Christian hedonism
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Christian hedonism is a Christian doctrine found in some evangelical circles, particularly those of the Reformed tradition especially in the circle of John Piper. The term was coined by Reformed Baptist pastor John Piper in his 1986 book Desiring God. Piper summarizes this philosophy of the Christian life as "God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him."[1] Christian Hedonism may anachronistically describe the theology of Jonathan Edwards.[why?]
"The great goal of all Edward's work was the glory of God. And the greatest thing I have ever learned from Edwards...is that God is glorified most not merely by being known, nor by merely being dutifully obeyed, but by being enjoyed in the knowing and the obeying" (John Piper; God's Passion for His Glory).
"God made the world that he might communicate, and the creature receive, his glory; but that it might [be] received both by the mind and heart. He that testifies His having an idea of God's glory [doesn't] glorify God so much as he that testifies also his approbation of it and his delight in it" (Jonathan Edwards; The Works of Jonathan Edwards, Vol. 13; ed. by Thomas Schafer).
Doctrine
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The Westminster Shorter Catechism summarizes the "chief end of man" as "to glorify God and enjoy Him forever."[citation needed] Piper has suggested that this would be more correct as "to glorify God by enjoying Him forever."[citation needed] Many Christian hedonists, such as Matt Chandler, point to figures such as Blaise Pascal and Jonathan Edwards as exemplars of Christian hedonism from the past[why?], though their lives predate the term.
Christian hedonism was developed in opposition to the deontology of Immanuel Kant. Piper supported Ayn Rand's attack on Kantian altruism:
An action is moral, said Kant, only if one has no desire to perform it, but performs it out of a sense of duty and derives no benefit from it of any sort, neither material nor spiritual. A benefit destroys the moral value of an action. (Thus if one has no desire to be evil, one cannot be good; if one has, one can.)[citation needed]
British writer C. S. Lewis, in an oft-quoted passage in his short piece "The Weight of Glory," likewise objects to Kantian ethics:
If there lurks in most modern minds the notion that to desire our own good and to earnestly hope for the enjoyment of it is a bad thing, I suggest that this notion has crept in from Kant and the Stoics and is no part of the Christian faith. Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling around with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.[2]
Piper later argues:
But not only is disinterested morality (doing good "for its own sake") impossible; it is undesirable. That is, it is unbiblical; because it would mean that the better a man became the harder it would be for him to act morally. The closer he came to true goodness the more naturally and happily he would do what is good. A good man in Scripture is not the man who dislikes doing good but toughs it out for the sake of duty. A good man loves kindness (Micah 6:8) and delights in the law of the Lord (Psalm 1:2), and the will of the Lord (Psalm 40:8). But how shall such a man do an act of kindness disinterestedly? The better the man, the more joy in obedience.[citation needed]
Criticism
Some Christians object to Christian hedonism's controversial name.[3] It has little commonality with philosophical hedonism; however, Piper has stated that a provocative term is "appropriate for a philosophy that has a life changing effect on its adherents." Critics charge that hedonism of any sort puts something (namely, pleasure) before God,[4] which allegedly breaks the first of the Ten Commandments: "You shall have no other gods before me." In response, Piper states in Desiring God that "By Christian Hedonism, we do not mean that our happiness is the highest good. We mean that pursuing the highest good will always result in our greatest happiness in the end. We should pursue this happiness, and pursue it with all our might. The desire to be happy is a proper motive for every good deed, and if you abandon the pursuit of your own joy, you cannot love man or please God."[5]
Notes
References
- Booth, Craig W. "A Biblical Study of the Theological Foundation of 'Christian Hedonism'".
- Grenz, Stanley J. "Theology for the Community of God".
- Lewis, C. S. The Weight of Glory and Other Addresses.
- Piper, John. "Desiring God. 1986".
- Piper, John. "Christian Hedonism : Forgive the Label, But Don't Miss the Truth".
- Rand, Ayn. For the New Intellectual. New York: Signet, 1961.
