New Humanisms for Old

Man’s constant struggle to understand himself and to relate himself to a swift-moving world prompts him ever and again to articulate both his self-image and his role. Several factors in contemporary life join to underscore the urgency of the theological task at this point.

Those of us who pursued our seminary studies with representatives of the movement calling itself religious humanism are inclined to ask, Where has the older humanism gone? One thinks especially of that form that was articulated in the Humanist Manifesto of 1933 and by J. A. C. Fagginger Auer in his Lowell Lectures for 1932.

Dr. Auer viewed man on the threshold of the second third of this century as shut up to one real option, that of “Prometheus struggling against the gods in his own right.” This point of view was dealt what seemed a death blow by the massive forms of “man’s inhumanity to man” under Nazism and Sovietism.

At the same time, man’s continuing concern with himself lays every generation under obligation to deal with the question, “What is man?” Professor Roger L. Shinn has rendered us a distinct service in the publication of his 1968 volume, Man: The New Humanism, the sixth volume in the series “New Directions in Theology Today.” In this work, it is suggested that new forms of humanism are emerging, each in close liaison with theological inquiry, and resting upon changing developments and changing insights into the human predicament.

Professor Shinn sees the change of mood that has occurred in the past thirty-five years summarized by the differences between the Oxford Conference of 1937 and the Geneva Conference of the World Council of Churches in 1966. The former, under a crushing sense of man’s sin, called the Church to the task of reconciliation in the world, but from a posture of transcending the world. The latter, eager and militant in the assertion of man’s dignity, called for the immersion of the Church in the world, for the purpose of the humanization of human life and human institutions.

The newer humanistic trends expressed in the latter mood stemmed from several cultural-historical circumstances, notably the following: man’s technical achievements, man’s new awareness of more recent assaults upon human dignity, the threat of the loss of “humanity” before technological development, a renewed awareness of the problems inherent in the sacred-secular dialogue, and the “discovery” in biblical studies of humanistic dimensions for theology. Taken together, these seem to suggest the necessity for new life-styles in theological formulation. These will involve, it is said, new dimensions in man’s self-estimate—and will issue in new humanisms related closely to the mood of the age.

The definition of humanism proposed in Man: The New Humanism is in terms of “the appreciation of man and of the values, real and potential, in human life. It esteems man—not as an animal, a machine, or an angel, but as man.” It follows that newer humanisms are concerned with the entire range of human concerns, and more especially, with the secular dimensions of man’s life. “The secular” has encountered many difficulties since 1937, and is seen to have triumphed in the contemporary “celebration of the secular” that is an essential ingredient in the orthodoxy of the New Worldliness.

Inevitably the statements of Bonhoeffer, notably those in his letters written from prison between June 8 and July 21, 1944, figure prominently in the “rejoicing in this world” that seems typical of the emerging forms of humanism. Bonhoeffer doubtless had a point in demanding that we cease using God as “a stop-gap for the incompleteness of our knowledge.” But he may prove to be very wrong in his claim that modern man is a qualitatively unique being who can now manage very well without God. While man has learned to do for himself a great many things that he formerly called upon deity to do (and the Christian acknowledges these achievements gratefully), it is far from certain that man has no residual problems of overpowering importance for which he needs a divine solution.

The newer forms of theological humanism show marked differences from the theological style of the religious humanists of the thirties. There is a renewed appreciation of man’s inner experiences, factors that the older humanism viewed with a jaundiced eye. There is likewise a recognition that man is less free, and less the master of his own destiny, than was assumed by the signers of the Humanist Manifesto.

Recent styles of humanism share some insights of existentialism, while at the same time reserving the right to criticize other of its features. Newer humanisms emphasize “man in his actual existence, not in abstraction,” and stress personal freedom as an indispensable ingredient of humanness. At the same time, there is a questioning of the individualistic and introverted qualities of existentialism. The latter is felt to be too romantic in its idealism, too willing to settle for withdrawal and passive alienation.

While the robustness of the religious humanism of the thirties is sharply modified by the formulators of the humanisms of our decade, these are unwilling to accept the existentialist alternative of cultivated anxiety, or its amorphous and private understanding of the category of authenticity. The real problem is whether political activism can furnish an adequate set of concepts and symbols for a religiously based form of humanism.

This raises the more basic problem of definition. Is man correctly understood, not as homo religiosus, but as a creature who can be understood exclusively by reference to himself? Again, is man to be defined simply in terms of a group of creatures with homogeneous needs and desires, as “closed” forms of humanism assert? Or must he be seen in more “open” and ecological terms?

The answer to these and related questions will need to be found in the larger contexts within which newer humanisms are drawn. That is to say, much will depend upon whether a theistic or a non-theistic “style” is assumed and accepted. If the architects opt for the latter, and accept for their platform the shared belief in the possible self-perfectibility of man, the “new” will scarcely be better than the “old.”

If, on the other hand, the dimension of man’s need for God’s grace is placed at the heart of the humanism-style, and if human life is acknowledged to be lived always “under God,” then a wrong-headed form of human autonomy may be avoided. What is at stake is whether or not man is willing to be brought to newness of life through Jesus of Nazareth, whom Christians know as Christ the Lord.

HAROLD B. KUHN

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