Reinhold Niebuhr

Reinhold Niebuhr has frequently remarked that he is not a theologian. Whether we accept this genial self-depreciation will depend on the meaning we assign to the word. Certainly, as Paul Lehmann has put it, " Niebuhr is not writing systematic theology. But he is writing theological ethics. And what he demonstrates is that when Christian doctrine is considered in relation to ethics, the insights expressed in the doctrine take on reality and meaning and the concerns of ethics are given foundation and direction." The world he knows so well and which he has analyzed so perceptively, has always been viewed by him from the perspective of the revelation in Christ. Niebuhr's thinking is thoroughly Christocentric. And if profound and continuous reflection on the meaning of the Christ event for man and history is the mark of the theologian then assuredly Niebuhr is a theologian. Be that as it may, the Christocentric character of Niebuhr's thought is of paramount significance for his ethics. His concern is ever to show how the agape of the Cross illumines the whole meaning of our existence and provides both insight and resource for the responsible living of our life. At the Cross we discern that love which is the norm, the law of human life.

Simply to say this is to be confronted with a number of questions that lead us at once into the heart of Niebuhr's thought. What does Niebuhr mean by the love which is the law of life? Throughout the years he has been involved in continuous controversy over this matter and thus has had ample opportunity to state and clarify his thought. We can best get his understanding before us by asking him two questions: (1) What is the nature of the norm? and (2) What is the source of the norm? When we have secured our answers to these questions, we shall then be able to inquire how he understands the relationship of the norm to the decisions and structures of our historical existence.

In a word, the norm of life is love--sacrificial, heedless, uncalculating love. "The law of his [i.e. man's] nature is love, a harmonious relation of life to life in obedience to the divine centre and source of his life." It is the love that "seeketh not its own," but sacrificially and spontaneously seeks ever the neighbor's good. It is the agape of the Cross which, as someone has said, Paul in Corinthians did not so much think up as copy down.

This understanding has certainly not gone unchallenged. Niebuhr has had continually to define and defend his understanding, especially against three other positions: (1) those who believe that the concept of mutual love is more meaningful and relevant; (2) the proponents of natural law; and (3) those who are impatient with all norms and who conceive self-interest as "normative." It is only as we see Niebuhr's position in relation to these that the full dimensions of his concept of sacrificial love as the norm of life can be uncovered. At this point it will be most profitable for us to note his debate with those who contend that the concept of "mutual love" more fully interprets the meaning of Christian love.

This debate began early. In 1933, in a critical discussion of Moral Man and Immoral Society, George A. Coe joined the debate with Niebuhr at this very point. It is the transcendent character of the norm of sacrificial love that disturbs Coe as much as Niebuhr's loss of "confidence in human nature." This sacrificial and "disinterested" love which Niebuhr"mistakenly calls Christian," continues Coe, "if it existed, would be a nuisance. But he thinks it sublime, and therefore regards as inescapable tragedy the fact that it won't work."