Are there Degrees of Spirituality?

This is not a question that I can answer. In my view a person's spirituality is an inner attitude; it is not a foreign supplemental addition to oneself. One can evaluate spirituality in terms of exterior social behavior after defining what is meant by "religious," but that is not quite the same thing as studying a mental state or stance toward something. The inner mental state or stance of spirituality is never available for direct study; instead, only the stated claims of those polled about spirituality may be analyzed.

 

            The Apostle Paul, however, thought there were degrees to spirituality, and from the perspective of nascent Christianity he described the scale this way:

 

But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people, but as fleshly, as babes in Christ. I fed you with milk, not solid food; for you were not ready for it; and even yet you are not ready, for you are still of the flesh. For while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not still of the flesh and behaving just like ordinary people? For when one says, "I belong to Paul," and another, "I belong to Apollos," are you not just ordinary people? (1 Cor 3:1-4)

 

The degree scale that Paul establishes is at its lowest end "ordinary fleshly people" (or babes in Christ) and at its highest end "spiritual people." I suppose that the designations fleshly/spiritual would come together at the midpoint halfway through the scale. Paul is able to distinguish these two extremes, however, only in terms of human behaviors and he gives his readers an example.  Ordinary fleshly people act jealously and create strife (1 Cor 3:3). Presumably the spiritual people at the upper end of the scale would act just the opposite; that is, spiritual people would be characterized by trust and they would create harmony. But perhaps we should use his words as to how spiritual people behave:

 

The fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. (Gal 5:22-23 RSV)

 

On the other hand, the behaviors to which the flesh (what Paul regards as human lower nature) leads are:

 

fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, anger, selfishness, dissention, party spirit, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and such things." (Gal 5:19-21 RSV

 

            Does "spirituality," however defined, improve the species Homo sapiens?  Again, it is not a question that can be answered for two reasons: 1. It will depend on how you define "improvement." For example, some may think spiritual improvement means being less formally "religious" (however defined), since they might regard religiosity as a holdover from the superstitious period of humanity's primitive past; and 2. Since "spirituality" is a personal attitude (that is, how one regards oneself or how one is regarded by others), we can never analyze the degree of one's spirituality directly. We can only know how we regard ourselves and what we claim about someone else—and our self claims and what others claim about us may disagree.

 

            Suppose, however, "spirituality" were defined in terms of stated concepts of the Divine—that is to say how has the species Homo sapiens described the Gods it serves? Have concepts of God evolved or devolved? My theory is that spiritual people are more apt to conceive a more ethically respectable God; spiritual people would scarcely serve a flawed Deity. The more ethically their Gods behave; the keener must be the spiritual sense of those believing in such Gods.

 

            I do see specific indicators of gradual change in the representation of Deity by the species Homo sapiens. The overlapping changes are not uniform throughout the world and have been occurring over millions of years.

 

1.   The ascription of Divinity to the primal forces of nature (Primitive period).

2.   Polytheism and anthropomorphism (Classical Greek and Roman period).

3.   Monotheism and Spirit (Judeo-Christian period).

4.   Panentheism: God is in everything and everything is in God (Post-Enlightenment).

 

Whether this represents an evolution that makes our species more spiritual or whether it is a devolution that makes our species less spiritual, is a subjective judgment, however, and will be answered according to one's personal faith.

 

Charles W. Hedrick

Professor Emeritus

Missouri State University

“Jesus has come in flesh” Early Christian Confessions (continued)

The ancient Greek Gods, Zeus and company, were known to have encounters with men and women. The Gods assumed human disguise for these encounters and in some cases even appeared as animals. Zeus is particularly famous for his liaisons with human females. In the form of a swan he consorted with Leda and had two children with her (Castor and Pollux).  Here is another example: Zeus came to Alcmena and "becoming like" her husband Amphitryon, Zeus "lay down" with her and she bore two sons, Hercules and Iphicles. I only know of one instance where these divine human disguises were described as "fleshly" (in order to distinguish the personal presence of the Gods from their material statues). Such intimate situations clearly suggest that there was "fleshly" contact. This description is similar to that in the Valentinian Gospel of Truth (possibly 2nd century), where Jesus "came by fleshly form" (31:4-6).

            The writer of Hebrews noted that as children "shared blood and flesh, he [Jesus] himself similarly shared these" (Hebrews 2:14); some manuscripts add the word "misfortunes" to clarify the indefinite "these" of 2:14. "Sharing" flesh and blood is imprecise.  It is scarcely a claim that Jesus was human, but only a claim that he was "human-like," as were the Greek Gods described.

            Twice more Hebrews uses "flesh" to describe Jesus.  In Hebrews 5:7 the writer refers to "the days of his flesh." The expression suggests that the "days of his flesh" constituted only a temporary passage of time in an otherwise longer existence and that he himself was not to be identified by "flesh" in the same way the rest of us are; his fleshly state was something he only "shared" temporarily with us. Flesh and blood were only the means by which he opened up for us "a new and living way" into the presence of God (Hebrews 10:20).

            A somewhat rambling creedal-like statement appears in the Epistles of Ignatius (early second century):

There is one physician

Fleshly and spiritual

Born and unborn

God in man

In death true life

Both from Mary and from God

First capable of suffering and then incapable of suffering.

(Letter to the Ephesians 7:2)

The statement shows the difficulty Ignatius had in describing Jesus precisely, and reveals the potential for misunderstanding statements that attempt to be comprehensive and yet brief.  This statement is clearly dualistic even as it gropes toward a unified description for the nature of Jesus.

            The strange passage in John 6:51-58, where Jesus promises eternal life to the one who "eats his flesh and drinks his blood," is generally taken as an anachronistic allusion to the church's celebration of Eucharist. Ignatius seems to echo this John passage when he described Eucharist as the "medicine of immortality" (Letter to the Ephesians 20:2). These latter passages suggest that there was something special about the flesh of Jesus.  It was not simply common human flesh, for "his" flesh possessed a spiritual power, and was the means by which he brought eternal life.  Hence "his flesh" was hardly ordinary.

            Judging from this evidence, it appears that in the early days of the church (later 1st and early 2nd centuries) there existed no uniform way to describe Jesus as Christ. There were attempts to form some kind of plausible explanation that would do full justice to what everyone knew (i.e., he was a man) and to what everyone believed (i.e., he came from God).  So one might say about this early period that wide speculation existed, but that no definitive explanation emerged, which claimed general acceptance. In truth, there never has been a description satisfactory to everyone. While the "definitive" Chalcedon statement ("truly God and truly man") ended speculation in 451 for the orthodox churches, on the fringes of orthodoxy speculation continued—and still continues.

            What do you suppose was the impulse giving rise to all the Christological speculations in the late first and early second centuries?

 

Charles W. Hedrick

Professor Emeritus

Missouri State University

Early Christian Confessions: An Inter-textual dialogue

One of the earliest Christian confessions is "Jesus Christ has come in flesh" (1 John 4:2, 2 John 7; dated around the end of the first century; and Polycarp to the Philippians 7:1, dated middle second century).  These references all describe the statement as a "confession," that is, a formal statement of religious belief. The words of the confession do not connote, however, how the confessor understands the expression, but merely states that Jesus Christ "has come" to a location described as "in flesh," which begs the question: where was he prior to having come to the "in flesh" location?

The Gospel of John 1:1-18 may perhaps clarify somewhat his previous location.  John describes the Word as Jesus Christ (1:17), who existed before creation (1:1-5), and who later "became flesh" (1:14); that is to say the divine Word was "en-fleshed."  Oddly John 1:14 does not claim that Jesus Christ became human (ἀνθρώπινος), or even that he became a man (ἄνθρωπος), but rather that he became "flesh" (σάρξ).  Was the confession in the Johannine letters and Polycarp intended to communicate the idea that his being "in flesh" was a state foreign to his prior state, as is suggested by the second half of John 1:14: "and he took up (temporary) residence (ἐσκήνωσεν) among us"?  Not being equipped to read minds, all that I can say is that such an explanation is a possible understanding of the confession.

The confession basically only claims that Jesus Christ is not a "phantom," a condition suggested by the disciples' experience in Mark 6:50, where it is suggested that το the disciples he briefly appeared to be only a ghostly apparition.  On the contrary, the confession affirms that he is actual substantive flesh (and blood), such as the rest of us are (1 John 1:1).

            The confession does not speculate on the nature of his fleshly condition, but such a speculation does exist in Paul, where he states that the "flesh" of Jesus Christ was of a different kind than that characterizing the normal human condition.  Paul asserts that God sent "his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh" (Romans 8:3)—meaning that his flesh only looks like that of the rest of us sinful fleshly human beings; his "flesh" is distinctly different.  These are very strange words indeed, suggesting that the flesh of Jesus was of a different sort and that it was only "similar" to the sinful flesh human beings share.

The Pauline statement and the idea also fit an early Christian hymn, which Paul quotes: that Christ was "born in the likeness of men" (Philippians 2:7); that is to say, he was not really a man or a human being, but he only appeared to be a man.

            A confession in 1Timothy echoes language similar to Philippians  2:7, the Pastor (a name given by scholars to the author of the Pastoral Epistles) begins a confession as follows: "he was made visible in flesh" (1 Timothy 3:16).  This statement takes up a middling position affirming that he was "visible in flesh" but not agreeing with either John 1:14, where he became flesh and Romans 8:3 where his flesh was of a different sort.  Prior to his having become visible in flesh, the suggestion seems to be that he was invisible, a state that is characteristic of deity (Colossians 1:15, 1 Timothy 1:17, Hebrews 11:27).

            Paul describes on one occasion that he came into the world in the manner of a human birth: "when the time had fully come God sent forth his son, born of a woman" (Gal 4:4), but the "sending forth" language suggests something more than a natural birth occurred.  The birth narrative in Luke also has the façade of a natural birth (Luke 1:31; 2:7), but clearly something else is going on (Luke 1:35).  Matthew's story also shares the façade of a natural birth, but clearly it is not (Matthew 1:18, 24-25).

            Summarizing the view that seems to be reflected in these early texts, it appears that Jesus Christ was not conceived as a human being. Rather he was a "divine Other," who did not share the human condition, but only took up residence among us "in flesh."  Imagine my surprise then to read the decision of the Council of Chalcedon (in 451 AD); in seeking to resolve the Christological disagreements in the church, the Council decreed that Jesus Christ was "truly God and truly man"; he had two natures, human and divine, both of which resided indivisibly in the same persona.  This orthodox creed, which has existed in the Western church since the middle of the fifth century, is that Jesus Christ was "fully God and fully human."  It is somewhat ironic, however, that the earliest followers of Jesus do not seem to share that confession.  What do you suppose might have been the motivation for ignoring the views of the earliest followers of Jesus?

 

Charles W. Hedrick

Professor Emeritus

Missouri State University