Worldview (Causal Factors)

     What are the basic factors making nations advance or degenerate? How do societies become dynamic or stagnant? What is the key force in the history-making process? Technology? Science? Capital? Natural resources? Knowledge? Governmental policy? Leadership? Productive force? Weltgeist?

     …For nearly three decades I have taught history in Asia, North America, and Europe; but I have thus far deliberately refrained from touching the subject of historical causation. Now, with my hair increasingly graying, I can no longer remain hesitant in making my personal view known on this question, even at the risk of attracting ridicule.

     Among the myriad of causal factors in history — physical, social, economic, political, intellectual, and institutional — I believe spiritual factors to be the key force. This conviction stems from my belief that man, a special creation of God, made in His image, is a ”living soul” – an embodied spirit.

     A basic assumption underlying this work is that every national society possesses a worldview (often more than one) that makes certain people share certain beliefs and attitudes. Insofar as man, basically a spiritual being in bodily form, expresses his thoughts and ideas in physical and material ways, the quality of a given worldview conditions, in large measure, the quality of his life.

(Won Sul Lee, Christian Worldview and Historical Change, Singapore: BAC Printers; from Introduction, ix)