I doubt there has ever been a time or place in history where people do not prize the fight for freedom as one of the greatest human enterprises. The trouble is, as people pursue freedom, its boundaries grow wider. Isaiah Berlin, a 20th century Russian-British philosopher, claimed that throughout history, we’ve defined freedom in two ways—negative and positive freedom. Negative freedom is an individual’s freedom from outside interference. In American terms, it’s the “my body, my choice” or “hands off my guns” mentality. Positive freedom has to do with pursuing the greatest good for the most people.
Berlin points out that both visions come with problems. Totalitarian governments, for example, couch their oppressions in the language of positive freedom. They are creating a utopia and aren’t you lucky they told you to wear a blue shirt today?[1] In Western society, we do a good job of exposing the excesses and abuses of positive freedom projects. But we’ve let the pursuit of negative freedom (localized in your identity journey) grow into a monster with a voracious appetite.
The Enlightenment of the 17th and 18th centuries redefined everything, including freedom, in personal and subjective terms.[2] Historian Peter Gay defines the Enlightenment era as : “freedom from arbitrary power, freedom of speech, freedom of trade, freedom to realize one’s talents, freedom of aesthetic response, freedom, in a word, of moral man to make his own way in the world.”[3] In 1992 in Planned Parenthood vs Casey, Judge Anthony Kennedy put it this way:
“At the heart of liberty is the right to define one’s own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life.”[4]
We believe that as long as I’m not hurting anybody, I should be free to be whoever and whatever I want. The idea of not hurting anybody else gets murky, but let’s set that aside. In essence, you’re asking each person, in order to be free, to come up with not only their own set of moral standards, but also a coherent theory on sociology, science, ethics, history, and the meaning of life. I don’t know about you, but I feel overtaxed keeping up with groceries and laundry. Taken to its logical extreme, it follows that if you swallow a germ of what someone tells you about who you should be (a parent, teacher, mentor), you’ve given up some of your freedom.
A better definition of freedom is “the path you take to get to your best self.” This pursuit, then, begins falling along the same lines as the quest for self-actualization. Defined in these terms we begin to perceive the usefulness of discipline and restraint. If I want to be a professional soccer player, I will have to restrict my time with videogames and ice cream. I gain a better picture of what I want to be free from because I see it’s getting in the way of what I want to be free for. Real freedom starts with the end in mind. Who do I want to become?
The Bible helps us find this real freedom because it shows us a clear picture of our best self in Jesus. The road to freedom then becomes more clear. It is a freedom that is full of boundaries and restrictions, but these act like guardrails. They are a way of focusing and channeling your energy towards your best self, which is looking more and more like Jesus.
How to deal with Identity FOMO: Should you have chosen to ben someone else?
[1] Isaiah Berlin, “Two Concepts of Liberty,” in Four Essays on Liberty (Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 1969), 118-172.
[2] John Frame, A History of Western Philosophy and Theology (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 2015), 203-5
[3] Peter Gay, The enlightenment: An Interpretation – The Rise of Modern Paganism (New York: Knopf, 1966), 3, quoted in Rosner, p. 125
[4] Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833, 851 (1992), https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/505/833.
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