Asked how Christian self control differs from stoicism – the dour “grin and bear it” philosophy – David Höhne the Academic Dean at Moore College gave a great answer: “There are nine fruits of the spirit, and self-control is the last one,” Höhne said. “What are the others? Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness and self-control. Okay, how should we be self controlled? Well, lovingly, joyfully, patiently, kindly goodly and so on and so on. The other virtues that Paul mentions in terms of the fruit of the spirit are what makes our self-control Christ-like.”
This quote comes from the Q and A session at the end of a public talk by Höhne for Moore’s Centre for Christian Living, that was titled Self Control in an Era of Self Actualisation.
Höhne was appreciative of the work of philosophers and theoreticians outside Christianity, to an extent that some readers might have not expected of a senior Moore College lecturer. His analysis led him to be to be critical of two forces that have shaped our current world: romanticism and modern western capitalism. He began by using the lens of a feminist philosopher Kathleen Wallace to define the self. “Communitarian philosophers like her want us to keep in mind that the self is actually a network of interactions and relationships.”
And he went on to use a Wallace example: “Consider Lindsay, she’s a spouse, mother novelist, English speaker, Irish Catholic feminist professor of philosophy, automobile driver, psychological organism, introverted, fearful of heights, left-handed carrier of hunting’s disease, resonant of New York. Now this is not an exhaustive set, but just a selection of the traits or identities that make up her network. Self traits are related to one another to form a network, Lindsay is an inclusive network, a plurality of traits related to one another.”..” Self control, Höhne suggested consisted of keeping the network together.
“Lindsay will always be a daughter and potentially always a mother, but not always an automobile driver, not always a professor of philosophy,” Höhne said. “And so she sees herself as changing as a consequence over time. Now in our western culture, there have been significant social and cultural pressures on the network self and we are going to consider two of these romanticism and free market capitalism as being the main social drivers that push this network towards self-actualization in the midst of its attempts to control itself.”
Höhne first dealt with the romantic urge to seek “Bildung:” For the more secular romantics, though an individual’s Bildung was the harmonization of her mind, heart, selfhood and identity through personal transformation using exacting standards of education across a wide range of sciences and arts. Bildung was far more than the three Rs. The cultivated man or woman developed their bildung as a process of self-determination in harmony with the living force of things. That is when I feel that I am in my most best state of having achieved my bildung. The whole universe is there to applaud me.”
In an “ouch” moment Höhne pointed out that Bildung is not far from many Christians. “Now you can find the contemporary version of die bildung in the perspective of any independent church private school. My teaching friends tell me that every middle class family has a gifted and talented child and they’re all working on their bildung at school even as we speak.”
Bildung is a non Christian route to sanctification, to align oneself to the universe with Höhne describing the romantics as wanting to restore the primacy of love which had been crushed by rationalism.
But romanticism’s seeking of authentic life has been amplified by a new ally. “According to the Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor, the western Anglo-European culture entered an age of authenticity in the mid 20th century. The affluence provided by post-World-War-II economic recovery in the west, played a significant role of evolving 19th century romanticism into the age of expressive individualism – as Carl Truman has called it in his book, The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self. Now, what emerged in this point in western culture was a marriage between the romantic ideals and the concept of freedom inherent in free market capitalism. That is, freedom from the constraints of others, freedom to pursue self-interest.”
Advertising pioneer Edward Bernays emerged as a villain in Höhne’s account, harnessing the power of psychological research to creating desire through advertising – and Höhne reminded this listener that Bernays’ uncle was Sigmund Freud. Clive Hamilton from the Australia Institute’s critique of “Affluenza” forms part of Höhne’s critique: “We’ve already mentioned that in terms of romantic thought, that is the gap between who I am and who I would like to be and one of the key aspects of Affluenza is this desire to bridge that gap through consumption. Affluenza is the force of achieving authenticity through associating brands with my sense of self as one CEO of Gucci said, ‘luxury brands are more than goods.’ Their goods are secondary because first of all, you buy into a brand, then you buy the products.”
One of the architects of Critical theory, Theodore Adorno gets praise, too. “In the early 20th century, philosophers like Theodore Adorno and others who made up the Frankfurt school criticized the western culture of self-actualization. Adorno complained of a fetishization and atomization of the self that could drive consumer culture on the one hand and provide the perfect subjects for irrational mass movements such as fascism on the other. That is if the whole world is a battle of wills, then the winner is the will that exercises will over all others.” But Adorno was too quick to blame Christians Augustine and Luther for the West spending to m much time looking inward.
Höhne counters with “It was the Lord Jesus who pointed out that it’s what comes out of a person, out of a heart, out of the heart that reveals what is true about them. That truth is an envious inward retreat from God’s sovereignty expressed in his promises concerning his chosen king.”
Referring back to the Kathleen Wallace definition of the network self he adds: “It’s the reason why Wallace’s picture of the network self has no reference to God. Did you notice that the network self is missing the fundamental person, isn’t it? Its connection to God. Now, Augustine and Luther after him, were simply reflecting on the curse of this inward turn. That is our attempt at self-control. That is the turn away from God and towards ourselves. We are slaves to sin as Paul wrote, and that sin is the desire to separate ourselves from God and from others and we call that control.”
Höhne has unpacked the Bible’s call for self control in a useful way by highlighting the contrast with how our world makes sense of the struggle. The forces in our society, both expressive individualism and fetishied desire born of capitalism are powerful distorters of our live experiences. We are in desperate need of self control, so that we can be people in solidarity with each other, not performing to our fantasies and our selfish agendas. But who can help us?
Christ, as Bonhoeffer and Höhne point out, is my “recovered centre.” Christ gave his self for us, so that we can have a new life before God.
We don’t get to choose the world we live in, a world which offers self actualisation as the remedy for the desires the system foists upon us. But in Christ we have a way to live, and the ability to reach truth despite the distortions that surround us.
The video of David Höhne’s talk will be made available for free on the Centre for Christian Living’s website where there is a growing library of free resources.
Image Credit: Moses Namking/Flickr