What Are Humans?

"What is man, that thou art mindful of him?" (Psalm 8 KJV)

Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, our behavior, culture, technology, linguistics, and society. Anthropologists examine evidence: the material leftovers of our lives, and the effects we have had on our environment. They use that evidence to devise a model for what humans are like. Sometimes there are surprises. In a Smithsonian article about discoveries in anthropology in 2023, there is the surprising (to me) news that neanderthals had big, social crab roasts by the sea. The same article reports that some Homo erectus may have butchered each other. What kind of model do we have for these proto-humans based on these discoveries? We both like to eat together as a community, and sometimes we like to eat each other?

Theological anthropology does similar things. Theological anthropology thinks about humans from a theological perspective and tries to devise a model for what humans are like. One thing you'll have heard a lot of in Presbyterian circles is that we believe that humans are fallen. We think theologically about what humans are like and we find out that we're prone to sin. Instead of bones and archeological evidence, we look at evidence from our lived experience and from scripture. Paul talks about his lived experience when he says in Romans, "I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do." We do not understand, but scripture gives us an explanation in the story of temptation in Genesis and the expulsion of Adam from the Garden of Eden. We don't understand our behavior, really, but we look to that story and conclude that we're fallen.

What else do we say about ourselves? I was reviewing some basic theological anthropology in the confirmation class. We talked about some other stories from Genesis. God scooped up some dirt and formed a man and breathed God's Spirit into it and it became alive. Humans are made up of elements like carbon and oxygen and hydrogen, but there's some other spark that makes us not just chemical compounds. We have consciousness and personality, intellect and emotions. In confirmation class we said dirt plus spirit equals human.

In the other story of creation in Genesis, it says humans were made in God's image. That's a profound statement of theological anthropology: we bear the image of God. When we look at each other, we see people who look like God. This means that humans deserve a certain amount of dignity. This is in contrast to the view that we're all fallen. As fallen creatures, we are imperfect and deserve a certain amount of pity, distrust, and even disdain. But as bearers of the image of God, we deserve compassion, respect, and even reverence.

I have a Siddur, a Hebrew prayer book. This is a book of prayer for the Jewish community to use at weekly Sabbath services, on Holy Festival days, and even at home in daily prayer. It's the kind of beautifully bound and printed book that might be given to a child at her bat mitvah or his bar mitvah. Rabbi Nosson Scherman wrote a beautiful introduction, and in part of it, he is basically talking about how prayer relates to theological anthropology. He says:

The Mishna lists four primary types of destructive forces, such as animals and open pits in public places. One of these causes of damage is called maveh, an unfamiliar word found in no other context. "What is maveh?" the Talmud inquires. According to Rav, mav'eh means man, and the name maveh is derived from the root beh, to pray. In other words, the Mishnah defines man as "the creature that prays," as if to say that man's capacity to pray is integral to his very identity as a human being.

Rabbi Scherman also points out that in 1 Samuel, Hannah uses the phrase "pouring out her soul to the Lord" to mean that she was praying. Her soul IS prayer. "Dirt plus spirit equals human" now can be said "dirt plus prayer equals human."

In another place, Rabbi Scherman says that prayer

. . . is also a service of the mind, because the Hebrew word for prayer, tefillah, is derived from the root filal, to judge, to differentiate, to clarify, to decide. In life, we always sort out evidence from rumor, valid options from wild speculation, fact from fancy. Thus, prayer is the soul's yearning to define what truly matters and to discard the trivialities that often masquerade as essential. Prayer is a process of self-evaluation, self-judgement; it is the process of removing oneself from the tumult of life to a little corner of truth, and refastening the bonds that tie one to the purpose of life.

We are familiar with self-evaluation and self-judgement. That's a big part of what the season of Lent is for us. Solemn introspection and repentance. During Lent we look at ourselves to see in what ways we are fallen, and we try to distinguish in what ways we can think better, do better, be better, to lead a more righteous life. I like Rabbi Scherman's take on it, though. He is talking about discerning truth about ourselves and our circumstances without a particular bias to our fallenness. That means during Lent, we pray, and praying we see BOTH our fallenness AND the image of God we bear, BOTH our depravity AND our dignity.

If anthropology asks academically, "What is man?" then theological anthropology asks of God, "What is man, that thou art mindful of him?" We have said that humans are dirt plus Spirit, or dirt plus prayer; humans are the creatures that pray; humans are fallen; humans are God's image bearers. All of these are true.

The verse from Psalm 8, though, literally adds another perspective on humans: humans are creatures that God is mindful of. God is mindful of us, and that is an essential component of our model of what humans are like. This gets at another Reformed idea of theological anthropology. Humans can't do it on their own. Humans can do nothing to make God mindful of them. God does that. God, and God's self-revelation to us, and God's relationship with us, and God's being mindful of us, and God's love for us--all that is what makes us human, and none of that is in our control. We can only trust God and receive all these blessings from God as God makes us what we are.

Thanks be to God.

--Chas