Wisdom Unites the Virtues
German Philosopher Josef Pieper
In our exploration of virtue in the life of MIT, there are two reasons to begin with wisdom. Wisdom is the virtue most obviously related to the university, one that the Octet Collaborative seeks to advance by engaging MIT scholars and students in questions of what sort of future their research is building, and why, and whether it truly promotes human flourishing. But less obviously, in traditional Christian doctrine, wisdom is the virtue that unifies all the others. In this view, it is impossible for one virtue to develop in a person independently of all the others - for someone to be courageous but unjust and intemperate, for example - and the reason for this is that, because virtue simply consists in choosing the right action, in the right circumstances, for the right reasons, all of the virtues are bound together by wisdom. One who is wise will not fail to be just, courageous, and temperate, and one cannot be any of the latter three without possessing wisdom.
This feature of wisdom turns out to be an important corrective against the common notion that wisdom is simply a form of head knowledge, or even applied knowledge - that it is, in the end, a virtue of the intellect alone. Wisdom may be defined as practical knowledge for navigating life, but if it implies and is implied by all the other virtues, then it must find its seat not only in the mind, but also in the heart, the will, and the soul itself.
A strange idea
The twentieth-century philosopher Josef Pieper points out that there is something very strange to modern ears about the notion that wisdom (or “prudence,” as it has traditionally been called) would unite the virtues - that “none but the prudent… can be just, brave, and temperate…” Surely, we want to object, it is possible for someone to lack wisdom but nevertheless be able to act in ways that are just and courageous? Aren’t our stories full of protagonists who are quite simple in their understanding, and yet capable of acts of bravery (think of Samwise Gamgee, Neville Longbottom, or Forrest Gump)? One way to respond to this is to note, with Julia Annas in her book Intelligent Virtue, that because virtues are stable dispositions of character that are built in us over time, like skills, it is perfectly reasonable to talk about someone who is growing in virtue, but still has a ways to go. But the reason that wisdom is necessary for all virtuous action is that virtue is always aligned with things as they truly are. A courageous action is one which risks real loss for the sake of real goods; if one is fundamentally mistaken about the good or about the cost then one has further to go in perfecting courage. Samwise can seek justice that aligns with the way things truly should be; we have no trouble respecting and admiring his halting steps toward courage and wisdom just because neither is yet fully perfected - but this doesn’t mean that we would still consider him just in taking an action that fundamentally opposed the truth of how things are and how they should be.
Wisdom, Pieper argues, is about nothing less than an apprehension of the way things really are… “reason perfected in the cognition of truth,” as Thomas Aquinas put it. There can be no act of justice or courage that fails to align with truth. “Prudence,” Pieper writes, “is the cause of the other virtues’ being virtues at all. … Virtue is a ‘perfected ability’ of man as a spiritual person; and justice, fortitude, and temperance, as ‘abilities’ of the whole man, achieve their ‘perfection’ only when they are founded upon prudence, that is to say upon the perfected ability to make right decisions.” (The Four Cardinal Virtues, 6; subsequent page numbers refer to the same book)
Pieper points out that this gives to wisdom a receptive character. The presumption of this view of wisdom and the unifying function of wisdom among the virtues is that there is an objective nature of reality, and that virtuous action must receive it as a given. We aren’t the Creator, and so we have no capacity to define reality as we fit; wisdom, as CS Lewis famously observed in The Abolition of Man, is a matter of conforming ourselves to reality, rather than seeking to bend reality to our whims (a project which may succeed for a time but which always ultimately gives way to reality, pushing back). So while the precondition for virtue is wisdom, the standard for wisdom is reality itself. This is why an institution like MIT, focused on science and engineering, is at the same time in need of wisdom and essential to the project of building wisdom. It is in need of wisdom because the development of science and technology must receive and acknowledge the objective nature of reality, particularly human nature, if our innovations and how we use them are to be wise; it is likewise essential to the project of building wisdom because the more we understand the nature of the world that God has made, the better we can discern what things are, what they are for, and how we might steward the creation that God has put in our care. “He alone can do good who knows what things are like and what their situation is,” (10) Pieper writes, and science is an essential, albeit not the sole, tool God has given us to search things out.
Mind and Hand, Heart and Soul
There is not yet much in what I have written so far to assuage the concern that wisdom is only an intellectual virtue - that it has only to do with knowledge. Perhaps we might already be able to say that it is applied knowledge, involving mens et manus, mind and hand, as MIT’s motto puts it. But in fact, there is more to say. If wisdom unites the virtues, it unites all of the perfections of the human being - mind and hand, but also heart and soul and spirit. Wisdom is receptive not only in that our intellects apprehend the nature of reality, but also in that reality draws the affection of our hearts, and engages our will in action, and indeed that all of these are involved in the apprehension of reality (one of the things that makes us human is that we are inextricably embodied creatures, who interact with and apprehend the world with our bodies, not only our minds). Pieper writes, “Prudence… is not only cognition, not only knowing what is what. The prime thing is that this knowledge of reality must be transformed into the prudent decision which takes effect directly in its execution.” (11) This means that while prudence indeed has a “receptive” mode, apprehending reality, it also has an active mode, that Pieper calls an “imperative” mode, directed toward decision and action.
The direct connection between prudence and justice appears in that apprehending what is can also be an apprehension of how things fall short of the way they should be, or a failure to do so, often motivated by self-centered bias. “Whoever looks only at himself and therefore does not permit the truth of real things to have its sway can be neither just nor brave nor temperate - but above all he cannot be just. For the foremost requirement for the realization of justice is that man turn his eyes away from himself. It is not by chance that in everyday talk the ideas of partiality and justice come to almost the same thing.” (21-22) When wisdom and justice act in concert with one another, the whole human being is alive to what is true, what is beautiful, what is good, and how to get there.
But where is wisdom to be found?
After all this, the question posed in Job 28 remains - where is wisdom to be found? It is a question that looms larger than ever if wisdom is the sine qua non for all virtues, if we simply cannot be just or courageous without it. Where do we find it?
The scriptures of the Christian tradition point us in three directions, all predicated on one amazing truth: that the God who is the Creator and therefore the one who alone has defined the objective nature of reality is a God of revelation.
First, he has given us his law. The law of God, while it may not always comport with our desires, shows us how life is meant to be lived. The scriptures are replete with praise for God’s law, which is characterized as a light to our path and a guide for navigating our lives.
Second, he has revealed himself to us as a God of glory, inspiring awe, wonder, gratitude, and obedience not only by his immeasurable power and wisdom in creation, but by his even greater love and mercy in the work of redemption. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, the scriptures say again and again - and he has revealed himself as a God to be feared for his mighty works, his tender mercies, and his steadfastly loyal love.
Third, and above all, he has given us not only the words inspired by his Spirit, but has revealed himself in the Word himself, the logos underlying all reality, his Son Jesus Christ. How fitting that just as wisdom engages all parts of the human being - mind, heart, soul, and strength - wisdom is most fully revealed not in a text or a principle or even in the fabric of the cosmos, but in the Son of God made man, for us and for our salvation. In his life we see wisdom on full display. In his light, we see light.
