More than two decades ago, I wrote a 30-page class paper on "The Nature of Man" for my psychology class in a college in Los Angeles. My instructor was one who sounded like either agnostic or atheist, judging from the opinions he dished out from time to time. Since he graded my paper "A," he must have understood well the logic of the analysis I presented and hopefully, accepted the conclusions. I would have wanted to disseminate my analysis as part of a book collection of essays, but time seems to be running out. So, let me just do the next best thing and share with you some excerpts from the last chapter of my paper since pertinent to a discussion we, in an egroup on cyberspace, had on the nature of man. So much has been written about this topic from time immemorial, but to my knowledge, the Creation has never been explained the way it has been analyzed in this paper.
Interpretation of the Biblical Narration
an excerpt from “The Nature of Man” by
Blanca Datuin, (c) 1990
The story of creation in the Bible tells of God saying, after creating the earth and the firmament and kinds of living things, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. Let him have dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, and the cattle, and over all the wild animals and all the creatures that crawl on the ground." In the second story of the creation, again, man's beginning is told but it focuses on another aspect of his being: "...the Lord formed man out of the clay of the ground and blew into his nostrils the breath of life, and so man became a living being." .........
There are two things in the biblical narration that this researcher observes to be very significant in explaining human nature. First is the medium out of which God made man. The second is God's breathing into his nostrils to give him life and thus, making man "in our image." "And the Lord God formed man of the slime of the earth and breathed into his face the breath of life, and man became a living soul." (Genesis, 2, 7)
Slime or clay is that fine-grained earth that, mixed with the right amount of water, can be formed into any shape the sculptor or potter wishes. It is dull, without luster, until polished to a gloss. It is soft enough for shaping purposes but hard as a rock once it is kilned to a degree. Unlike rock, however, the finished product, because made of clay, remains fragile. It can break into pieces if not handled properly. The same qualities are manifested in a human being: from being newly-born up to a certain young age, he is pliant and can be shaped into the desired form, before he gets hardened in the furnace of life He is earthy and corruptible in his basic instincts; dull of mind until honed to perfection in a process of education and re-education and as an ever-evolving person. He is also fragile and vulnerable until his coping mechanism is strengthened in a nurturing environment.
Whether taken literally or figuratively, man's body having been formed out of clay, will always infer the above-mentioned qualities of human nature. Clay is the perfect medium for an artist to whom God, in His act of creation, is likened. Clay is also that solid matter that explains the materiality of the human body. In the Christian way of thinking, however, the body is like a temple of God as it is where the soul resides. It should thus be treated with respect: it should not be abused, defiled or tainted the way a drug-dependent, for instance, or a sex maniac abuses his own as well as those of others.
The second significant point in the biblical narration is the statement about God's having blown into man's nostrils the breath of life. This is the infusion of a part of God's perfection, a part of His own nature as a spiritual being: the breath of life that animates. This is the principle of life--the soul that is capable of rising to heights of splendor an All-Good God is said to have wanted man to rise to . His potentialities abound beyond imagination even as his efforts to sift the good from the bad is fraught with much faltering, trepidation and pain.
God's breath is the external force, the efficient cause described by St. Thomas in his Summa Theologica discussed earlier in this paper. Even if taken merely as a metaphor, the act would still symbolize the privileged position of man among all His other creations. For man alone is the one breathed into by God; thus, he alone has had that kind of personal contact with God, which explains what most theologians describe as an intimate relationship between God and man. It is an act of perfect love from God that no rational person can deny. For how can one's giving of himself to another be anything else? In infusing man a part of His own perfection, God made him in His own likeness: endowed with spirit like Himself and a creator himself in many ways: a giver of life in the regenerative process of life, a poet, an artist, a lover, an engineer, an author, and in various other ways.
As can be deduced from the Story of Creation alone, man is of dual nature. Whether to be taken literally or metaphorically (as has been debated constantly between believers and non-believers), the implication remains the same, that man is made of matter and form—matter, which the body is made of, and form--the soul, which, in the words of St. Thomas Aquinas, has for its end the natural longing to be united back to its Creator. Thus, man has the bodily nature whose laws and needs must be obeyed if the body is to be healthy and not deteriorate to the utter failure of its vital functions: it must be fed, it must be nourished properly, cared for and not abused, etc. Then there is the spiritual nature whose laws must also be obeyed if the soul will fulfill its function of directing its will to its proper end of being united to its Creator: nourish it with all the possible ways at man’s disposal; let it grow to the height it is meant for by its Creator. The union of body and soul implies their interacting together in a symbiotic way.
It is not within the realm of this paper to elaborate on those possible ways the Creator gave for man to use, but suffice it to say that He gave man a very potent tool he can use in directing his way to the right route towards his end. That tool is free will, the power to choose whether to harness or squander all the Creator’s gifts to mankind. Man has the power to choose whether to rise to the sublime and above the level of the brute, above the appetitive and sentient level of life or to go down and crawl like the serpent in the Garden of Eden.
The power to reason, a principle of activity basic to man’s nature, is a dynamic term connoting certain laws of nature which are within his reasonable intellect to observe, apprehend, analyze and act upon accordingly. Fully developed, this power urges him to seek truth and justice and pushes him to realms of grandeur and beauty. An impairment of this rationality, of course, or a refusal to exercise it in the accomplishment of a life harmonious to both his bodily and spiritual nature is an imperfection that may be traced to some physical defects (brain damage, for instance), cognitive flaws or societal ills, topics not within the realm of this discussion. Rationality, in the final analysis, is man’s greatest asset, his redeeming instrument in what is, more often than not, a tumultuous life journey.
- alma viajero
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