|
Main
- books.jibble.org
My Books
- IRC Hacks
Misc. Articles
- Meaning of Jibble
- M4 Su Doku
- Computer Scrapbooking
- Setting up Java
- Bootable Java
- Cookies in Java
- Dynamic Graphs
- Social Shakespeare
External Links
- Paul Mutton
- Jibble Photo Gallery
- Jibble Forums
- Google Landmarks
- Jibble Shop
- Free Books
- Intershot Ltd
|
books.jibble.org
Previous Page
| Next Page
Page 25
In discussing the doctrine of the _Incarnation_, Eucken attempts to get
at the inner meaning--the truth which the doctrine endeavours to
express, and he finds this to consist in the fact of the ultimate union
of the human and Divine, and this truth is one that we dare not
renounce. He criticises the attempt that is made in Christianity to show
that such union only obtained once in the course of history. Incarnation
is not one historical event, but a spiritual process; not an article of
belief, but a living experience of each spiritual personality.
He considers as injurious to religion in general the Christian
conception of the _Atonement_. He believes that the idea that is to be
expressed is that of the nearness of God to man in guilt and in
suffering. In endeavouring to express this close intimacy the idea of
suffering was transferred to God himself. The anthropomorphic idea of
reconciliation and substitution thus arose, and this Eucken considers to
have done harm. "The notion that God does not help us through His own
will and power, but requires first of all His own feeling of pity to be
roused, is an outrage on God and a darkening of the foundation of
religion." So Eucken objects to the attempt to formulate the mystery
into dogma. "All dogmatic formulation of such fundamental truths of
religion becomes inevitably a rationalism and a treatment of the problem
by means of human relationships, and according to human standards." "It
is sufficient for the religious conviction to experience the nearness of
God in human suffering, and His help in the raising of life out of
suffering into a new life beyond all the insufficiency of reason.
Indeed, the more intuitively this necessary truth is grasped, the less
does it combine into a dogmatic speculation and the purer and more
energetically is it able to work."
The conception of the _Trinity_ is again an attempt to express the union
of Divine and human, "the inauguration of the Divine Nature within human
life." The dogma, however, involves ideas of a particular generation,
and so threatens to become, and has indeed become, burdensome to a later
age which no longer holds these ideas. Further, the doctrine of the
Trinity has mixed up a fundamental truth of religion with abstruse
philosophical speculations, and this has provided a stumbling-block
rather than a help.
At the same time, Eucken lays the greatest stress on the _personality of
Jesus_. He considers the personality of Jesus to be of more importance
to Christianity than is the personality of its founder to any other
religion. "Such a personality as Jesus is not the mere bearer of
doctrines, or of a special frame of mind, but is a convincing fact, and
proof of the Divine life, a proof at which new life can be kindled over
anew." And again: "It is from this source that a great yearning has been
implanted within the human breast ... a longing for a new life of love
and peace, of purity and simplicity. Such a life, with its incomparable
nature and its mysterious depths, does not exhaust itself through
historical effects, but humanity can from hence ever return afresh to
its inmost essence, and can strengthen itself ever anew through the
certainty of a new, pure, and spiritual world over against the
meaningless aspects of nature and over against the vulgar mechanism of a
culture merely human." But while he would appreciate the depth and
richness of the personality of Jesus, he protests against the worship of
Jesus as divine, and the making of Him the centre of religion. The
greatness of Christ is confined to the realm of humanity, and there is
in all men a possibility of attaining similar heights.
Christianity is, in Eucken's view, much more closely bound up with
historical events than any other religion, and it thus suffers more
severe treatment at the hands of historical criticism than any other
religion. Eucken considers such historical criticism to be of great
value. In Christianity as in other religions we find the eternal not in
its pure form, but mixed with the temporal and variable, and historical
criticism will help in the separation of the temporal from the eternal
elements. In so doing it does an immense service, for it frees religion
from fixation to one special point of time, and enables us to regard it
as ever developing and progressing to greater depths.
Eucken emphasises that the _historical basis_ of Christianity is not
Christianity itself, is not essentially religious; and he quotes
Lessing, Kant, and Fichte to support him in his contention that a belief
in such a historical basis is not necessary to religion, and may even
prove harmful to it. The historical basis is, of course, useful as
bringing out into clear relief the personality of Jesus, and the other
great spiritual personalities associated in His work, and Eucken lays
stress upon the use that history can be to Christianity in giving
records of the experiences of great spiritual personalities in all ages,
but it is important that the history is here a means to an end, and not
an end in itself, and that the importance lies in the spiritual
experience and not in the historical facts.
Previous Page
| Next Page
|
|