by Adi Schlebusch
The question regarding the nature and meaning of culture is an extremely relevant one for the time in which we live. We often refer to “our culture” to distinguish it form foreign or alien cultures. We also often speak of “the culture” when referring to the contemporary mainstream anti-Christian culture prevalent in most Western societies today. But what does “culture” mean? The word itself is derived from the Latin word “cultus” which literally means to cherish or develop, but it also has a spiritual (or figurative) meaning, namely to venerate and glorify.
Thus, by its very definition culture is something that is simultaneously both spiritual and physical. The author David Bruce Hegeman defines culture as follows:
[It is] the product of human acts of concretization undertaken in the developmental transformation of the earth in accordance with the commandment of God.[1]
In other words, Hegeman traces the existence of culture to the fact that God had commanded mankind to exercise dominion over the earth (Genesis 1:26). We must work to develop creation, i.e. create culture. Genesis 1:26 is therefore also appropriately called the Cultural Mandate. While Hegeman’s definition is helpful in terms of understanding culture, it does not account for the fact that a culture can of course position itself in direct opposition to God and his commandment. The description of Satan found in 2 Corinthians 4:4 is often translated into English as “god of this world.” However, the Greek word commonly used for world is “cosmos,” whereas the word used here by the apostle is “ainon,” which literally means “period” or “era.” In other words, Paul is making an observation regarding the degenerate Greco-Roman culture of the time, rather than making an ontological claim. There are therefore godless cultures in which Satan functions as the divine entity glorified in that culture.
Every culture glorifies some god, because glorifying a god is an inescapable part of culture. The only question is which god is being glorified. It is in light of this reality that the Calvinist philosopher Henry van Til’s famous claim that “culture is religion externalized” needs to be understood. It is not that religion is merely the spiritual element of culture, but rather that religious commitments are necessarily expressed through the customs, habits, vocabulary, rituals, leisure time and priorities of any given culture.
This does not mean that all Christian cultures would look the same, of course. In fact, both Scripture and experience teach us that the covenantal unit primarily responsible for the visible development and manifestation of culture is the nation or ethnic group. The entire idea behind having countries with borders is based on the assumption that different peoples have different cultures, even in cases where nations on both sides of the border are Christian, as had been the case for centuries throughout European Christendom, for example. This principle can also be logically deduced from the Great Commission (Matthew 28:19), where the Lord Jesus expressly commands that nations—not individuals, not families and not empires—but nations, are to be baptized, discipled and sanctified in accordance with the cultural mandate. While culture starts with the family, it is most evidently expressed through the communal life of the people as a whole. Thus, culture is the expression of ethnoconfessionality.
This ethnoconfessional nature of culture can be seen in a nation’s particular public confession as well as in the way in which that nation practically treats its own members and outsiders. Culture is inherently religious, but with a strong ethnic or familial component as the physical dimension necessary for the concrete externalization of that religion. The natural appitites, strengths and weaknesses associated with this physical component shape culture in a way that impacts our humor, our conversation topics, the elements which constitute our social gatherings, how we spend our leisure time, the festivals we celebrate and how we celebrate, which talents we can and opt to cultivate, the music we listen to and of course the language we speak as well as the vocabulary of that language we opt to use. All these things ought to be sanctified so that Christ may thereby be glorified.
Because culture is inherently religious, the culture war against the enemies of Christ is so vitally important. Satan’s minions actively seek to destroy Christian cultures in an attempt to undermine Christ’s Lordship over all of creation. And it is also because of the very fact that we as believers, in obedience to God, rightly resist these attempts at destroying Christian cultures and nations, that the culture war commences in the first place.
It therefore remains the perpetual calling of every Christian to fight the culture war regardless of the context they find themselves in. We have a duty to fight so our families and our people can continue to glorify God through our distinct cultures. Let us labor for the sake of our covenantal posterity, so that they may truly be culturally enriched by our efforts.
The author is a senior researcher at the Pactum Institute.
[1] David Bruce Hegemon, Plowing in Hope: Toward a Biblical Theology of Culture (Moscow, ID: Canon Press, 1999), 15.