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What is Man?

People can have a wide range of answers to a simple question like this "What is man?" Is man to be viewed as nothing more than some kind of advanced animal or is he to be understood as a machine which is determined by his environment and his genetic make-up or again is he spiritual being?

It is of course possible to ask the question in a variety of different ways – the tone of voice or the context of the questioner may lead us to realize that the questioner has  very different things on his mind.

As we read through the OT we find that the question is asked on four different occasions and in each case the context is different.

In Job 7 we find Job crying out in his suffering and longing for some respite from it – why does the LORD seem to focus so much upon him:

Job 7:17-19 "What is man, that you make so much of him, and that you set your heart on him, visit him every morning and test him every moment? How long will you not look away from me, nor leave me alone till I swallow my spit?"

Job is struggling and at a loss to understand just why God seems to treat him as special when he obviously isn't!

Or again, still in the Book of Job, Eliphaz, one of Job's false comforters, asks the question in a different way:

Job 15:14 "What is man, that he can be pure? Or he who is born of a woman, that he can be righteous?"

Eliphaz is basically telling Job that it is ridiculous to set the sights too high – no man can be expected to live a pure life he's a man after all!

In Ps.144:3 the question "What is man?" expresses incredulity that God will give any consideration to the arrogant rebel who, although his life is so brief and ephemeral, imagines that he can succeed in his rebellion against God:

Ps.144:3-4"O LORD, what is man that you regard him, or the son of man that you think of him? Man is like a breath; his days are like a passing shadow."

In Psalm 8 the Psalmist is reflecting on the transcendent greatness of God and as he considers the wonderful way this same God takes care of His own it leads the psalmist to expression his feelings of absolute amazement.

Psalm 8 is a celebration of God, His creation and man's place within this creation.

The structure of Psalm 8 is very simple and straightforward. The Psalm begins by focusing upon the magnificence of God and concludes with exactly the same words.

v.1 "O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!"

As David meditates on God he thinks of Him as being excellent, majestic, great and mighty, glorious, brilliant, honourable and magnificent. God is no localised deity with only a limited sphere of influence but rather His influence and renown are world-wide. Indeed the earth itself cannot encompass Him because His glory He has set above the heavens (v.1b). Truly the God that David is thinking about is awesome!

And it is in this context of thinking about the splendours of God that David turns his thoughts to man and poses his version of the question: "What is man?" This should strongly suggest to us that we will not be able to understand man properly if we leave God out of the equation. Indeed David doesn't merely add God into the equation as it were but rather God forms the entire context of the equation!

v.4 "what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him?"

Lying behind the question David puts is all the teaching of Gen.1+2. In those chapters we learn that God is the glorious Creator of everything there is. He has with a mere word spoken into existence a wonderful world which demonstrates the wisdom and power of its Creator. We also learn from those chapters that man's place in that creation is important. Man, made in the very image of God, is the pinnacle of God's creation!

But David is so amazed by the greatness of God that all his attention is focused there any subsequent attention this God then pays to man is to David absolutely astounding. After all this great God has made not merely the earth but the heavens. The night sky in all its immensity, in all its beauty and grandeur is just the work of His fingers! He has set the moon and the stars in place much as you might set the ornaments out on a piece of furniture. Just as you take care to place them neatly and tidily so has God deliberately fixed each in its proper place.

Elsewhere in the Psalms the might of God in the creation of the night sky is underlined by the use of another picture:

Ps 104:2 "stretching out the heavens like a tent… (AV curtain)"

David is left reeling as he realizes that man is so highly regarded by such a God that he has been made God's vice-regent in this world and benefits from wonderful care and provision.

And we too should pause and wonder at the description of God's plan and purpose for man that is contained in this Psalm. As we look out on our sorry world, we see men behaving in ways which belie this high calling but what we have here in Psalm 8 is a copy of the original blueprint of God's plan. Sadly we live in a world that is no longer the perfect world of Gen.1+2 but in the world of Gen.3 – does this mean then that Ps.8 has little to say to us in our present situation? Does it merely speak to us of what might have been? Not at all! And let me show you why.

There are two indications that the Psalm does indeed recognize that the circumstances in which we now live are not the ideal ones of the creation at the beginning.

Firstly, there is the use of the covenant name – LORD. While this name does appear as far back as Gen.2:4 we later learn that the LORD was not known by this name by the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. That is the significance and meaning of the name was not revealed to them. The name was specifically revealed later in history as God entered into covenant relationship with His people promising them deliverance. Such deliverance is only necessary in a fallen world..

Secondly, the psalm specifically mentions enemies and foes in v.2. It is an easy thing for God to rout these adversaries even through the weakness of babies and infants – God's purposes are never thwarted - but once again the mere presence of enemies shows the existence of a fallen world.

But let us be careful that we do not somehow imagine that God is locked in some desperate struggle against Satan and that the outcome is hanging in the balance. Our LORD is so awesome in His power that He can and does secure victory by using mere babes and infants – He has no need of mighty allies to help Him out!

And so in this context David revels and thrills that God should condescend to enter into a covenant relationship with men. He glories in the fact that this great and exalted LORD thinks about man and cares for him – both verbs implying not merely mental reflection but both implying action.

Now if we were to leave the psalm there we would already have much to meditate upon.

We would have the following subjects which would prove fruitful to our souls:

a.       God's majesty and renown

b.       God's power in creation

c.        God's plans for mankind relentlessly pursued even after the rebellion of the Fall

d.       A goal to strive towards – living appropriately as God's vice-regent in this world.

But we needn't stop there and indeed we mustn't either! It would actually be a grave mistake to stop at this point without going on to see how the NT interprets this Psalm as speaking about Jesus Christ.

Psalm 8 is cited on three different occasions in the NT – we will look at them in turn.

1.       Jesus

Mt.21:12-16 "And Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who sold and bought in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money–changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons. He said to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,’ but you make it a den of robbers.” And the blind and the lame came to him in the temple, and he healed them. But when the chief priests and the scribes saw the wonderful things that he did, and the children crying out in the temple, “Hosanna to the Son of David!” they were indignant, and they said to him, “Do you hear what these are saying?” And Jesus said to them, “Yes; have you never read, “‘Out of the mouth of infants and nursing babies you have prepared praise’?”"

The context of these verses is important. Jesus has just entered Jerusalem to the acclaim of the crowds in what is known as the Triumphal Entry. Having arrived in Jerusalem He went straight to the Temple where He drove out traders and money-changers from the courts. Matthew then recounts that the blind and the lame came to Him and He healed them. Wonderful works of power! Who since the creation of the world had given eyesight to the blind and here was Jesus exercising creation-power to do good to sufferers.

The children who were there appreciated something of what He was doing and raced about the place singing out the same praises that they had heard from Jesus' followers as Jesus entered Jerusalem – they cried out "Hosanna to the Son of David."

These were words of praise that declared that Jesus was the Messiah!!

And they were words that at once irritated and made the chief priests and the scribes indignant. Instead of joining in praise they turn on Jesus wanting Him to silence those young voices.

Well now, how did Jesus respond to their obvious desire to have Him rebuke the children and call them to order?

Do you see Jesus linked their praise directly to the words of Ps.8:2! (Remember that the Psalm mentions enemies in close proximity to infants and babies) In Jesus' own understanding this Psalm spoke about Him. Jesus is the man who does the works of God and the one to whom praise is rightly directed! A further claim to deity on His part!

There were different responses to our LORD Jesus then and we have our opportunity of responding to Him today. We are people with the potential of responding as did those children with praise and adoration or with the hostility and animosity of the chief priests and scribes who were too busy pursuing their own personal ambitions.

What kind of man are you? Are you on God's side or are you on the side of His enemies? What is your relationship with Jesus Christ really like?

2.       Paul

1Cor.15:19-28 "If in this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied. But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death. For “God has put all things in subjection under his feet.” But when it says, “all things are put in subjection,” it is plain that he is excepted who put all things in subjection under him. When all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to him who put all things in subjection under him, that God may be all in all."

Paul quotes from Ps.8 in his famous chapter on the resurrection from the dead. How important this chapter is for all of us as in it Paul deals with man's relation to death itself! Sin has entered the world and affected all of us with the consequence that we will all face physical death, it is inevitable. But physical death is not the end of our existence – the Bible teaches that the soul continues to exist. Either we will live in the bliss of God's immediate presence or we will be banished from that delightful presence and have an existence that the Bible can only designate as eternal death.

Jesus came into the world to secure the redemption of man and to secure it the last enemy death must be defeated. If any of the redeemed be lost and not raised to newness of life but held captive by death then Christ would have failed in His mission. Paul however assures us that the victory is certain because it is promised in Ps.8:6 that everything is put under His feet and everything includes death itself!

How any man is going to spend eternity depends upon His relationship to Jesus Christ, the perfect man, the ideal man described in Psalm 8. It is in Christ that all will be made alive but only in Christ!

My friend, are you in Christ? What is your relationship to the Lord Jesus Christ like?

3.       Writer to the Hebrews

Heb.2:5-10 "Now it was not to angels that God subjected the world to come, of which we are speaking. It has been testified somewhere, “What is man, that you are mindful of him, or the son of man, that you care for him? You made him for a little while lower than the angels; you have crowned him with glory and honour, putting everything in subjection under his feet.” Now in putting everything in subjection to him, he left nothing outside his control. At present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to him. But we see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, crowned with glory and honour because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone. For it was fitting that he, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering."

Earlier we noted that men's behaviour seems to belie the truthfulness of the words of our Psalm now the writer to the Hebrews deliberately draws our attention to this discordant note when he declares that although it is written that everything is put in subjection under his feet we don't currently see that to be the case. After all in our own lives we struggle to subdue even our own sinful tendencies let alone subdue things outside ourselves.

However the fact that we don't see the complete victory in our lives that we might like/expect to see this does not mean that we see nothing at all and the writer continues to point out what it is that we do see!

We see Jesus! That is we see Jesus, the perfect man, the ideal man, the God-man, the man par excellence that our Psalm 8 has been speaking about. And He is that man on behalf of others!

·       He tasted death for everyone so that

·       He might bring many sons to glory

There are thus two alternatives before us – we are in ourselves vanquished, failing to subdue even our own selves, or we are made victors through union with Christ. Which are you? Are you one of the vanquished or are you a victor? It all depends on our relationship to Christ.

By trusting in the LORD Jesus Christ you may begin to experience the fulfilment of God's purposes for you as a man or a woman. Or you can go on living independently of Jesus Christ and fall short of God's best again and again and again.

Come to Christ and be saved! Come to Christ and rejoice! Come to Christ and live!

Amen.