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31УДК 141.144 + 141.5 + 17.021.2
The History of Personality
Galina S. Ryzshkova*
Ural Federal University 51 Lenin str., Ekaterinburg, 620083 Russia 1
Received 9.07.2011, received in revised form 8.10.2011, accepted 14.11.2011
The article carries on a thorough research of the history and development of the concept “personality”. It is shown that the components of the idea “personality” were based on one another historically: at first there was individuality, then-personality, after I. Kant there was personalization. Only after the European Reformation the notion “personality” establishes itself with its complete features. There is an independent existence of a person in it. A particular area is formed in anthropology which is called personology.
Keywords: philosophy, anthropology, personality, personology, personalism, impersonalism.
Introduction. The notion “personality” is one of the most commonly used ones. It is employed in the humanities, in philosophy and theology. The idea of personal existence has become an important regulating principle of the European countries and the countries ruled by them. The importance of personality, their rights and freedoms have become the basis for the world view of the newest philosophical, social and psychological personology.
There is a substantial amount of literature on the study of personality. It can be found in philosophy, sociology and especially in psychology, where the idea of personality is one of the most popular ones. There is also a lot of secondary literature where the conceptions of personality are studied and systemized. Specialists number several hundred definitions for the concept “personality”. Nevertheless, according to the majority of researchers it is still one of the most indefinite ones. The notion is believed to
have appeared in the philosophy of personalism at the end of the XIX - the beginning of the XX centuries. It is true to some extent, as “personality” in personalism is the key notion, around whose definition all theoretical discussions are formed. But if we consider the content of this notion, its semantic characteristics and connotations, we have to admit that “personality” has had a long history of development.
The roots of the concept “personality”. There were different definitions of the notion “personality” in ancient languages that were close to the modern idea of this word. Firstly, we one should consider ancient and Semitic cultures.
In ancient Greek there were several notions: npocmnov - person, tStrnxn? - a person isolated from the society h rcoMxn? - person as part of the society. Besides npocmnov didn’t just mean a person’s face but it was used to mean a person in general. It was employed to mean an actor’s role
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(mask), a role in the court: plaintiff, defendant etc.
A Latin word «persona» was similar to the word «rcpocrnrcov». Tertullian introduced it into common usage, transferring the term “persona” from the legal practice into works about a human being and his soul. Unlike the Greek analogue, “persona” was perceived in a more common way, to define an autonomous individual, and was used with specifying predicates: persona grata or persona non grata, persona civtata etc.
Both rcpocrnrcov» and «persona» expressed a human individuality. The fact that Aristocle was different from Aristophanes and Feodor was different from Theophrastus, wasn’t a particular secret to an ancient man. But in ancient times there were no examples of a human existence as a person that would acknowledge a person’s selfassertion. Human individuality and distinctive natural characteristics and features were not perceived as originality, self-determination, as a person. Because an ancient man, even a great man like Caesar, considered himself as part of an entity: a polis-like state, ruled by gods.
Ancient Hebrew knew about a “face” as a synonym to a person. In the Jewish Bible there were two terms, meaning “face”: hn (af) and q’dd (phanim). The first one - hn (af) meant a person’s appearance in Hebrew, a face in its own sense, including a nose, nostrils, in other words they meant protruding parts of the face. A famous Biblical story about the creation of man and him taking in God’s breath is based on hn (Gen. 2:7).
Another definition of a person - q’dd had several meanings in Hebrew. This word, like hn, was used to mean “surface”- or “exterior visible or front side of both inanimate and animate objects”, for example earth, wind (Gen. 2:6, 4:14, 7:4, Psalms 34:5, 102/103:30). Besides, there are many places in the Scripture where a person is referred to in another meaning. For instance: “I didn’t expect to see your face,” said Israel to
Joseph (Gen. 48:11). It is obvious that it’s not only about appearance, his son’s face, that Jacob who had aged was looking forward to seeing, but most importantly it’s about him meeting with his son who had changed and grown up in a foreign place apart from him. In “Book of Leviticus” it is also said that the necessity to revere a face of an old man is synonymous with a wise and experienced person. “Stand up before the face of an old greyhaired man and revere him and be afraid of your God” (Lev. 19:32).
It had very deep religious roots, because reverence of the elderly was based on the fear of God. The perception of the face as q’dd, as a person in general, was based on the Jewish tradition - there was comprehension of God as a Personality and a Face. A feature of being a Face meant his ability to express himself in his own way he desires. God has a complete freedom to show himself, his Face or hide it. That’s why he is a Personal God. He rules the world freely, keeps its existence and the existence of his every creation. (Psalms 103/104: 27-30)
Thus the word “face” (Q’30) in sacred Jewish scriptures didn’t just mean “face as part of the body” but was also used to refer to God, angels and human beings. It was employed to mean a person as a whole, pointing to his special characteristics in comparison with other people. The right to have q’dd referred to free people and slaves, men and women. That’s why the Hebrew was inclined to accept the individuality along with the importance of a person’s face. It meant something more than in Antiquity, because the importance of every single person was admitted.
Christianity and personality. Christianity took a Jewish image to name a person with his face in another sense - according to his relationship with other free conscious-minded people. Christ is God who appeared in flesh and had the Face -npocmrcov. He let us see it in the full glory of his transformation (Matthew 17:2, Luke 9:29), saying
to his disciples: “The one who saw Me, saw the Father” (Joann. 14:9).
Jesus Christ’s commandment about love to God “until hatred to oneself” (Luke 14:26) does not mean you need to destroy all that is human in a person. The point is it’s necessary to hate “the old self” man in order to give birth to “a new God’s creature” (Galat. 6:15), that is not an impersonal typical creature, because different gifts of the Holy Spirit yield before a naked man (1 Corinth. 12:8-7, 10-11). God creates life and enriches individuality and a man’s personality, because it is precious to Him. The idea of personality, the value of a man’s individual existence is one of the most crucial ones in the New Testament. Its importance is even bigger than in the Jewish culture, for all the differences between a man and God are excluded in Christianity: “There are no Jewish, no heathens, no slaves, no free men, no women, for you all are the same in Jesus Christ” (Galat. 3:28)
This thought was the key one for the holy fathers. “God’s image” becomes the main anthropological category that characterizes the man’s essence. It also measures the importance of a man, unveils God in a person. The notion “God’s image” starts from Saint Irenaeus, which is called “divinization”. In the times of Trinitarian theological discussions and arguments were concentrated around the notions “face” and its difference from “essence”. Another term appeared and was introduced by Origen who had borrowed it from Plotinus. Originally the word meant “lecturn” in Greek, and according to Aristotle it was a synonym to the basis of essence. Cicero translated the word «urcocxaci9> into Latin substantia in parts (loan translation) to define the members of the Holy Trinity in order to characterize people. This translation caused much debate in the West, as it could be understood as the Holy Trinity according to Aristotle’s theories. When referring to a human, the word was also
perceived as something inappropriate: a human being was alike an inanimate creature.
Another Greek word axo^ov (inseparable) turned out to be a terminological problem. Cicero again translated the word into “indiduum” which gradually started to be perceived as a personal definition, similar to a person, applied to a man’s characteristics as a whole and complete entity where the body and the soul are in harmony.
As it is generally known the great Cappadocians - St. Basil the Great, St. Gregory of Nazianzus, St. Gregory of Nyssa - defined the Trinityterminology,includingthenotions“person” («rcpocrnrcov») and “image” («unocxaci^»). St. Basil the Great distinguished between the words “essence” and “image”, defining “image” as a part of the whole - the essence.
Cappadocians are given the credit for approximating the two notions - “image” and “face” to the point of identifying between them. When applied to animated objects the notion “image” became a personality term, whereas “face” transformed from the axiological standard role term into ontological one. As a consequence a new term appeared - “image-face”. Thereby, by using the categorial research of the Antique philosophy, theologists managed to prove theoretically the Biblical idea of the personal god and the idea of the similarity between a man and God, where the God’s image exists in a personal free and conscious reality.
In the anthropological projection the categorical term “image-face” did not leave its mark. The Cappadocians claimed that a man’s true calling was not his attempts to be original and unique, which was very characteristic of the patristic tradition. The Fathers thought that a desire to assert oneself is the sign of passion and pride. A man’s calling is to reach divinization which would not deprive him of his individuality and important personality traits. But this divinization should change the individuality for the best.
St. Fathers of Cappadocia, like the fathers later on, did not find it necessary to introduce a new term, different from “face”, “image” and “individual”. They used these words interchangeably. There was no theoretical need for that. Reverend John of Damascus said about it: “Holy Fathers refused to have pointless arguments about many things and called the inferior kind -substance (oumav), nature (^uciv) and form (^op^v) - for instance an angel, a human being and a dog etc. ... Something singular they called “an individual” (axo^ov), “face” or “image”, e.g. Peter or Paul” (John of Damascus, p. 84). When referring to animated objects, Reverend John and the latest Eastern teachers thought that an individual, face and image did not mean the nature (essence, substance) of people and dogs, not their common natural traits: freedom, consciousness, morality, but their many individual differences in human nature.
Personality in scholastics. This tradition of using the word remained in the western scholastics. Due to the peculiarities of the development in the theological thought in the West, some unique ideas and notions were introduced there. On analyzing the image (personal) entity of Christ’s natures, Boethius did not think it was correct to call Him a “person”, which was connected to the theatrical mask and could lead to accepting a phantasmal human nature in the Savior. That’s why a Greek term “image” was more appropriate. On showing its shades of meaning he uses the term “subsistencia” as a bearer of accidents in a conscious individual. He defines a person (in the Russian translation “personality”) as “an individual substance of the conscious nature” (Boethius, p. 138).Boethius did not think this definition to be either final or very important, because the crucial thing for him was to find the unity of Christ’s image as opposed to Nestorius and Eutychian, and to define the formula of the Trinity. According to Boethius there is a common
essence (essentia) and sub-essence, but there are three substances and persons in the Trinity. In this idea Boethius is very precise and gives absolutely the same definitions as the Greeks. Christ has two essences (sub-essences), two substances (the Greeks would read it as “images”), but one person (in the Russian translation “personality”). A human is the essence, the sub-essence and substance, the person and the personality.
The fact that Boethius redoubles the notions is of little value, as at first he identifies “substance” and “person” and then contrasts them. But with him begins the consistent tradition of using the notion “person” when referring to conscious objects and the notion “substance” acquires its modern usage in the sense of the fundamental principle.
Thomas Aquinas adheres to Boethius’s definition: “All the individuals with the ability to think are personalities” (Thomas Aquinas, p. 369). He uses a specific personal notion -“personalites” - in order to define the Holy trinity, angels and saints. This notion means a superior form of a person’s existence, the superlative form, which is in its sense close to the perfection - the human sub-essence, which is in its turn the genuine realization of the human’s personality. Other thinkers in scholastics (Johannes Scotus Eriugena, Roger Bacon etc.) perceived the person, the sub-essence of the human individual, the same way.
Reformation and the affirmation of the personality. Judging by the development of the sense, the idea of personality and the values it generated, we can claim that it was not formed until the Renaissance idea of the value in the earthly man or what is more likely not until the period of the new European civilization. The connection between the personal way of existence and the basic values of the western civilization of the New Time after Reformation is quite obvious. A man, having established his sovereignty, could
assert his right to be independent by making it the principle of his existence. “The right of the personal property is sacred” is confirmed in the first constitutions of the west. The right to choose his own government and influence its politics also becomes sacred for a man with self-respect and dignity. By protecting their rights for sovereignty, sovereign individuals create special protective institutions - legal and civil societies. That is only a person who determined himself as independent, unique and valuable could fight for democratic and liberal values. It was due to Protestantism, its doctrine, ethics and worldview. Along with the ideas of capitalization of the property and the spirit of capitalism (according to M. Webber), the idea of the personal determination comes from Protestantism as an important principle. According to this a man and his value are determined by the autonomy of his freedom. The latter meant that a person had his own moral and social responsibility for what is his duty before God, society and himself. So the man became selfmademan - a man who did everything thanks to himself (Webber, p. 191). Both instances -the capitalization of the activity and the individualization of the will are interconnected and come from the ideas of Reformation, which belong to europeism and Modern Period.
M. Luther proclaimed two fundamental principles in his “95 theses”: “Solo fide” (salvation is possible only through faith) and “ Solo Scriptura” (the truth is only in the Scripture). He wrote that only through thoughtful reading of the Scripture and unconditional faith that God sent His Son in this world for Redemption, a person experiences a moral and spiritual rebirth. Thus a man is alike Christ and can do acts of piety judging on his faith. M. Luther commented on the epistle by Paul the Apostle to the Galatians: “I lead a double life - my own, natural or carnal and the Christ’s life. As for my carnal life, I’m dead and live someone else’s life...” “Then who
lives there?” - “A Christian” (Luther, p. 198). Luther’s Christian is a new existence of a person, which elevates him above his own nature and the non-believers. This is what defines the notion “personality”. According to Luther a Christian is a person ennobled by the faith. From the point of view of a person’s social and moral actions, a man started to be perceived as a ruler of his own ego, having enough internal sources of faith and service to Christ, no matter what his vocation or job is (Beruf).
Philosophical reflection on the personality in Modern Time. In post-Reformation philosophy the study of a person as individuality in nature was done by G.B. Leibnitz. The uniqueness of monads - individual substances - was projected on the uniqueness of human beings. Monads are spiritual. According to Leibnitz, “every monad should be different from one another as there aren’t two creatures in nature which are the same and have no internal differences” (Leibnitz, p. 414).
In “Monadology” it’s said that the psychic rules the world. It does not appear or gets destroyed, but it changes itself depending on the level of organization of the monads - from the unconscious to distinct and conscious ones. Leibnitz’s universal psychism (spiritualism) let him establish the steps in the development of the spiritual monads - from passive ones that accept the world and themselves to the active self-reflective ones - the human individuals, which are distinguished by the levels of their cognitive abilities. Neither the notion “image” nor “personality” is analyzed or used in Leibnitz’s theories.
I. Kant tried to discriminate between the notions“personality” and“person”.In his “Critique of Pure Reason” he used different definitions: «Person», «Personalitat», «Personlichkeit». From these the word «Personalitat» is the closest to the notion “personality” and it matches the
Russian word - “person as a carrier of a face”. The notion “person” according to Kant is not enough to prove whether these thinking creatures have the personality and whether they are aware of their existence, isolated from the matter. Kant thought that consciousness is a mandatory indication of a personality, but not of a person. A person is a figure whose actions can be sane. An individual’s moral responsibility, his sense of duty before other people reaches such level in a person when a conscious person becomes a personality. Through notions like “freedom”, “consciousness”, “responsibility”, “duty” Kant invents the formula of a personal existence. “A person elevated by the duty, that empirically defines the existence of a person in time and his aims...is a personality”. (Kant, p. 414). Kant shows the difference between a person and a personality with how freely he executes his duties before others. A personality, as a superior creature, has an ability to act independently with his own mind and to subordinate a person, as it belongs to the world perceived by senses. As a consequence, a personality is a form of existence of a person and manifests himself depending on the level of his development. Kant’s study on personalization proved itself to be very important as well. The term “personalization” was employed by Kant to define the process of the formation of a personality, acknowledgment of his ego as a beginning of a man’s transition from an individual to a personality. Personalization means applying human characteristics to objectify internal component of a person into his social, cultural and natural creative activity. “Personality” starts to be perceived as the main category of a man’s existence, which forms a new area in anthropology - personology.
Personalism and impersonalism on personality. Kant’s definition of personality later influenced his followers. A new movement -personalism - was formed. Its most famous
representatives include H. Lotze, G. Teichmuller, M. Scheler, G. Flewelling, N.O. Lossky, N. Berdyaev, E. Mounier. The common thought of all personalists was that a personality has internal sources of existence - freedom, creativity, spirituality, which are not rooted in nature, but which stand above it. A juxtaposition of “personality” and “individual” appeared in personalism. “Individual” is a nature notion, stressed N. A. Berdyaev, whereas “personality” belongs to the categories of spirit. Personality is an individual elevated by his creativity to the summits of his free self-expression.
Some Russian theologists also sided with personalism: metropolitan Antony Khrapovitsky, V. N. Lossky and others.
Berdyaev’s method to define personality was recorded by them in theological descriptions of personality. It’s especially obvious in the works of V. N. Lossky and a Greek metropolitan Ioann Ziziulas (F. Papanikolaou, p. 360). But are all the issues of the personal existence resolved? Including the original theological issues. For instance is acceptable to speak about the personality of the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit, or is the Holy Spirit supposed to be a personality? In general is it right to speak about the personality in Trinitarian and Christological theology? It turns out that there is no easy answer to any of those questions.
As opposed to Kant’s personalism another movement appeared - impersonalism. It claimed that a personality has external sources and borders of determination - society, politics etc. Its representatives in philosophy and sociology included K. Marx, E. Durkheim and P. Sorokin. A typical definition of a personality in impersonalism is “an individual existence of social relations”.
Essentially personalism revolted against depersonalizing a man, whereas impersonalism legitimized it. Subconsciously impersonalism
identifies “personality” with the Greek лоМтп? in an obvious way, and personalism rises against it and imperceptibly finds similarities between “personality” and npocranov, as it establishes some personal features, not characteristic for all human beings.
Conclusion. So when did the notion of personality appear? It is obvious that it did not happen in Antiquity, nor at the turn of Christian civilization. It is difficult to precisely define who the first person was to call a man a personality not a person, the bearer of a face. Not always do we manage to find the author of this or that notion. It is possible, although not so crucial, to define who introduced this or that term. It is of more importance to find out another thing: when the essence of the idea appeared and when a personal way of existence was recorded.
It is reliable to claim that the birthplace of the personality idea was Western Europe. Up until now Asia does not consider personality, a word so difficult to translate into their languages because of the differences in the mentality. It is also possible to show the appearance of the word “personality” in new European languages (with the interval of several hundred years). This is the period from XV to XVIII centuries. During this period words that mean personality appeared: “personality” in English, «Peronalitat» and «Personlichkeit» in German, «personalite» in French, «лросютакотпта» in Greek. The Russian word “личность” appeared later and was borrowed from the West at the end of the XVIII - the beginning of the XIX centuries. N. M. Karamzin was one of the first who used this word in his “History of Russia”.
In the modern consciousness the word “personality” means a way of the individual expression of the human ego, a way that is independent, sovereign or relatively independent from the external influence. First of all this term shows a person’s autonomous existence. At the same time personalism insists on the highest autonomy of a man’s personality, whereas impersonalism highlights the borders of this autonomy. Nevertheless in both sciences the final (necessary) sign of personality is the level of realization of a man’s freedom.
Besides, the history of personality shows that “personality” is a compound idea that has three components. The first idea is individuality that is a man’s uniqueness, which was acknowledged in ancient times, which now helps to transfer “personality” retrospectively into ancient cultures, although it is not precise. The second idea is the idea of personality that is the value of a human ego fully expressed in the Christianity of the New Testament and the holy fathers. The third idea is personalization that is man’s independence and autonomy appeared in Modern History, after Luther, Kant and their followers.
It is necessary to add that the components of the idea of personality were formed historically one on another: first there was individuality, then personality and after that personalization. There are many interpretations of the personality depending on its content. That is why we need to scientifically clarify this notion from all the semantic uncertainty by adding serious philosophical research to the sociological and psychological concepts.
References
Boethius “Against Eutychius and Nestorius” in Consolation of Philosophy” and other works, (Moscow, 1996) in Russian.
M. Webber “Protestant ethics and the spirit of capitalism” , Selected works (Moscow, 1990), in Russian.
Reverend John of Damascus, The source of knowledge (Moscow, 2002), in Russian.
I. Kant “Critique of Practical Reason”, Works in 6 volumes. - V. 4, p. 1 (Moscow, 1965), in Russian.
G. B. Leibnitz “Monadology”, Works in 4 volumes. - V. 1 (Moscow, 1982), in Russian.
M. Luther, Lectures on “Epistle to Galatians” (Minsk, 1997), in Russian.
F. Papanikolaou, “Divine energies or divine personhood: Vladimir Lossky and John Zizioulas on conceiving the transcendent and immanent God”, Modern Theology, 7 (2003), 357-385.
St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, P. 1. - Kiev; Moscow, 2002 (in Russian).
История личности
Г.С. Рыжкова
Уральский федеральный университет Россия 620083, Екатеринбург, Ленина, 51.
В этой работе исследуется история формирования понятия «личность». Показывается, что составные части идеи личности исторически вырастали друг на друге: сначала индивидуальность и персональность, далее, после И. Канта, персоналистичность. В полноте содержательных признаков «личность» утверждается после европейской Реформации. В ней автономное существование человека. Формируется особый раздел в системе антропологического знания - персонология.
Ключевые слова: философия, антропология, личность, персонология, персонализм,
имперсонализм.
