A Comparison between Xun-Zi's Social Ontology and Colin E. Gunton's Ecclesiological Ontology

A Comparison between Xun-Zi's Social Ontology and Colin E. Gunton's Ecclesiological Ontology

Andy S. CHIU

As Dietrich Bonhoeffer, in his doctoral dissertation Sanctorum Communio, sets the doctrine of the church in the midst of a theology of sociality, Gunton also affirms the greatest significance of the concept of sociality for the life of the Christian community. However, their similarity cannot overshadow their difference. It should be noted that Bonhoeffer's concept of sociality is involved in his Christocentic theology only, while Gunton comprehends the sociality of the Christian community in reference to his Trinitarian theology, as well as the doctrine of the humanity of Jesus. On Gunton's view, traditional ecclesiology puts much emphasis on the divine Christ, and this has thus often led to the church making arrogant claims for authority or even infallibility. Consequently, this divinization process of the church would make it lose its true nature, which is manifested by its ontological structure of being-for-the- other and unity-in-diversity. Therefore, Gunton argues that a greater stress on the humanity of Jesus and the social being of the Triune God is crucial to the development of ecclesiology. The being of the Triune God must be seen as the ontological foundation of the being of the church. However, the aim of this paper is not to make a comparison between Bonhoeffer and Gunton, but a comparison between Xun-zi's non-substantial understanding of sociality and Gunton's substantial understanding of the ontology of the church. Concerning the ontology of community, both Xun-zi and Gunton stress the primacy of otherness and relationality, but they develop these two notions by different methods, namely a non-substantial view and a substantial view. In Xun-zi's world, community relationship is inter -subjectively and culturally constituted. As a result, Xun-zi's ontology of community puts more emphasis on the primacy of dialogical inter-subjectivity instead of the primacy of otherness and particularity. Dialogical inter-subjectivity is an immediate relation of like-minded subjects. Underlying this is a relationship of undifferentiated sameness. In contrast to Xun-zi's non-substantial view of sociality, Gunton establishes the being of the Christian community on the foundation of the substantiality of the three particular Persons, namely the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. As a result, he can argue from the emphasis on the particularity and ontological distinctions of the divine persons for an ecclesiology of unity in otherness and diversity.