Item: A newspaper advertisement for radial keratotomy, a surgical operation which corrects nearsightedness and astigmatism, begins, "Some [local] doctors can help you see the future without your glasses."Item: A newspaper article reports a recent study of tree rings of ancient bristle-cone pines, which suggests that the globe has been in a cooling cycle for six thousand years or so.
As a surgeon, my (perhaps too irreverant) response to the advertising copy was an image of colleagues gleefully sewing crystal balls onto the eyes of a hopeful patient. As an essayist with a philosophical quirk, my response to the news item was to reflect on the world's intellectual "climatology." That, indeed, may be difficult to define, but it seems fair to ask whether twentieth century thought has not been in a "cooling cycle" all its own.
This century's explosion of knowledge about the cosmos has so rapidly overwhelmed our sense of meaning, that we now define ourselves as being in the "postmodern age." We are Modern Man in Search of a Soul, as the title of Carl Jung's 1933 book [1] has so aptly stated it. Is there any reason to hope that we might somehow correct our lenses to see into a warming future of meaningful intellectual life?
Professor of philosophy Huston Smith has defined the intellectual eras (Let us call them "climates") of western history in terms of their predominant attitudes toward ultimate reality. Following the classical age, from about the fourth century, Christendom assumed that reality is "regulated by inscrutable but beneficent will." [2] The modern age of science, spanning the seventeenth century to the mid-twentieth, held that reality is objectively ordered. To the extent that it was religious, it was deistic more than theistic. [3]
However, the worldview of the postmodern mind, when it acknowledges worldview at all, is the view from a foggy window, [4] and metaphysics has been replaced by philosophical anthropology. [5] Smith writes, "... the distinctive feature of the contemporary mind ... is its acceptance of reality as unordered in any objective way that man's mind can discern." [6]
The postmodern attitude tends toward the absurdity of existence, and toward confusion and denial of meaning. Smith asks, is it possible for humankind to live indefinitely with its world out of focus? [7]
Thoughtful Christians, seeing a simultaneous decline in society's sense of meaningfulness and in Christian influence might well wonder whether Christianity too (at least in its ecclesiastical aspect) has lost its focus. Could Christianity, which once had the preeminent position in Western intellectual life, universalize itself sufficiently to bring the world back into meaningful focus? Would it be willing to undergo an operation on its own vision, in order to respond to the myopia and astigmatism of the current age?
Let me suggest that the work of Albert Schweitzer and Pierre Teilhard de Chardin has given us an outline of the necessary operation. Each of these thinkers, though grounded in traditional Christianity, has risen well beyond rigid ecclesiastical orthodoxy to give us separate descriptions of the broad and distant view from the heights. Yet their lenses are uniquely complementary; taken together, they sharpen human vision and lead us toward meaningful ethical participation in the work of cosmos.
Albert Schweitzer (1875-1965), son of a Lutheran pastor, was himself a pastor with a doctorate in theology. His review of research on the historical Jesus (1906) ends movingly with his affirmation of Jesus who "comes to us as One unknown," whom we may know, not historically, but only as he reveals himself "as an ineffable mystery" in our own experience. [8] Throughout his life he seemed fascinated by the "ineffable mystery", for he wrote, "Jesus has simply taken me prisoner since my childhood. My going to Africa was an act of obedience to Jesus." [9] Yet Schweitzer did not hold literalist orthodox views regarding Jesus as Christ. [10]
Schweitzer is most widely remembered, as he wanted to be, for his philosophy of reverence for life, formally set forth in 1923. [11] While it is usually categorized as ethic rather than metaphysic, Jackson Ice writes that Schweitzer was "less concerned with constructing a systematic ethic than with the mystery of the moral phenomenon per se." [12] Ethics rests on metaphysics, for ethics arises from mystical awareness of the ultimate reality:
Reverence for life means to be in the grasp of the infinite, inexplicable, forward-urging Will in which all Being is grounded. [13]The only reality is the Being which manifests itself in phenomena. [14]
There is no Essence of Being, but only infinite Being in infinite manifestations. [15]
We must rise to a spirituality which is ethical, and to an ethic which includes all spirituality. Then only do we become profoundly qualified for life. [16]
There is such a strong metaphysical aspect to Schweitzer's thought that reverence for life is often considered religious. Schweitzer himself wrote, "... this ethic, profound, universal, has the significance of a religion. It is religion." [17] Also, "The surmisings and the longings of all deep religiousness are contained in reverence for life." [18] Yet, "Because it has its origin in realistic thinking, the ethic of reverence for life is realistic, and leads man to a realistic and clear confrontation with reality." [19]
Reverence for life is not a system of thought which derives from or requires theistic belief. [20] One might also argue that it is not religious in the sense that it offers no central unique symbol system by which (to use Jungian terminology) the ego communicates with the unconscious self for personal transformation (individuation). Rather, it is a statement of that existential attitude or awareness which extends beyond and underlies all symbol systems.
Schweitzer considered reverence for life to be the essence of the ethical spirituality taught by Jesus. For example, he referred to "the unconditional validity of reverence for life, as it is contained in the religion of Jesus." [21] It was precisely this thinking relationship between mysticism of Being and the ethical spirituality of Jesus which provides the modern challenge to Christianity:
If Christianity, for the sake of tradition or for any considerations whatever, refuses to let itself be interpreted in terms of ethical religious thinking, it will be a misfortune for itself and for mankind. Christianity needs to be filled with the spirit of Jesus, and in the strength of that shall spiritualize itself into the living religion of inwardness and love that is its destiny. [22]
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955), a Jesuit priest, philosopher, and paleontologist, spent a major portion of his professional life in China, and participated in studies of the Peking Man fossils. As essayist, he wrote movingly of a new spirituality grounded in the reality of the universe. Both Schweitzer and Teilhard had theological difficulties with their respective religious establishments: Schweitzer encountered orthodox resistance in obtaining sponsorship for his first African trip; [23] Teilhard's order refused him permission to publish, thus making his writing available only posthumously.
Teilhard's principle philosophical work was The Phenomenon of Man, but several volumes of essays have also been published, such as The Divine Milieu, Human Energy, and The Future of Man. His Writings In Time of War dates from his World War I service as a stretcher bearer at the front. He introduced many special terms to convey his sweeping view of a creation in progress: It is drawn in its cosmogenesis by a Christic radial energy toward the Omega Point of unity in the divine. This evolution has been characterized by hominization in which humankind became conscious (and becomes more conscious) to participate in noogenesis, the evolving of the "mind" of the universe, expanding its "thinking layer", the noosphere.
Teilhard's christology is suggested in the titles of his essays "Christ the Evolver" (1942), and "Christianity and Evolution: Suggestions for a New Theology" (1945). Several quotations from his earlier essay, "Christology and Evolution" (1933) will convey the theme with which we are concerned here. Teilhard writes:
[O]ur religion is essentially perception of the universe and coming to practical terms with it `in Christo Jesu'. [24][O]ur Christology is still expressed in exactly the same terms as those which, three centuries ago, could satisy men whose outlook on the cosmos it is now physically impossible for us to accept. What we now have to do without delay is to modify the position occupied by the central core of Christianity and this is precisely in order that it may not lose its illuminative value. [25]
When the face of Christ is projected, along the axis of this mystery [of the Incarnation], upon a universe that is evolutive in structure, it expands and fills out effortlessly. Within this organic and moving framework, the features of the God-man spread out and are amplified with surprising ease. There they assume their true proportions, as in their own natural context. Projected, then, on the screen of evolution, Christ, in an exact, physical, unvarnished sense, is seen to possess those awesome properties which St. Paul lavishly attributes to him. He is the First, and he is the Head. In him all things received their first impulse, and in him all things hold together and all things are consummated." [26]
This presentation of the gospel, and this alone, so far as we can judge, stands out as capable of justifying and maintaining in the world the fundamental zest for life. It is the very religion of evolution. [27]
Schweitzer and Teilhard both point us toward a level of knowledge and understanding, conventional and spiritual, which goes far beyond traditional Christian orthodoxy. Yet I do not believe that either had a worldview which was "postchristian," in the sense of a Christianity abruptly superseded by something entirely different. Rather, I believe that both were thinking in terms of an evolving of its theology beyond the orthodox expectation of a literal "kingdom of God." They looked toward Christianity's continual unfolding and fulfillment, as human consciousness becomes ever more aware of the spiritual realm of a living and ordered cosmos, whose "kingdom" is that deep divine nonlocal [28] mysterious reality from which creation daily springs.
Thus, we might say that their thought represents a "metachristianity" which takes Christianity to a new dimension, beyond its historical plane. It stands below it in the depth of its mystical awareness. It stands above it in its intellectual grasp of the spiritual significance of modern knowledge. The metachristianity which we can discern in their writings is the spiritual fulfillment of a rigorous grand synthesis of current knowledge, and thus can accept no conflict between spirituality and science.
Metachristianity stands above and leads beyond the "dogmatic spacetime" which has defined church history. Yet it finds ever more profound meanings in its traditions of music, art, and liturgy. It is the bridge (or better, the rainbow) which arches between the historical Jesus and the cosmic Christ, to join in contemporary experience the sublime expression of ethical spirituality and its powerful symbol of cosmic order and meaning.
The Mission of such metachristianity is justice. All life has meaning, because all life is the immediate expression of the life of the cosmos. From that realization arises the fullest understanding of reverence for life. From it arises our imperative to participate fully in the unfolding of knowledge, and to work diligently for the creation of those conditions on the planet which foster justice and the further unfolding of meaning.
The Witness of such metachristianity is toward the further spread of ethical spirituality in world consciousness. By using the term meta-christianity, I do not intend to suggest any sense of exclusivity. Rather, the term suggests that the intellectual starting point for both Schweitzer and Teilhard has, through them, taken on implications far beyond conventional interpretations of sectarianism. Perhaps giving the name "metachristian" to this special complementarity of their spiritual perspectives can help us see better our own challenge and opportunity.
It is especially in this "metachristian interpretation" of reverence for life in an evolving cosmos that traditional Christians can learn to join in mutual embrace with sincere people of all other spiritual traditions. Perhaps even more importantly, it can help us reach beyond the postmodern mindset and beyond all parochialisms as we seek to experience a truly fulfilling and forever renewable world spirituality.
1. Carl G. Jung. Modern Man in Search of a Soul (1933), New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich (undated edition).
2. Huston Smith: Beyond the Post-modern Mind (1982), Wheaton IL: Quest Books, 1989. p. 16.
3. ibid., p. 6.
4. ibid., p. xiii.
5. ibid, p. 15.
6. ibid., p. 16.
7. ibid.
8. Albert Schweitzer. The Quest of the Historical Jesus: A Critical Study of Its Progress from Reimarus to Wrede (1906), New York: Macmillan, 1968, p. 403.
9. Albert Schweitzer quoted by Jackson Lee Ice, Albert Schweitzer: Sketches for a Portrait. Lanham MD: University Presses of America, 1994, p. 24. [hereafter cited as "Sketches" ]
10. ibid., especially pp. 23-30.
11. Albert Schweitzer. Philosophy of Civilization (1923), reprint Tallahassee: University Presses of Florida, 1981. [hereafter cited as "Schw., Ph.C."]
12. Sketches, p. 37.
13. Schw., Ph.C. p. 283.
14. ibid., p. 304.
15. ibid., p. 305.
16. ibid., p. 304.
17. Schw., quoted in Sketches, p. 38.
18. Schw., Ph.C., p. 313.
19. Schw., Out of My Life and Thought (1933), newly translated by A. B. Lemke. New York: Henry Holt, 1990. p. 234. ["Schw., OMLT"]
20. Sketches, p. 9.
21. Schw., Ph.C., p. 340.
22. Schw., OMLT p. 241.
23. ibid., pp. 114-115.
24. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. Christianity and Evolution. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich/Harvest Book, 1971, p. 76.
25. ibid., p. 77.
26. ibid., pp. 87-88.
27. ibid., p. 93.
28. The reference here is to the reality beyond spacetime known in quantum physics through proofs of Bell's Theorem. See Nick Herbert, Quantum Reality (New York: Doubleday, 1985) and Amit Goswami et al., The Self-Aware Universe (New York: Jeremy Tarcher/Putnam, 1993).