Do people matter?
So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. (Genesis 1:27)
There are different views about people in the world. In England we have adopted the Christian viewpoint, but as our society moves further from its roots, other values are coming to the fore.
The Old Testament is formative for the Jews, Christians and Muslims, so coming from the Scriptures our view of people is based on the same ideas. Firstly, that we were made in the image of God, so in some sense we have a moral and spiritual and intellectual nature like God does. Secondly, we learn that we are fallen from our proper place, and our bodies and souls are corrupted which means we do things we should not. (Even though we often reason so well why we should do these things.)
About 500 years ago in Europe there were two intellectual changes. One was the High Renaissance in the south, where great artists, writers and sculptors were creating art with ideas from the new humanist (scholarly) ideas. Man was seen as the centre of everything, and the Church’s authority was seen as equal to that of the Scriptures, and local traditions were brought into Church teaching. So, you have Dante and his allegory of Hell, and later, Michelangelo put in the Sistine chapel both the prophet Jeremiah and also a pagan prophetess of Delphi.
In the north of Europe came a reaction against this new teaching and a re-stating of the Scriptures saying that God is the centre of everything. The Reformation broke out after Martin Luther published his 95 criticisms of the Church. This led to ideas of the Bible as the supreme authority even over the ideas of mankind.
Fast forward to the European Universities in the 1700’s and the intellectual ideas of secularism started to develop, with the (then strange) idea that there might be no God. The ideas of mankind then were given free reign to develop science and art as we saw fit.
This has given us a wonderfully fertile and shifting set of cultures, where conflicting ideas circulate and with internet culture it is perfectly possible for people only ever to see ideas with which they agree, therefore unaware of contradictory ideas which could be better.
Democracy is a great idea where we all get a vote – a part in the decision making. But I don’t think we would go for full democracy in all cases – mob rule is not necessarily the best way forward. If we deny the Scripture’s teaching that all people are made in the image of God, and equal in His sight, then how do we measure a person’s worth? Their academic achievements? Their contribution to society? Their relationship to us personally? These are very open to the opinion of the observer – and who is qualified to judge?
Presently our society holds that people are valuable and should not be killed. But while we remember that it is 80 years since D day and don’t want to enter another war. The most noble of the countries of Europe in the 1910s were the Germans with a wonderful culture of music and art and literature, who were seduced in a few short years to become the brutal Nazi regime justifying the death of millions of people judged to be different from them. The Bible teaches that there is something bad in every heart, and without the Saviour, it is all too easy to follow the tempter’s leading into a terrible life, where everything turns to dust.
I believe people matter. But they matter because God made them. Those determined to choose not to see God’s existence need to find another justification for why people matter. Maybe it’s just that we keep our DNA going, but that doesn’t convince me.
“Job replied to the Lord: ‘I know that you can do all things; no purpose of yours can be thwarted. You asked, “Who is this that obscures my plans without knowledge?” Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know. ‘You said, “Listen now, and I will speak; I will question you, and you shall answer me.” My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you. (Job 42:1-5)
Brian Leathers (July 2024)