PERSONALITY

In philosophy and theology the term personality is relatively new, having been introduced by thinkers with longstanding psychological interests, such as W. james, E. S. brightman and S. A. kierkegaard. The older philosophical tradition preferred to center its discussion on the concept of person, of which personality is a more abstract derivative. With St. thomas aquinas one may trace the origins of the formal definition of person to boethius, the earliest of the Christian Aristotelians in the West (Summa theologiae 1a, 29.1). The absence of any significant discussion of person or personality among the Greeks or Romans is itself meaningful. It reveals that this concept, which occupies so prominent a place in the 20th century, was of little interest to the ancients. It likewise is an indication that the concept of person was of minor concern in palco-pagan culture, just as the person has lost significance in the cult of the masses in the neopaganism of K. marx.

In a sense, then, personality is a concept that belongs to Christian tradition, and only in an environment that maintains contact with its Christian origins does this concept achieve its full significance. This follows logically from the central Christian dogma of the Incarnation of the Word and the priceless gift of divine adoption that God conferred on man. Only a person can be adopted, and the entire economy of salvation is based on the relation of person to person. In view of this ultimate orientation, the human person is discussed in this section from three different points of view: the psychological, the philosophical, and the theological.

Psychological Aspect. The psychological dimension is man as he is known and as he knows himself. This is the empirical or existential personality, the aspect of man that has already been discussed. Psychological description of the person attempts to resolve a complex unit, man, into patterns of observable traits and inferred internal dynamics. The danger in this method is one of losing contact with the functioning whole in the preoccupation with traits and syndromes. Gestalt psychology, existential analysis, and clinical studies aim to avoid this pitfall and keep in focus the individual person in all his uniqueness and originality. Other studies of empirical or existential personality give rise to the variety of personality theories already noted. Most of these reflect the clinical methods and research interests of particular psychologists or schools of thought. They do not penetrate to the metaphysics of man or to the philosophy of the human person.

Philosophical Aspect. Without conflicting with empirical studies of personality, the philosophical aspect of the study of man is concerned with the metaphysical question, "What does it mean to be a human being?" and the ethical and juridical question, "What rights and immunities accrue to man by reason of his being a person?"

Historical Genesis. Aristotle's balanced formula for man, animal rationale, was "baptized" by St. Thomas in the 13th century and remained current until the decline of scholasticism. Even among the scholastics, however, there was a persistent tendency to upset this balance and to extol reason at the expense of man's animal or organic functions. Finally, R. descartes (1596–1650), with only a sketchy background in 17th-century scholastic thought, introduced a complete divorce between mind and body through his doctrine of the two substances. In his psychophysical model of man, mind became the seat of exclusively spiritual functions, whereas organic activities were reduced to the domain of physics.

With the Cartesian disruption of man's psychosomatic unity and the exploitation of reason by later philosophers, the individuality and uniqueness of human personality were soon lost, particularly in the abstractions of Kantian transcendentalism. The age of the Enlightenment carried the angelism and excessive rationalism of Descartes still further, until it reached its climax in Hegel's dialectic of subject and object. Even the launching of the new science of psychology in the latter half of the 19th century did little to offset this development. In fact, experimental psychology in its early decades was entirely dominated by positivism and associationism, which stemmed ultimately from the philosophies of T. Hobbes and J. Locke.

With the beginning of the 20th century, however, a massive reaction to the rationalistic concept of man began to take shape. This reaction was due in great measure to Darwin's glimpse of an evolutionary pattern underlying all organic life and to Freud's sometimes crude but persistent probing of human emotion and unconscious drives.

Psychosomatic Unity. As a result, there has emerged a concept of man as a psychosomatic unit that gives full meaning to the Aristotelian-Thomistic definition without ignoring man's organic or animal nature. Pope Pius XII gave currency and authority to this concept when defining personality in his address to the Rome Congress of Applied Psychology shortly before he died: "We define personality as the psychosomatic unity of man insofar as it is determined and governed by the soul."

In medical contexts, the term psychosomatic refers to ailments in which physical symptoms are caused or influenced largely by emotional conflicts and psychic tensions. But the word itself, derived from the Greek ψυχή (soul or mind) and σ[symbol omitted]μα (body), is admirably suited to signify any interaction between organic and mental components in man. Used in conjunction with unity, this term expresses the organic uniqueness of human beings among other forms of animal life, excludes interpretations that split human beings into two substances (body and mind), and signifies the incommunicable uniqueness of the individual person that is studied by empirical enquiry or clinical analysis.

All the important philosophical conclusions concerning humanity also follow from this psychosomatic unity. In particular, human sexuality and emotional life have their origin in this organic complex that functions also at the spiritual or psychic level (see sex; emotion). They are not something foreign to humans, contracted by association with brute animals. At the same time, autonomy, the continuity of self-consciousness, and a sense of responsibility establish humanity's rights and immunities as a person.

While the philosophical or metaphysical concept of human personality goes beyond the conclusions of contemporary psychology and is the foundation of humanity's rights and immunities as a person, it in no way contradicts current scientific views of man. In fact, when contemporary clinical and existential psychologists insist upon the necessity of a unified and self-integrated personality as the sine qua non of normal functioning and of sound adjustment, they are very close to demanding a return to such a concept of humanity.

Theological Aspect. This organically integrated and spiritually sensitive being is likewise the subject of elevation to the supernatural plane by the action of the Holy Spirit, which is made connatural to man through the mediation of Christ. This constitutes the supernatural or theological aspect of personality. Supernatural man, the sublime concept of Christian humanism, stands out in sharp contrast to the cult of the superman of F. W. nietzsche, A. Hitler, and the proponents of neopaganism. Entirely the creation of grace, supernatural man could not have come to be except through the Incarnation of the Word. This is the "new man" who is created in "the justice and sanctity of truth" and of whom St. Paul speaks so eloquently to his new converts of Galatia, "My little children, with whom I am in labor again, until Christ is formed in you" (Gal 4.19).

The unobtrusive transformation of nature by grace does no violence to the human personality because it begins with faith, the free assent of the mind to God's redeeming word. The first word spoken in a dialogue, faith is a person-to-person communion with Christ that reaches its climax only in the life after this. Thus the liturgy, the Sacraments, ascetical practices, and prayer take on the character of a personal encounter with the Transfigured Christ. Hence, even the possibility of redemption rests upon the fact of human personality.

The doctrinal epitome and guarantee of this teaching is found in the dogma of the Resurrection, which St. Paul places in the very center of the affirmation of Christian faith. This is a twofold dogma. It begins with the simple affirmation of the Creed that Christ suffered, died, was buried, and rose again. From this central doctrine a corollary follows: those who believe in Christ, whose lives are engrafted on His, the True Vine, who strive to conform their lives to His, will rise in glory with Him on the Last Day. This doctrine of the resurrection of the body, undreamed of in pagan philosophy, can be grasped by faith alone. Yet, what could be more fitting than that the psychosomatic unity so harshly disrupted by death be restored at the moment the human person enters into his glorified state? The organic complex preceded the soul in existence, called forth its unique creation, and, throughout the life span of the person, participated in every advance of the soul in virtue. Since the body has a real part in the preparation of the soul for beatitude, it is only fitting and proper that it be reunited to the soul to share in the life of glory.

Indeed, one may say that only in the light of the dogma of the Resurrection does the true dignity of the human personality stand fully revealed. Humans are surely rational animals, as they are social and emotional animals, but they are much more. Thay are spirit vitalizing matter, living under the laws of protoplasm, but destined to lead matter to a life in which only the laws of spirit hold sway. Such is the conclusion that the gospel accounts of Christ's appearance to His disciples after the Resurrection force upon us; it represents the complete transformation of the human personality in Christ.

Bibliography: t. j. gannon, Psychology: The Unity of Human Behavior (Boston 1954). m. b. arnold and j. a. gasson, eds., The Human Person (New York 1954). a. walters and k. o'hara, Persons and Personality (New York 1953). j. e. royce, Man and His Nature: A Philosophical Psychology (New York 1961). g. p. klubertanz, The Philosophy of Human Nature (New York 1953). t. v. moore, The Driving Forces of Human Nature and Their Adjustment (New York 1948). b. froget, The Indwelling of the Holy Spirit in the Souls of the Just, tr. s. a. raemers (Westminster, Md. 1950). pius xii, "Venus du monde" (address, April 10, 1958) "Applied Psychology," tr. p. j. oligny, Pope Speaks 5 (1958) 7–20.

[t. j. gannon]