Die waarde van ’n christelike mensbeeld vir die geneeskunde

Abstract

The serious crisis in which medical ethics finds itself at present can be regarded as a symptom of a deeper crisis surrounding contemporary man. Positivists hold the view that creation can be explained from itself Here the cultural mandate to man is unilaterally over-emphasized, and an effort is made to set man over all things as owner and free ruler, almost as if he were a god. The basis for ethical norms is destroyed, and a future of total control is envisaged. Transcendentists look for spiritual values above or outside the created, measurable things and rational thought. Man's freedom is over-emphasized. The so-called human dimension of human nature is sought. Various transcendentists have sought of ind the cause of the dilemma in rationalism and the autonomy of reason. The New Age propagates Eastern mysticism as a solution. The liberating perspective of the Bible represents man as the child of God. Man constitutes a unity of various facets, viz. physico-chemical, hereditary, hormonal, reflexive, psycho-sensitive, intellectual and religious. One facet cannot be reduced to the other (either upwards or downwards) or be deduced or developed from it. Each subsequent facet is an intimate intertwining of the characteristics of the previous facet. Ultimately the religious facet offers the full human meaning as being image carrier of God, steward and child of God. This is the meaning of Christ’s work, and this gives meaning to all the other facets, ranging from the intellectual to the physicochemical. This view constitutes a meaningful basis for medical and scientific ethics, meaning and normative freedom. Practical, testable hypotheses can be deduced from this in order to study the unity of man.