2. With regard to the impulse to express the God-consciousness externally: there is, of course, no ‘inner’ which does not become also an ‘outer,’ and thus there are expressions of the God-consciousness, in which no relation to the race-consciousness can be directly shown. But the question here is of those expressions which aim at fellowship and on which all such fellowship is based. Now the fellowship without which there can for us be no living and vigorous piety is conditioned by these external expressions; it therefore is conditioned also by the inner union of the race-consciousness and the personal self-consciousness, for as this is the general source of all recognition of others as being of like nature with ourselves, it is also the only source of the presupposition and the ground of the fact that the ‘inner’ is known and grasped along with and by means of the ‘outer’; hence we may justly regard the two thus interrelated as belonging to the original perfection of man. This inclusion of the race-consciousness in the personal self-consciousness and the communicability of the ‘inner’ through the ‘outer,’ which is connected with it, is the fundamental condition or basis of social life, for all human fellowship rests solely upon it; and even in this wider connexion it belongs here, for, in every other kind of fellowship also, whatever its object, a man’s acts, because accompanied by a sensible excitation of self-consciousness, may contain at the same time a communication of his God-consciousness. Nay more, the free and mobile outward life of man must be able in its whole range to serve this external expression and communication of the God-consciousness (though not in the case of each individual taken singly, but only in combination with others), for otherwise there would be a sensuously stimulated self-consciousness with which the God-consciousness could unite inwardly, but in conjunction with which it could not express itself outwardly; and thus the range of externalization and communication would be more narrowly limited than that of the inner excitation. Such a discrepancy we should have to call an original imperfection.

3. The statements in our proposition then include all the conditions necessary for the continuous existence of the God-consciousness in every human individual, and also for its communication from one to the other in proportion to the different levels of human fellowship, including also the perfection with which it can be communicated from the Redeemer and through Him to the redeemed: hence the requirements of this section are fulfilled. In the knowledge of the elements of this original perfection as present in every one we find a justification for the original demand that the God-consciousness should exist continuously and universally; and human nature, repeating itself identically through heredity in every human being, is seen to be sufficient for its realization.² We found ourselves obliged to treat the two chief points as one whole complete in itself, which is a fresh justification, in the sphere of the God-consciousness, of a scientific method of treatment which everywhere aims at totality and is impossible on any other terms; it is justified both for Dogmatics proper, where we have to reduce the whole of religious affections to loci communes,and for religious Ethics, where we have to distinguish those types of conduct which show the influence of the God-consciousness on our purposes; also for Practical Theology in general, which is concerned with the description and distinction of the different forms of fellowship in God-consciousness. This is natural, for the whole procedure of Dogmatics—in which, if we take the word in a rather wider sense than usual, the last-mentioned discipline also is included—rests on what we have here exhibited as the original perfection of man.

§ 61. Fulness of experience in the sphere of faith is due to the individual development, in virtue of this original perfection of human nature, of each human life brought into existence by procreation. But how, on the same presuppositions, the first men developed, history gives no account, and the hints we have on that subject cannot form a religious doctrine in our sense of the word.

1. To understand the fundamental aspects of human life as set forth in the above description of man’s original perfection, i.e. so that everything is related to the God-consciousness, is undoubtedly a matter of faith; for it depends entirely on the certainty which accompanies religious experiences, by virtue of which alone all other states of life attain certainty through sharing in those experiences. If, on the contrary, we suppose a man to have religious experiences, but unaccompanied by certainty, so that he can equally well regard them as deceptive or veridical, he will not arrive at the idea of original perfection given above, but will co-ordinate the God-consciousness with other elements of life, or will possibly even take original perfection to consist solely in the possibility of freeing himself from the God-consciousness as a product of human imperfection; and thus what one experiences as a furtherance another will experience as a hindrance. Now matters of fact in the development of man are never questions of faith but of history, and statements concerning matter of fact, whether general or particular, are not propositions of faith but historical statements, even when, viewed directly, their subject-matter is the state of the God-consciousness in an individual or a community. In this respect there can be no distinction between the first men and ourselves. Everything we know of the actual conditions of the first men and of their course of development, including the manner in which the indwelling tendency to God-consciousness became operative in them without the stimulating influence of tradition, all this is in no sense faith but history—unless we are prepared to alter completely the usage of the word and, say, call history which is mingled with uncertainties, ‘faith.’ Otherwise ‘faith’ would consist simply in historical knowledge, and would be held and disseminated by historical statements and portrayals. That even in their case we should regard as an advance only those conditions which express an increased value of the God-consciousness, is certainly a matter of faith, but of the very same faith as is expressed in the conception of original perfection given above. There could only be specific doctrines of faith concerning the first men in so far as their unique manner of coming into being and of temporal existence might modify the application of our conception to them. Even then we should, of course, always have to maintain that the application of our conception is limited to the sphere of procreation, and could leave aside the question what in their case took its place, except in so far as the relation thence arising between them and us altered our God-consciousness in its combination with our race-consciousness. The question arises, then, whether their history has come down to us in such a form that we are compelled to lay down such propositions.

2. Now it is clear that the Old Testament narrative,³ on which alone we have to depend, is far from putting forward a history of this kind. For even if the question whether this narrative is meant to be taken historically were answered entirely in the affirmative, the particular points which it presents simply take for granted most of what we chiefly want to know about the first men. Especially, for one thing, speech, and the form of consciousness determined by it, the acquisition of which by men after birth is the surest proof that in their case the state of animal-like confusion is already disappearing, is here everywhere assumed; and in the same way, the God-consciousness appears as already present, and we learn nothing of the mode of its development. Even what is recounted of the converse of God with man, instead of helping the solution of the other problems, is itself a new and still more difficult one. For we learn nothing more exact of the way in which God made Himself intelligible to men, except that bodily form is quite plainly ascribed to Him. But it is equally difficult to see how an idea of God already existing could have been referred to such a phenomenon as its object, or how on occasion of such a phenomenon a true God-consciousness could have arisen. And indeed, even with regard to external conditions, the description of the life of Paradise is only helpful in a negative way, for though the question how man could have supported life from the beginning raises no particular difficulty, no information is given about how the first men spent the time, or of the result in the expansion both of the objective consciousness and of self-consciousness. Even what is said about the naming of the animals ⁴ leaves us quite uncertain whether the designation had any regard to the relation of the kinds of animals to their species and of the species to the larger classes, and if so, to what extent. The moral situation is equally undefined, for their innocent lack of modesty, as well as their initial obedience to the divine command, admits of the most diverse interpretations. Since, then, besides all this, no measure of time is given, and consequently all materials for forming a historical picture are wanting, we can only say that everything we are told about the first men before the Fall is adequately elucidated by the conception of original perfection which we have proposed.

3. If the narrative is regarded not as history but simply as an ancient attempt to make good the lack of a historical account of the beginnings of the human race, the particular points in it will have inner truth for us in so far as they agree with the conception which we have laid down. But all attempts to form a historical picture of the first beginnings of human existence are bound to fail, because, as we have no experience of an absolute beginning, we have no analogy by which we could make the absolute beginning of rational consciousness intelligible. We have no clear idea even of the consciousness of the child in the first period of life. Yet we cannot miss the fact that in the case of the child the arising of consciousness out of unconsciousness coincides with the detachment and separation of its life from community with the life of the mother, and forthwith the environing spirit, already developed, influences the spirit which is just arriving at conscious thought; the first man, on the other hand, can only be described as one to whom this means of development was wholly lacking. The formula which accords best with this analogy and with our experience of the conditions of any as yet largely undeveloped human society is that the first men are to be regarded as good-natured grown-up children;⁵ but this is really quite inappropriate and gives us no clear view, for we cannot think of their spiritual development any more than that of the child as proceeding purely from within outwards, and the bodily sustenance of adult primitive man required from the outset activities which we can only conceive as acquired by memory, association, and repetition. If it be suggested that the first man was more like an animal and guided only by instinct, we cannot understand the passage from this condition to one of consciousness and thought without the assistance of a life which was already intelligent, since it would be the beginning of a new kind of existence wholly unconnected with what went before. Attempts have been made to avoid this difficulty by means of two ideas, the grounds of which, at least to some extent, are to be found in the Old Testament narrative. One is the proposition, familiar in many dogmatic systems, that the necessary capacities were from the first present in man by creation, and were capable of extension from what was necessary for the preservation of life further and higher to the genuinely spiritual level. But this really only means that the first condition of man cannot be conceived as different from the later conditions which are determined by previous conditions; that is to say, an absolutely first condition cannot be conceived at all. Also, if we are unwilling to fall back on instinct, it is unthinkable that there should be a consciousness of these created capacities before they are applied, and again it is inconceivable that, in a genuinely human situation, there should be an impulse which would set them in motion without consciousness of them. Certainly those theologians⁶ do not lessen the difficulty (rather they simply return to the starting-point and give a description of the problem more than a solution) who are ready to make assertions about an actual condition of the first man, but at the same time represent the personal perfections which they ascribe to him as mere potentialities, excluding everything which requires previous exercise. The other expedient is as follows: it is supposed that those things which secure for a human being, when born, fellowship with those who are already grown and developed, the newly created man obtained through a revealing and educative fellowship with God or the angels. But if we examine this more closely it leads us back, by one way or another, to the first idea. For if this educative revelation were a purely inward influence, this would be immediately connected with creation itself and indistinguishable from it, and the true and proper life of man would, on this view, begin in much the same way as on the view that there were abilities implanted at creation. If, on the other hand, the fellowship in question is external and mediated through human language, then of course the grown-up child, with this environment, can through speech learn also to think by innate human reason; but if it is to be set in motion in definite activities demanded by self-preservation, either those higher Beings too must lead a completely human life so as to bring the imitative impulse into play, or else we must assume that the understanding is sufficiently developed to apprehend the teaching and precept which would exert an educative influence.

4. If, then, we are unable to form an intelligible idea of the first states of development of primitive man, and if we cannot point to anything compelling us to modify the application of our conception to them in any special way, there is no reason why we should lay down any special doctrines concerning the first men. All that follows is that we can only exhibit the validity of our conception within the context of earlier and later generations, where human existence begins in the manner with which we are familiar and depends for its development upon human tradition. In this connexion, our certainty of the original perfection of human nature, as set out by us, furnishes ground for the assumption that the first men themselves, when their influence on a second generation began, stood at some quite definite point in the line of development (though a point which we may be unable further to define), and consequently they were in a position to influence the development of the God-consciousness in the next generation; that is to say, self-communicating piety is as old as the self-propagating human race. This assumption is implied in the consciousness that piety is a universal element of human life.

If, then, following the Mosaic account of the creation, which views all organic beings ‘after their kind,’⁷ we take the expression of the divine will given there with respect to man⁸ not as referring exclusively to the first men in their unique position, but to them only in so far as they were the first instances of the human species, and if we ask whether the designation, ‘image of God’ (which indisputably denotes the superiority of human nature over the other creatures described), is in harmony with the conception we have set forth, we can only answer ‘yes’ with great caution. For even though we can describe the living presence of the God-consciousness as a being of God within us, which seems to be something much greater than a resemblance to God, yet this living presence of the God-consciousness is something different. And since this activity of the God-consciousness occurs in us only in connexion with our physical and bodily organism, if we would argue regressively from the likeness or image of God, as it is and has been described here, to God Himself, then we should have to accept one of two alternatives: either the whole world is related to God in the same way as our whole organism is related to the highest spiritual power in us, in which case it would be difficult to see how God could fail to be identical with the world; or else there is something in God which at least corresponds to our psychical organization, which is largely constituted by the so-called lower psychical forces; and in this way the idea of God would acquire a strong and really defiling admixture of humanity, and attributes would have to be ascribed to God which can mean nothing when taken as divine,⁹ or else attributes would have to be ascribed to men which could not be thought of as human.¹⁰ Here, then, is another instance of the truth that Biblical expressions, especially when they do not occur in a purely didactic context, can seldom be adopted in the terminology of Dogmatics without more ado. Hence it is not surprising that many of our theologians, taking what immediately follows it as the explanation of the divine words regarding ‘the image of God,’ have, like the Socinians, connected the divine image with man’s formative and governing relation to external nature rather than with his own inner being.

The other common phrase, ‘original righteousness,’ which is not quite so scriptural, gives rise to other difficulties. These difficulties arise not only because righteousness in the ordinary sense is concerned only with more extended social relations, such as a first human pair could not possibly have; it is, in fact, concerned primarily with the sphere of law proper which, starting from a state of simple family life, could only reach development in later generations. But the difficulties in question arise even more because we are accustomed to include righteousness under the general idea of virtue; yet a basal disposition is never called virtue, but only one which arises through spontaneity. Here, however, it is a question of just such a basal disposition, or of one present in man by creation, from which a development should start such as can relate itself to divine demands; and it is a conformity to these demands, achieved by an active attitude to them, which is so frequently called ‘righteousness’ in the Old Testament Scriptures: thus giving rise to a very undesirable double meaning of the word. In this way we should be led back, only too easily, to the idea of created capacities, a result which could only be avoided by a most definite explanation that in this connexion the word ‘righteousness’ has a totally different meaning—a meaning which certainly can be traced back to the usage of common life, inasmuch as we call a thing ‘just’ (right) when it corresponds to its definition. If now we consider the divine decree ordaining the whole development of the human race by means of redemption, and the fact that this was included in the idea of human nature from the beginning, though unknown to mankind itself, then it will be precisely those attributes laid down in the proposition given above on which this capacity for redemption depends.

5. In view of these considerations, it will be felt as very natural that our symbolical documents and, in agreement with them, later teachers of doctrine have wavered in their use of these expressions, sometimes designating by them those original excellences of human nature which lie at the root of all later development¹¹ and sometimes asserting a definitely perfect condition of the first man, thus laying down doctrines about the first man¹²—this condition being regarded sometimes more as present by creation and sometimes as in part acquired. Now if we interpret the first class of passages quoted in such a way that ‘nature’ in the second of them is called ‘good’ and ‘holy’ because the perfections asserted in the first passage develop out of it (as indeed the first passage itself represents them as still in the future), then our proposition makes clear how and why this development takes place. For even the uniform temperamentum of the bodily functions can only indicate, on the one hand, the uniformly easy control of the soul over them in every direction; and on the other hand, of course, there must here be reckoned the resistance, equally adequate on all sides, which the organism offers to external influences, thus always maintaining itself in its original relation. This latter point is not definitely included in our formula, because the power of the God-consciousness does not immediately depend upon it; rather it shows itself to be so indifferent to the favourable or unfavourable relations of bodily life to external nature that it has often been maintained that piety flourishes best in sickness and poverty. In fact, this sufficiency of the organism, and everything pertaining exclusively to the natural side of man¹³ in his conflict with other natural forces, would be better dealt with under the heading of the Perfection of the World in relation to mankind, on the same principle as that which led us to discuss human mortality not in the form of the question whether it conflicted with man’s proper perfection but rather as the question whether the perfection of the world in relation to man was diminished by it. With regard especially to the obedience of the lower powers of the soul to the higher (a point which is always reckoned an essential part of original righteousness) the question only arises here, where we are altogether disregarding the actual condition of the first pair as individuals, in so far as there resides in the lower functions a receptivity for the impulses of the higher; and this not only in the state of quiescence but during their proper life-process. And this point is, of course, brought out in our proposition, since the activities in which the influence of the God-consciousness takes effect determine all its communications. But when Augustine understands by the expression ‘desire’¹⁴ simply the proper life-process of these functions, and at the same time holds that it cannot be thought of as co-existing with original righteousness, he seems to be at least as much open to blame as the Pelagians, if they considered the opposition between the lower and higher faculties as man’s original condition, and included all acquired perfection under the concept of the removal of that opposition. For Augustine’s opinion presupposes also an original contradiction between the spirit in man and that which is necessary for his animal life.

But this leads us over to the other point of view—namely, the representation of original righteousness or the divine image as an actual condition of the first man. Now if, on this view, the statement that man was created by God good, righteous, and holy, means no more than that, in opposition to the Pelagian doctrine, the first real state of man could not have been one of sin, we may unreservedly assent. For sin must have been preceded by knowledge and recognition of the divine will, and in that case it must have been preceded by free activity which was not sinful. But if what is meant is a real power exercised by the higher faculties over the lower, then (even if we do not conjoin with this the position of Augustine referred to above), the greater this power is taken to be, it is from this point of view impossible to conceive of anything but a growing intensification of that power in the same regard. This is probably the real reason why the Roman Church has explained man’s original state of sinlessness, not by the original perfection of human nature, but rather by an extraordinary divine influence—an explanation which clearly implies a Pelagian conception of human nature as such.¹⁵ It may not be quite so harmful in its consequences, but it confuses the idea of original perfection none the less, when our dogmatic theologians maintain that the first pair, in their original condition, were partakers of the Holy Spirit.¹⁶ Thus the attempt to define more closely the primitive condition of the first man seems to lead nowhere, whether he be considered as completely corresponding with what we can recognize in later times as a progressive development of original perfection, or whether he be considered as completely corresponding to what appears to us a retrogressive state. The Pelagians, starting from the second of these presuppositions, gain a double advantage—they admit no original perfection which has been lost, and a progressive development can take place from the point of departure which they accept; but they incur a double disadvantage—that the good for them is not original, and that the Redeemer appears only as an individual member in the development. The doctrine of the Church, on the other hand, gains a double superiority—it postulates the good as immediately produced by God, and, since with the loss of this condition the development is broken and a new point of departure is needed, the Redeemer can come in as the turning-point; but it incurs a double disadvantage—the good which was already actual in the phenomenal world has been lost, in spite of the sustaining divine omnipotence, and the sole purpose for which we are tempted to form a picture of the original state of the first man, i.e. in order to have a starting-point for the genetic conception of all that follows, is not attained. Hence we may take it as more to the purpose not to define anything more accurately as regards the condition of the first man, but simply to elicit the ever self-identical original perfection of nature from the higher self-consciousness viewed universally. But if we are to see everything that can develop out of such original perfection all together in a single human instance, it is not to be sought in Adam, in whom it must have again been lost, but in Christ, in whom it has brought gain to all.

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Footnotes

1. Cf. § 5, 1-3. ↩

2. Omnes homines.in primo homine sine vitio conditi (Ambrose, de vocat. Gent. i. 3). ↩

3. Gen. 1²⁶ ff. 2⁷–3²⁴. ↩

4. Gen. 2¹⁹. ↩

5. Cf. de Wette, Sittenlehre, § 38, and Theol. Zeitschrift, ii. pp. 84–88. ↩

6. Reinhard, Dogm., §§ 70, 73. ↩

7. Gen. i¹¹. ²¹. ²⁴. ↩

8. Gen. i²⁶. ↩

9. So Quenstedt, Syst. Theol., p. 843, reckons as part of the original perfection conformitas appetitus sensitivi cum Dei castitate. ↩

10. Ibid. p. 844: In corpore primi hominis eluxit imago Dei … per impassibilitatem. ↩

11. Apolog. Conf. i. (p. 20. Ed. Lücke) inclines in this direction: Justitia originalis habitura erat non solum aequale temperamentum qualitatum corporis, sed etiam haec dona, notitiam Dei certiorem timorem Dei fiduciam Dei, aut certe rectitudinem et vim ista efficiendi; though even this shows some confusion. And Solid. Decl., p. 643: In Adamo et Heva natura initio pura bona et sancta creata est. ↩

12. Here belongs Solid. Decl., p. 640, in so far as it calls original sin a privatio concreatae in Paradiso justitiae originalis seu imaginis Dei, ad quam homo initio in veritate sanctitate atque justitia creatus fuerat; and Conf. Belg. xiv.: Credimus Deum ex limo terrae hominem ad imaginem suam bonum scilicet iustum et sanctum creasse, qui proprio arbitrio suam voluntatem ad Dei voluntatem componere et conformem reddere posset. Less clearly, Conf. Helv.: Fuit homo ab initio a Deo conditus ad imaginem Dei in iustitia et sanctitate veritatis, bonus et rectus. ↩

13. Cf. Luther in Genes. i. § 187: ‘To this inner perfection was later added the most beautiful and admirable strength and glory of the body and all its members.’ ↩

14. Concupiscentia. The relevant passages are too many to give in detail, but the use of the word is so varied that it would be hard to decide whether, and if so how far, his doctrine goes beyond the proper bounds. ↩

15. Frenum extraordinarium. See Bellarmin., de Gratia pr. hom, cap. v. ↩

16. Melanchth., loc., p. 112: Adam et Eva erant electi, et tamen revera amiserunt Spiritum Sanctum in lapsu. ↩