The Meaning of Persons by Paul Tournier
"The Meaning of Persons" by Paul Tournier explores the intricate relationship between individuality and the social roles that people adopt, which he refers to as "personages." Tournier, a Swiss physician with a strong Christian background, emphasizes the importance of authenticity in human relationships and the significance of personal dialogue. He argues that true freedom arises from genuine connections with others and from making responsible choices that reflect one's true self, rather than merely conforming to societal expectations.
Drawing on his experiences as a counselor, Tournier illustrates his concepts with relatable examples, such as the dynamics of an orchestra, where the conductor (the individual) must harmonize the various roles played by the musicians (the personages). He advocates for a "medicine of the person," arguing that effective healing must consider the psychosomatic nature of illness and the necessity of understanding the patient as a whole person.
Additionally, Tournier integrates Christian principles into his philosophy, underscoring the importance of spiritual dialogue with God to uncover one's true identity. He posits that life is a series of relational encounters, where maintaining a connection with the divine is vital for personal growth and authenticity. Through his teachings, Tournier invites readers to reflect on their own lives and the masks they wear, encouraging a journey toward deeper understanding and genuine expression of self.
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The Meaning of Persons by Paul Tournier
First published:Le Personnage et la personne, 1955 (English translation, 1957)
Edition(s) used:The Meaning of Persons, translated by Edwin Hudson. Cutchogue, N.Y.: Buccaneer Books, 1999
Genre(s): Nonfiction
Subgenre(s): Didactic treatise; handbook for living; spiritual treatise
Core issue(s): Confession; freedom and free will; grace; healing; psychology; responsibility
Overview
Paul Tournier was a Swiss doctor in general practice in Geneva. He was brought up in a Calvinist church and experienced a conversion when he was about eleven years old. He was emotionally reserved, having been orphaned early in life. He was graduated in 1923 and by that time had gained confidence in his studies and in student affairs. Even so, his early medical practice was marked by great formality with patients. However, in 1932, after attending a small Christian group inspired by the Moral Re-Armament movement (MRA), he had a deep spiritual experience that gradually freed him emotionally and helped him enter a meditative dialogue with God. In this he was greatly helped by his first wife, Nelly. From 1937, his clinical practices changed dramatically as he moved more into the role of counselor.
Tournier became concerned with reconciling the scientific and spiritual practices of medicine, and this concern expressed itself in a series of books and essays, beginning with Médecine de la personne (1940; The Healing of Persons, 1965). At first, these circulated only in the French-speaking world and were met with a good deal of skepticism. With the translation of The Meaning of Persons in 1957 and its publication in the United Kingdom and the United States, his ideas began to gain some acceptance. Tournier’s easily digested wisdom of European psychology and theology met a real need in the English-speaking world. While his psychological theories are eclectic, it is possible to see the influence of Emil Brunner, one of the Geneva group and a noted neo-Calvinist theologian, in his religious expression.
In the early 1960’s, almost in fulfillment of Tournier’s own theory, there was a growing desire to break out of current pietistic rigidities and to seek spiritual renewal, which included a concern for inner healing. His other books were translated, including Bible et médecine (1951; A Doctor’s Casebook in the Light of the Bible, 1954); Les Fort et les faibles (1948; The Strong and the Weak, 1963); and Vraie ou fausse culpabilité (1958; Guilt and Grace, 1962). Often invited to speak and tour the United States, Tournier became a forerunner of many widely accepted counseling practices.
The Meaning of Persons is constructed in Tournier’s hallmark way. Twelve chapters of roughly equal length are divided into four parts, each having three chapters. The four parts are “The Personage,” “Life,” “The Person,” and “Commitment.” His argument is interspersed with many examples from his clinical practice, quotations from colleagues and mentors, and frequent summations of the argument so far. His Christian principles are gradually introduced at relevant moments, until the last part of the book is deeply religious. Tournier aims at a popular audience, not trying to rigorously back up his claims nor systematically using Scripture.
Tournier’s main thesis is that as humans, we all long for authenticity. We realize we put on masks and assume roles, which he calls our personages. Utopian humanists assume we can somehow dispense with these personages to reveal the true person and walk naked, as it were, outside inauthentic attitudes. By contrast, Tournier suggests that true freedom is found by practicing those things that are truly personal, such as relationships with others; creating dialogue with and making commitments to others; exercising choices that lead to freedom at whatever cost and taking responsibility for them; and respecting others’ choices. He builds in various touchstones to mark our truth: our respect for others’ secrets and our use of confession to restore relationships as well as trust and transparency.
Tournier uses a number of instructive examples. One of his favorites is that of the orchestra. The composer is God, who has written the score of our lives and thus determined a purpose and direction for us. The conductor is the person interpreting the score and directing the orchestra, which is the various personages we have. If the person/conductor is in charge, then the personages will all harmonize, or be integrated, to use the psychological term. Another example is driving. For much of the time, our driving is automatic. However, at junctions, the driver, the person, has to make a choice. Thus, the person needs personages, but they should be true expressions of the person’s purpose and direction in life.
As a doctor, Tournier realizes that we cannot treat people as a set of outward personages. Illness is psychosomatic and can be effectively dealt with only by personal dialogue, physician to patient. He calls this “medicine of the person” and presents it in opposition to the growing trend toward the impersonal, objective practice of medicine in which a patient is merely a machine that has gone wrong. A doctor, thus, needs to learn to listen humbly to the patient.
Christian Themes
Tournier also sees the Christian life in terms of person and personage. We have a spiritual encounter with God that reveals our true person and brings new life to it. However, our new person needs expression and forms of practice to maintain our new spiritual life. Gradually these forms become our religious personage and can hedge us in, even killing our new life. Then we need a fresh experience of God through repentance and confession. Thus, he sees the spiritual life not as a steady flow, but as intermittent, with highs, plateaus, and valleys.
More significant, Tournier sees that a true dialogue, for instance, the dialogue of marriage, can be maintained only if there is a dialogue with God going on at the same time. God is only personal; he “calls us by name” (Isaiah 45:4) and seeks a relationship through dialogue with us. Such a dialogue can be conducted in various ways, but listening prayer is the most effective. Christ is the only human who has truly been a person and not a personage: It is through his authenticity that we can know God’s commitment to us and our choices. It is only through him that our fallenness can be mended. Tournier’s Calvinism is very strong here, in his stress on the inability of humans to ultimately heal themselves.
Tournier holds the Bible in high regard. He sees it as a book that demands authentic choices and as a record of people who have listened to God and heard him. It is a record of God’s grace. Since Tournier, Christian theology has tended to emphasize the work of the Holy Spirit, and in hindsight, Tournier’s lack of reference to the third person of the Trinity and his comparatively few references to supernatural healing through corporate prayer might make him seem dated and account for the difficulty in finding his books on any publisher’s list. However, his insistence that life is relational and all medicine must be the same is profoundly urgent in contemporary society, as is his insistence that all life is spiritual, though there is a high price to be paid for making such choices to gain true freedom in the spirit.
Sources for Further Study
Collins, Gary R. The Christian Psychology of Paul Tournier. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker, 1973. Collins is an evangelical who was forced to study Tournier through the interests of his students. He went to Geneva and talked with him at length. He is not uncritical of Tournier’s theology but tries to make a fair assessment.
Hacpille, Lucie. Le Défi de l’âge: Se réconclier avec la vie—Hommage à Paul Tournier. Paris: Éditions Frison-Roche, 1993. In the absence of recent English reassessments of Tournier, this French work is the best availaible.
Johnson, Paul E., ed. Healer of the Mind: A Psychiatrist’s Search for Faith. Nashville, Tenn.: Abingdon, 1972. A collection of essays, including an autobiographical one by Tournier.
Peaston, Monroe. “Aspects of the Person: Some Themes in the Recent Writings of Paul Tournier.” Pastoral Psychology 33, no. 1 (Fall, 1984): 35-43. Peaston updates his earlier book.
Peaston, Monroe. Personal Living: An Introduction to the Thought of Paul Tournier. New York: Harper and Row, 1972. A good introduction to Tournier’s thought and writings until 1970.