VIRTUOUS LIVING - Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University

Looking in the right direction entails embracing the “triune God, who through hisword, the Bible, and by his Holy Spirit, enlivens, enlightens and enables all whobelieve, in order that they may worship and serve him in spirit and in truth” (Morris1988:732). Worship is therefore communal. At the name of Jesus, as we kneel inhumility and submission to him, we meet each other and learn to “see” together. Thisvirtue helps us to know that we all belong to God. What we are and what we do is forGod’s glory and not for the promotion of our political party and or a means ofachieving our selfish ends.“to the glory of God the father” (v11b) suggests that, even when Jesus Christ isgiven the highest name above all names, when all is said and done, glory belongs toGod. The possession of virtue/ubuntu is not for self-gratification, though it may seemso. One does not boast about the service, greatly enhanced by these characterqualities. To boast about one’s virtue and service would be at odds with the virtue ofhumility, and a misunderstanding or even an abuse of the source of one’s enabling,namely God.After many other supportive evidence in African and biblical proverbs I wish toconclude with the salient points in Paul’s ancient hymn with its reference to thecentrality of Jesus Christ as the model for virtues ethics. Paul uses the wisdom of thisancient hymn to communicate the dynamic character shaped by virtues asdemonstrated by Jesus Christ. Three levels concerning our fundamental motifs withregard to this study are thus fulfilled in Jesus Christ, the prototype of virtue ethics in auniversal sense, and for African virtue ethics in particular. Below is a summary of thatdynamic movement that restores God to the centre of our virtue ethics, reclaims theindividual and sets him/her on a course of constant moral renewal within the newcommunity of the good, just, and wise.The dynamic movement in this ancient hymn also demonstrates the motifs of thetriune God, the individual and the community.First, in Christ, the traditional belief in God is affirmed. Jesus, “who being in the verynature God” reintroduces God into African morality. He is no longer remote, butclose, in the heart of the believer. He nevertheless remains transcendent as328