LEISURE IN CHRISTIAN THOUGHT
AND PRACTICE
David Purcell's Seminar Paper
You will look in vain in a dictionary for
a definition of Leisure. A dictionary will express its meaning
vaguely as being "free time," which conveys a completely inadequate
impression of what leisure really is. Now it is hardly surprising
that a dictionary cannot help us. Leisure is a spiritual and mental
attitude - an Idea - and we cannot encompass in a single term or
sentence the definition of an Idea. An examination of some aspects
of this Idea, however, will help us to understand the nature of
leisure. The first thing to note is that leisure has a positive
value of its own. It is not merely the negation of work. In Greek
and Latin there were only negative words to express the idea of
work. In Latin, the word for leisure was "otium." The word
for business was "neg-otium"-"not leisure." Similarly also
in the Greek. Most of the work in the Greek and Roman civilizations
was performed by slaves. A free citizen would however have been
involved in negotiations of one kind or another and would have
regarded negotiation or what we call commerce or business as the
negation of leisure and hence work.
Leisure is an attitude of contemplation, of
an inward calm, of surrendering to Reality. The English word "leisure"
is derived from the Latin word licere meaning "to be allowed."
The Book of Ecclesiasticus gives us an insight into the nature
of leisure when it tells us "The wisdom of a learned man cometh by
his time of leisure, and he that is less in action, shall receive wisdom."
(Ch. 38, v. 25). "Leisure is a receptive attitude of mind, a contemplative
attitude, and is ... the capacity for steeping oneself in the whole
of creation." (Leisure The Basis of Culture, Josef Pieper, p.
49.) Here again we note this idea of receptiveness - of letting things
happen Licere - to be allowed. It should not be supposed that leisure
means just idleness. The meaning of the Old English word "idel"
was probably "empty." (Concise Oxford Dictionary.) An idle person
then was one who was empty of reality. ''Idleness . . . means that
a man prefers to forego the rights . . . that belong to his nature
... he does not wish to be what he really, fundamentally IS." "At the
zenith of the Middle Ages ... it was held that sloth and restlessness, "leisure-lessness,"
the incapacity to enjoy leisure, were all closely connected, sloth
was held to be the source of restlessness, and the ultimate cause of "work
for work's sake." (Pieper, op. cit., pp. 48, 49.)
It has been held by many philosophers that what
is hard work is good. This view was held by one of Plato's companions,
by Emmanuel Kant, by Calvin and by a lamentably large numbers of
modern (self-styled) Christians. The historical Christian view, still
held (at least nominally) by the majority of Christians, is diametrically
opposed to this viewpoint. St. Thomas Aquinas held that the essence
of virtue consists in the good rather than the difficult and
that virtue makes us perfect by enabling us to follow our natural
bent in the right way. And he wrote "there should be men who devote
their lives to contemplation ... necessary not only for the good
of the individual who so devotes himself, but for the good of human
society."
(Commentary On Proverbs.)
It is obvious therefore that in classical and
mediaeval Christian thought leisure did not derive its value from
the relief it brings from work, nor from the fact that it can be
a restorative after work or a strengthening agent for present or
future work. If leisure is considered as merely a break in one's
work it "is still a part of the world of work. The pause is made
for the sake of work . . . and a man is not only refreshed from
work but for work." (Pieper, op. cit., p. 56).
But we will more clearly understand the nature
of leisure by examining the idea of leisure in Christian thought
and teaching. Though one may only rarely find the word "Leisure" mentioned
in Christian writing - the idea is inherent in Christianity and indeed
is "one of the foundations of Western culture." (Pieper, op.
cit., p. 25.) We can only comprehend this by understanding the Christian
teaching on man's origin, nature and destiny. The Christian holds
that
"God created man to His own image and likeness." (Genesis 1,
26-27), and that "This image of God in man, is not in the body, but
in the soul, which is a spiritual substance, endued with understanding
and free will." (Notes on the Revised Rheims, Douay Bible, 1750,
Bishop Challoner). Now although Christians held this for many centuries
and the majority still holds it, there has been a denial of the true
nature of man, which, as I will show later, has profoundly affected
man's attitude to leisure.
"All things are ordered to one good, as to
their ultimate end . . . and this is God." (Summa Contra Gentiles
III, Ch. 17, St. Thomas Aquinas). Nothing can satisfy man's will
completely except God alone, for God is his beginning and his end.
Man is imbued with what has been called a "divine discontent." This
is what St. Augustine of Hippo had in mind when he prayed "Our hearts,
O Lord, are restless, until they rest in Thee." Christian belief
then is that God is the ultimate object; the ultimate end of all
man's desires, and the possession of God by the soul is complete
happiness. Since then this is so, all human activity should be directed
towards true happiness. Every effort of man, which endeavours to
deny God, or to ignore Him, or to leave out of account the destiny
of man, will suffer the fate of the ancient Tower of Babel. Men then
attempted to build their own path to happiness. Because their actions
were not in accord with reality, their efforts disintegrated. And
the very name of the edifice, which they attempted to erect, has
become the symbol of confusion - of feverish activity directed to
a futile end, of activism, or work for work's sake.
LEISURE IN THE NEW TESTAMENT
When we read the New Testament we notice immediately
similarities between the civilization in which Christ lived, and
our own civilization. We must be similarly struck with the contrast
to these attitudes to life in Christ's teaching. Here there is no
stressing the virtue of work for it's own sake; there is no praise
for material efficiency for its own sake. In fact we find the very
opposite. In the New Testament we read the message of peace and tranquility
of mind, and we find repeated warnings about the dangers of world-liness
- of concentrating our attention on material things. "No man can
serve two masters. You cannot serve God and mammon." (Matthew VI,
24). The Knox translation of the Scripture puts it "you cannot serve
God and money." "Come unto Me all you that labour and are burdened
and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and you shall find
rest unto your souls." (Matthew XI, 28.) I think that the "rest" of
which Christ spoke here, could not possibly have been closer to the
true nature of leisure. We find in the New Testament too a warning
to distinguish between shadow and substance, between what appears
to be important and what is in reality our destiny. "Lay not up to
yourselves treasures on earth: where the rust and the moth consume
and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up to yourselves
treasures in heaven, where neither the rust nor moth doth consume
and where thieves do not break through and steal. For where thy treasure
is, there is thy heart also." (Matthew VII, 19-21.)
There is in the words of Christ Himself the
first Christian pronouncement specifically on the subject of what
I term activism - that is, the practice of activity without reference
to the true purpose of Man - the modern concept of work. The scene
was at the village of Bethany and Our Lord was the guest of the two
sisters Martha and Mary. Mary sat at the Lord's feet and the Scripture
tells us, she "heard His word." But Martha, busy with the housework
and serving, complained that Mary had left her to do the work alone.
And Christ rebuked her saying,
"Martha, Martha thou art careful and art troubled about many things.
But one thing is necessary. Mary hath chose the better part . . .".
(Luke X, 38-42.)
The primacy of the spirit, the supremacy of
the spiritual over the material is exemplified in the Old Testament
in the words: "Not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word
that proceedeth from the mouth of God." (Deuteronomy VIII,
3.) And in the New Testament: "For the Wisdom of the flesh is death,
but the wisdom of the spirit is life and peace." (Romans VIII,
6.)
ST. FRANCIS OF ASSISI
It is important not to misunderstand this attitude
to material things - to what in Christian parlance is called the "world."
The Christian speaks of this world as a "Vale of tears" and yet he
knows that all creation, even material creation bears witness to the
existence of God and a higher life. If we try to divorce this world
from its origin and if we deny our own ultimate destiny, then this
life becomes meaningless and empty and well we may despair for then
we are really idle persons. This is one of the many paradoxes of Christianity.
Of all men, this paradox of being in and of the world and yet unworldly,
of despising this world's goods for their own sake and yet loving them
as God's creation, is most clearly seen in the life of St. Francis
of Assisi. A man so detached from material things that he actively
envied with a burning zeal the materially poor and the destitute, and
yet a man who so loved all created things that he bestowed upon them
the title of "Brother," "Brother Dog" and "Brother Sun," and even his
own body, with a paradoxical mixture of contempt and love, he affectionately
called
"Brother Ass."
I mention St. Francis of Assisi for another reason. He is a Saint who
is revered by Christians of all denominations and one who is frequently
admired even by atheists and agnostics, usually because there has come
to be associated with his name a kind of benevolent humanitarianism
and because his poetic nature appeals to the human imagination. It
is very strange, that such a man should be revered, because in the
sense that our civilization understands the term "work" he was a waster.
From youth onwards he didn't do a day's "work" for the rest of his
life! Could there possibly be a greater antithesis to modern thinking
about work than the spirit of the Poverello of Assisi who typifies
the attitude of the Christian Saints?
St. Francis appreciated profoundly the true meaning of leisure. He
loved nature-more than any other human being he considered the lilies
of the field and the fowls of the air, and because of this, more than
any other man, he followed implicitly the injunction: "Seek ye first
the kingdom of God and His justice, and all things shall be added to
you." (Luke XII, 31.) If a man first seeks the Kingdom of God,
and to the extent that he does so he will appreciate truly the gifts
of God.
It is an interesting commentary on the 13th, 14th and 15th centuries
that St. Francis, because he first sought the Kingdom of God, inspired
the art and poetry of these ages. These were the centuries in which,
however imperfect in their individual lives they may have been, men
had a clear idea of their nature and their final destiny. They knew
the importance of developing one's personality, which they termed personal
sanctification, and so it was natural that one in whom there was so
great a development of sanctity should be revered as St. Francis was.
It was not a matter of indifference to the men of the 13th to the 15th
century how their lives were spent. They understood craftsmanship because
they knew that God is glorified by beauty of form. The appearance of
the Church - the House of God - was a matter of importance, and in
building the great cathedrals they have left to us, they endeavoured
to glorify God by building Him as fitting an abode on earth as possible.
All this was directed towards their own sanctification - towards the
development of their own personalities through glorifying God. These
were the centuries of the artisan, the craftsman who was engaged in
the creative, organic process of true work. He was in contact with
the finished product of his labour and it was stamped with his personality.
He was "not the servant but the master in the process of production." (The
New Tower of Babel, Dietrich von Hilde-brand, 1953.) The artisan
loved his work, and he may have been attached to it for the joy he
derived from it, quite apart from its usefulness to him. The artisan
has gone. He is replaced by the process worker, who is engaged on what
is called
"repetition work," who is a cog in the machine of the assembly line,
who is no longer the master but the slave of production.
It is, I hope, now evident that there is a
definite relationship between religion and leisure. Our modern materialistic
"full employment" social system however, requires for its service men
that are spiritually bankrupt. The spiritual void in the life of modern
man is filled with "work" and his total occupation with this activity
in, one form or another, gives him a false sense of fulfilment which
mitigates the despair into which he inevitably lapses. A man spiritually
enlightened achieves fulfilment - achieves his instinct of "belonging"
to God and in God's creation in his religion. A man spiritually bankrupt
feels a spurious fulfilment in "work." And so "work" has become the
"religion" of our materialist age. What happened then to break down
the idea of leisure, which we have considered, so that, even though
the idea survives, it is become clouded and is jostled into the background
by new ideas?
ORIGINAL SIN AND LEISURE
At this point it is necessary to explain the
Christian doctrines of Original Sin and Justification, for the Christian
attitude to leisure is dependent upon the truth about the nature
of man, and his state before and after the Fall of Adam. When the
truth of these doctrines was denied, then the basis of the idea of
leisure was undermined. Briefly then, I summarise the teaching, which
was denied in varying degrees by Luther, Calvin, Jansen and others.
God created Adam as the first man and Eve the first woman. From Adam
and Eve the whole human race descends. When God created man, He gave
him, in addition to his nature, certain other endowments to which
man could lay no claim by virtue of his nature. Of these gifts the
primary one was sanctifying grace. God gave Adam other gifts - immortality
(ie., freedom from bodily death and from sickness and pain) and integrity.
By the gift of integrity man was free from that inclination to evil,
called concupiscence. These gifts Adam lost through the Fall and
through Adam they were lost by his descendents - the whole human
race.
Justification is a Divine act, which conveys
sanctifying grace to the soul, which by sin, either original or actual,
was spiritually dead.
CALVINISM
As simply and as briefly as I can put it, those
are the doctrines, which were held generally by Christians until
the time of Martin Luther. It is true that early in the Fifth century,
a British monk, Pelagius, denied the doctrine of Original Sin. His
view and the views held by Luther on the matter were poles apart,
and we need not concern ourselves in the context of Leisure with
Pelagianism. It held sway for only some 25 years, and its chief opponent
was St. Augustine (354-430).
Primarily it was the doctrine of Justification,
which Martin Luther denied. Luther's teaching is not pertinent to
the subject of the Christian view of leisure except in one aspect,
and that is the influence of his teaching on his own and subsequent
generations, which opened up the way for Calvinism. (I am not here
dealing with what is held by modern Lutherans or Presbyterians, on
which I am not qualified to comment. Here, and in the paragraphs
which follow, I speak of what Calvin himself believed and taught.)
In the middle sixteenth century John Calvin
accepted the Lutheran view that human nature is irremediably vitiated
by original sin. But Calvin was a much clearer and more logical thinker
than Luther. He developed Luther's ideas and held that view of the
absolute predestination of mankind which though humourously expressed
by Robert Burns in "Holy Willie's Prayer" is by no means misrepresented:
"O Thou, that in the heavens dost dwell, Wha as it pleases best Thysel',
Sends ane to Heaven and ten to Hell,
A' for Thy glory,
And not for onie guid or ill They've done afore Thee."
Calvinism spread from Geneva to France (where
its adherents were called Hugenots), to Scotland (where John Knox
was its chief propounded to Holland, to Poland, and to England through
the Puritans. From England it crossed the Atlantic to America. In
Geneva where Calvin had complete control, doctrine was quickly translated
into action. Elders were appointed whose function was to watch over
the lives of all individuals. They were stationed in every quarter
of the city so that nothing could escape their scrutiny. There must
be no leisure for its own sake - "those that are prodigal of their
time despise their own souls." (The Worth of the Soul, Matthew
Henry.) Contemplation became for the Puritan, a form of self-indulgence.
Work was exalted into a virtue - "God hath commanded you in some
way or other to labour for your daily bread." (Baxter's Christian
Directory, Vol. 1, p. 168.) Calvin's followers accepted "the
necessity of ... large scale commerce and finance, and the other
practical facts of business life."
(Religion and the Rise of Capitalism, p. 113, Prof. R. H. Tawney,
1926.) The word business is more correctly written and pronounced busy-ness.
JANSENISM
In the year 1640, there was published a book
(Augusti-nus) which was the fruit of twenty years' study of
the writings of St. Augustine. Its author, Cornelius Jansen, a Flemish
Catholic Bishop, had died two years before its publication. In his
book he refused to recognize that in the state in which man was created
by God, he was endowed with numerous gifts and graces that were the
pure gifts of God, in no way due to human nature. Since these gifts
were, according to Jansen, an integral part of man's natural equipment,
and since they were forfeited in the Fall of Adam, it followed that
by Original Sin, our nature was corrupted in its essence. Man fell
helplessly under the control of evil, so that, do what he would,
there was an irresistible inclination drawing him towards evil. To
counteract this inclination, Jansen held, God gives grace as a force
drawing man in the opposite direction, consequently man is drawn,
and drawn irresistibly towards good or towards evil according to
the relative strength of these two conflicting inclinations.
The Jansenist doctrine was taken up in France
by many who had hitherto rejected the teachings of Luther and Calvin,
and led to a campaign of rigorism in the Catholic Church in France
which lasted for nearly a century, and which was reminiscent of Pharisaism
or Puritanism, which have much in common. It has been said that the
Jansenists never learned to smile.
These policies were the logical outcome of the
philosophies from which they sprang. They have reached their apotheosis
in the period from the end of World War I to the present day. Exactly
how successful they have been in completely changing the social structure
of the world is, I think, self-evident. Why they were so successful
and how the policies have been helped to fruition is outside
my scope and would require a separate study.
THE GREEK AND ROMAN ATTITUDE TO WORK
To the Greeks and the Romans work was un-leisure.
To the modern world leisure has become un-work. We rest from work
only to repair the wear and tear of past work - only to build a reserve
of energy to fit us for more efficient work. The work of man has
become the same as the work of animals. Both men and animals work
to produce something. The sheep works of its nature to produce wool
and lambs. There is no intention on the part of the sheep to do this
- it does so of its very nature, operating by instinct. But in the
work of man there is an element other than the result produced -
this element is intention or purpose, which involves the exercise
of reason and will and which includes self-perfection or self-development.
Errors regarding the nature of personal beings
have led to the idea that the importance of a man consists primarily
in the production of impersonal goods or in some aspect of organization
of that production, and in his accomplishments for the State, for
art, for science, for economics - even for sport. Achievement, as
such, is placed above personality. Within the range of goods produced,
the preference is given to those which are least stamped with the
impress of individual personality. These goods are considered to
represent the "important"
and "serious" part of life such as the sphere of economics, politics,
national "development" and so on. Pure knowledge or art, or communities
such as family and marriage, are relegated to the background. Work,
as such, is immensely overrated. The terrible rhythm of work enslaves
the individual person and prevents him from fulfilling his true purpose.
Pope Pius XI pointed out (in Quadragesima Anno) that " ... it
may be said with all truth, that nowadays the conditions of social
and economic life are such that vast multitudes of men can only with
great difficulty pay attention to that one thing necessary - namely,
their eternal salvation." This is a modern reminder of the injunction
of Christ to Martha "... one thing is necessary . . .. Speaking as
the shepherd about his flock he remarked in a most poignant passage: "We
can scarcely restrain our tears when we reflect upon the dangers which
threaten them."
WORK FOR WORK'S SAKE
The position to which the function of work has
been exalted, does not mean that all persons are engaged in the work
itself for particularly long stretches of time. In fact, it is probable
that the majority of people work for less time than they have done
in past epochs. The important thing is though, that the function
of work has been elevated into an end in itself. Individuals, trades'
unions, employers' unions, political parties, whole nations are pursuing
work as an end in itself. All clamour insistently that we must have "full
employment." Since work has become an end in itself life is orientated
towards it. Studies of the aged are made with the primary aim of
equipping them for useful work. They must not be allowed even to
grow old in graceful leisure. Hours of work are shortened, and leave
from work is increased, so that work may become more efficient. Special
universities are instituted for the specific purpose of training
people for work. Even the insane are conscripted for work. It has
been found that they excel at certain functions, which are soul-killing
for a normal person. There has been speculation about what this type
of work will do to one who is normal.
The alternative to work is amusement, and this
is regarded as important and necessary, but of course, somewhat frivolous
in comparison with the really serious business of work. Amusement
plays an enormous role and is considered an essential part of life.
The racecourses, the football field, the television screen, the radio,
the picture theatre, the hotel, have become the alternatives to work.
We hear frequently the terms "escape films" and "escape literature." Escape
from the soul-destroying tedium of work into the dream world of amusement.
Idleness in its true sense. Beelzebub is invoked to cast out Satan.
"The modern alternative to work on the one hand
and amusement on the other is, in a certain way, an expression of
infantilism. It is normal for children to consider school as being
the serious part of life and to identify seriousness - with unpleasant,
burdensome tasks. The child is free to play only when schoolwork
is done, and playing thus becomes identified with the joyful. The
same unfortunate-alternative has sometimes-grave consequences in
education. Many guilt complexes are due to the fact that work is
considered to be the only serious part in life. Some people feel
morally guilty as soon as they are not working. They even feel "guilty" when
they give their time to some important human affair rather than to
professional work, even though in doing so they behave in the morally
right way." (Von Hilderbrand, op. cit., p. 226.)
New Times October 10, 1958. |
