Written by Carl R. Trueman |
Monday, January 10, 2022
Thus, here I want to note the thought of three men who, while very different thinkers, helped shape the way we imagine human nature today: Friedrich Nietzsche, Karl Marx, and Charles Darwin. All three in their different ways provided conceptual justification for rejecting the notion of human nature and thus paved the way for the plausibility of the idea that human beings are plastic creatures with no fixed identity founded on an intrinsic and ineradicable essence. While there are others whose thinking also played a role in this shift, these three are arguably the most influential as fountainheads for later developments up to the present day.

The Plausibility of Self-Creation
The idea that we can be who or whatever we want to be is commonplace today. Consumerism, or late capitalism, fuels this notion with its message of the customer as king and of the goods we consume as being basic to who we are. Commercials communicate this message in the way they present particular products as the key to happiness or life improvement. You have the power to transform yourself by the mere swipe of a credit card. The possession of this thing—that car, that kitchen, that item of clothing—will make you a different, a better, a more fulfilled person. Underwritten by easy credit, consumerist self-creation is the order of the day.
Such self-creation is perhaps more of a myth, or what Freud would have called an illusion, an act of wishful thinking, than a practical reality. Indeed, the underlying dynamic of the consumer marketplace is that desires can never be fully satisfied, at least not in any long-term manner. The consumer may not simply be a hapless dupe of the ruthless capitalist reinventing the market to maintain income streams, as some on the Left would argue, but the negotiation between producer and consumer is ultimately predicated on the fact that the desire for consumption never seems to be met by the act of possession. If the producer creates desires in order to fulfill them, then the consumer seems a willing-enough party in the process. To use Hegelian jargon, the consumer society really does present persons whose being is in their becoming, constantly looking to the next purchase that will bring about that elusive personal wholeness.
This illusion of sovereign self-creation through consumption still has its limitations. All of us are ultimately limited by a variety of factors that are not always susceptible to transubstantiation by credit card. First, there is the range of goods or lifestyles on offer. The marketplace does not have an infinite number of products for sale. The consumer is not an absolute monarch; as noted above, the marketplace involves a negotiation between supplier and consumer.
Second, society is constantly changing its mind about what is and is not fashionable, what is and is not cool, and what is and is not acceptable. We might think that we have the power to create ourselves and our own identities, but we are typically subject to the range of options and the value schemes that society itself sets and over which most individuals, considered as individuals, have very limited power. Consumerism makes us believe we can be whoever we want to be, but the market always places limits on that in reality.
Third, there are always specific individual limitations to our ability to invent ourselves. Physiology, intellectual capacity, income, location in time, and geographical location all play their role. I might truly desire to be Marie Antoinette, queen of France—indeed, I might happily decide to self-identify as such—but my body is male, has a genetic code provided by my English parents, is physically located in Pennsylvania, and exists chronologically in the twenty-first century. Being Marie Antoinette is therefore not a viable option for me. My body, not my psychology, has the last word on whether I am the last queen of France in the eighteenth century.
Nevertheless, the idea of self-creation, that we can shape our essences by acts of will, is deeply embedded in the way we now think, to the point that, while I may not be able to overcome the genetic and chronological issues that prevent me from being an eighteenth-century Austrian-born queen of France, I can at least deny the decisive say that my chromosomes might wish to have over my maleness. As Bruce became Caitlyn and was recognized as such by society, so Carl might now become Caroline, if I so wished.
The world in which this way of thinking has become plausible has both intellectual and material roots. Streams of philosophical thought from the nineteenth century have exerted a powerful effect in weakening and even abolishing the idea that human nature is a given, something that has an intrinsic, nonnegotiable authority over who we are. And changes in our material circumstances have enabled the underlying, antiessentialist principles of these philosophies to become plausible and, indeed, perhaps even the default of the way we think about selfhood today; however, I cannot address these material factors but will focus rather on intellectual developments.
Thus, here I want to note the thought of three men who, while very different thinkers, helped shape the way we imagine human nature today: Friedrich Nietzsche, Karl Marx, and Charles Darwin. All three in their different ways provided conceptual justification for rejecting the notion of human nature and thus paved the way for the plausibility of the idea that human beings are plastic creatures with no fixed identity founded on an intrinsic and ineradicable essence. While there are others whose thinking also played a role in this shift, these three are arguably the most influential as fountainheads for later developments up to the present day.
Charles Darwin
Darwin is likely the most influential. Setting aside the question whether evolution—or, to be more precise, one of the numerous forms of evolutionary theory that looks back to Darwin’s work as an initial inspiration—is true, there is no doubt that vast numbers of people in the West simply assume that it is so.
Whether evolution can be argued from the evidence is actually irrelevant to the reason most people believe it. Few of us are qualified to opine on the science. But evolution draws on the authority that science possesses in modern society. Like priests of old who were trusted by the community at large and therefore had significant social authority, so scientists today often carry similar weight. And when the idea being taught has an intuitive plausibility, it is persuasive.
The obvious implications of this situation are, first, that the sacred account of human origins given in Genesis is undermined and, second, that human beings are therefore relativized in relation to other creatures. Descent from a prior species excludes special creation of man and woman, and natural selection renders teleology unnecessary as a hypothesis. In short, human nature as a significant foundational category for understanding human purpose is annihilated. And in a world in which belief in evolution is the default position, the implications for how people imagine that world, and their place within it, are dramatic.
Friedrich Nietzshe
The influence of Nietzsche is perhaps less obvious in terms of it being a source—I suspect many more have heard of Darwin—but no less pervasive. As we noted, he, too, attacks the idea of human nature, though from the perspective of his assault on metaphysics. Nevertheless, the result is much the same: neither human nature nor human destiny any longer have any transcendent or objective foundation; in fact, they were never anything more than manipulative concepts developed by one group, most notoriously the Christian church, to subjugate another.
This points to two further pathologies of this present age that can be seen as finding some inspiration in the work of Nietzsche. First, his genealogical approach to morals carries with it a basic historicist relativism and a deep suspicion of any claims to traditional authority. Both of these are now basic to our contemporary world. From the casual iconoclasm of pop culture to the dethroning of traditional historical narratives, from the distrust of traditional institutions such as the church to iconoclastic attitudes to sex and gender, we can see the anarchic outworking of the challenge posed by Nietzsche’s madman and the ruthless critical spirit of On the Genealogy of Morals. The average twelve-year-old girl attending an Ariana Grande concert may never even have heard of Nietzsche, but the amoral sexuality of the lyrics she hears preach a form of (albeit unwitting) Nietzscheanism.
And that leads to the second area where Nietzsche’s thinking is reflected in current social attitudes: living for the present. When teleology is dead and self-creation is the name of the game, then the present moment and the pleasure it can contain become the keys to eternal life. While Nietzsche himself may have had a view of hedonism that was different from that which grips the popular imagination today (he understood the pleasure to be gained from struggle and from triumphing over adversity), the idea that personal satisfaction is to be the hallmark of the life—or perhaps better, moment—well lived is basic to our present age. Again, Nietzsche’s books may not be widely read, but his central priorities have become common currency.
Karl Marx
That brings us to Marx. As with Darwin and Nietzsche, he assaults the metaphysics on which traditional religions and philosophies have built their views of the moral universe. Again, as with Nietzsche, he not only relativizes ethics via a form of historicism, he also presents moral codes as manipulative, as reflecting the economic and political status quo and therefore designed to justify and maintain the same. Modern suspicion of traditional authority owes a debt to Marx, as to Nietzsche, for its theoretical foundations.
Marx also makes another major contribution that is now basic to how we think about society: he abolishes the prepolitical, that notion that there can be forms of social organization that stand apart from, and prior to, the political nature of society. For Marx—and even more for later Marxists—all forms of social organization are political because all of them connect to the economic structure of society. By Marx’s account, the family and the church exist to cultivate, reinforce, and perpetuate bourgeois values. In today’s world, this thinking helps explain why everything—from the Boy Scouts to Hollywood movies to cake baking—has become politicized. And one does not need to be an ideological Marxist to be pulled into this tussle, for once one side gives a particular issue or organization political significance, then all sides, left, right, and center, have to do the same.
Iconoclastic Influence
Finally, the cultural iconoclasm of all three thinkers is notable. Darwin is perhaps the least culpable in this regard: his thought relativizes culture but is not directly iconoclastic. For Nietzsche and for Marx, however, history and culture are tales of oppression that need to be overthrown and overcome. If ever the Rieffian deathworker of today needed a philosophical rationale, then the thought of Marx and Nietzsche and the traditions of cultural and political reflection they helped birth certainly provide it. These men shattered the metaphysics for the sacred order that underlay the Rieffian second world of nineteenth-century Europe and thus challenged the culture to maintain itself purely on the basis of an immanent frame of reference—something that Rieff declares to be impossible. In light of this, the words that Nietzsche applied to himself in his autobiography, Ecce Homo, might easily be applied to all three:
I know my fate. One day my name will be associated with the memory of something tremendous—a crisis without equal on earth, the most profound collision of conscience, a decision that was conjured up against everything that had been believed, demanded, hallowed so far. I am no man, I am dynamite.1
Notes:

Nietzsche, Ecce Homo, 326.

This article is adapted from The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self: Cultural Amnesia, Expressive Individualism, and the Road to Sexual Revolution by Carl R. Trueman. This article is used with permission.

Gerry Bowler observed in his book Christmas in the Crosshairs, that while the birth of Jesus has always been important to the gospel, the first generations of Christians “lived in profound expectation of [Jesus’] imminent return.” He suggested that, among other things, when those eschatological hopes weren’t immediately fulfilled, the birth of Jesus began to get more attention. When Constantine issued the Edict of Milan making Christianity a legal religion, the annual celebration of festivals and holy days soon followed.

The history surrounding Christmas has been anything but peace on earth and goodwill toward men. While contemporary religious and cultural traditions may evoke a certain nostalgia for its celebration, its history is actually a mess! One big mess—with feverish disagreements, hostility, and even rioting. In Christmas in America, Penne Restad wrote: “Christians [have] wrestled for centuries with questions of if, when, and how to celebrate Jesus’ birth.”
Stop the sleigh! Christians have wrestled with if Christmas should be celebrated? To some that might be a bigger surprise than the presents under the tree. After all, according to Gallup polling, ninety-three percent of people across all demographics celebrate Christmas in the United States, and of those who are fairly religious that number rises to ninety-six percent. In a society that’s deeply divided on any and every issue, Christmas is a near-universal observance. But it wasn’t always so. Paul VM Flesher said: “The notion that Christians of any stripe should not want to celebrate Christmas is so foreign to our present concept of the holiday that we need to review some history to understand it.”
The incarnation—the act of the eternal and only begotten Son becoming man—is foundational to the Christian faith. As John Chyrsostom preached: “Truly wondrous is the whole chronicle of the Nativity.” For some, the yearly commemoration of that event is one of the most important days of the year. Yet Jesus never indicated that this redemptive act was to be annually celebrated, and its yearly observance didn’t enter into the way the Apostles ordered the worship and life of the church. Early Christian scholar Origen (d. 253) asserted that celebrating birthdays was foreign to Christianity, saying: “It has not come from the thought of any of the saints; not one from all the saints is found to have celebrated a festive day or a great feast on the day of his birth” (Homilies on Leviticus 8).
Gerry Bowler observed in his book Christmas in the Crosshairs, that while the birth of Jesus has always been important to the gospel, the first generations of Christians “lived in profound expectation of [Jesus’] imminent return.” He suggested that, among other things, when those eschatological hopes weren’t immediately fulfilled, the birth of Jesus began to get more attention. When Constantine issued the Edict of Milan making Christianity a legal religion, the annual celebration of festivals and holy days soon followed.
Emperor Constantine commissioned that the Church of the Nativity be built in Bethlehem over the cave where it was believed Mary had given birth to Jesus. Historians debate the role of Constantine in the precise development of Christmas, but it has been suggested that he had a personal interest in the festival of the nativity. Nevertheless, it was in the 4th-century when the Roman Church began celebrating December 25th as the birthdate of Jesus. In the spirit of celebration Maximus of Turin (d. 465) said: “Brothers and sisters, our hearts still echo with the joy of the Lord’s birth, and our continuing gladness creates in us a sense of heavenly festivity. For, though the joyous day itself has passed, the sanctification that joy brought is still with us” (Sermo 6).
As that spirit grew around this man-created holy day, so too did traditions, superstitions, and syncretism. Leading to centuries of trouble was the struggle to keep the celebration set apart from worldly activities. For example, warning of the dangers of celebrating the feast in a worldly way, Augustine (d. 430) preached: “For our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who became Man for our sake, paid a price for us. He gave Himself as a price and He did so for the purpose, namely, to redeem and separate you from the pagans. But if you wish to intermingle with the pagans, you do not wish to follow Him who redeemed you” (Sermon 198 on New Years Day). He went on to say: “Therefore, in order to follow your Redeemer, who bought you back with His own blood, do not mix with the pagans by aping their customs and deeds.”
Again, Bowler wrote: “Time after time, century after century, clergy would warn against unseemly folk rituals being practiced by Catholic believers; Christmastide was not the only battlefield but was a particularly contested one.” It seems, however, it was a losing battle. At first, Christians and the church adopted rituals they deemed harmless, but soon even practices once condemned (like gift giving and feasting) became high points of celebration. By the sixteenth century Christmas celebration was well established.
Then the Reformation happened. Often, when we think of the Reformation we think of reclaiming the biblical gospel especially as its related to the doctrine of justification by faith alone. But the Protestant Reformation was also about worship. In his The Necessity of Reforming the Church, John Calvin wrote: “The whole substance of Christianity [is] a knowledge, first, of the mode in which God is duly worshipped; and, secondly of the source from which salvation is to be obtained.” As Sinclair Ferguson concluded: “[The Reformers] well understood that the rediscovery of the gospel and the reformation of worship were two sides of the same coin.”
Following the Protestant Reformation certain branches within Protestantism retained the celebration of Christmas. For example, the Augsburg Confession of the Lutheran churches states: “Of Usages in the Church they teach that those ought to be observed which may be observed without sin, and which are profitable unto tranquility and good order in the Church, as particular holy days, festivals, and the like” (Article 15.1).
Even some of those Protestants who followed a Reformed doctrine of worship gave place to its observance as helpful to piety although not given by God. The Church Order of Dort (1619) prescribed: “The congregations shall observe, in addition to Sunday, also Christmas, Easter and Pentecost”—and they threw in the circumcision of Jesus for good measure (Article 67). Francis Turretin (d. 1687), a Reformed scholastic, said “anniversary days” for the nativity, passion, or ascension should, according to the orthodox, “be left to the liberty of the church.” He argued this even while recognizing the festivals “were kept neither from the institution of Christ nor of the apostles.”
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David is not afraid though ten thousand should hem him in (Ps. 3:6) because the Lord sustains him. But let God even ever so little withdraw his support (Ps. 55), and fearfulness overtakes him and dread overwhelms him. It is clear that this man after God’s own heart has so little heart of his own when left to himself. God sometimes lets us fall so we can clearly see in whose strength we stand. He allows us to see the hand that holds us, to let us know that without him we are but men (Ps. 9:20). 

Behold, the hour cometh, yea, is now come, that ye shall be scattered, every man to his own, and shall leave me alone: and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with me, (John 16:32).
True friends multiply joy as well as lessen misery. Some of Christ’s truest friends on earth were his faithful apostles. But in his time of greatest need, the prophet Isaiah describes the Lord’s experience, “ I have trodden the winepress alone; and of the people there was none with me,” (Isa. 63:3). And in Psalm 69:21, “I looked for some to take pity, but there was none; and for comforters, but I found none.” In his time of extreme human need, Christ’s closest companions actually desert him rather than support him.
How truthfully he could say, “I came to my own, and my own would not receive me.” He came to the Jews, his chosen people, and they accused him of being a glutton, a winebibber, a blasphemer, and even Beelzebub himself (Matt. 11:19). In his own province in Galilee he is disregarded and disesteemed (Matt. 13:55; Mark 6:4). He comes to Jerusalem, whose inhabitants are enlightened by his sermons and amazed by his miracles, and still they break his heart. “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often would I have gathered you… but you would not,” (Matt. 23:37). And that’s not all, for when he is arrested, Jesus is accused of treason against Caesar, sedition against the Law, enmity against the temple, and blasphemy against God. But this is not all.
When you look more closely, you find that many of his own disciples (2 Tim. 4:10) return to the love of this present world. “Many,” the text says in John 6:66, “drew back and walked no more with him.” But will his closest friends leave him too? Before they have said, “Master, to whom should we go? You have the words of eternal life.” And yet, when the sun beats hottest on them, how soon are they all withered. One betrays him, another swears against him, but all forsake him.
What does it mean that his own apostles forsake him? Scripture asks that if the light itself becomes dark, how great is that darkness? If the salt of the world loses its saltiness, how can it be effective? (Matt. 5:13).
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