A regular series with Jurgen Moltmann.  Today’s quote taken from his book, On Being Human, page 16.  He writes,

Ecce Homo! Behold the man!       

“When we get down to the heart of the matter, in the biblical stories the question, “What is Man?” is not derived from comparisons with that which exists for ever, with animals, with other nations, or with the divine above us.  It arises in specific form in the face of a surprising and specific divine call and commission.  So Moses on Mount  Sinai (Exodus 3:11), When confronted with the God who speaks to him out of the burning bush and charges him with the release of Israel from slavery in Egypt, asks “Who am I, that I should go to Pharaoh, and bring the sons of Israel out of Egypt?” So Jeremiah, in his inaugural vision, confesses, ”Ah Lord God! Behold, I do not know how to speak, for I am only a youth” (Jeremiah 1:6)  And Peter in his encounter with Jesus confesses, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord” (Luke 5:8). Here self-knowledge does not arise simply from the impression of the divine above.  It arises at the point at which man in his life is charged with something impossible by the call of God.  In this event the man affected knows his particular limits and inabilities and recognizes them as being his fault. He learns what sort of man he should be but cannot be of himself.  He learns what could be made out of him, but as far as he is concerned cannot be.  The divine call, which demands of him a new being, places him at an insuperable distance from himself.  It cuts so deeply into his life that it separates him from himself, and involves him in a change of identity.”