The Super

For every student, I believe there's a point in schooling when you know you've already "made it". No, you don't know everything, not even in your selected field; you don't even have a diploma, and you've got several classes left before you receive one. But you've reached a point where you know whatever you're "supposed" to know in order to advance you on your particular life-journey.

I have reached this point. As of last night I now 'know', and truthfully, I think I've always known. It's just that, now, I can better articulate my suspicions and I know that there were others before me who have thought as I've thought.

So, what is it that I 'know' now? It's very simple: I know what it is to be truly human. I can see my own potential, built upon a clean slate and not upon the social constructs that others have laid before me. It's a return to the foundation of what it is to be a person.

But, I'm not done yet.

I've spent this whole semester cutting away the foliage of society to get to the root of you and me. Never once did my faith in Jesus Christ waver in the face of logic; even in things I didn't agree with, I could nonetheless see the rationale that lay beneath them. All in all, my study of sociology has left me with a question:

Are we called to be human?

I know what dehumanization is; most of us live our lives as sub-humans, exploited and alienated from ourselves, each other, our being, our labor... so many things. It's not dehumanization that I'm leaning toward here when I question the call to be human. If dehumanization is what makes us sub-human, and if sociology uncovers the hidden humanity beneath society's oppression, then I suggest there is, perhaps, a super-human who grows from the foundation of humanity. Let me explain...

In a world where all are liberated, maybe there is no super-human... and perhaps there is no need for one. When we are allowed to just 'be', then there is no struggle to find our 'being'. But in a world such as ours, with so many forces at work, where humans are reduced to sub-humans, and where one is not allowed exist as a mere human being without resistance... Put simply, in order to be human, one must be allowed to do so freely, without oppression.

But ponder this: What separates 'good' from 'great'? What separates 'ordinary' from 'extraordinary'? What separates 'mediocre' from 'exceptional'? It's difficulty. And in this world, one cannot be human except with much difficulty. And with that difficulty, one must exert more than the reasonable effort just to achieve 'human' status.

The term 'super' means 'above' or 'beyond'; to become human, we must go above and beyond our circumstances. So, if any person says that he or she is human, in a world constructed to force that person into sub-humanness, how can that person NOT be super-human?

Yet again, however, I find philosophy being an equation to an answer that was already written in God's Word: "If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature; old things are passed away". I'm not sure if my interpretation is right, but you know what I think? I think that the "new creature" is a human who is removed from the constraints of society. In Christ, you live your life according to His standards, and not to those constructed by this world and society. Thus, you live in society, but you are not subject to society: "in this world, but not of this world". You live 'above' and 'beyond' your circumstances... a super-human.

I know some philosopher or sociologist or psychologist is turning over in his grave right now--- maybe turning over in his bed--- but this is my personal interpretation-leading-to-action*. I am super-human because, in the face of known oppression, I know what it is to be human and, through exceptional effort, I continue being human.


Now THAT'S a Liberal Arts Education... B-J



*"Philosophers have hitherto only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it."
-Karl Marx, Theses on Feuerbach