Who is holier? The man who does a righteous act after careful planning and benevolence[1] aforethought? Or how’s about the man who simply does what is righteous out of habit? Now, if you’re like most American Christians, especially Evangelicals and Pentecostals, you’ll probably say, without thinking, that the person who does the righteous deed out of benevolence – literally good-will in Latin – then that person is holier because he’s exercising his will, demonstrating that he actually WANTS to do good and isn’t just doing it out of habit.
And that certainly has something to it, does it not? There is something very Socratic (or Platonic?) about this argument. You can almost imagine reading this in one of the Dialogues…
Socrates: Who is holier: the man who chooses to love the gods or the man who loves the gods by rote?
Some Chump: Certainly, the man who chooses to love them, O wise Socrates.
Socrates: Then choosing is more important than not choosing?
Some Chump: I can see no other way of imagining it, Socrates!
Socrates: Then the things I do by habit are not meritorious?
Some Chump: No! Socrates, never!
Socrates: So, by this logic the man who never errs because he constantly does right by rote, pleases the gods less than the man who only does one act of piety in his entire life?
Some Chump: It is impossible to be otherwise, Socrates – you have proved your point and there is no possible counter-argument that ever could be presented, ever![2]
See, the problem with this argument, as is the problem with a lot of the psychological and legal-psychological and neuro-legal/ psychological/ legal-psychological/ philosophical…literature is that it only looks at habituated behavior from the point of decision-making. It doesn’t (or rarely) takes into consideration the causes of the habituated/ impulsive behavior.
For instance, in mock trials (and real ones) defense attorneys attempt to present juries with the claim that because the defendant’s brain is broken that he had no choice in carrying out the impulsive criminal caper! But the question that I, as a theologian, am interested in is “why did he become impulsive in this way?” Is it possible people can commit assaults, robberies, rapes, and murders without exercising free-will? Can people commit the most egregious evils by habit? Without choosing?
Well, yeah, probably. I think that’s completely consonant with the biblical record. The more evil[3] you do the less capable you are of not doing evil! That’s the danger of letting your conscience be seared with a hot iron. Let’s not forget that the Greek word for conscience is συνείδησις soon-AY-day-sis. Like the Latin word “conscience” sunaydaysis means “with knowledge”. It means both to do something consciously, with awareness of your actions in an experiential sense, as well as in a moral sense. In this way there’s a significant overlap in the meaning of the English, Latin, and Greek terms. What this means, biblically, is that a person can lose moral, and even physical awareness of their actions, after they’ve become habituated.
Now, maybe you think this is impossible! Is it? Have you never gotten home and realized that you have no idea how you drove the last 2 hours? Have you ever done a complex task at work while carrying on a conversation and never once actually thought about your work? Perhaps it exists, but I haven’t found any literature that demonstrates the upper-limit of complexity for habituated behaviors. It seems that under the right (or wrong) circumstances, any action can become a habit, nomatter how complex (or evil?).
OK, now here’s where the whole neuro-legal/ psychological/ philosophical stuff gets really interesting. Is a person who does evil things by habit bear any less responsibility than the one who does it with an active will? If by habit, I would say “No” he doesn’t bear LESS responsibility, but MORE! The “impulsive-actor” (to use technical parlance) has made a series of life choices to evil and so often that said impulsive-actor now does evil by habit. I’d say that makes him MORE responsible. More responsible because the reason he acts without will is because he willingly acted so evilly so often that he now is wretched by rote.
Let’s use an analogy that may help clarify. Who’s likely to be a better baseball player? A person who’s taken 1,000,000,000 ground-balls and hit 50,000 line drives, who works on the fundamentals every single day for hours a day so that he can play at the highest level or the person who walks up to the plate or stands at short-stop with no practice? Sure the unpracticed man has to consciously and willingly make every minute micro-movement. Sure, the All-Star doesn’t even think about using two-hands, moving the ball to his belly-button, finding the horseshoe-seams, and making a great throwing motion with his feet properly planted, getting the ball to first! He doesn’t think at all – it’s habit. And at home-plate! Is there a more physically complex and challenging act than hitting a major-league fastball? But the All-Star has hit a lot of fastballs, and quicker-than-thought, his body sees the release, trajectory, and spin on the ball and his habits do the calculations for him so that he can put a one square-inch portion of a round bat against a round ball moving by him at 90 mph or better! Who’s the better baseball player?
Now, you may say that this is an imperfect analogy, because in the baseball example we’re talking about talent, but with criminals we’re talking about responsibility. But isn’t the All-Star just as responsible for his success as the noob is for any success he might have. The All-Star may not consciously perform all the actions needed for success – but isn’t his practice done willingly? Doesn’t he choose to live a life where he performs these actions with extreme frequency? I think the All-Star is at least as responsible for his success as the noob. I’d say MORE. The noob might get a hit by pure luck. The All-Star is too well-trained to do anything by luck.
Now, I think this analogy, while imperfect, fits our criminal example. The person who lives a life of surrendering to impulses of his own free will has made a free choice to be unfree! And I think that makes him more responsible for any evil he did because he’s chosen to live a life where he will NEVER not act impulsively because he’s made himself a slave. The man who chooses to commit a crime is responsible, but he may also choose to not do evil. And by that standard he retains his freedom – and his guilt – but he retains his freedom, and retains his consciousness and conscience which makes him less evil, certainly, but I believe less culpable and less responsible because one iterated evil act done freely is less guilty than a lifetime of evil choices and the decision to surrender to unconsciousness.
Perhaps you disagree and say that the responsibility argument isn’t persuading you – OK. But I think we would all agree that the person whose actions have made him a habituated evildoer is the more evil person and is certainly prone to do more evil, both in quality and quantity, than the free-actor.
But I started this conversation talking about holiness. And now let’s get to holiness. You see, we recognize, I think, that the habitual evildoer is a more evil person than the occasional evildoer – both more in quality and quantity. Thus, it stands to reason that the habitually holy person is more holy than the occasionally holy.
But here’s where a lot of contemporary Christians are going to resist. Because habits and things being done apart from free-will sound very “unspiritual”. We don’t even like pre-written prayers for the fear that they are inauthentic. So, it stands to reason that a lot of Christians would resist my argument that we should work so hard to be holy that we become holy through habit.
But again, let’s turn to our baseball analogy. The All-Star who succeeds because he practices is better, objectively better, than the person who just shows up in cleats, some day. No one would argue that. But perhaps you’ll object, but Lukey-poo, being “better” at performing a deed where it’s inauthentic, and there is no heart-love for holiness is Pharisaism.
But that’s a major misunderstanding of the central critique Jesus had of the Pharisees. His problem with them was hypocrisy, not habits! Motivations, not methods, was the issue. The Pharisees did things that Jesus commended! The diligently searched the Scriptures, they tithed, they were strictly obedient to the Law. Those are good things, until you think that your own ability will save you and not the Savior!
Nowhere does Jesus, nor do the Apostles, nor the prophets, nor the writers, anywhere in the Bible condemn seeking to be holy by habit. Moreover, we have the opposite! All that stuff about training-up a child. What do we think that means? Why do we think the great Shema commands parents to constanly talk about the Law of Moses? Why do you think that God instituted annual calendrical feasts and fasts? Why do we worship every Sunday, why do we have the sacraments? Why do we read the same bible?
Because God wants us to develop habits of holiness. God wants us to be so holy so often that we’re holy without thinking about it. Now, some might object to this and say, “but then it’s not really me who’s being holy!” Really?! Then who is it?!?! Don’t make the foolish distinction between YOU and YOUR BRAIN or YOU and YOUR UNCONSCIOUS SELF! There is no such distinction. The unconscious you is still you – maybe a truer and deeper you than the conscious you! We’re all mysteries even to ourselves. None of us knows our own hearts. None of us knows what truly is inside of us. But if our inner-secret-unconscious selves are becoming holy that means that WE are becoming holy. If you become holy by habit it’s because you’ve chosen to develop that habit!
Of course, we recognize this in EVERY SINGLE OTHER ASPECT OF LIFE! We don’t train our children to read so that they can painstakingly sound-out every word for the rest of their lives. We want to outsource phonetics and word recognition to the subconscious and unconscious mind. Same thing with walking, and singing, and washing the dishes, and cleaning-up, and homework, and brushing teeth, saying please and thank you, waiting to be excused from the table, and on and on. We help our kids develop habits because habitually industrious, fastidious, conscientious people tend to be more successful in life than lazy, slovenly, rude little piglets – also they’re more pleasant to be around! At work we become proud when we can swing a hammer and drive a nail in without thinking or bending it over – when we can touch-type on the new keyboard – when we without thinking can write the perfect email, back in the short trailer down the long path, find the perfect way to teach a certain complex lesson, reassemble the engine faster than anyone and still chat-it-up with friend. When we outsource complex actions to our subconscious and unconscious we take it as a sign of developing excellence, of professionalism, or greatness!
Why not in holiness? Oh yeah, cause it’s inauthentic. Except I don’t buy that, and hopefully you don’t either. So, how do we get there?
Spiritual Disciplines. Prayer, Fasting, Meditation, Giving, Reading, Singing, Public Worship, Acts of Service, Confession of Sin, and on and on. And of course, there is a difference between Devoted Christianity and Devotional Christianity. We don’t do these to earn brownie points with God, but so that we can transform our minds (so they can act habitually?) to the mind of Christ.
Holiness is a huge thing.[4] It’s complex and it can’t be developed as a habit overnight. But it can be developed as a habit. We can actually grow in holiness. And I believe a big part of that growth is outsourcing holiness to our subconscious and unconscious selves – renewing our minds – letting our selves do God’s will without even thinking about it.
As we ring in the New Year[5] let’s determine that this year, if we don’t already, we’ll work hard at developing Spiritual Disciplines that will form habits of holiness!
Footnotes:
[1] I know that “benevolence” isn’t a perfect antonym of “malice”. There’s malevolent and benevolent; maleficence and beneficence; there’s malefice and benefice – but these aren’t antonyms and neither are common. Sadly, we lack a good antonym for “malice”. It made me sad. If it made you sad, too, then we should be friends.
[2] If you think I’m exaggerating…well, I am, but seriously, read some of Plato’s Dialogues…Socrates has some serious fanboys. Also…eww.
[3] Both quality and quantity.
[4] There is an interesting study that came out and the gist of it is that the more complex the habit the less frequency mattered and the more “contextual stability” mattered. So, in terms of being holy, what matters isn’t necessarily doing all the Spiritual Disciplines every single day – though that can’t hurt – but creating a lifestyle where your context is stable – you want to worship at the same church, you want to read at the same times, meditate in the same places, give charity under the same circumstances. Not that switching up is BAD, but if you want to develop these has habits, contextual stability and also perceived reward seem to be far more important than frequency. See: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6667662/
[5] Is New Year’s racist, yet?