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Is the Golden Rule in Patristic Ethics? Its Contexts, Meanings and Functions from the New Testament to Augustine

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Is the Golden Rule in Patristic Ethics? Its Contexts, Meanings and Functions from the New Testament to Augustine danish yearbook of philosophy 51 (2018) 3-23 brill.com/dyp How “Trivial” is the Golden Rule in Patristic Ethics? Its Contexts, Meanings and Functions from the New Testament to Augustine Johannes Aakjær Steenbuch University of Copenhagen [email protected] Abstract In patristic ethics there are many differing formulations of the Golden Rule (“do unto others…”), the greatest difference being perhaps that between the negative and the positive version. The Golden Rule was typically considered a matter of natural law, but it is rarely considered the exclusive principle to be applied in practice. Often it was considered an instrument for recognizing generally true principles, such as those of the second table of the Decalogue, or, in Augustine, to direct attention to a “law of the heart.” While Chrysostom saw it solely as a regulative principle for horizon- tal relationships between human beings, Augustine believed it to regulate the believ- er’s relationship with God as well. The rule was not, in patristic ethics, an abstract philosophical principle, but something that structured not only particular actions or types of actions, but practices in a more contextual sense. For these reasons the Golden Rule should, in patristic ethics, always be understood against the background of a broader context of values. Though the Golden Rule may seem to express a uni- versal ethics, its meanings and functions depend on the larger moral-philosophical framework. Keywords The Golden Rule – patristic ethics – moral epistemology – love – tradition – context © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2018 | doi 10.1163/24689300-05101004Downloaded from Brill.com10/02/2021 09:58:58AM via free access <UN> 4 Steenbuch Introduction The Golden Rule is widely recognized as the most widespread ethical norm in religious, as well as philosophical ethics.1 For proponents of religious univer- salism and pluralism, the ubiquity of the rule in world religions, or its status as “moralisches Weltkulturerbe,” often makes it a preferred principle or ideal for a global ethics.2 In modern philosophical discussions the rule is often treated in abstract, ahistorical terms. Such decontextualization tends to lead to unsat- isfactory results, making some modern ethicists consider the rule insufficient. This was the case when Immanuel Kant characterized the rule as “das triviale,” which could be used for justifying more or less any kind of behavior.3 The fol- lowing discussion of the Golden Rule in patristic ethics aims at suggesting a contextualized understanding when working with patristic ethics, by pointing at how the Golden Rule was often understood in relation to a broader moral philosophical framework. In its origins, the rule may be considered a matter of reciprocity, and a coun- terpart to the lex talionis (the principle of retaliation) or the principle “Do ut des” (“I give in order that you may give”).4 Seneca understood the rule as a posi- tive principle of putting oneself in the place of the other and to “give in the way in which we ourselves should like to receive,” while the Rabbi Hillel the Elder is quoted for a saying that “[w]hat is hateful to you, do not to your neighbor (ḥaber): that is the whole Torah; the rest is commentary; go and learn it.”5 In 1 The term “the Golden Rule” is a modern one (17th century), not used by patristic authors. In contemporary ethics the Golden Rule is often taken to be, e.g., a positive substitute for the lex talionis, a demand that persons should see themselves in “the other” (Erikson), an instrument of moral education (Singer), or a principle of universalizability (Hare) or consis- tency (Gensler). E.H. Erikson, “The golden rule in the light of the new insight” in Insight and Responsibility (New York, W. W. Norton: 1963); M.G. Singer, The Ideal of a Rational Morality: Philosophical Compositions (Oxford: 2003); Hare, R.M.: Freedom and Reason (Oxford, Claren- don Press: 1963); Harry Gensler, Formal Ethics (Routledge: 1996). For a brief history see Jeffrey Wattles, The Golden Rule (Oxford: 1996), p. 78. 2 Martin Bauschke, Die Goldene Regel: Staunen, Verstehen, Handeln (ebverlag: Berlin 2010); see also Harry Gensler, Ethics and the Golden Rule (Routledge: 2013). 3 Kant rejected the Golden Rule (“quod tibi non vis fieri, etc.”) in a footnote, while William James believed the rule to be against human nature. Immanuel Kant, Grundlegung zur Meth- aphysik der Sitten (1785), iv.430; William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience (Lect. 11) (1901/1985). See also S. Anderson, “The Golden Rule: Not So Golden Anymore” in Philosophy Now (2009). 4 R.G. Apresian, “Talion and the Golden Rule” in Russian Studies in Philosophy, vol. 41, no. 1 (M.E. Sharpe Inc. 2002), pp. 46–64. danish yearbook of Downloadedphilosophy from Brill.com10/02/2021 51 (2018) 3-23 09:58:58AM via free access <UN> How “Trivial” is the Golden Rule in Patristic Ethics? 5 the New Testament the rule is known from Jesus’ Sermon on the Plain (Luk 6:31) and the Sermon on the Mount (Matt 7:12). In his unpublished dissertation on the Golden Rule from 1966 Bruce Alton argued that “[…]evidence for the correct analysis of it solely on the basis of its New Testament context is as inconclusive as evidence on the basis of the form of its occurrence there.”6 But Alton’s historical interest is in “the Golden Rule’s typical linguistic structure and function in ethics” and his analysis is, as he says, first of all conceptual.7 Alton’s approach is characteristic for discussions of the Golden Rule in contemporary ethics. But while internal linguistic details are important aspects of understanding the rule, the meaning of such a principle as the Golden Rule can hardly be adequately understood independently of a broader conceptual background, as Alton also acknowledges. The most comprehensive study of the history of the Golden Rule so far is perhaps Olivier du Roy’s “La Règle d’or — Histoire d’une maxime morale univer- selle” from 2012.8 Roy notes that “all the Greek, Syriac, and Latin Fathers accept and teach this doctrine of the Golden Rule as being the content of natural law.”9 While this is a credible claim, the characterization of the Golden Rule as natural law does not in itself settle its meaning. It would, perhaps, be more precise to argue that these authors saw the Golden Rule as the form of natural law, whereas the actual contents depend on further contextual factors. Ricoeur has argued that for a law (an ethical principle) to be intelligible, there must be a narrative, as law makes instructions out of narratives. In its New Testament setting, says Ricoeur, the Golden Rule conveys a notion of ethical reciprocity that transcends ordinary reciprocity by substituting moral norms with an economy of the gift in the light of Jesus’ supraethical demand to love others.10 Ricoeur points to the necessity of understanding the Golden Rule in a broader context. The meaning of the Golden Rule is flexible and depends on tradition, con- text, setting, and function. As Jeffrey Wattles has argued, the Golden Rule is 5 E.g. Seneca, De Ira, iii, 12.3; De Benef., ii.1.1; Hillel, Babylonian Talmud, Shabbat 31A. 6 Bruce Alton, An examination of the golden rule (unpublished PhD-thesis available on microfilm) (Stanford University: 1966), pp. 32–33. 7 Alton 1966, pp. 8–9. 8 Olivier du Roy, La Règle d’or — Histoire d’une maxime morale universelle, 1+2 (Cerf: Paris 2012). 9 Olivier du Roy, “The Golden Rule as the Law of Nature, from Origen to Martin Luther” in Neusner & Chilton (ed.), The Golden Rule: The Ethics of Reciprocity in World Religions (Continuum: London 2008), p. 97. 10 Paul Ricoeur, “Ethical and Theological Considerations on the Golden Rule” in Figuring the Sacred: Religion, Narrative and Imagination (Fortress Press: 1995), pp. 293–302. danish yearbook of philosophy 51 (2018) 3-23 Downloaded from Brill.com10/02/2021 09:58:58AM via free access <UN> 6 Steenbuch not the sole principle or an axiom in a deductive system of ethics produced by the extension of an abstract principle. The Golden Rule is, says Wattles, a searchlight rather than a map, which is why the Golden Rule “cannot operate in a value vacuum,” but requires a fuller philosophy of moral living.11 The following introduces an overview of how the Golden Rule was un- derstood in early Christian (patristic) ethics from the New Testament until Augustine of Hippo (354–430), but does not (for obvious reasons) attempt to reconstruct the philosophies of “moral living” (Wattles) for all the examples in which the Golden Rule appears in patristic ethics. The aim is the more mod- erate one of outlining some of the complexities of the main themes which should be considered when engaging with the Golden Rule in patristic ethics, and thereby pointing to the need for contextual analysis. Its Different Versions The perhaps best known formulations of the Golden Rule can be found in the gospels of Luke and Matthew, “as ye wish that men may do to you, do ye also to them in like manner” (καθὼς θέλετε ἵνα ποιῶσιν ὑμῖν οἱ ἄνθρωποι, ποιεῖτε αὐτοῖς ὁμοίως) (Luk 6:13), and “[a]ll things, therefore, whatever ye may will that men may be doing to you, so also do to them” (Πάντα οὖν ὅσα ἐὰν θέλητε ἵνα ποιῶσιν ὑμῖν οἱ ἄνθρωποι, οὕτως καὶ ὑμεῖς ποιεῖτε αὐτοῖς) (Matt 7:12). The “therefore” (οὖν) in Matt 7:12 suggests that the Golden Rule is a conclusion on Jesus’ moral teachings, while the “all things” in Matthew suggests a reciprocal relationship involving specific acts. The “as” in Luke suggests a reciprocity of general behav- ior, being an indicator of a type of behavior rather than a class of acts, as Alton puts it.12 As the Golden Rule is said to be “the law and the prophets” in Matt 7:13 it is often considered identical to the commandments to “love the Lord your God” (Matt.
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