On Thinking the Human: Resolutions of Difficult Notions

by Robert W. Jenson

Since Socrates, the effort to understand ourselves precisely as human has been the central occupation of Western thought. In this short, profound book Robert W. Jenson argues that not only are all philosophical attempts to accurately think the self doomed to failure, but also that the category "human" is unthinkable without reference to God. Under chapter titles that reflect the problem's different facets — "Thinking Death," "Thinking Consciousness," "Thinking Freedom," "Thinking Reality," "Thinking Wickedness," and "Thinking Love" — Jenson limns the difficulty inherent in each concept and then shows how the unthinkable becomes thinkable in light of the triune God of Scripture. As Jenson says at the outset of the book, "our anthropological endeavors are at once impelled and checked by an epistemic quirk or set of notions we need to use and do use when we talk about ourselves as human resist being thought." On Thinking the Human, which tackles this problem theologically while also giving a nod to philosophic heavyweights like Hegel, Nietzsche, and Heidegger, is a concise attempt to explain why this is so. v

Genres: Theology, Philosophy

98 pages, Paperback

First published July 1, 2003

About the author

Robert W. Jenson was a student of Barth's theology for many years, and his doctoral dissertation at the University of Heidelberg earned Barth’s approval as an interpretation of his writings. A native of Wisconsin, Dr. Jenson attended Luther College in Iowa and Luther Theological Seminary in Saint Paul, Minnesota, before studying at Heidelberg where he was awarded his Doctor of Theology, summa cum laude. After doing graduate work at the University of Basel he returned to the United States. He taught theology for many years at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg and St. Olaf College. Dr. Jenson also served as Senior Scholar for Research at the Center of Theological Inquiry, Princeton, NJ. He died in 2017.

Reviews

[Graham Hoppstock · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is some bold theological writing

[Patrick · Rating 4 out of 5]

Subtitled: Resolutions of Difficult Notions. Each chapter included a brilliant and incisive analysis of the history of the idea or its contemporary version, followed by a critique and, sometimes tricky to follow, a reversal to Trinitarian thinking. But if all this is comprehended adequately, the subtitle does deliver what it promises. The trick to thinking “the human” is not to remain within the human, or to even begin with the human, but to look to God, that is, the actual God, the Triune God. It is not by the western principle, “know first thyself,” that the problematic ideas of death, consciousness, free will, reality, wickedness and love are solved. There is no chapter that is especially powerful, but a secular philosopher of the mind might find the chapters on consciousness and free will the most accessible or relevant.

[David C. · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book rather ingeniously helps you understand the beauty and utility of the Trinity without dumbing it down or just stopping at "it's mysterious and hard to understand, just go with it". It takes six topics, including death, consciousness, freedom, reality, wickedness, and love, and points out that these subjects are really important and we all know what they are and think about them a lot, but that upon closer inspection when we really try to grasp them they slip through our fingers. For example, we all know what love is, and we know it has elements of desire ('I want you, oh baby oh baby') and elements of giving ('I'd take a bullet for you, babe'), but we can't quite always align them, and they seem to be in a kind of tension so that we recognize when they've gone wrong: they become either a love that desires the beloved the way a man desires a delicious lobster dinner, or a love that so pours itself into the beloved that nothing of itself is left (and if numbing or avoiding your true self is what you're after, booze works just as well and doesn't entangle another person in the project). There's always a turn in each chapter where Jenson then says, "this framework is frustrating and we've written ourselves into a corner- let's get a new framework based on the Triune God". It turns out that there's a third party involved in our "I-Thou" love desire-vs-giving showdown, the Holy Spirit, who wills us to love one another and who can't get caught in that subject-object dichotomy because He not only is loving, He's Love itself. We can love because of God's love inherent in the Trinity: the Father loves the Son, the Son loves the Father, and the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son as the love between them.

I'm giving this 4-stars instead of 5 because the structure of the book itself never quite transcends its origins as a set of adapted lectures. If you already have the background in Hegel and know quite well what a begriff and vorstellung is and can tell at sight the difference between a quote from Augustine, Luther, Edwards, and Descartes, all the better for you. The kindle edition I read had linked footnotes, which are better than un-linked footnotes, but it can take you out of the reading. Probably much less annoying in paper form.

[Christopher Gow · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just so good.
I feel like a have a pretty good grasp of his basic framework and still he makes a turn in nearly every essay that is surprising and brilliant.

Here’s a teaser quote that’s typical:
“We of course make many difficulties for ourselves about Real Presence. We do this because we suppose there is some other criterion of reality, by which the reality of the Son’s presence is to be measured. There is none; rather, our grasp of the Son’s real body and blood is the criterion of all our other attempts to grasp something real.”

[Chris Callaway · Rating 2 out of 5]

Rather scholarly for a popular press, but more informal and conversational than an academic book. There is a lot of thought provoking material here, but there were also many key points that were unsubstantiated. I found myself wishing I could just talk about these things with him in person rather than reading the book.

[Charles Bell · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tough read but I got through.

[Andrew Boyle · Rating 4 out of 5]

The trinitarian explorations were difficult to follow, but his analysis of difficult notions was profound.