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So far we’ve been talking about ‘face’ as it relates to an individual. However in Chinese culture it is more than that! One’s face can also be linked with the face of others in your social group…

Imagine a high school child, who fails to get into university. That high school child will not be the only one who loses face before his family and peers. His parents will also lose face among their peers – and this is a serious thing ("Hey Tommy, I hear your eldest didn’t get in to university!" – or worse still, if everyone knows, but no one says anything)!

Or imagine if a boss is humiliated in front of his employees by a stranger. The employees will go to the outsider and demand that he apologise. The employee will fight to preserve the face of their boss – they will feel compelled to uphold his honour.

These two scenarios illustrate how face is not just something that affects the individual (like the son, or the boss). The rising and falling of someone’s face also affects other members of one’s family, friends, gang, or company. So an affront to one, can actually be felt by all. David Ho writes that, "the behaviour of closely related persons is included in the evaluation of one’s prestige. Thus, the prestige of a scholar-official suffers as a result of his son’s misconduct."

And because of this, you sometimes have others in the company (or gang, or family) fighting to preserve the face of their boss (in the example above). You could say that they are jealous for the face of their boss.

2. The face of the ‘big man’

In this context of the social aspect of face, what is also significant is the face of the da ren, or ‘big man’. In Chinese culture, this da ren is the acknowledged head of a group in society. Samel Ling writes that,

‘For thousands of years Chinese people have been accustomed to a hierarchical way of leadership. There is the emperor on top, with different gradations of government officials. On the local level there are the landowners (gentry) who act as the middlemen between the peasants and the local government official. Everybody knows who the “big men” are in town – the heads of the landowning households. And they are addressed as da ren […], meaning “great person”. Such is the way the Chinese look upon a person who exercises some leadership in society.’

Samuel Ling, The Chinese Way of Doing Things, 147-48.

The social situation today is greatly different, but the concept of the da ren continues on. These da ren are in effect the important people in each society grouping – family, company, church - to which people accord respect and honour. It could be the elderly patriarch of our family, the boss of our company, even the pastor of our church. And in Chinese culture there is great concern for subordinates to preserve the face of the da ren.

In his fourth year project Alistair Chiu draws attention to a widely reported news story in China, illustrative of this face behaviour.

[...] where a director forced an employee at a bowling alley to kneel before him and pour him tea. The director had gone bowling with his subordinates when there had been an argument over a technical problem. The employee manager had tried to solve it but the director felt disrespect and got angry demanded she restore his honour.

When the boss arrived and saw them fighting, he told her who the director was. As soon as she head this, she acquiesced to his demands and knelt before him in the bowling alley to serve him tea, sacrificing herself to restore his pride and honour and save the bowling alley from his wrath.

Surprised and yet satisfied by this display of public humiliation, the director returned to good humour and offered to pay for the bill.

As part of a study about face practices, Wenshan Jia (The Remaking of the Chinese Character and Identity in the 21st Century: the Chinese face practices) shared this incident with some consultants who remarekd that, ‘a superior’s face is more important than the face of subordinates.’ And ‘one should not lose face, especially in front of one’s subordinates.’

Alistair describes what is happening behind the scenes in this scenario:

Having lost face, the director needed to regain it, or he would lose standing and respect amongst his subordinates. Even if they did not think so, he thought so. There was also an intricate relationship between power or position and mianxi (another word for face). For example, an apology equaled loss of face and in extension loss of power. This fact explained why the superior, even if afterwards he felt regret for what he had done, could never apologise but would affirm his own rightness to his underlings.

Alistair Chiu

Even those who participated in Wenshan Jia’s study were disturbed by the behaviour that was produced by such face-consciousness, and in fact there was public uproar in China when this incident made the news.

As Christians, we have even greater reason to be disturbed – after all, who is this chairman? Merely another one of God’s creatures, who will also one day stand naked and trembling before the throne of God. And the unrighteousness of one of God’s creatures demanding that he be exalted by another, demanding that others humiliate themselves for the sake of his face, is all the more plainer for those who have come to know their own place in God’s created order.

3. God’s concern for his own ‘face’

And indeed we saw in our last post that someone’s concern for their own face can become idolatrous (see previous post). However concern for face is not always idolatrous… and you see this particularly when we come to the Bible, and consider God’s own concern for his ‘name’.

Because God is face-conscious! Ultimately God is concerned for his own honour. This is actually God’s purpose in creation (Psa 19:1-2). He works salvation not merely for our sake, but for the praise of his glory (Eph 1:11-14). Even when he exercises judgment it is so that people will know that he is the Lord (Exo 7:17). He is jealous to preserve his holy name from being defamed (Isa 42:8). He vindicates his holy name in justifying sinners, by having an atoning sacrifice bear sin (Rom 3:25-26). God’s concern, in everything he does, is his ‘name’.

But while our preoccupation with our own ’name’ is ugly and idolatrous, God’s preoccupation with his ‘name’ is not. This is because it is eminently right for God to be concerned for his own glory and honour. But for a creature to be concerned for their own ‘name’ is not. Because they are giving their own small ‘name’ the place that only God’s ‘name’ should have.

In Desiring God, John Piper puts it like this:

God’s ultimate goal [...] is to preserve and display his infinite and awesome greatness and worth, that is, his glory.

God has many other goals in what he does. But none of them is more ultimate than this. They are all subordinate. God’s overwhelming passion is to exalt the value of his glory. To that end he seeks to display it, to oppose those who belittle it, and to vindicate it from all contempt. It is clearly the uppermost reality in his affections. He loves his glory infinitely.

This is the same as saying: He loves himself infinitely. Or: He himself is uppermost in his own affections. A moment’s reflection reveals the inexorable justice of this fact. God would be unrighteous (just as we would) if he valued anything more than what is supremely valuable. But he himself is supremely valuable. If he did not take infinite delight in the worth of his own glory he would be unrighteous. For it is right to take delight in a person in proportion to the excellence of that person’s glory.

John Piper, Desiring God.

This is why, all throughout the Bible, God is concerned for his own ‘name’.

4. Fighting for God’s ‘face’

As Christians then, in the same way that an employee is disturbed to see his employer lose face and works to regain honor for him, we also are disturbed to see the name of God dishonoured (Rom 2:17-24). And positively, we are people who strive, in all things, for the name / glory of God (1 Cor 10:31). We are now his people -a people who declare his praises, that others might see and join in our praise (1 Pet 2:9-10).

Which is why when Christians idolise their own face, this is doubly wrong. Not only are they treasuring something that is inferior! More seriously, they are also witholding from God the honour that he alone deserves.

And so when we address the world, we do so not just as dispassionate advocates for a better way of life. We are God’s own people – who are jealous for the glory of God’s name! We don’t just disagree with unbelievers. We are disturbed when his name is slandered! We don’t just have a different opinion – we are filled with sorrow when we see people choose their own face over God’s!

In fact we will willingly do things that make us lose face – if only God receives greater honour. Because at the centre of our universe is now the glory of God. It is his name, his honour, his ‘face’ that is precious – and not ours.

[ PS: who are the da ren's in your social groups? When the gospel comes to the Chinese, how does it transform things? ]