WHAT IS MAN?

"And the younger of them said to his Cither, Father, give me the portion of goods that falleth to me. And he divided unto them his living." — Luke xv. 12 (A.V.).

"And the younger of them said to his father, Father, give me the portion of thy (marg. Gr. the) substance that falleth to me. And he divided unto them his living."— (R.V.)

The custom that is in this verse alluded to is so foreign to our views about property that it is difficult for us to realise how a son could make such a request, or a father grant it; and yet Jesus would have blunted the edge of His comparison if He had introduced details into the story that would have challenged the contradiction of His hearers. But according to Eastern ideas, the father holds the family property in trust for his children, and he may divest himself of that property in their interest This case does offer us some suggestions regarding the nature of man additional to those already suggested by the discussion of the nature of God. We have already seen that as God is manlike, so man is godlike; there is a likeness of nature between God and man. We have also seen that God is Father as the will to save and bless mankind, and so man may become the child of God in accepting that salvation and blessedness. This verse suggests three thoughts that will bring out more clearly the relation of God and man, and man's need of the saving love of God. (1) Man is dependent on God: the son has no property of his own, but must ask that the father may give. (2) Man asserts himself even in relation to God: the son seeks to be independent by gaining control over his portion. (3) God assents to man's liberty: the father divided unto them his living. The analogy between God's relation to man and the relation of an earthly father to his son is close enough to preserve these suggestions from arbitrariness.

1. Man is Dependent on God.

(1) In all religion there is a sense of dependence on the divine; one of the world's best teachers, Schleiermacher, defined religion as the feeling of dependence. Man finds himself in a world the laws of which he does not fully know, and the forces of which he cannot fully control, and yet on that world he depends for food and clothing, shelter and safety, health and strength, and so weal or woe. He depends on powers above him and above the world to secure good, and to avert evil from him. Jesus in His teaching confirms this witness of pagan religion regarding man's dependence. He declares the impartial beneficence of God's universal providence, and requires of man freedom from anxiety through confidence in God (Matt. vi. 25-34).

(2) Man's dependence appears even in his distrust of and disobedience to God. The younger son must get his portion from his father before he can use it according to his own wishes. The mind that thinks falsehood, the heart that feels hate, the will that chooses wrong, the whole personality that is evil, owes all to God except its abuse of all His gifts. It is true that that dependence is often forgotten, and men act as if they were their own makers and so masters; but man's forgetfulness does not alter the fact that it is from God that the portion so abused comes to them.

2. Man Asserts Himself even in Relation to God.

(1) There is a tendency in man towards selfassertion; he has an individuality that he seeks to realise; the impulse to self-preservation, self-protection, self-advancement, and selfsatisfaction is natural and necessary to man; he feels himself to be an end in himself, and he uses the world and his fellow-men as means towards that end. Within its proper limits this movement in man towards individual independence is salutary. Self-development is a necessary characteristic of personality; man makes himself and is not merely made. Foolish parents sometimes speak about breaking the will of their children, and, if they should succeed in so doing, it would be the worst injury they could inflict upon them. Self-will is an evil; but self-control is good; the one is the abuse, the other the condition of human individuality. It is not at all desirable that any man should lose his sense of individuality, and should, chameleon-like, become simply the reflection of his environment. What gives interest to life is the variety of experience and character; what makes men and women mutually helpful is that they are severally different. As has been said, it takes all sorts of men to make a world. It is right that every man should seek to be himself, to develop his own individuality, instead of being a mere copy of his parents, teachers, or companions. That man should seek control over his own portion of goods is both natural and necessary.

(2) In his self-development there is an alternative before him; he is midway between the beast and the angel; the animal appetites on the one hand clamour, the spiritual ideals on the other hand call. As he yields to the one or the other is his realisation of himself for evil or for good; he sinks to the beast, or soars to the angel; and the possibility of the angel in him refused makes the reality of the beast the more beastly. The beast's appetites are limited by instinct; the man's appetites are increased by the promise and potency of being more than the beast. There is one effect of this choice that must here be especially emphasised. As a man yields to appetite, his self isolates itself from and opposes itself to other selves; his self-development is more and more characterised by self-will, regardless of and antagonistic to other wills. But if on the contrary he surrenders himself to his ideals, the self enters into ever wider relations with other selves; his self-control is a co-operation with other wills for common ends. Whether then man's will to be himself, which is both natural and necessary, shall be self-will isolating from others, or self-control, relating to others, depends on his choice of the appetites or the ideals as the ends of his self-realisation. It is in the will to be himself, and the possibility of the choice of appetite, and the assertion of self-will that the source in man of sin must be recognised.

(3) This self-assertion is not limited to man's social relations, his intercourse with his fellow-man; he has the religious relation to God; even in the lowest stages of human development there is some consciousness of the divine, and of dependence on and obligation to the divine. Man's self-will, therefore, isolates him from and opposes him to God as well as man. Absolutely dependent on God, and unable to divest himself entirely of his sense of dependence, he may yet assert his self-will even against the will of God. He may distrust and disobey what he acknowledges to be his God. While in practice the fool says in his heart, There is no God, for he acts as though God's moral authority were nonexistent for him, it is but seldom that in theory he goes on to deny the divine existence. Practical atheism is much more common than theoretical; and many a man who is clearly guilty of the former would be filled with indignation if he were charged with the latter; but it is important that this consideration should be pressed, that self-will is practical atheism. God calls in the ideals, and to realise the ideals is to maintain our dependence on Him; whereas to yield to our appetites is to distrust and disobey Him on whom we must depend in all things. There are some who making man altogether master of himself take the next step and deny that there is any God on whom he depends. So natural to man is the impulse to religion, the recognition of the divine, that it is not unjust to argue that the theoretical atheism results from the practical in the history of the race, although, of course, we must be on our guard in ascribing to any individual to-day intellectual difficulties about the existence of God to moral defiance of the authority of God. Yet much may be said in support of the contention that it is as men disobey God in their ways that they seek to forget God in their thoughts. In his career of vice the prodigal thought as little of his father as he could; it was only when he came to himself that he bethought him of his father's house. Man, though dependent on God, has the power to assert himself in the gratification of his appetites, not only against his fellow-men, but even against God Himself; and as he so asserts himself his consciousness of God grows less distinct, and so the restraints which that consciousness imposes become less potent; and it becomes possible for the creature to distrust and disobey, and at last to ignore and deny the Creator. But it may well be asked, How does God permit such a development of his creature?

3. God Assents to Man's Liberty.

(1) The father in the parable complied with the younger son's request, though it would not be hidden from his insight what use the son wanted to make of his portion, or from his foresight what the issue of such an abuse of his inheritance would be. God has chosen to give man liberty, even although that liberty is abused in distrust of and disobedience to Himself. What is the reason? Firstly, men are not merely creatures of God to be controlled by His omnipotence; they are made in God's likeness and for God's fellowship as children; and so they must be controlled through their own voluntary obedience to God's moral authority. There can be the relation of creator and creature without freedom; but there cannot be the relation of father and child. Love cannot be forced; obedience cannot be compelled. God desiring to gather around Him a loving family endowed mankind with freedom. But freedom is not real where there is no choice; there must be possibility of evil as well as of good where there is liberty. The will that can obey must also be able to defy; the heart that can trust and love must also be capable of distrust and estrangement. Hence even divine omnipotence could not create a child of God who could not become a sinner against God.

(2) But if that is granted, the further objection may be urged. Did not God forsee what the abuse of human liberty would be; and should not the vision of all the evil to be have restrained the creative hand of God? In answer to this question two considerations may be offered. First of all, it is by no means so certain that God does foresee free action. Until the choice is made, two possibilities are open; and God does foresee the two possibilities. To affirm that He also foresees which of the two shall be chosen is surely to contradict the fact of the possibility of both. God's foreknowledge of the choice made would surely limit man's freedom in making. This line of thought is suggested not as a solution of the problem, but rather as an indication of the contradiction in which we must involve ourselves as soon as we go beyond the limits set to our intelligence, and begin making confident assertions as to what God does or does not foreknow.

Secondly, had God abstained from creating, evil would have defeated God before it ever came to actuality. But it may be urged, Whenever the evil choice was made, why did God not withdraw the abused gift? The answer is twofold. First, God's end of a loving family of God is so absolutely good that, as God willed it at any risk, He will pursue it at any cost. Better far a world redeemed from sin than no world at all. Secondly, God's continuance of the race in spite of its sin is surely the guarantee that His resources are such that He can overrule the sin of man for His glory, and can bring greater good out of all the evil of the world. Is there not even a hint in the parable itself that the son who left home for the far country was more completely recovered for the father's heart than the elder brother who remained at home? Sin is sin, and only evil; but, nevertheless, God can by His grace so conquer sin that the joy of the recovery of the lost is greater than it would have been had there been no loss and no recovery.