Thrownness

Thrownness is finding oneself in a particular time and place, meaning a particular culture and understanding of what it is to be human. Heidegger (2019) writes, “This characteristic of Dasein's Being—this ‘that it is’—is veiled in its ‘whence’ and ‘whither’, yet disclosed in itself all the more unveiledly; we call it the ‘thrownness’ of this entity into its ‘there’; indeed, it is thrown in such a way that, as Being‐in‐the‐world, it is the ‘there’. The expression ‘thrownness’ is meant to suggest the facticity of its being delivered over” (174).

Thrownness is my contextual givenness in being, and thus my ability to make sense of the world is constrained by my particular situation (Withy 2014, 65). As Katherine Withy (2014) states, “to be human is to be both free, spontaneous, transcendent, and limited, constrained or finite” (61–62). My situation restricts my ability to make sense of the world I am thrust into. According to Withy (2014), “our sense‐making is always limited by the particular things that are to be made sense of, and by the particular ways of making sense of them available to us” (62). For instance, prior to the Copernican Revolution, it was a reasonable and sensible thing to believe that the heavens rotated around the Earth. However, such a belief is no longer acceptable. How I make sense of the world is constantly bumping up against the limits of my context. Therefore, my ability to interpret the world is ontologically restrained by my thrownness. Thrownness is constitutive of the human person. If this is correct, then whatever is meant by the image of God is also constituted by being thrown.

Fallenness

Thrownness is more than our context; it is the fact that Dasein cannot ground their situatedness that makes them Dasein. Moreover, that situatedness is what is known as being fallen. Fallenness, Heidegger states, “designates an essential relationship of man to Being within Being's relation to the essence of man” ([1976] 1993, 235–36). Fallenness is an existential feature of Dasein's Being‐in‐the‐world. In their everydayness, Dasein lives in a state of falling‐into‐the‐world. The downward plunge, this motion of falling, is a falling away from one's self, as a self‐determining being. John Caputo (1984) observes that fallenness is to drift away from a “proper self‐understanding, and to interpret itself in light of the public understanding” (169). Fallenness is a movement from an authentic to an inauthentic way of being‐in‐the‐world.

Fallenness, however, does not have the typical negative connotations associated with fallen or inauthentic. Fallen and inauthentic describes one's usual way of being in the world; it is the average everydayness of existence. Although Heidegger's conception of fallenness shares echoes with some theological understanding of fallenness, for Heidegger, there is no moral component to being fallen. Therefore, it is not helpful to envisage an Augustinian concept of original sin or the fall. Instead, fallenness is the natural state of being human; it is an absorption into the world due to Being‐with‐one‐another.

Projection

To be authentic is to choose to be oneself. Heidegger (2019) writes, “Dasein is in each case essentially its own possibility, it can, in its very Being, ‘choose’ itself and win itself…. But only in so far as it is essentially something which can be authentic—that is, something of its own” (68). Authentic Dasein chooses to actualize certain possible ways of being based on one's desires and not the world's. To the extent it is concerned with its Being, Dasein exists as a state of possibilities. However, this is not a mental state of planning and carrying forth; instead, it is a primordial condition of Dasein. As Heidegger (2019) tells it, projection is understanding; understanding insofar as it “is the existential Being of Dasein's own potentiality‐for‐Being; and it is so in such a way that this Being discloses in itself what its Being is capable of” (184). The projecting of Dasein is the disclosing of Dasein's possibilities. Heidegger (2019) argues that “as understanding, Dasein projects its Being upon possibilities” (188). The consequence of projection is that Dasein exists in a state of perpetual becoming, as I am, and I am not yet. Heidegger's claim of unfulfilled possibility is oppositional to any a priori determinative statement about what it means to be human.

Language and Self‐Referential Emotions

The philosopher Charles Taylor also argues that humans are interpretive animals, and here, Taylor defends a specific instance of interpretation, which is self‐interpretation. In Heideggerian terms, Taylor explores the idea of Dasein as the type of entity for which Being is a concern.

Taylor ([1985] 1999) maintains that the hermeneutics of humankind, as ontologically self‐interpretive animals, appears to contravene the modern “paradigm of clarity and objectivity” (45). How could one arrive at something objective, that is, ontological, by examining one's experience of the world? At face value, one's experience appears to be subjective. Nevertheless, like Heidegger, Taylor (1999) claims that one's self‐interpretation and experiences are constitutive of the human person; and are not merely subjective nor epiphenomenal (47).

The Argument

Taylor presents a five‐part constructive argument, in which interpretation is an ontological feature of human existence. As his point of departure, Taylor (1999) takes the thread of contemporary philosophy that runs through Heidegger, Hans‐Georg Gadamer, Jürgen Habermas, and others of this ilk, who, in one fashion or another, argue that humans are self‐interpreting animals (45). The synopsis of Taylor's (1999) argument is as follows: (1) some emotions have meaning attributed to them; (2) these imports are self‐referential; (3) one's subject‐referring emotions provide epistemic insight into the human constitution; (4) the constitution of one's emotions is determined by how one articulates their emotions; and (5) that articulation, or in other words interpretation, requires language (75–76). Taylor's argument demonstrates that interpretation is ontological, thus not a contingent feature of humankind.

Import‐Bearing Emotions

Starting with the first claim, Taylor (1999) argues that emotions are import‐bearing experiences of a given situation (49). Imports ground the subject's emotion or feeling. An import is anything that gives importance or relevance to a subject's desires, purposes, or feelings; they are difference‐making properties (Taylor 1999, 49). For example, adjectives such as shameful or wonderful. Moreover, saying I feel a certain way regarding a given situation is to say that the emotion discloses the situation as it is (Taylor 1999, 49). It is one thing to be ashamed of an action; it is another to say that the situation is shameful. That is, my feeling of shame reveals the situation as one that is shameful as I experience it (Taylor 1999, 49).

Heidegger on Moods

Experiencing something like shame, from a phenomenological perspective, is to acknowledge one's emotion or feeling as “an essential feature of it tout court” (Taylor 1999, 48). Here, Taylor closely aligns with Heidegger's understanding of moods. Moods are the everyday ontic expression of Dasein's state‐of‐mind, which is ontological (Heidegger 2019, 172). The term state‐of‐mind refers to an openness to the possibility of moods, the state of being affected. Having a state‐of‐mind or the ability to be affected is an existential attribute of Dasein (Heidegger 2019, 174). Affectedness is an essential aspect of becoming the image of God, which I discuss below regarding Kathryn Tanner's (2010) conception of the human person and the image.

According to Heidegger (2019), moods are a product of Being‐in‐the‐world. Moods are context‐dependent; they assail us (176). In this sense, they are neither subjective nor objective; they just are. More importantly, moods are disclosive; they are an apocalypse of Being, delivering Dasein over to the fact “that‐it‐is,” as being‐there in its world (Heidegger 2019, 173). Heidegger (2019) writes, “The mood has already disclosed, in every case, Being‐in‐the‐world as a whole, and makes it possible first of all to direct oneself towards something” (176). For Heidegger, mood discloses Dasein so that Dasein finds itself, is brought before itself.

Heidegger's conception of mood is not the same as emotion, though they are closely linked. His discussion on fear, in §30 of Being and Time (Heidegger 2019, 179–82), suggests that emotions are an expression of a mood. However, Taylor shares with Heidegger the idea that emotions, or in Heidegger's case, moods, disclose a fundamental aspect of nature and reveal something about oneself. Taylor's second argument refers to the emotions as being subject‐referring.

Emotions as Disclosive

Coming back to shame, shame is subject‐referring because it shapes the subject and can only be born out of experience. Properties that are subject‐referring exist within a subject's experience (Taylor 1999, 54). As a result, subject‐referring properties, like moods, are neither subjective nor objective (Taylor 1999, 55). Shame, Taylor (1999) argues, is an import ascription and not merely subjective. Instead, ascribing an import to an experience “is to make a judgment about the way things are” and not reducible to a feeling (55).

Often these subject‐referring properties place on the subject an obligation. According to Taylor (1999), Subject‐referring properties obligate me to action, such as caring for the environment or another person (57–58). To show concern for or care of another is also subject‐referring. I am obligated to act for a subject other than myself (Taylor 1999, 58). More relevant to my thesis is Taylor's claim that humans bear the weight of obligation because of the type of creature they are. Taylor (1999) writes: “But in this case, the import is that we are called upon to act. And we are called upon in virtue of being a certain kind of creature” (58). Unlike other animals or inanimate objects (e.g., rocks), humans are obligated to the world around them (58). As a result of being human, self‐referring import properties place an obligation on oneself to act. Not only in support of fellow humans but in all situations that obligate us toward another (i.e., care for the environment or nonhuman animals). It is arguable that being an image‐bearer, assuming that the image of God is more than a synonym for humans, would place on human persons an obligation, one that they could recognize and respond to appropriately. Furthermore, it seems reasonable to say that animals and inanimate objects do not have obligations to act. Humans feel compelled to act, to make a difference in the world (e.g., action on climate change, humanitarian aid). The call to act, placed on humankind, brings Taylor to his third point, that subject‐referring emotions reveal a sense of what it means to be human (60).

The Reflexive Self

Self‐reflexivity, Taylor (1999) argues, is a core trait for being human. Reflexivity allows human persons to identify matters of importance to them (60). He understands self‐reflexivity to ground the traditional view that humans are rational animals (Taylor 1999, 60). For me to feel shame, or more optimistically, dignity is for those feelings to serve an epistemic purpose. It is a judgment about what I know to be so (Taylor, 60). Taylor writes, “If I were quite impervious to any such feeling, these norms and ideals would carry no weight with me; I would not even be tempted to subscribe to them, and I would not describe myself as ‘knowing’ that they were true/valid” (60–61). Underlying these emotions is a claim of what I know to be true of reality. Of course, that does not make it so.

Nevertheless, my feelings demonstrate a situational awareness by which I ascribe a sense of truth to my import‐bearing emotions. It is clear to Taylor that for feelings to be import‐bearing, they must refer to a self‐aware subject. As such, one cannot reductively come to understand a situation as having import by itself. I could not describe an act or context as fearful, shameful, or dignified if I did not have the import‐bearing emotions. Therefore, Taylor (1999) argues that reasoning is “reasoning out of insight embedded in feeling” (61–62). Moreover, subject‐referring emotions disclose the openness of being human and to the possibility of the good. A good, Taylor contends, results from the good's alignment with one's feelings (63). With that last statement, the objectivist's hackles are certainly raised. How can Taylor justify the good as being that which aligns with one's feelings?

Temporarily setting that objection aside, if I, as an image‐bearer, have obligations that necessitate actions, I must be able to append some semblance of right or wrong to those actions. In other words, I must be able to discern the world's goods and behave toward them accordingly, especially if the world results from a creator God's divine will. For Taylor, to think reflexively about one's emotional response to a given situation provides a context for discerning the good or the appropriate action to take.

To recap Taylor's first three arguments: certain emotions are import‐bearing, and as such, they reveal something about how the world is. Subsequently, for emotions to be revelatory, they must be subject‐referring. That is, they must reveal situations or things to be necessary to a subject. Thus, self‐referencing and import‐bearing emotions provide epistemic insight into reality and an intuitive sense of the good. As self‐reflexive subjects, humans discriminate about what goods are higher than others and which goods are a good at all.

Articulation and Language

For Taylor, this is the point where he can begin to speak as humans as the self‐interpreting animal. Thinking reflexively about my import‐bearing emotions assign a moral predicament to any situation, where I make hierarchical claims about goods and label other goods as not being a good at all (Taylor 1999, 63). Taylor's (1999) fourth point is that my self‐referring, import‐bearing emotions are dependent on my articulation of them (64), and language (his fifth claim) constitutes subject‐referring emotions (71). Taylor (1999) argues that in stacking articulation on top of the first three claims, he can now assert that humans are therefore self‐interpreting—“For the joint result of the first three claims is that our subject‐referring emotions open us to the domain of what it is to be human. And now we see them as giving articulation to this domain” (64). Articulation reveals the domain of being human, and language is an essential feature of articulation.

The discriminating process is an articulation of one's moral reasoning. In saying I find X to be a good, I am saying that this is important and valuable. Therefore, by affirming certain emotions as being import‐bearing, I am explicitly stating that these are central to being human. Discerning some goods to be of higher value than others articulates my moral predicament (Taylor 1999, 63). Articulations, Taylor (1999) writes, “are like interpretations in that they are attempts to make clearer the imports things have for us” (65).

My moral intuition emerges out of feelings, and emotions are initial attempts to articulate my interpretation of a situation. However, and here Taylor (1999) hopes to assuage the fears of the objectivist, while articulations are born out of one's feelings, they are not left to my interpretation alone (64). If I feel guilty, I intuit an action as right or wrong; this implies a pre‐given understanding of right or wrongness. If not, how else could I assign a sense of guilt to my feeling? There is a context out of which I am interpreting my feelings. As Taylor (1999) states, “the interpretation is constitutive of the feeling” (63). If my interpretation is to bring clarity, it must be attempting to understand a situation in its givenness as something real and independent of myself. For an articulation to be of use, it must “be faithful to what it is that moves us” (Taylor 1999, 64–65). If I have faithfully articulated a feeling of shame, then the context must be one that is shameful. According to Taylor, there is a getting something right or wrong about one's interpretation. It is not simply a subjective mooring. Interpretation is not a contingent feature of being human; it is an essential aspect of human existence (65).

Emotions are an initial articulation of the givenness of a situation. However, emotions suggest a need for a more thorough articulation. Accordingly, Taylor argues that these initial articulations give way to further articulations, as each interpretation must also be interpreted. It is a lifetime process of self‐interpretation striving toward self‐understanding (Taylor 1999, 65). Language, Taylor argues, provides a means for fuller articulation. Language clarifies an emotion and defines it. To say that I am angry provides the context for understanding my emotive response as one of anger. Therefore, no matter how I might feel, I understand that feeling in the language that defines it. Language is constitutive of one's feelings. Taylor (1999) states, “Language articulates our feelings, makes them clearer and more defined; and in this way transforms our sense of the imports involved; and hence transforms the feeling” (71). I cannot understand my emotion as anger or fear without having a concept of anger or fear, which language provides.

Moreover, language, for everyone, is ontological; it is constitutive for being human. Although language is certainly a contingent feature of reality, it is nonetheless ontological. Language forms me; it is how I come to understand myself, and it mediates my experience of the world. Language is something I receive, something given to me. Taylor (1999) argues that “language is constitutive of our emotions,” not because one can articulate them, but because they are “the medium in which all our emotions, articulate and inarticulate, are experienced” (74). My ability to clearly express my emotions is predicated by my ability to use language (language is, of course, more than the spoken word). Therefore, I can only articulate my emotions in the terms set forth in the language I am given.

To summarize Taylor's argument: some emotions are import‐bearing—they have meaning. These imports are self‐referential, and subject‐referring emotions give access to what it means to be human. Emotive responses are articulations, interpretive responses to one's situation. Finally, language clarifies one's emotions, and as the medium of articulation, they also shape what one's feelings mean and thus shape the person.

Heidegger on Language

Taylor's argument intends to demonstrate that humans are self‐interpreting animals, and he concludes that emotions and language are constitutive of what it means to be human. Heidegger, whom Taylor (1999) draws upon, argues that language is an existential characteristic of Dasein. For Heidegger, humans are interpretive animals tout court. Not only are they self‐interpreting, they interpret the world around them. Heidegger (2019) writes: “But in significance itself, with which Dasein is always familiar, there lurks the ontological condition which makes it possible for Dasein, as something which understands and interprets, to disclose such things as ‘significations’; upon these, in turn, is founded the Being of words and of language” (121). Heidegger acknowledges both the contingent and ontological nature of language, recognizing that Dasein as Being‐in‐the‐world is always a part of the totality of relations, significance. Humans are a part of the set of relations that makes language possible, and thus, Dasein's understanding and interpretation of the world. Dasein discloses the signification of beings, that is, their meaningful presence. Not only are human persons self‐interpretive, but they also interpret their world and other entities in it. A world with God as its author; therefore, the ability to reveal meaning in the world is arguably a necessary trait of the imago Dei.

Heidegger (2019) argues that “all interpretation is grounded on understanding” (195). Understanding is not knowledge; it is one's comportment to the world, that is, the set of relations. Furthermore, Heidegger (2019) states, “That which has been articulated as such in interpretation and sketched out beforehand in the understanding in general as something articulable, is the meaning” (195). In my fore‐conception of the world, due to my comporting to a set of relations, I already conceive of them belonging together. My interpretation, expressing something as something, is the meaning. However, note that Dasein discloses the meaning and does not bestow it. The totality of relations already possesses the possibility of being articulated as such.

In Heidegger's view, language is not an instrument of human will. Language, as Heidegger (2019) argues, is the “existential constitution of Dasein's disclosedness” (203). Language is self‐revelatory. Heidegger ([1976] 1993), in “Building Dwelling Thinking,” writes, “Man acts as though he were the shaper and master of language, while in fact language remains the master of man” (348). Moreover, Heidegger (2019) argues that discourse, speech, is “the existential‐ontological foundation of language” (203). The ability to discourse makes possible intelligibility, which is meaningfulness. Language is how I give shape to meaning in‐the‐world. Talking is always talking about something (2019, 204). Discourse expresses meaningfulness (2019, 204). According to Heidegger, “It is language that tells us about the essence of a thing” (1993, 348). Language shapes me, and I use language to shape my word. As such, I interpret not only myself, but also the world around me.

Both Taylor and Heidegger argue that humans are interpretive animals. While Taylor considered the self‐interpretive nature of human persons, Heidegger claims humans to be interpretive animals, full stop. Through gestures, actions, art, and language, humans can articulate meaning and understanding. Communication is arguable a necessary characteristic of the imago Dei. As image‐bearers, it seems that making God known, not only to oneself but to all creation, is an intrinsic feature of the image.

The Self‐Interpreting Image

Philosopher and theologian Claudia Welz, in Humanity in God's Image, argues that the image of God is a semiotic referent point to God. However, humans are not mere signs; instead, they are the only sign capable of self‐interpretation (Welz 2016, 46). According to Welz (2016), my self‐understanding, my self‐image, is an admixture of “feelings, thoughts, decisions, and dreams” (51). It is out of this self‐image, Welz argues, that humans are the image of God. They interpret themselves out of their self‐image, making visible the image of God. There is a co‐present image of God “in our acts of self‐presentation” (Welz 2016, 47).

Human self‐reflection is the conscious plumbing of one's own depths. By turning inward, Welz, like Taylor, argues that humans learn to express themselves as they wish to be seen. If I am to bear the image of the invisible God, then I must understand myself to be the imago Dei. As Welz (2016) states, “our self‐understanding must reflect that we are more than just the images of ourselves” (470). Therefore, emerging alongside my self‐knowledge, yet remaining distinct, is the knowledge of God (Welz 2016, 47). Welz is not saying that self‐interpretation is equal to interpreting God. Instead, as an image‐bearer, I can only bear that image out of my human capacities, and I can only articulate God through my self‐image.

Christ the Key

Kathryn Tanner (2010), in Christ the Key, unlike Taylor and Welz, does not take a phenomenological approach to Christology and instead, quite explicitly works with Christian strands of Neoplatonism (viii–ix). However, Tanner shares, with Heidegger, similar insights into the human person, which I will explore here, that makes possible human images of God. Moreover, like Welz, Tanner envisions Christ as the key to understanding God's image. However, I focus on the human traits Tanner identifies as to why humans can bear the image of God.

Tanner (2010) argues for the human person's lack of a given definition, malleability, unbounded character, and general openness to radical transformation as theologically interesting characteristics that make God's imaging possible (1). In contrast to theologies that equate the image of God to human attributes (e.g., human rationality, free will, the ability to rule), Tanner argues for a Christ‐centered understanding of the image of God, which she brings to bear on the human person. Nonetheless, while reticent of specific human attributes traditionally held to be the reason for declaring humans as God's image, Tanner embraces ontological aspects of human nature to account for human's ability to image God.

The Nature of Image‐Bearers

Tanner (2010) provides several key traits that distinguish human beings from other created beings—radical openness, plasticity, and the ability to form themselves. All of which closely align with Heidegger's Dasein and the existential care structure. According to Tanner, these distinct traits allow humankind to attach itself to the divine through attachment to Christ, allowing humans to image God in the strong sense.