Karol Wojtyla and the levels of meaning of the golden rule

Abstract

The golden rule, the ethical principle that we should do to others what we want others to do to us, is known also in Christian tradition as the rule of love of neighbor. The aim of this paper is to inquire the relationship between two levels of meaning of the golden rule according to Karol Wojtyla’s philosophical investigations, prior to his pontificate. One strand of the actual debate on the golden rule concerns its anthropological roots and ethical meaning. Karol Wojtyla’s philosophical approach to the golden rule involves both the investigation of its anthropological roots and its ethical requirements. Indeed, there is a pre-ethical sense of the golden rule in Karol Wojtyla, which is linked to his phenomenological approach to human person and life in community. At this level, the golden rule is described from the perspective of the self-fulfillment logic, which manifests the personalist value of human action. On the other hand, there is also a second sense, properly ethical, of the golden rule, thanks to which developed his perspective of self-donation as a condition for self-fulfillment. In this wojtylian perspective, what makes golden a moral rule is its ability to integrate and complement the search for self-realization with the fulfillment of another through the gift of oneself.