CONSCIOUSNESS
The perception of what passes in a man’s own mind. We must not confound the terms consciousness and conscience; for though the Latin be ignorant of any such distinction, including both in the word conscientia, yet there is a great deal or difference between them in our language. Consciousness is confined to the actions of the mind, being nothing else but that knowledge of itself which is inseparable from every thought and voluntary motion of the soul. Conscience extends to all human actions, bodily as well as mental. Consciousness is the knowledge of the existence; conscience of the moral nature of actions. Consciousness is a province of metaphysics, conscience of morality.
Fuente: Theological Dictionary
consciousness
(Latin: conscire, to know)
In an objective sense, signifies the totality of psychic phenomena which distinguish the state of wakefulness from that of a dreamless sleep. It includes the whole range of cognitive, emotional, and appetitive states that can be apprehended. In a subjective sense it denotes the cognitive act by which psychic states actually present are known and recognized as one’s own. This consciousness may be exercised in three ways. It may accompany any act of knowing; in the very act of perceiving an object, concomitantly with the knowledge of the object the mind knows the perception as its own though attention is not centered on this subjective phase of the act. Or it may be the act of a faculty expressly attending to the operations of other faculties, as when the mind is aware of the operations of the senses, movements of the. body, etc. Or it may be the reflexive act, called self-consciousness, by which the mind applies itself to observe its own activities. This reflex consciousness marks the essential difference between man and lower animals; since the latter have a faculty whose act renders them conscious of the operations of other faculties, but have no faculty capable of knowing its own act.
Fuente: New Catholic Dictionary
Consciousness
(Lat. conscientia; Ger. Bewusstsein) cannot, strictly speaking, be defined. In its widest sense it includes all our sensations, thoughts, feelings, and volitions–in fact the sum total of our mental life. We indicate the meaning of the term best by contrasting conscious life with the unconscious state of a swoon, or of deep, dreamless sleep. We are said to be conscious of mental states when we are alive to them, or are aware of them in any degree. The term self-conscious is employed to denote the higher or more reflective form of knowledge, in which we formally recognize our states as our own. Consciousness in the wide sense has come to be recognized in modern times as the subject-matter of a special science, psychology; or, more definitely, phenomenal or empirical psychology. The investigation of the facts of consciousness, viewed as phenomena of the human mind, their observation, description, and analysis, their classification, the study of the conditions of their growth and development, the laws exhibited in their manifestation, and, in general, the explanation of the more complex mental operations and products by their reduction to more elementary states and processes, is held to be the business of the scientific psychologist at the present day.
HISTORY
The scientific or systematic study of the phenomena of consciousness is modern. Particular mental operations, however, attracted the attention of acute thinkers from ancient times. Some of the phenomena connected with volition, such as motive, intention, choice, and the like, owing to their ethical importance, were elaborately investigated and described by early Christian moralists; whilst some of our cognitive operations were a subject of interest to the earliest Greek philosophers in their speculations on the problem of human knowledge. The common character, however, of all branches of philosophy in the ancient world, was objective, an inquiry into the nature of being and becoming in general, and of certain forms of being in particular. Even when epistemological questions, investigations into the nature of knowing, were undertaken, as e. g. by the School of Democritus, there seems to have been very little effort made to test the theories by careful comparison with the actual experience of our consciousness. Accordingly, crude hypotheses received a considerable amount of support. The great difference between ancient and modern methods of investigating the human mind will be best seen by comparing Aristotle’s “De Anima” and any modern treatise such as William James’ “Principles of Psychology.” Although there is plenty of evidence of inductive inquiry in the Greek philosopher’s book, it is mainly of an objective character; and whilst there are incidentally acute observations on the operations of the senses and the constitution of some mental states, the bulk of the treatise is either physiological or metaphysical. On the other hand the aim of the modern inquirer throughout is the diligent study by introspection of different forms of consciousness, and the explanation of all complex forms of consciousness by resolving them into their simplest elements. The Schoolmen, in the main, followed the lines of the Greek philosophers, especially Aristotle. There is a striking uniformity in the tractate “De Anima” in the hands of each successive writer throughout the whole of the Middle Ages. The object and conditions of the operations of the cognitive and appetitive faculties of the soul, the constitution of species, the character of the distinction between the soul and its faculties, the connexion of soul and body, the inner nature of the soul, its origin and destiny are discussed in each treatise from the twelfth to the sixteenth century; whilst the method of argument throughout rests rather on an ontological analysis of our concepts of the various phenomena than on painstaking introspective study of the character of our mental activities themselves.
However, as time went on, the importance of certain problems of Christian theology, not so vividly realized by the ancients, compelled a more searching observation of consciousness and helped on the subjective movement. Free will, responsibility, intention, consent, repentance, and conscience acquired a significance unknown to the old pagan world. This procured an increasingly copious treatment of these subjects from the moral theologians. The difficulties surrounding the relations between sensuous and intellectual knowledge evoked more systematic treatment in successive controversies. Certain questions in ascetical and mystical theology also necessitated more direct appeal to strictly psychological investigation among the later Schoolmen. Still, it must be admitted that the careful inductive observation and analysis of our consciousness, so characteristic of modern psychological literature, occupies a relatively small space in the classical De animâ of the medieval schools. The nature of our mental states and processes is usually assumed to be so obvious that detailed description is needless, and the main part of the writer’s energy is devoted to metaphysical argument. Locke’s “Essay Concerning Human Understanding” (1690) and the writings of Thomas Hobbes (1588- 1679), both of which combine with confused and superficial metaphysics much acute observation and genuinely scientific attempts at analysis of various mental states, inaugurated the systematic inductive study of the phenomena of the mind which has grown into the modern science of consciousness, the empirical or phenomenal psychology of the present day. In Great Britain the idealism of Berkeley, which resolved the seemingly independent material world into a series of ideas awakened by God in the mind, and the scepticism of Hume, which professed to carry the analysis still farther, dissolving the mind itself into a cluster of states of consciousness, focused philosophical speculation more and more on the analytic study of mental phenomena, and gave rise to the Associationist School. This came at last virtually to identify all philosophy with psychology. Reid and Stewart, the ablest representatives of the Scotch School, whilst opposing Hume’s teaching with a better psychology, still strengthened by their method the same tendency. Meantime, on the Continent, Descartes’ system of methodic doubt, which would reduce all philosophical assumptions to his ultimate cogito, ergo sum, furthered the subjective movement of speculation from another side, for it planted the seed of the sundry modern philosophies of consciousness, destined to be evolved along various lines by Fichte, Schelling, and Hartmann.
Such being in outline the history of modern speculation in regard to human consciousness, the question of primary interest here is: Viewed from the standpoint of Catholic theological and philosophical teaching, what estimate is to be formed of this modern psychological method, and of the modern science of the phenomena of consciousness? It seems to the present writer that the method of careful industrious observation of the activities of the mind, the accurate description and classification of the various forms of consciousness, and the effort to analyse complex mental products into their simplest elements, and to trace the laws of the growth and development of our several faculties, constitute a sound rational procedure which is as deserving of commendation as the employment of sound scientific method in any other branch of knowledge. Further, since the only natural means of acquiring information respecting the inner nature of the soul is by the investigation of its activities, the scientific study of the facts of consciousness is a necessary preliminary at the present day to any satisfactory metaphysics of the soul. Assuredly no philosophy of the human soul which ignores the results of scientific observation and experiment applied to the phenomena of consciousness can to-day claim assent to its teaching with much hope of success. On the other hand, most English-speaking psychologists since the time of Locke, partly through excessive devotion to the study of these phenomena, partly through contempt for metaphysics, seem to have fallen into the error of forgetting that the main ground for interest in the study of our mental activities lies in the hope that we may draw from them inferences as to the inner constitution of the being, subject, or agent from which these activities proceed. This error has made the science of consciousness, in the hands of many writers, a “psychology without a soul”. This is, of course, no necessary consequence of the method. With respect to the relation between the study of consciousness and philosophy in general, Catholic thinkers would, for the most part, hold that a diligent investigation of the various forms of our cognitive consciousness must be undertaken as one of the first steps in philosophy; that one’s own conscious existence must be the ultimate fact in every philosophical system; and that the veracity of our cognitive faculties, when carefully scrutinized, must be the ultimate postulate in every sound theory of cognition. But the prospect of constructing a general philosophy of consciousness on idealistic lines that will harmonize with sundry theological doctrines which the Church has stamped with her authority, does not seem promising. At the same time, although much of our dogmatic theology has been formulated in the technical language of the Aristotelean physics and metaphysics, and though it would be, to say the least, extremely difficult to disentangle the Divinely revealed religious element from the human and imperfect vehicle by which it is communicated, yet it is most important to remember that the conceptions of Aristotelean metaphysics are no more part of Divine Revelation than are the hypotheses of Aristotelean physics; and that the technical language with its philosophical associations and implications in which many of our theological doctrines are clothed, is a human instrument, subject to alteration and correction.
QUANTITATIVE SCIENCE OF CONSCIOUSNESS
The term psychophysics is employed to denote a branch of experimental psychology which seeks to establish quantitative laws describing the general relations of intensity exhibited in various kinds of conscious states under certain conditions. Elaborate experiments and ingenious instruments have been devised by Weber, Fechner, Wundt, and others for the purpose of measuring the strength of the stimulus needed to awaken the sensations of the several senses, the quantity of variation in the stimulus required to produce a consciously distinguishable sensation, and so to discover a minimum increment or unit of consciousness: also to measure the exact duration of particular conscious processes, the “reaction-time” or interval between the stimulation of a sense-organ and the performance of a responsive movement, and similar facts. These results have been stated in certain approximate laws. The best established of these is the Weber-Fechner generalization, which enunciates the general fact that the stimulus of a sensation must be increased in geometrical progression in order that the intensity of the resulting sensation be augmented in arithmetical progression. The law is true, however, only of certain kinds of sensation and within limits. Whilst these attempts to reach quantitative measurement– characteristic of the exact sciences–in the study of consciousness have not been directly very fruitful in new results, they have nevertheless been indirectly valuable in stimulating the pursuit of greater accuracy and precision in all methods of observing and registering the phenomena of consciousness.
SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS
A most important form of consciousness from both a philosophical and a psychological point of view is self-consciousness. By this is understood the mind’s consciousness of its operations as its own. Out of this cognition combined with memory of the past emerges the knowledge of our own abiding personality. We not only have conscious states like the lower animals, but we can reflect upon these states, recognize them as our own, and at the same time distinguish them from the permanent self of which they are the transitory modifications. Viewed as the form of consciousness by which we study our own states, this inner activity is called introspection. It is the chief instrument employed in the building up of the science of psychology, and it is one of the many differentiae which separate the human from the animal mind. It has sometimes been spoken of as an “internal sense”, the proper object of which is the phenomena of consciousness, as that of the external senses is the phenomena of physical nature. Introspection is, however, merely the function of the intellect applied to the observation of our own mental life. The peculiar reflective activity exhibited in all forms of self-consciousness has led modern psychologists who defend the spirituality of the soul, increasingly to insist on this operation of the human mind as a main argument against materialism. The cruder form of materialism advocated in the nineteenth century by Broussais, Vogt, Moleschott, and at times by Huxley, which maintained that thought is merely a “product”, “secretion”, or “function” of the brain, is shown to be untenable by a brief consideration of any form of consciousness. All “secretions” and “products” of material agents of which we have experience, are substances which occupy space, are observable by the external senses, and continue to exist when unobserved. But all states of consciousness are non-spatial; they cannot be observed by the senses, and they exist only as we are conscious of them–their esse is percipi. Similarly “functions” of material agents are, in the last resort, resolvable into movements of portions of matter. But states of consciousness are not movements any more than they are “secretions” of matter. The contention, however, that all states of consciousness, though not “secretions” or “products” of matter, are yet forms of activity which have their ultimate source in the brain and are intrinsically and absolutely dependent on the latter is not disposed of by this reasoning.
To meet this objection, attention is directed to the form of intellectual activity exhibited in reflective self-consciousness. In this process there is recognition of complete identity between the knowing agent and the object which is known; the ego is at once subject and object. This feature of our mental life has been adduced in evidence of the immateriality of the soul by former writers, but under the title of an argument from the unity of consciousness it has been stated in perhaps its most effective form by Lotze. The phrase “continuity of consciousness” has been employed to designate the apparent connectedness which characterizes our inner experience, and the term “stream” of consciousness has been popularized by Professor James as an apt designation of our conscious life as a whole. Strictly speaking, this continuity does not pertain to the “states” or phenomena of consciousness. One obviously large class of interruptions is to be found in the nightly suspension of consciousness during sleep. The connecting continuity is really in the underlying subject of consciousness. It is only through the reality of a permanent, abiding principle or being which endures the same whilst the transitory states come and go that the past experience can be linked with the present, and the apparent unity and continuity of our inner life be preserved. The effort to explain the seeming continuity of our mental existence has, in the form of the problem of personal identity, proved a hopeless crux to all schools of philosophy which decline to admit the reality of some permanent principle such as the human soul is conceived to be in the Scholastic philosophy. John Stuart Mill, adhering to the principles of Hume, was driven to the conclusion that the human mind is merely “a series of states of consciousness aware of itself as a series”. This has been rightly termed by James “the definite bankruptcy” of the Associationist theory of the human mind. James’ own account of the ego as “a stream of consciousness” in which “each passing thought” is the only “thinker” is not much more satisfactory.
ABNORMAL FORMS OF CONSCIOUSNESS
In processes of self-conscious activity the relative prominence of the self and the states varies much. When the mind is keenly interested in some external event, e. g. a race, the notice of self may be diminished almost to zero. On the other hand, in efforts of difficult self-restraint and deliberate reflection, the consciousness of the ego reaches its highest level. Besides this experience of the varying degrees of the obtrusiveness of the self, we are all conscious at times of trains of thought taking place automatically within us, which seem to possess a certain independence of the main current of our mental life. Whilst going through some familiar intellectual operation with more or less attention, our mind may at the same time be occupied in working out a second series of thoughts connected and coherent in themselves, yet quite separate from the other process in which our intellect is engaged. These secondary “split-off” processes of thought may, in certain rare cases, develop into very distinct, consistent, and protracted streams of consciousness; and they may occasionally become so complete in themselves and so isolated from the main current of our mental life, as to possess at least a superficial appearance of being the outcome of a separate personality. We have here the phenomenon of the so-called “double ego”. Sometimes the sections or fragments of one fairly consistent stream of consciousness alternate in succession with the sections of another current, and we have the alleged “mutations of the ego”, in which two or more distinct personalities seem to occupy the same body in turn. Sometimes the second stream of thought appears to run on concomitantly with the main current of conscious experience, though so shut off as only to manifest its existence occasionally. These parallel currents of mental life have been adduced by some writers in support of an hypothesis of concomitant “multiple personalities”. The psychological literature dealing with these phenomena is very large. Here it suffices to observe in passing that all these phenomena belong to morbid mental life, that their nature and origin are admittedly extremely obscure, and that the cases in which the ego or subject of one stream of consciousness has absolutely no knowledge or memory of the experiences of the other, are extremely few and very doubtful. The careful and industrious observations, however, which are being collected in this field of mental pathology are valuable for many purposes; and even if they have not so far thrown much light on the problem of the inner nature of the soul, at all events they stimulate effort towards an important knowledge of the nervous conditions of mental processes, and they ought ultimately to prove fruitful for the study of mental disease.
Reverie, dreams, and somnambulistic experiences are forms of consciousness mediating between normal life and the eccentric species of mentality we have just been discussing. One particular form of abnormal consciousness which has attracted much attention is that exhibited in hypnotism (q. v.). The type of consciousness presented here is in many respects similar to that of somnambulism. The main feature in which it differs is that the hypnotic state is artificially induced and that the subject of this state remains in a condition of rapport or special relation with the hypnotizer of such a kind that he is singularly susceptible to the suggestions of the latter. One feature of the hypnotic state in common with some types of somnambulism and certain forms of the “split-off” streams of consciousness consists in the fact that experiences which occurred in a previous section of the particular abnormal state, though quite forgotten during the succeeding normal consciousness, may be remembered during a return of the abnormal state. These and some other kindred facts have given rise to much speculation as to the nature of mental life below the “threshold” or “margin” of consciousness. Certain writers have adopted the hypothesis of a “subliminal”, in addition to our ordinary “supraliminal”, consciousness, and ascribe a somewhat mystic character to this former. Some assume a universal, pantheistic, subliminal consciousness continuous with the subliminal consciousness of the individual. Of this universal mind they maintain that each particular mind is but a part. The question, indeed, as to the existence and nature of unconscious mental operations in individual minds has been in one shape or another the subject of controversy from the time of Leibniz. That during our normal conscious existence obscure, subconscious mental processes, at best but faintly recognizable, do take place, is indisputable. That latent activities of the soul which are strictly unconscious, can be truly mental or intellectual operations is the point in debate. Whatever conclusions be adopted with respect to those various problems, the discussion of them has established beyond doubt the fact that our normal consciousness of everyday life is profoundly affected by subconscious processes of the soul which themselves escape our notice. (See PERSONALITY; PSYCHOLOGY; SOUL.)
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MICHAEL MAHER Transcribed by Rick McCarty
The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume IVCopyright © 1908 by Robert Appleton CompanyOnline Edition Copyright © 2003 by K. KnightNihil Obstat. Remy Lafort, CensorImprimatur. +John M. Farley, Archbishop of New York
Fuente: Catholic Encyclopedia
Consciousness
is the perception of what passes in a man’s own mind. We must not confound the terms consciousness and conscience; for though the Latin be ignorant of any such distinction, including both in the word conscientia, yet there is a great deal of difference between them in our language. Consciousness is confined to the actions of the mind, being nothing else than that knowledge of itself which is inseparable from every thought and voluntary motion of the soul. Conscience extends to all human actions, bodily as well as mental. Consciousness is the knowledge of the existence; conscience, of the moral nature of actions. Consciousness is a province of metaphysics; conscience, of morality.
Fuente: Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature
Consciousness
CONSCIOUSNESS.We have to consider, so far as the facts recorded in the Gospels permit, our Lords consciousness of Himself and of His mission. The subject is difficult. It is beset by perplexing psychological and theological problems. It also demands very careful treatment, for it opens up discussions which may soon pass beyond the limits prescribed by reverence. We shall be guided by the following division:
I.The data, as found in the Gospels.
i.Certain narratives that reveal the consciousness of Jesus.
ii.The implications involved in His teaching generally, and in the impression He produced upon His disciples.
II.Psychological problems.
i.Growth.
ii.The Divine consciousness and the human.
iii.Knowledge and ignorance.
III.Theological results.
i.Uniqueness of our Lords personality.
ii.His Divinity.
I. The Gospel Data
i. Narratives revealing the, consciousness of Jesus.1. Among the narratives which, in a specially clear way, reveal our Lords consciousness, one of the most remarkable refers to a very early period of His life. St. Luke tells us (Luk 2:41-52) of His visit to Jerusalem at the age of twelve years. When, after long searching, He is found in the Temple, and His mother questions Him, Why hast thou thus dealt with us? His reply shows plainly that extraordinary realization of God which is the most outstanding characteristic of His consciousness: How is it that ye sought me? Wist ye not that I must be in my Fathers house? (or, about my Fathers business, ). Here is evident the work of the childs imagination, in which the dominant idea controls absolutely everything else, and the most unlikely events appear perfectly natural: How is it that ye sought me? What is extraordinary is the nature of this dominant idea. Already, at the age of twelve, our Lord knows God as His Father, and that in a manner so intimate and so peculiar that ordinary human relationships are as nothing in comparison with the relation to God. The doing of Gods will is already the supreme motive. It is to be noted also how the my Father of His reply contrasts with the thy father of Marys question. It is perhaps more natural to regard this as the inevitable reaction of His consciousness than as a deliberate correction of His mother. If so, it is all the more impressive. It shows how fundamental was the position in His mind of the filial relation in which He stood to God. How unlike this was to the Jewish mind of the time is shown by St. Lukes statement about Joseph and Mary: They understood not the saying which he spake unto them.
2. The Baptism occupies an important place in the data of our subject. It is clear that all the Evangelists intend to point out that our Lords baptism was unlike all others performed by John the Baptist. It was not a baptism of repentance. This is most clearly shown in St. Matthews account. John felt the difficulty and would have hindered him, saying, I have need to be baptized of thee, and comest thou to me? But Jesus answering said unto him, Suffer it now; for thus it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness. Then he suffered him. John discerned the incongruity, and our Lord acknowledged it, but gave a reason which showed how distinctly He realized His unique position and calling. The baptism was part of Gods will for Him. It had a necessary place in His life and work. It is also noteworthy that the descent of the Spirit and the voice from heaven are stated by St. Mark to have been manifested to our Lord Himself. With this St. Matthew and St. Luke agree. Only from St. John do we learn that the Baptist shared the experience. In view of what has gone before, we cannot look upon this event as the beginning of our Lords knowledge of His unique Sonship. It was, rather, an objective Divine confirmation of the truths which He already knew from the testimony of His inner consciousness. It was manifested to Himself and to the Baptist when the time had come for the public proclamation of the gospel of the Kingdom. It was a witness to His Sonship, Thou art my beloved Son; to His sinlessness, in thee I am well pleased; and to His Messiahship, He saw the heavens rent asunder, and the Spirit as a dove descending upon him (see Isa 42:1).
Careful study of the Gospels shows that these three elements in our Lords consciousness are those which are disclosed most frequently in His life and teaching.
Some able students (e.g. Wendt, Teaching of Jesus, i. p. 96 ff., English translation ) think that at the Baptism Jesus first attained to the consciousness of His Messiahship, though already aware of His Sonship. But, as has just been pointed out, the answer which He gave to John the Baptist reveals a fully developed sense, not merely of His sinlessness and relation to God, but of His mission. The testimony of even one Evangelist (St. Matthew) on a point like this is superior, as evidence, to any amount of psychological speculation.
3. The Temptation of our Lord, following immediately (Mar 1:12) after His Baptism, shows the nature of the internal conflict which He had to face when He set about the work of His life. There was no struggle with doubt as regards God, or Himself, or the end which He sought. The force of every temptation depended indeed on the clearness with which these were realized. His victory was an overcoming of the tendency to escape from the limitation, the lowliness, and the self-sacrifice which, to human thought, seem so unbecoming the Son of God in His great work of establishing the Kingdom.
It is impossible in the short space available here to deal with all the definite instances of self-revelation which are given in the four Gospels. It must suffice to dwell briefly upon a few of the more remarkable, and to mention such of the rest as cannot be omitted. It may be added that, to those who have really considered the question, almost every incident in our Lords life is, in some way or other, a manifestation of His superhuman consciousness.
4. One of the most noteworthy instances is that given by St. Matthew (Mat 11:25 ff.) and by St. Luke (Luk 10:21 ff.). St. Luke introduces the passage with the remarkable words, In that same hour he rejoiced in the Holy Spirit, and said. It is a proof that the Apostles recognized our Lords utterance on this occasion as the open expression of His communion with God. The insight into the heart of God, which was the secret of the inner life of Jesus, finds here such utterance as human language can give it. He addresses God as Father, Lord of heaven and earth, a great expression which foreshadows the truth which follows: All things have been delivered unto me of my Father; and no one knoweth the Son, save the Father; neither doth any know the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son willeth to reveal him (Mat 11:27). It is impossible to exaggerate the importance of these words. They contain four great assertions about our Lord and His work: (1) His universal authority; (2) the mystery of His person, known in its fulness to the Father only; (3) the unique relation of the Son to the Father, as involved in the Sons perfect knowledge of the Father; (4) the knowledge of the Father, so far as it is possible to man, is to be had only through the Son. This short passage contains the whole Christology of the Fourth Gospel. It records for us an occasion when our Lord permitted His hearers to gain some insight into His consciousness of God, of Himself, and of His mission.
Among the many important passages which agree with those which have been discussed, may be mentioned the following: (1) The account of our Lords reception of the disciples of John the Baptist who brought their masters doubts to Him for solution (Mat 11:2-7 and Luk 7:19-24). Here our Lords perfect confidence in His mission is obviously based upon His consciousness. The contrast with the intensely human searchings of heart displayed by John in his time of trial is very striking. (2) The narrative which includes the confession of St. Peter and the teaching which followed it (Mat 16:13 ff., Mar 8:27 ff.; Luk 9:18 ff.). The announcement of His approaching death and the tremendous terms in which He claims the utmost self-sacrifice from His disciples, give an extraordinary depth to the revelation of our Lords self-knowledge contained in this narrative. (3) Every incident and every teaching belonging to the last period of the ministry reveals the overpowering intensity of His consciousness of the mission which He had to fulfil and of its dependence upon Himself. All the circumstances of His public entry into Jerusalem are notable in this respect (Mat 21:1-16, Mar 11:1-11, Luk 19:29-47, Joh 12:12-19; see especially Luk 19:39-45 in St. Lukes account). (4) His answers to those who questioned His authority (Mat 21:23end, Mar 11:27 to Mar 12:12, Luk 20:1-19) are equally impressive. The parable of the Wicked Husbandmen, which is given in all the Synoptic Gospels, is very striking, as showing how our Lord made an essential distinction between Himself and all other messengers of God. (5) The description of the Future Judgment (Mat 25:31-46, cf. Mar 8:38, which shows the same conception, and proves that the idea is not peculiar to St. Matthew among the Synoptists), contains as lofty a conception of the dignity of the Son as any passage in the Fourth Gospel: Then shall the king say (Mat 25:34; Mat 25:40). What a depth of consciousness is involved in the words, ye did it unto me and ye did it not to me (Mat 25:40; Mat 25:45).
It would be possible to give many more instances almost as impressive. The fact is important, as showing that here we are dealing with an essential element in the Gospel history. So far our instances have been taken from the Synoptic Gospels, and mainly from narratives which are common to them all. When we turn to St. John, we find the self-revelation of Christ on every page, almost in every paragraph. See, as examples, Joh 1:51; Joh 2:19; Joh 4:26; Joh 5:17-29; Joh 6:38-42; Joh 6:61-62; Joh 8:14; Joh 8:46, (sinlessness) Joh 8:55; Joh 10:38; Joh 12:49-50; Joh 13:3; Joh 14:9-10 etc. The climax is reached in ch. 17, in which we are admitted to the sanctuary in which the Son pours out His heart in the presence of His Father. Here are evident all the elements already noted as peculiar to our Lords thought about Himself and His mission: His unique Sonship, His sinlessness, His Messiahship, His universal authority, the mystery of His relation to the Father.
ii. Implications of His teaching and the impression He produced.When we come to consider how this consciousness is implied in His teaching generally and in His effect upon mankind, we find ourselves face to face with a mass of materials so great that selection becomes very difficult. It must suffice to point out certain classes of facts
1. His mode of thinking and speaking about God. God is, for Him, the Father. Sometimes, with clear reference to His own unique relationship, our Lord calls God my Father (Mat 7:21; Mat 10:32-33; Mat 11:27; Mat 16:17; Mat 18:19; Mat 18:35, Mar 8:38; Mar 13:32, Luk 10:22; Luk 22:29, Joh 5:17; Joh 6:32; Joh 8:19, and throughout chs. 1417, etc.). But it is perhaps even more remarkable that when Christ is teaching His disciples to think about God as their Father in heaven, and speaking of Him as the Father or your Father, He always adopts the manner of one who knows this truth from within. It is not a doctrine which He has learned from Scripture, or proved by reason, or even gained by vision or revelation. It is spontaneous, a truth welling up from the depths of His being, and as essential and natural to His thought as breathing to His bodily life. To Him God, His Father, was an ever-present reality, the greatest and most intimate of all realities. He knew God as none else knew Him (Mat 11:27). He abode in His Fathers love (Joh 15:10). These expressions describe in the simplest possible way the spirit which is manifested in all our Lords utterances. Take, as an example, the Sermon on the Mount, the most distinctively ethical part of His teaching. Here, if anywhere, we should expect this purely religious apprehension of God to become dormant. In the introduction (Mat 5:3-13), the promises all reveal a deep insight into the purposes and nature of God: they view the world with its many kinds of people from the Divine point of view (see also Mat 5:16; Mat 5:20; Mat 5:45; Mat 5:48; Mat 6:1; Mat 6:4; Mat 6:6; Mat 6:8-9; Mat 6:14-15; Mat 6:18; Mat 6:20; Mat 6:24; Mat 6:26 ff., Mat 7:11; Mat 7:21), All through, human things are viewed in the light of Gods character. Jesus knew all these things about human life because He first knew God. Instances of this underlying consciousness might be multiplied indefinitely.
2. His self-assertion. It has often been pointed out (especially by Liddon in his Divinity of our Lord, Lect. iv.) that qualities which are incompatible in any other character combine freely and harmoniously in the character of Jesus. The most remarkable instance is the union of self-assertion with the most perfect humility. To those who believe in the Deity of Christ, the reason, the why, of this fact is not far to seek. But the how remains a difficulty. How is it that all seems natural and inevitable in the portrait as we find it in the Gospels? The answer must surely be that the self-assertion is the necessary expression of a real consciousness. It is well to be reminded how tremendous the self-assertion is. The following passages are a selection: Mat 5:11; Mat 5:22; Mat 5:28; Mat 5:34; Mat 5:39; Mat 5:44; Mat 7:21-22; Mat 7:28-29 (the former verses show this authority which astonished the multitude) Mat 8:6; Mat 8:10; Mat 8:22; Mat 10:15; Mat 10:32-33; Mat 10:37-39; Mat 11:27-29 (in these passages we have the self-assertion and the humility side by side: I am meek and lowly in heart follows the illimitable claim of Mat 11:27-28) Mat 12:6-8; Mat 12:41-42; Mat 16:24 ff; Mat 22:45; Mat 25:31 ff., Mar 2:28; Mar 8:34 ff; Mar 10:29; Mar 12:6; Mar 13:26, Luk 9:23-28; Luk 14:26 ff; Luk 21:12 ff., and throughout St. Johns Gospel (see especially Joh 5:17-18 ff., Joh 8:12 ff., Joh 10:30; Joh 14:6 ff. etc.). In these passages our Lord declares Himself greater than Abraham, David, Solomon; greater than the Temple, the Sabbath, the Law; He claims for Himself all the homage and devotion of which the hearts of men are capable; He calls Himself the King, and describes Himself as the Judge of all the nations; He demands as His right that honour which belongs to God alone (Joh 5:17-24). Yet He is among men as he that serveth (Luk 22:27).
3. The effect of this consciousness upon those who were brought under His influence is very evident. The impression which Jesus produced upon the minds and hearts of men was quite unique. He not only preached Himself, He revealed Himself. This revelation carried conviction with it. It is plain that He designed His ministry to be such a revelation. It was not His usual method to say exactly who He was, but rather to lead His hearers on until they were able to make that discovery for themselves (Mat 16:13-20). We speak of our Lord claiming such and such things; but whenever He made an assertion about Himself, it was because it was necessary that His hearers should know the truth on account of its essential importance for themselves. His object was to lead them to give Him the whole faith and love of their hearts, because in so doing they attained their highest good. A notable instance of the effect of our Lords self-revelation occurs in the case of St. Peter (Luk 5:8), Depart from me: for I am a sinful man, O Lord. Here the depth of the impression is shown by the moral effect (cf. Job 42:5-6 and Isa 6:5). It is clear that St. Peter was impressed not merely by the miracle, but by the moral glory of Christ. The miracle was but the occasion when there came to him a sudden insight into the character of Jesus. The intense faith which our Lord awakened in the hearts of those who responded to Him testifies to His self-revelation. He looked for a faith which rested in Himself as its object. Such faith always called forth His highest approbation. Almost every page of the Gospels witnesses to the truth of this. The case of the Centurion (Mat 8:5-13, Luk 7:1-10), though perhaps the most striking instance, is yet only typical. The principle involved in it may be found everywhere; see Mat 8:2-3; Mat 8:22; Mat 9:22; Mat 9:28; Mat 10:22; Mat 12:30; Mat 13:58; Mat 15:22-28; Mat 19:29, Mar 1:40-41; Mar 2:5-11; Mar 5:34; Mar 9:23-24; Mar 9:37; Mar 10:29; Mar 10:52; Mar 13:9; Mar 14:3-9, Luk 7:37-50; Luk 9:23-26; Luk 10:13-16; Luk 10:42; Luk 13:34; Luk 14:25-33; Luk 17:17-19; Luk 18:22; Luk 19:40, Joh 5:24; Joh 6:29; Joh 6:35; Joh 7:37-38; Joh 8:12 etc. The extraordinary claim involved in these passages, and in many others, would strike us much more than it does were it not for the fact that the experience of the Christian centuries has amply justified it. Christianity, together with all the moral and spiritual benefits which it has bestowed upon mankind, is the effect produced not primarily by any doctrinal system or method of organization, but by a personality. It was the deliberate aim of our Lord, with full consciousness of the method He was adopting, to influence humanity by the revelation of Himself.
II. Psychological problems.These are many and difficult.
i. Growth.In the case of a merely human intelligence, growth is a necessary element; and a psychological examination would aim at tracing the course of development by showing how the mind reacted upon the circumstances or its history and environment. Our Lord was truly human; but He was not merely human, and therefore it is unsafe to reason from ordinary experience apart from the facts of His life as given in the Gospels. Concerning His early years, we are distinctly told that there was development. The child grew and waxed strong, filled (becoming full, ) with wisdom (Luk 2:40). And again (Luk 2:52), Jesus advanced () in wisdom and stature. The language in both places implies growth in the true sense of the term. We are not, then, to imagine the infant Jesus looking out upon the world, from His mothers arms, with eyes already gleaming with the fulness of that superhuman knowledge which He afterwards possessed, as certain ancient pictures would suggest. In His consciousness, as in His bodily frame, He developed from helpless infancy to maturity. But there is unmistakable evidence that, as His consciousness unfolded, it attained, in ways which were to it perfectly normal and proper, experiences which are unique among the phenomena of human existence. It is clear from what has been already stated, that Jesus, from His childhood, possessed a consciousness of God as His Father which was utterly different from the faith to which others attain through teaching and the influence of religious surroundings. The incident of His childhood which reveals this fact must be viewed in the light of the self-revelation which fills all His teaching. Then its meaning is clear. We learn that His knowledge of His Father in heaven and of the loving harmony of will which subsisted between them was not a revelation imparted when the time of His public ministry drew near. It was an essential element in His earliest spiritual experiences. So far we are carried by the mere facts. Every attempt at a theological, or even psychological, co-ordination of these facts will carry us much further, and show that this inexplicable knowledge of God and consciousness of harmony with Him form together the ruling and guiding principle of our Lords whole life.
We have already passed in review the large classes of passages which show most distinctly our Lords self-revelation of His consciousness of union with His Father. The force of these passages is greatly augmented when certain negative characteristics most clearly manifested in the Gospels are taken into consideration.
1. There is no trace in our Lords teaching or life of any effort to arrive at truth by means of reasoning. Jesus was never a seeker for truth: it was not any task of His to discern Gods will before He began to do it, or to satisfy His own intelligence before He taught others. In dealing with the things of God, He moves with the absolute certainty of One who knew the truth from within. His use of Holy Scripture is never an effort to fortify His own mind: He speaks and acts as One who knew Himself a superior authority. Just as He was greater than the temple and Lord of the Sabbath, so is He above the Law and able to take the position of One who has the right to modify it or deepen it on His sole authority (see Mat 5:17; Mat 5:21-22; Mat 5:28 etc. Mat 7:28-29; Mat 12:6, Mar 2:28). When, in His teaching, He reasons from Scripture or from nature, it is simply that He may convey to others, in a way which corresponds to their mental equipment, the truth which He Himself knows independently. In such cases there is always some degree of that fulfilling of the Law, that drawing out of a deeper meaning, of which so many instances occur in the Sermon on the Mount. Perhaps the most remarkable example is His proof of the future life from the revelation at the Bush (Mat 22:32, Mar 12:26-27, Luk 20:37-38). Here the real proof is the manifestation of the character of God as it is involved in the declaration to Moses. See for other instances of argument of this kind from Scripture, from reason, or from nature, Mat 5:45; Mat 6:8; Mat 6:24; Mat 6:26 ff., Mat 7:11; Mat 7:16; Mat 12:3 ff., Mat 12:11-12; Mat 12:25 ff., Mar 2:9; Mar 2:17; Mar 3:4; Mar 7:17 ff; Mar 10:3 ff; Mar 12:35 ff., Luk 13:15; Luk 14:5; Luk 14:28 ff., Joh 13:14. It is quite plain in these and all other instances that our Lord is reasoning, not in order to satisfy His own mind, but to carry conviction to the minds of His hearers. There is not the faintest trace of the struggle for truth.
2. There is no sign that progressive revelations were made to Him during the course of His ministry. Many efforts have been made to show that Jesus attained at certain turning-points to new views of His mission, and of the means by which His work was to be accomplished. It is certainly true that in His teaching it is possible to discern two stages, the first marked by a broad and more ethical treatment of the Gospel of the Kingdom, the second dealing with the means by which the Kingdom is to be established, His own Person, sufferings, and death. But it is quite impossible to show that these two stages are not essential parts of one organic whole. The truth is that they are perfectly consistent, and form together one great scheme of revelation. To suppose any change of purpose, or even fresh insight into the means by which our Lords mission was to be accomplished, during His ministry, is to go beyond the evidence afforded by the Gospel history, in obedience to some a priori psychological or theological theory. It is supposed by some that He began with the belief that the Kingdom would be, somehow or other, introduced miraculously when the people as a whole were ready to receive it, but that, as time went on, and He found Himself rejected by the leaders, He became convinced that the Kingdom was already being realized in the hearts of the faithful, and finally saw that it was necessary that He Himself should die for its advancement. But how is this consistent with such passages as these: Mar 1:17; Mar 1:25; Mar 1:34; Mar 1:37-38; Mar 1:43; Mar 1:45; Mar 2:20; Mar 3:12, and the corresponding passages in St. Luke; also the whole Sermon on the Mount in St. Matthew? Why should our Lord so sternly and so consistently forbid the spread of popular excitement if He thought the Kingdom would suddenly appear, supervening miraculously upon the old order? Here is clear proof that from the beginning He understood the spiritual nature of the Kingdom. Why again should He, from the beginning, foreshadow the days of mourning when the Bridegroom shall be taken away, unless He had in view all along the great sacrifice which was to end His ministry? (See Mat 9:15, Mar 2:19-20, Luk 5:34-35. This saying obviously belongs to the earlier days, when the disciples of Jesus were marked by their joyous acceptance of all the good gifts of their Father in heaven). These conclusions are greatly strengthened by a consideration of the crisis which was brought about by the feeding of the five thousand. That there was a crisis is evident from Joh 6:15; Joh 6:24; Joh 6:66 compared with Mat 14:23-24 and Mar 6:45-47. But it was not a crisis in the consciousness of Jesus. It concerned rather the response of the people. Now at last they are utterly disappointed of their hopes of a worldly Messiah, and the very manner of their disappointment shows our Lords perfect consistency. His conduct throughout is that of one whose mind is made up and whose course is absolutely clear. At the very end, it may be thought, we have, in the Agony in the Garden, a crisis at which He became at last fully persuaded of the necessity of His death. But surely it is much more in accordance with the whole history to regard this as a moral crisis, when, for the last time, He was tempted to turn aside. There are indications that, all along, this temptation was presented to Him (see Mat 16:22-23, Mar 8:32-33, Joh 12:27). Our Lords utterances before the Agony show the very fullest consciousness of His mission, and of how it was to be accomplished.
3. Repentance had no place in the consciousness of Jesus. As Harnack (What is Christianity?, p. 32 f.) puts it, No stormy crisis, no breach with His past, lies behind the period of Jesus life that we know. In none of His sayings or discourses can we discover the signs of inner revolutions overcome, or the scars of any terrible conflict. Everything seems to pour from Him naturally, as though it could not do otherwise, like a spring from the depths of the earth, clear and unchecked in its flow. This is the strongest proof of our Lords perfect sinlessness. It is incredible that the keenest spiritual insight ever possessed by man should have been blind to its own condition. In confirmation of this the following passages are important: Mat 5:20 ff; Mat 7:11; Mat 18:24-25; Mat 18:35, Mar 9:42 ff., Luk 13:3; Luk 13:5; Luk 17:10 etc. show our Lords sensitiveness to the presence of sin in the hearts of men; how He recognized its universality in the world, and how high was His standard. Mar 1:11, Luk 6:40, Joh 4:34; Joh 8:29; Joh 8:46, give a direct insight into His consciousness of His own moral condition. Luk 5:8; 1Pe 2:22; 1Pe 3:18, 1Jn 2:29; 1Jn 3:5; 1Jn 3:7, 2Co 5:21, Heb 4:15 etc. show the impression He produced, in regard to this matter, upon the minds of His disciples. Our Lords consciousness of union with His Father was not marred by any sin within His own soul.
On the subject of growth, then, our data lead us to the conclusion that there was a real development in the consciousness of Jesus during His youth, but that this development was completed, certainly in all its essential elements, before He began His ministry.
ii. The most perplexing of all the psychological problems opened up by our subject is that which is presented by the endeavour to distinguish the Divine and human elements in our Lords consciousness, and to define the mode of their union. What in general the contents of His Divine consciousness were, so far as they have been revealed to us, we have seen above. But it is extremely hazardous to draw negative conclusions from these positive results, and every attempt at definition of the two elements involves negative as well as positive statements. Psychologically, we are presented with an insoluble problem. There are no facts, and no laws, known to the science of mind which can help us to understand the consciousness of Jesus. That He knew as man knows there can be no question. All the evidence we possess points to mental growth during the years of His youth; and though, as we have seen, the facts of His history during the period of His ministry do not warrant us in attributing to Him progressive attainments in the knowledge of Divine things, it is clear that ordinary human knowledge came to Him as it comes to us. It is often said of Him, that He came to know (, Mat 12:15; Mat 22:18; Mat 26:10, Mar 2:8; Mar 8:17, Joh 4:1; Joh 5:6; Joh 6:15; Joh 16:19; see Mason, Conditions of our Lords Life on Earth, p. 130 ff.). Again, we are told that He was guided by the evidence of His senses: When Jesus saw it, he was moved with indignation (Mar 10:14); He came forth and saw a great multitude, and he had compassion on them (Mat 14:14); When he drew nigh, he saw the city and wept over it (Luk 19:41). Such passages are convincing; and others, which tell of a supernatural knowledge of the thoughts and motives of men or of events (e.g. Joh 1:48; Joh 4:18, Mat 21:2, Mar 14:13, etc.), do not weaken their force. But side by side with this human consciousness we find unmistakable evidence of a consciousness which knows the heart of God from within, and which therefore sheds an unparalleled illumination over the whole realm of spiritual things. Jesus could say of Himself, No one knoweth the Son save the Father; neither doth any know the Father save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son willeth to reveal him. Such an assertion would be folly or worse were it not justified by the contents of His teaching. But the truth is that what Jesus showed mankind about the Father and His Kingdom, His Love and His holiness, and the revelation which Jesus gave of human life as seen in the light of this Divine manifestation, have ever remained the highest heights of spiritual vision. And, more wonderful still, this revelation has proved itself, as He foretold, inseparable from the Person who gave it. The teaching, Divine though it is, has ever been subordinate to the Teacher. It is always Jesus Christ who reveals the Father. Here then are the two elements, a consciousness of God and of Himself in relation to God different in kind from anything known in our experience, and side by side with it ordinary human knowledge based on the evidence of the senses. Harnack puts the problem thus: How He came to this consciousness of the unique character of His relation to God as a Son, how He came to the consciousness of His power, and to the consciousness of the obligation and the mission which this power carries with it, is His secret, and no psychology will ever fathom it (What is Christianity? p. 128).
iii. Knowledge and ignorance.We cannot enter here upon a general discussion of this question. It must suffice to note that our Lord in one instance pointedly confessed ignorance (Mar 13:32), that He asked questions, evidently to gain information (Mar 5:30; Mar 6:38; Mar 9:21, Joh 11:34), that He showed surprise (Mat 8:10, Mar 6:6), that He sought for what He could not find (Mat 21:19, Mar 11:13), and that there is no trace in the Gospels of His possessing supernatural knowledge of human and secular things beyond what was necessary for His work. These facts may be connected with the following statements made by our Lord Himself: The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father doing (Joh 5:19); I can of myself do nothing; as I hear, I judge: and my judgment is righteous; because I seek not mine own will, but the will of him that sent me (Joh 5:30); My teaching is not mine, but his that sent me (Joh 7:16); He that sent me is true; and the things which I heard from him, these speak I unto the world (Joh 8:26); I do nothing of myself, but as the Father taught me, I speak these things (Joh 8:28); I speak the things which I have seen with my Father (Joh 8:38); The Father which sent me, he hath given me a commandment, what I should say and what I should speak; The things therefore which I speak, even as the Father hath said unto me, so I speak (Joh 12:49-50); The words that I say unto you I speak not from myself; but the Father abiding in me doeth his works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father in me (Joh 14:10-11; see also Joh 14:24; Joh 14:31, Joh 15:15, Joh 17:7-8). From these statements it surely follows that our Lords Divine knowledge was imparted to Him in His communion with His Father. Apart from this means of knowing, He depended simply upon His human faculties. This being the case, we must see that, if anything which could not be known naturally was not made known to Him by the Father, it would not be known by Him (Bishop OBrien of Ossory, quoted by Canon Mason, op. cit. p. 192). The psychology of this communion with the Father, as a means of knowledge, is doubtless beyond us; but the facts given in all the Gospels agree with the statements of our Lord Himself as recorded by St. John. See, further, Authority of Christ.
III. Theological results.
i. The first result is an extraordinary emphasis upon the uniqueness of our Lords personality. In the psychological sphere the consciousness of Jesus Christ is as miraculous as His resurrection is in the physical. There is this difference, however, that His consciousness is a fact which comes in all its freshness before everyone who reads with clear eyes the story of His life. It is the most truly living element in the Gospels, and it is the same in them all. It is a concrete fact, not an abstract doctrine. To attribute its unity and concreteness to the sudden development of a dramatic instinct among certain religiously-minded Jews of the 1st cent., is as impossible as to derive its amazing spiritual elevation from an idealizing tendency among those who believed in God and His promises, and were looking for the Messiah and His Kingdom. Every attempt at explanation of this kind has proved, and must ever prove, a failure. The truth and vividness of the Gospels flow from the reality of the Christ whom they portray, and the consciousness of Jesus is the soul of that reality.
ii. The study of the consciousness of our Lord is the most convincing proof of His Divinity. When such passages as Joh 5:17-30; Joh 8:12-58; Joh 10:27-38; Joh 14:1-10 are compared with such as these from the SynopticsMat 11:25-30; Mat 25:31-46, Mar 8:34-38; Mar 10:28-30; Mar 12:35-37; Mar 14:7, Luk 9:22-27; Luk 9:57-62; Luk 10:21-24; Luk 10:42; Luk 12:8-10; Luk 19:40; Luk 20:13-15and both series are discerned to be the inevitable and consistent utterances of the mind of Him who called Himself the Son of God and the Son of Man, the conclusion is irresistible, unless, indeed, preconceived views of the nature of the Universe forbid the inference, that the traditional doctrine of Christianity is the only adequate interpretation of the facts of the life of Jesus.
Literature.Weiss, Leben Jesu; Wendt, Lehre Jesu; Mason, Conditions of Our Lords Life on Earth; Gore, Dissertations and Bampton Lectures; Liddon, Divinity of Our Lord; Baldensperger. Das Selbstbewusstsein Jesu; Beyschlag, Leben Jesu; Adamson, Studies of the Mind in Christ; Fairbairn, Place of Christ in Modern Theology; Godet, New Testament Studies; Row, Jesus of the Evangelists; Keim, Jesu von Nazara; Harnack, Das Wesen des Christentums [English translation What is Christianity?]; Seeley, Ecce Homo; R. Mackintosh, articles on The Dawn of the Messianic Consciousness in Expos. Times, 1905.
In some of these, and in many other works which might be named, will be found a great deal of rather free speculation based upon psychological considerations, and often but loosely connected with the statements of the Gospels. The present writer has endeavoured to keep as closely as possible to the historical evidence. On account of the peculiar nature of the problem, he is convinced that psychology affords but little assistance, and he regards even an isolated statement by one of the Evangelists as evidence of higher quality than a priori arguments of any description. Yet he has not forgotten the views of modern critics, and has been careful to show, by an array of references to texts, that the principal contents of our Lords consciousness are witnessed to by all the original authorities.
Charles F. DArcy.
Fuente: A Dictionary Of Christ And The Gospels
Consciousness
(Lat. conscire, to know, to be cognizant of) A designation applied to conscious mind as opposed to a supposedly unconscious or subconscious mind (See Subconscious Mind; Unconscious Mind), and to the whole domain of the physical and non-mental. Consciousness is generally considered an indefinable term or rather a term definable only by direct introspective appeal to conscious experiences. The indefinability of consciousness is expressed by Sir William Hamilton”Consciousness cannot be definedwe may be ourselves fully aware what consciousness is, but we cannot without confusion convey to others a definition of what we ourselves clearly apprehend. The reason is plainconsciousness lies at the root of all knowledge.” (Lectures on Metaphysics, I, 191.) Ladd’s frequently quoted definition of consciousness succeeds only in indicating the circumstances under which it is directly observable”Whatever we are when we are awake, as contrasted with what we are when we sink into a profound and dreamless sleep, that is to be conscious.”
The analysis of conscioisness proceeds in two principal directions
a distinction may be drawn between the act of consciousness and the content of consciousness and the two may even be considered as separable ingredients of consciousness, and
consciousness is analyzed into its three principal functionscognition, affection and conation.
Locke, Reid and others restricted consciousness to the reflective apprehension of the mind of its own processes but this usage has been abandoned in favor of the wider definition indicated above and the term introspection is used to designate this special kind of consciousness. See Behaviorism. — L.W.
(Ger. Bewusstsein) In Husserl
Noematic intentionality in general. The intentional constituting of the temporal stream-of-consciousness itself is an instance of “consciousness” in this broad sense, though it is intrinsically prior to the constituted stream.
The stream of subjective process, or any part of it, as having the characteristic of noematic intentionality.
The stream of “actual” subjective process, or any part of it; the “ego cogito”.
— D.C.