SWBAT: Students will be able to identify three historical versions of dualism and assess how dualism has developed the prevailing sacred-secular divide.
Students will be able to recognize the temptation and destruction that comes from radical autonomy.
Hook: Read Bill Nye’s view of humanity, a view he shared when being honored as the 2010 Humanist of the Year.
I am insignificant… I’m just another speck of sand. And Earth, really, in the cosmic scheme of things, is another speck, and our sun—an unremarkable star, nothing special—is another speck. And the galaxy is a speck. I’m a speck on a speck orbiting a speck among other specks amongst still other specks in the middle of specklessness! I am insignificant! I suck!3
This view represents materialism, the view that all of reality in physical and that there is no immaterial reality.
Question #1: Who do you think is the earliest materialist(s)?
Question #2: Who was an early opponent to the earliest materialists?
Book: Materialism is as old as Western Philosophy. Today we will investigate early views of humanity that shape the thinking of our modern day.
I. Dualism
a. Aristotelian Dualism
i. Aristotle taught that humans are both material and immaterial4 TN: It is important to note that much of Plato and Aristotle wrote was in response to the atheistic, materialists of their day.
ii. He described a Unity of Self. It states that the physical aspect of a person is constantly changing but a person’s identity does not change; therefore, identity cannot be rooted in the material self but the immaterial self.5
TN: Aristotle’s teachings show the wisdom that can come from natural revelation.
Unfortunately, his philosophy lacked any connection to special revelation.
3 Bill Nye, “The Best Idea We’ve Had So Far,” TheHumanist.com, December 10, 2010, https://thehumanist.com/magazine/november-december-2010/features/best- idea-weve-far.
4 Ronald H. Nash, Life’s Ultimate Questions (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1999), 100.
5 R. Scott Smith, In Search of Moral Knowledge (Downers Grove, IL:
iii. He had no understanding of a sin nature and ideas of moral law were ambiguous.
iv. He denied any personal interaction between God and man.6 b. Cartesian Dualism
i. Rene Descartes was a Catholic that denied naturalism but sought a way to prove his own existence without a divine authority.7
ii. He realized that his thinking, specifically his doubt, proved his existence, thus coining the famous line, “I think, therefore, I am.”
TN: Descartes did not seek to undermine godly thinking with his philosophy. He even felt that he had created another proof for God’s existence. In a sense he did demonstrate that humans are both material and immaterial. However, he rejected St. Augustine’s view of rationalism that says that human reason finds its source in divine illumination.8
iii. He proposed that personhood and identity are found in the mind.
c. Kantian Dualism
i. Kant moved beyond the concept of self-sufficiency and taught the concept of complete autonomy.9
TN: Immanuel Kant was bothered by the skepticism that doubted or denied immaterial reality. This led him to a rejection of older forms of rationalism of Augustine and Descartes. Instead he thought truth came from the mind.10
ii. Kant believed that the rational mind took the raw data from nature and created a personal truth; thus, truth was something created not discovered.11
6 John Frame, Cornelius Van Til: An Analysis of His Thought (Phillipsburg, NJ: P & R, 1995), 259.
7 Hoffecker, “Enlightenments and Awakenings,” 253-54.
8 Richard C. Gamble, “Christianity from the Early Church Fathers to
Charlemagne,” in Revolutions in Worldview, ed. W. Andrew Hoffecker (Phillipsburg, NJ:
P & R, 2007), 121.
9 Stanley J. Grenz, The Social God and the Relational Self (London:
Westminster John Knox, 2001), 76.
10 Nash, Life’s Ultimate Questions, 266-67.
11 Nash, Life’s Ultimate Questions, 264.
The Dualism and the Trending View of Personhood (Lesson 3) II. The Sacred/Secular Divide
i. Many in modern culture divide truth between observable facts and subjective personal truths.12
ii. This leads to a radical autonomy where the individual determines reality for themselves with self-fulfillment is the ultimate good.13 TN: A common argument from the sacred/secular divide comes up with the discussion of abortion. There are those who find the practice terrible and would never have one
themselves, yet they would not deny someone else the right to have one if they so desire.
In other words, each person creates their own truth when it comes to the practice of abortion.
iii. Radical autonomy is incompatible with any worldview that hold to a transcendent source of truth.
III. The Truth Behind Radical Autonomy (a study of James 1:14-16) a. Everyone is tempted by their own desires (1:14).
TN: Everyone has certain proclivities towards certain sins. We are not all tempted in the same way. Allow that fact to develop a level of compassion for someone who struggles with a sin that does not seem to tempt you.
b. Sin begins in the desires of the heart (1:15a).
c. Sin always leads to death (1:15b).
d. Sin always presents itself as something it is not in order to deceive (1:16).
Look: Reflect on the way you described yourself at the beginning of class. What descriptors are based on transcendent truths and what descriptors are based on your personal preferences?
Took: This evening set aside 10 minutes with God to ask one simple questions, “Is there some sin in my life that I do not see because I am being deceived?” For ten minutes quietly meditate on that question and ask the Holy Spirit to evaluate your heart and mind.
Then confess any sin that the Holy Spirit reveals and make a plan to overcome that sin.
12 Nancy R. Pearcey, Total Truth (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2004), 104.
13 Nancy Pearcey, Love Thy Body: Answering Hard Questions about Life and Sexuality (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2018), 164.