The Evolution of Conscience: A European Legacy Explored
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Conscience has influenced persons of stature throughout the world, from the founders of the American republic through Gandhi and Mandela and beyond, but its origins (and still, to some extent, its sponsorship) are European and European-derived. The West has no monopoly on ethical self-scrutiny or principled inner rejection of ethically repugnant behaviour. Certainly, all languages and all societies possess their own, distinctive conceptions of duty or responsibility, or shame about failure to meet the standards of the society or the self. Even though ancient Hebrew had no word or exact equivalent for conscience itself, Hebrew theology has gotten along perfectly well on concepts of will and intent and moral duty and responsibility before a God who implants precepts in the heart of the believer.
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Swiftly and seamlessly embraced by the early church, conscience is often thought to be Christian in its origins. But Latin conscientia was already a flourishing concept in Roman persuasive oratory and legal pleading well before the birth of Christ. Roman conscience gave texture and imagery to early Christian ideas of conscience, and many of its attributes would inform both Catholic and Protestant conceptions of conscience. Carried forward within these conceptions, it remains influential in views of conscience today. The foundation of Classical conscience was public or social opinion. People at odds with public opinion or social consensus found themselves vulnerable to the accusations of conscience and to conscience’s pangs. Cicero, in public address, enlisted and swayed opinion by weaving conscience into his arguments on behalf of clients and his denunciations of the guilty and proud.
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This language of conscience – including its capacity to cajole, to wound, to mark or stain – has a familiar ring to it, for conscience is already up to its 2,000-year endeavour of harassing the bad and upholding the good, and visiting pain, terror, pallor, and trepidation upon those who ignore its strictures. This language and imagery were well suited to the emergent Christian religion, faced with multiple tasks of converting the hesitant, disciplining new believers, and encouraging self-vigilance and personal reform within its ranks. Already proven as a spur to action and an incentive to life-change, conscience was conveniently adaptable to Christian aspirations and needs. No wonder it was embraced and elaborated with such zest that it became an early and crucial component of the Christian worldview.
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The character of biblical and Christian conscience was thus mixed at its very inception, combining principles of private ethical discernment with public expectation. This fusion – or one might say potential confusion – of the internal and the external forums meant that Christian conscience would always potentially serve two masters: its possessor or subject, on the one hand, and the doctrinal or theological views of its ecclesiastical sponsor, on the other. Conscience speaks from a position shared with the self, but incorporates elements and perspectives external to the self. A decisive key to the ambivalence of conscience’s location and behaviour rests in the etymology of the Latin word itself. Conscience is knowledge of oneself, but also knowledge of oneself by oneself.
