A short time ago we got into an incredibly pointless argument on FaceBook which began when someone made the somewhat “interesting” remark that because Jesus, whom Christians regard as a divine person, was a convicted felon, then no one should have any problems with the current president of the United States.
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| Wesley Newcomb Hohfeld |
First, a little background. The whole asinine argument had its roots in an error that Wesley Newcomb Hohfeld noted and attempted to correct in his Fundamental Legal Conceptions (1919): using a word in a legal context which has a precise meaning in one set of circumstances and quite another meaning or number of meanings in other circumstances. It is an example of the logical fallacy of equivocation, mixing up the meaning of words and using them out of context.
Hohfeld’s example of a word often misused, often even in the same sentence, was “property.” In popular speech often refers to the thing owned, but in its precise legal meaning refers to 1) the absolute natural right every human being has to own, and 2) the limited and socially determined bundle of rights that define what an owner may own and what the owner may do with what is owned. These are “the generic right of dominion” and “the universal destination of all goods,” respectively.
It is, of course, a serious error to confuse these two definitions of property and assume they do not go together as a unified whole, one complementing the other, and both essential to the concept of property as a natural right. That, however, is precisely what socialists and capitalists typically do.
Socialists assume as a matter of course that the limited aspect of the universal destination of all goods nullifies the absolute aspect of the generic right of dominion, while capitalists assert that the absolute character of the generic right of dominion negates the limited character of the universal destination of all goods. For the socialist, then, circumstances dictate whether someone may own at all, and theft (a violation of property) is justified. For the capitalist, they assert ownership without limits; not only can they own anything and far more than they can ever use, but they can also do anything they like with what they own.
Okay, so over the course of the argument, and aside from pointing out the crashing non sequitur, the issue came up whether Jesus had rights and was therefore a human person — something having nothing whatsoever to do with Jesus’s purported divinity. The individual insisted rather vociferously that Jesus, because he was a divine person (again, something that had nothing to do with the case), was not and could not be a human person as that term is used in society and law.
We, of course, disagreed. Mere humanity is the only condition for being a human person. Anything else makes personality conditional and thus the being more or less human, depending on the conditions.
The word at issue here is “person.” What the other individual objected to, by the way, was the contention that Jesus is not a convicted felon (as the judge, Pontius Pilate admitted — “I find no fault in this man”), and that the trial was a put-up job, a farce that clearly violated Jesus’s fundamental rights as a human person.
Thus, Jesus was put on trial illegally and executed illegally, all in violation of his human rights, irrespective of his status as a divine Person. Whether Jesus is the Son of God or not, his rights as a human person were violated; it would have been the same for any other human being in the same circumstances. The fact that Christians believe Jesus to be the Son of God does not change the fact that his human rights were violated. The truth of one circumstance does not and cannot change the truth of the other circumstance.
The other individual denied Jesus was a human person; that he was only a divine Person. The individual refused to consider the possibility — as demonstrated by logic — that Jesus was also a human person, which is no contradiction, as becomes immediately obvious and is thus manifestly true:
· According to Christian belief, Jesus is true God and true man; this is an article of faith.
· All men, whether considered as adult human males or as generic members of the human race, are human beings.
· All human beings are as human and are human in the same way as all other humans. (This is the first principle of reason expressed as the law or principle of identity.)
· All human beings have the analogously complete capacity to acquire and develop virtue, and thus all human beings have the full spectrum of natural rights.
· Having rights defines someone or something socially or legally as a person; persons have rights, while things do not; persons can own, while things are owned.
· In human society, all human beings have rights by nature (natural law) and are thus natural, human persons.
· In human society, things such as governments, municipalities, and business corporations can have rights delegated to them by natural persons and thereby become artificial persons, “creatures of law.”
· Natural human persons have rights absolutely while artificial non-human persons have rights conditionally.
· Human persons may have the exercise of rights limited or taken away for just cause and through due process.
· Non-human persons may have the rights themselves taken away for just cause and through due process.
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| Empirically yes, logically no. |
Of course, nothing in this line of reasoning denies or affirms Jesus’s status as a divine person — which has nothing to do with the argument. Neither does proving or asserting Jesus is a divine person (assuming you even believe such a thing is possible) preclude him also being a human person. Proving or holding by faith Jesus is a divine person says nothing whatsoever about his non-status as a human person, nor could it: you cannot logically prove a negative.
You can prove, if you believe it, are so inclined, and accept the proof, that Jesus is a divine person. You cannot prove that he is not a human person. This is because asserting a logical negative proof is contrary to reason; proving a negative can only be done empirically. For example, you can prove that Fido is not a cat by proving Fido is a dog; the two are mutually exclusive, whereas being a human person does not preclude being a divine person or vice versa.
Nor can you claim that you hold by faith that Jesus is not a human person, for faith does not and cannot contradict reason; faith goes beyond reason, it does not contradict reason — the “negative” statement of the first principle of reason, the law or principle of (non) contradiction: nothing can both “be” and “not be” at the same time under the same conditions.
We will consider the implications of this in the next posting on this subject.
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