The first dimension of human personhood is the most fundamental and at the same time the hardest to grasp: the fundamental spiritual existence as a person — even before the human being thinks, feels, or wills consciously for the first time. Hedwig Conrad-Martius calls it the “hypokeimenal pneumatic being”: the underlying spiritual being, the spiritual foundation upon which everything further is built. It is the spiritual being-there of the person, prior to and beneath all consciousness.
From the book
“The first dimension is the fundamental spiritual existence as a person. In this dimension the inalienable dignity of every human being is grounded.”
— Three Dimensions of Human Personhood, Chapter 4
This dimension precisely does not presuppose actual consciousness. It is there before consciousness awakens, and it remains there when consciousness is extinguished. In the first dimension the inalienable dignity of every human being is grounded. Even the embryo who has not yet opened his eyes is a someone, not a something. He possesses the spiritual foundation as an active disposition. His spiritual principle of life — his spiritual soul — already informs his entire body from the first cell onward (cf. Bexten 2017, pp. 183—202).
The first dimension comprises four essentially necessary characteristics: the human person is (1) real — not a mere idea or social construction; (2) standing in itself — a being in its own right, not a mere function; (3) unique and indivisible — an original that can be replaced by nothing; and (4) it possesses the possibility of unfolding consciousness as an active disposition. All these characteristics are there as soon as the human being is there. They need not first be acquired. The second and third dimension build upon the first, but can never abolish it.
Ontological classification: Superordinate concept: Dimension of the Fundamental Form of Reality
Ontological relations:
- ontologically precedes: Second Dimension
- presupposes: Fundamental Form of Reality
- ontologically follows: Fundamental Form of Reality
- has necessary condition: Ecosystem
- is presupposed by: Second Dimension
Chapter assignment: Chapter 4: What Is Human Personhood? (esp. 4.7.3), Chapter 1
Sources: Generated by querying the Personhood ontology.
Further sources:
- Bexten 2017, pp. 244–258 (Fundamental form of reality and first dimension).
- Conrad-Martius, H.: Das Sein (1957). Munich: Kösel. (German) (Hypokeimenal pneumatic being as spiritual foundation)