The Concept of the Human Person 16.090607
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The Rationalistic Interpretation. Theclassical/philosophical interpretation: here thehuman being is understood primarily from the perspective ofhis/her rationality, that is, that men and women are creaturesof reason. The human ability to reason is the most important characteristicof being a person.
That rationality is the most distinctive mark of humanityhas been expressed in Plato and Aristotlewhosaid that "reason is the highest faculty of the soul," and thusoccupies a central position in human knowledgeand understanding. For them, “reason alone is able to comprehend the true nature of things" (Titus:359).
Reason provides ethical consideration. It is reason thatguides human conduct so that a virtuous person is a wise person. Accordingly, goodness, resides in knowledge and intelligence,while ignorancepromotes vice.
Furthermore, wisdom is possibleonly because of the human ability to think/reason. It is wisdom through reason that makeslifebeautiful. Asthe Greeks put it, "life is the gift of nature,but beautiful living is the gift of wisdom" (Durant:49).
Nohuman beings, however, are consistently rational. The perennialHumanproblems seem to contradict human rationality. Like othercreatures, human beings arealso whollya part of nature.
B. The Scientific Interpretation
Human beings are wholly a part of the physicalorder of nature whoareequally subject to the physical and chemical laws of nature.Human beings also share a commonphysical characteristics and Chemical elements with other non-human species and inanimate objects.Hence from the scientificview asserts that the human beingis merely a being who occupies space and time subject to the laws of gravitation and motion like any other objects in the natural world.
Though physically each person belongs to a race, it is argued thattheracesof human beings come from a common origin.However, no race is inherently superior/inferior to another. This is not todeny that there maybe superior/inferior individualwithin aracialgroup in term of talent, for instance, among individuals of the same or different sex.
There is no denying that though human beings may be determinedby the laws of physics/chemistry, s/he is very much differentfrom other animals. Only human beings, for instance, havewritten language, can use symbols for communication, and can speak of his/her past. Higher primateshave been shown topossess intellectual ability or intelligence and can even solve mathematical problems. But they have no capability to tell their young their life stories. Cultureis possible only when there is continuity of verbaland symbolic communication and interaction which only humanbeings possess.
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C. Theological Interpretation
The Judeo-Christian tradition to which we subscribe to interprets the human being as
1. first and foremost the creature ofGod. And created in the"image of God"
2. that the human being is clothed with dignity and intrinsic worth. The psalmist expressed it this way, "who is man that thou art mindful of him?" Hence, human life is valuable and sacred and must be treated ethically or morally.
3.Because the human person is a creature of greatvalue, nomust be treated as means to an end. If any person has intrinsic worth and dignity, then every person,whether male or female deserve to live a lifefree from injustice,
violence, and man's inhumanity to men and women. There is here a demand for a more humane treatment in the human quest for peace, justice, and security
4. Implicit in the demand for a more humane behaviouristhereligious assumption of a meaningful world. The human personiscreated and located in a world that has meaning and moralpurpose.It is important for Judeo-Christian faith to asserta teleologicalinterpretation in order to maintaina sense of
meaning in any human project. For a world without meaning and purpose is indeed a world not worth living.
5. The Judeo-Christian view also recognizes humansinfulness part of human weakness and predicament. Sin is defined as basicallyarebellion against God. This condition necessitates obediencetothe divine and a God-basedethicsof religious obligation. This in turn makes the sense of right and wrong an
absolute morality rather than just a matter of opinion. That there is something as right and wrong, good and bad, trueand false is fundamental in human choice and action.
The quest for spiritual as well as moral truthgivestheperson the necessity to fulfill his or her duty and obligation to realize good and the will of God. Here morality and religion are one. To actualize the good, one must be obedient to God.
Centralto the Judeo-Christian understanding governing the human-divine relationship is agape, the love of God, which is thought to be a precondition to any ethical/moral act. The love of God and the love for fellow human beings are two sides ofthe same virtue. As the Scripture puts is, "love God above all thing and love your neighbour as yourself." This is the greatest commandment, and on this should rest all human possibilities for whatever is deemed good, right, and just. Ultimately, obedience and unquestionable loyalty/devotion to God is, accordingly, the chief purpose of human life
II. Patriarchal Conviction about Women
Patriarchy: "the sexual system of power in which the male possesses superior power and economic privilege". It is oftencited by radicalfeminist scholars as the prime reasonresponsible for femaleoppression
A. Biological Explanation
As the dominant cultural and gender ideology, patriarchy is rooted and enforced by the belief in women's innate inferiority. This has been expressed in Freud famous aphorism
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which states that "anatomy is destiny." The philosophical spokesperson, Aristotle, considered men as "better"half of humanity. This idea is derived from his theoretical biology of women's nature which goes this way: the "form" of the human body is provided by the male seed so that every male insemination would naturally produce another male individual in the image of his father. In case of a "biological accident" a female matter distorts this male form andso produces aninferior/defective human species called the female. Because of this, women are thought to be biologically inferiorto men physically, mentally, and morally. Hence, Aristotle's definition of woman as a "misbegotten male."
The subordinate stereotyping of women as "the other" justifiedthe biological declaration of women's place: thehomeand nursery. Darwin, for instance, saw some connection betweenthebiologicalfunction of the female body and its influence onherbehavior. Somehow "women are designed by nature for a function only she could perform." Speaking of men's mental capability, Darwin said,
woman seems to differ from man in mental disposition . ...The chief distinction in the intellectual powers of the two sexes is shown by man's attaining to a higher eminence, in whatever he takes up, than can woman - whether requiring deep thought, reason, or imagination, or merelythe uses of the sense and the hands." (quoted, Degler:107).
B. Theological Interpretation
According to R.Ruether (1993), humanity as male and female is understood in classical Christianity as having a dualstructure: humanity as Imago dei and humanity as a fallencreature. This dual aspect of humanity is what differentiate theoriginal essence (goodness/authenticity) from the actualexistence of humanity ( historically distorted, fallen,and sinful). Originalgoodness, until humanity's fall from grace, is represented in the concept of theimage of God.
In the interpretation of the original creation in the image of God, gender equality is assumed. Butit somehow created ambiguities in the way the image of God and the sinful nature of humanity has been correlated with maleness/femaleness. In spite of the Christian affirmation of sexual equality in original creationthere is a tendency to think of women as "bearers of sin" and hence as having less ofthehigher spiritual nature.
St.Augustine accepts that women areredeemableand thus canparticipate in the image of God (meaning can contribute positivelyto the building of God's image - which is thehighest good). But he thinks that this is only secondary and notnormative(necessaryas men, because he says that women cannot possess, separately and independently from man, the image of God. Augustine affirms that women cannot,in her own way, actualize the highest good. He also saidthat
a house is right where the man commands and the woman obeys.
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St. Thomas [Aquinas] views is even more controversial forhen thought of women as totally devoid of God's image and woman as an incomplete man. For him, only the male is the direct image of God (Moltmann-Wendel:86).
ForAquinas, social inequality is necessary sincein the orderof things we all face domination and subjugation. Naturally, the male who excel in the "higher faculty ofreason"dominates and the female who have "less rational capacity andmoral self-control" are subjugated. In other words,Thenaturally superior should rule the naturally inferior (Summa Theologica 1, ques. 29, art 1; Ruether:96; also Borresen, 1981).
ForGod's perfect creation, it seems unthinkable for a "defective" creature such as women to have any place innature.But Aquinas answer is that women are created because of their role in procreation,and this is the only reason! (Ruether:96).
3. Martin Luther: He gave Eve an equal status with Adam in theoriginal creation. Eve, however, lost her original equality withthe entrance of sin through the Fall and became inferior in mind and body. Hence, her fall from grace has made men her superior. Her inferiority is a punishment for sin. It is the expression of the judgment of God, and that refusal to accept this is refusal to accept God's justice.
4. John Calvin suggested that women are equal to men in their essential nature, and have as much capacity in mental andmoral and spiritual things as men. Hierarchy is therefore not a consequence of biological differences in human nature,butofappointed social office and functions. It reflects God social order of creation by which some rule and others follow.
For Calvin, man's rule over women is not a result of man's biological superiority, but simply because God commanded this to be so. In other words, social hierarchy, but not inequality, is a divine mandate, not a natural order of things. Man therefore is ultimatelyanswerable to God for creating inequality amonghuman beings (Potter, 1986:725-739).
It is difficult to change the image of things created bybiology as well as situation created and especially sanctionby religion. Both provide a difficult limit to what women can do. Indeed, we cannot easily contradict biology or what seems tobe "naturally" the case, and much more the "will" of God.
The final judgment on the woman question from Aristotleto Calvinor from biology to theology is thatwomenaredoomed creature. "Biology is women's unfortunate and unchanging destiny." Thenotion of inferiority created inferior socialstatus forwomen,and this situation created patriarchy which in turn gave men the justification to rule and oppress women.
3. Deconstructing Gender Ideology
Most of gender roles and stereotype of women are explained by gender ideology based on the biological differences between the sexes which implies social role-
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differentiation.Gender is further reinforced by the cultural expression of gender ideologyknown to us as patriarchy. A positivecontribution to gender consciousness and sensitivity may perhaps be provided by statinga comparative gender-roles stereotype of men and women.
A. On Biological Assumptions
Inpatriarchal societies, the sexual division of labor has placed men and women in the so-called "separate sphere." The "women's sphere" includes all activities associated with the home and the maintenance and survival of the family (Guettel, 1984). The "men's sphere" includes all activities associated with the provisionof family income or goods that have monetary value tomeet basic necessities of life. Women's home-works, however, are not granted economic value compared to their men. Like charity, injustice also begins at home.
This separate sphere is expressed by the belief that biologically men has the physical strength; hence men are justified to seek outside work, while women should stay at home to do household works.
Furthermore, men are seen as aggressive, decisive, independent, and rational which justify their being head of theirfamilies and thus the patriarchal order of society. By nature, men arebelieved to be polygamous which justifies their being promiscuous.
The women are passive, peaceful, loving, self-sacrificing,and emotional which justify their being mothers to their children and wives to their husbands. By nature, women are believed to be
monogamous (Eviota, 1996).
At the outset, it seems easy to validate all the male common -sense assumptions about men and women that "nature" has decreed. But studies have shown that gender differentiation and the sexual division of labor is less of a natural, but more of a cultural assignments of roles.
In feminist literature, the social roles of men/women are better understood by distinguishing sex and gender. Sex is a biological characteristic. Every person is born either male or female. But gender is a social construct. Being masculine/feminine is defined almost exclusively by culture. So, as we stated, are the gender roles assigned to men and womenWhat does this imply? It implies that if gender roles are culturally determined, then there is no universal roles or behaviorsassociated with sexual differentiation or with being male or female because of cultural variations. This means therefore that thereis no such thing as a men's sphere and awomen'ssphere and that traditional stereotype has no biological basis.
The capabilities to do things regardless of sex has beenshown in Mead's study of sex and temperament in threesocieties where being gentle and kind, ggressive and fierce are notthe exclusive temperaments of either sex. Both sexes are capableof these. In fact, the
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case of the Tschambuli absolutely falsifies the traditional belief that women are dependent, passive, and emotional (Mead, 1935). This study supportsthefeminist premise that men and women are essentially equal and share the samehuman capabilities. This idea then must take precedence over notions of sexual differences.
What about the assumptions of men's mental superiority? On thispoint, Darwin has been proven wrong. Compulsory education has falsified the myth about women's mental weakness: women are better students than men (Degler:108).
In expressing a contrary opinion to biological explanations of human behaviors, there is no need to presume that biology has no part or plays no role in the shaping of the nature of women. There is no denying, however, that gender differences, like any other human traits, as evidenced by cultural anthropological studies, are almost exclusively the product of socialization and culture. Unfortunately, given the indisputable physiological fact that only women can be child-bearers and breast-feeders, and hence food-preparers, it is inevitable for those seeking biological determinants and explanations for human behavior to limit women's space in the home and the nursery with the children. The effectof confiningwomen to household tasks because of the belief in biologically-designated functions or roles has providedmen with the advantage and privilege of actualizing their project, while women are denied the opportunity to do the same. That is why there are more men than women whohave achievedexcellence in their chosen work considering the fact that almost every position in society is in the hands of men. Patriarchal culture has indeed decreed that women should have no placeinsociety.
The consequences of such unfair practice in the division of labor have provided superiority status to male andinferiority status to female which in turn have enhanced the power of the male overthe female. Superiority implies aggression, intelligence, reason,efficacy, and power on the part of the male, while inferiority implies passivity, ignorance, etc. That men are by nature superior to women is but a socially constructed falsityaimed at the preservation of a patriarchal culture. Hence, sexual differences cannot and should not be used to justify social inequality.
On the whole, sexual differences justified by gender ideology gobeyond the question of equality and human rights of women. Arguments concerning women's biologically determined role and function such as child care is irrelevant to the question of men's power over women which men try to preserve. So whatif womenare by nature "child-bearers" or "carers of men?" Doesa "biologically-induced" role such as this implies that the male hasall the right to dominate or control the female? or even violently oppress her? It is clear that biological explanations do not,in any way, provide ethical consideration.
Biology does not determine morality or better still morality is not determined by biology.
B. On Theological Justification
Patriarchal practices have also been given religious sanction bothin church and society. Until recently, the Church has not taken seriously into consideration the question of sexualor gender equality especially in the church because of the persistenttheological
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doctrine that placed womenina subordinated status either by "nature" or by the "will of God." Such theological perceptionof women's realityhas long beenunkind and unjustto women, and as a consequence,provided a limitation towomen's probable participation in ecclesiastical leadership. Will there ever be a Woman Pope?