The Nature and Destiny of Man, Vol 2

by Reinhold Niebuhr

Arguably Niebuhl's most important work, this book offers a sustained articulation of his theological ethics and is considered a landmark in 20th-century thought. This book issues a challenge to Western civilization to understand its roots in the faith of the Bible. The growth, corruption and purification of the important Western emphases on individuality are chronicled here insightfully.

Genres: Theology, Philosophy, Religion, Nonfiction, History

328 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1964

About the author

U.S. theologian. The son of an evangelical minister, he studied at Eden Theological Seminary and Yale Divinity School. He was ordained in the Evangelical Synod of North America in 1915 and served as pastor of Bethel Evangelical Church in Detroit, Mich., until 1928. His years in that industrial city made him a critic of capitalism and an advocate of socialism. From 1928 to 1960 he taught at New York's Union Theological Seminary. His influential writings, which forcefully criticized liberal Protestant thought and emphasized the persistence of evil in human nature and social institutions, include Moral Man and Immoral Society (1932), The Nature and Destiny of Man, 2 vol. (1941 – 43), and The Self and the Dramas of History (1955).

from The Britannica Concise Encyclopedia

A 1958 interview with Reinhold Niebuhr: http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/multimedia/video/2008/wallace/niebuhr_reinhold.html

Reviews

[Steven H · Rating 5 out of 5]

Karl Paul Reinhold Niebuhr (1892-1971) was an American theologian and prominent ‘public intellectual’ during the early-to-mid-20th century. After serving as a parish minister in downtown Detroit (from which he derived his working class and labor class issues sensitivity), in 1928, Niebuhr left Detroit to become Professor of Practical Theology at Union Theological Seminary in New York, where he taught for more than 30 years---retiring in 1960. (He is also the older brother of another theologian, H. Richard Niebuhr.) [NOTE: page numbers below refer to the 328-page paperback edition.]

He begins the first chapter of this 1943 book with the statement, “Man is, and yet is not, involved in the flux of nature and time. He is a creature, subject to nature’s necessities and limitations; but he is also a free spirit who knows of the brevity of his years and by this knowledge transcends the temporal by some capacity within himself… But the sense of melancholy which the anticipation of death induces in the human spirit is not known in the animal world. To brood... upon the fact that man is as ‘the grass which flourisheth in the morning and in the evening is cut down and withereth’ is to reveal the whole dimension of existence which distinguishes men from the animal world.” (Pg. 1)

He states, “The significance of Christ is that he is a disclosure of the divine purpose, governing history within history. Wherever it is believed that man’s capacity to transcend self and history can be disassociated from his finiteness, the meaning of salvation is conceived as essentially redemption from history, obviating any necessity of, or desire for, the fulfillment of man in history, or for the disclosure of history’s ultimate meaning.” (Pg. 5)

He continues, “It is not possible to interpret cultures according to their expectation or want of expectations of ‘A’ Christ without drawing upon the faith that THE Christ has been revealed; for there can be no interpretation of the meaning of life and history without implicitly or explicitly drawing into the interpretation the faith which claims to have found the end of these expectations. This is to say, merely, that there can be no interpretation of history without specific presuppositions and that the interpretation which is being attempted in these pages is based upon Christian presuppositions.” (Pg. 6) Later, he adds, “The history of Christianity is the history of the truth of Christ contending constantly against the truth as men see it.” (Pg. 47)

He observes, “The self-disclosure of God in Christ is significantly regarded by Christian faith as the final ‘word’ which God has spoken to man. The revelation of the Atonement is precisely a ‘final’ word because it discloses a transcendent divine mercy which represents the ‘freedom’ of God in quintessential terms: namely God’s freedom over His own law. Yet this freedom is not capricious. It is paradoxically related to God’s law, to the structure of the world. This is the paradox of the Atonement, of the revelation of the mercy of God in its relation to the justice of God.” (Pg. 67)

He goes on, “The significance of the affirmation that God is revealed in Christ, and more particularly in his Cross, is that the love (agape) of God is conceived in terms which make the divine involvement in history a consequence of precisely the divine transcendence over the structures of history. The final majesty of God is contained not so much in His power within the structure as in the power of His freedom over the structures, that is, over the logos aspects of reality.” (Pg. 71)

He points out, “Yet whatever ‘newness of life’ flows from the experience of repentance and faith it, when governed by true Christian faith, conscious of a continued incompleteness and a certain persistence of the strategy of sin. For this reason the peace which follows conversion is never purely the contentment of achievement. It is always, in part, the peace which comes from the knowledge of forgiveness.” (Pg. 100)

He states, “the power which breaks the self-centered will must be perceived as power from beyond the self; and even when it has become incorporated into the new will, its source is recognized in the confession, ‘I, yet not I.’ Yet a difficult problem confronts us in this confession. If divine grace alone were the source of the new life Christian faith would be forced to accept a doctrine of divine determination which would seem to imperil every sense of human responsibility. This is exactly which Reformation theology, and more particularly Calvinist theology, runs in its doctrines of predestination…” (Pg. 115-116) He adds, “If it be true… that no sinful self-centeredness can ever destroy the structure of freedom and self-transcendence in man, it must follow that there is some inner testimony from the very character and structure of the human psyche against the strategy of sinful egotism.” (Pg. 117)

He argues, “the unity of human existence… is such that it cannot be ‘saved’ either by disavowing its freedom in order to return to nature, or by sloughing off its creaturely character so that it may rise to the ‘eternal.’ This is a final enigma of human existence for which there I no answer except by faith and hope; for all answers transcend the categories of human reason. Yet without these answers human life is threatened with skepticism and nihilism on the one hand; and with fanaticism and pride on the other. For either it is overwhelmed by the relativity and partiality of all human perspectives and comes to the conclusion that there is no truth, since no man can expound the truth without corrupting it; or it pretends to have absolute truth despite the finite nature of human perspectives.” (Pg. 149)

He suggests, “It is recognized that ‘grace’ always remains in partial contradiction to ‘nature,’ and is not merely its fulfillment. The very apprehension of this paradox is itself an expression of the twofold aspect of grace. It is a thought beyond all human thought and can affect thinking only indirectly… But ‘grace’ enters and purifies our thought and action fully only if the contradiction between it and ‘nature’ … is understood. Here lies the secret of forgiveness. Mercy to the foe is possible only to those who know themselves to be sinners.” (Pg. 217) He adds, “The history of Christianity proves that such grace as is manifested in Christian life does not lift men above the finiteness of the mind; nor yet save them from the sin of claiming to have transcended it.” (Pg. 219)

He asserts, “Pride may ascend the ladder which was meant for the descent of grace; but that is a peril which inheres in the whole human cultural enterprise. The secularists end by building ladders of their own; or they wallow in nihilistic culture which has no vantage point from which ‘my’ truth can be distinguished from ‘the’ truth.” (Pg. 231)

He says, “[Man’s] transcendence over history makes it impossible to complete his structure of meaning within the limits of history. He must ask how historical truth is related to ultimate, that is, ‘eternal’ truth. And is he knows that historical truth is nor merely imperfect but also corrupted truth, he faces a problem for which there is no answer but a divine mercy which purges the historical of its corruptions and completes its incompleteness.” (Pg. 240)

He acknowledges, “The Biblical symbols cannot be taken literally because it is not possible for finite minds to comprehend that which transcends and fulfills history. The finite mind can only use symbols and pointers of the character of the eternal. These pointers must be taken seriously nevertheless because they express the self-transcendent character of historical existence and point to its eternal ground.” (Pg. 289)

He concludes, “an adequate Christian philosophy of history requires better use of the symbol of the Antichrist than as a polemic weapon against contemporary foes or as the bearer of inadvertent insights, scattered among literalistic illusions… The Antichrist stands at the end of history to indicate that history cumulates, rather than solves, the essential problems of human existence… The Antichrist who appears at the end of history can be defeated only by the Christ who ends history.” (Pg. 318-319)

Theologians such as Niebuhr are often perceived as seriously “out of fashion” these days; but this book remains the best example of his mature thought, and is still well worth reading for a reflective person these days.

[Steve Greenleaf · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reinhold Niebuhr’s The Nature and Destiny of Man: Human Destiny (vol.2). Human destiny seems an almost absurdly immense topic, but Niebuhr brings formidable learning and perspective to his self-imposed task. When he wrote and delivered these Gifford Lectures in1939, the Second World War loomed on the horizon. Soon Nazi armies would run rampant through Europe. Hitler and Stalin had entered into a pact that allowed for the division of spoils in Eastern Europe. Western Civilization and the values that it had cultivated for centuries were under attack. In this half of the project, Niebuhr directs us to think profoundly about our heritage. Of course, thinking and lecturing don’t win wars, but stating and examining our ideas and ideals help us to understand and define ourselves and to discover what we value. This Niebuhr does magnificently.


Niebuhr began his career at a Lutheran parish in Detroit after completing divinity school at Yale. In Detroit, he experienced the injustices and problems of working people, and these experiences shaped his thoughts and attitudes about social justice and politics. He also mined the Western tradition of Christian and secular thought. This book (and its predecessor) reveal an impressive understanding of the Christian traditions. In this book, like all of his works, he deploys his knowledge of the Biblical tradition. But he also understands and explicates Catholic, Lutheran, Calvinist, sectarian, mystical, and (to a lesser extent) Orthodox positions on issues like sanctification, justification, grace, and so on. One may think that this sounds like a rather dry history of various Christian doctrines that most Christians, not to mention non-Christians, would find dull and irrelevant. To the contrary, Niebuhr brings these issues and their implications to life.


In all of Niebuhr’s writings, you find a persistent endeavor to recognize and grasp the implications arising from the paradoxes of human existence. Salvation by works or by faith? A transcendent or an immanent God? Pride or sensuality as the foundation of sin? Deference to government or defiance? For each set of issues, some of which have caused the greatest divisions—including torture and warfare—are carefully exposed, explicated, and critiqued. Niebuhr provides no easy answers; no “do this, do that” recipes. Instead, he provides insights into the human predicament.

Someone might ask why they should spend time reading a now long-dead (1971) 20th century American theologian, especially if one is not a Christian. The answer is that Niebuhr provides abiding perspectives on the human condition, into our attempts at political life, achieving justice, dealing with pride and sensuality, and understanding international relations—to list some of this most prominent themes. For each great challenge that he addresses, he provides his reader with observations that capture the paradoxes and folly of human action. In this time of growing uncertainty and fear, Niebuhr, along with Hannah Arendt and George Orwell, writers from my grandparents’ generation, provide wisdom so sorely needed now.

[Aaron Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

HUMAN DESTINY AND HISTORY

History reduced to mechanisms of nature.

History swallowed up in eternity.

Christian interpretation of history. Grace mitigates our pride without removing hope. Redemption is not in life and history.

“…a man who stands in an historical process is too limited in vision to discern the full meaning of that process, and too limited in power to fulfill the meaning, however much the freedom of his knowledge and his power is one element in the stuff of history.”

“Historical religions… look forward to a point in history and finally to an eschaton (end)… where the full meaning of life and history will be disclosed and fulfilled.”

“The real problem of history is the proud pretension of all human endeavors, which seeks to obscure their finite and partial character and thereby involves history in evil and sin.”

“When prophetic Messianism affirms that life and history are under the sovereignty of a hidden God it declares, not that life and history are meaningless, but that they can be understood only in terms of a dimension deeper and higher than the system of nature, that there are obscurities and contradictions in the ‘behaviour’ of history which can be clarified only if the unique purpose of God is more fully disclosed; and that human explanations of this behaviour must be corrected since they contain sinful elements.”

[TomHServo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Phenomenal book but incredibly DENSE! Honestly, you cannot read this book quickly. Niebuhr takes take to consume and consider. However, the gains are worth it. This is an amazing piece of challenging theology that will give pause to any reader regardless of faith.

[Grayson Minneman · Rating 4 out of 5]

This guy had me through so many highs and lows... I loved some of his points, hated his denial of a literal Fall and Resurrection. Really insightful read though. Glad it was one of my last for college.

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was an interesting book. It posits that the destiny of humankind lies in threading the needle between sin (which ultimately comes down to trying to rescue oneself from the limits of human finitude by one's own action and energy) and pride (being so sure that one has the "truth" that one's truth becomes the focus and center of religious activity and thought). These are, of course, greatly simplified definitions, and may appear relatively paltry when compared to what Niebuhr himself has written. Again, I'm not sure I understood the book in its entirety, but I surely got some of it. I think the final paragraph sums it up best:

"Thus wisdom about our destiny is dependent upon a humble recognition of the limits of our knowledge and our power. Our most reliable understanding is the fruit of 'grace' in which faith completes our ignorance without pretending to possess its certainties as knowledge; and in which contrition mitigates our pride without destroying our hope." p.321

[Norman Styers · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wise and insightful.

[Cheryl · Rating 2 out of 5]

More of a seminary textbook style of writing. Early in my ministry I would have devoured this book, but now in my retirement I’m no longer willing to slog through it.