theory of Man: Thirty-two Propositions on Anthropology.” Revised Feb 13/10 |