The problem with the hierarchy of being system is that it reduces each of these domains (God, man, world, society) into separate entities.
What has occurred through history based on this system is gnostic notions of traveling from one domain to another. Thus, we see dualisms arise such that the spiritual (God) is good and all the other domains are bad. The spirit is good and the body is bad. World-fleeing becomes the norm. Grace/Nature dichotomies plague theology. The Scriptures, however, tell us the Creation was good.
Modal philosophies try to incorporate all the domains together so that we understand the way each domain is integrated into the other such that, i.e., the domain of man is not autonomous from God, nature, or society. It provides a more holistic approach to understanding. (A Christian modal philosophy will still maintain the asceity of God while at the same time acknowledging that no man is autonomous from God.)
A Christian modal philosophy avoids the error that man is autonomous in his thinking from God, nature and society. When man believes he is an autonomous domain distinct from God his theoretical thoughts become apostate and lead to antinomies. (The original sin)
Theoretical thought that arises from self-knowledge, dependent on the knowledge of it's origin-God, cognizant of it's relation to the world and society, is less likely to engage in apostate theoretical thought.
Absolutely excellent observation, the_conscience!
But at the same time, to “reduce” the partners into separate entities fatally detracts from the universal, synergistic cooperation and coherence of the partners, which is what the symbol “great hierarchy of being” intends to convey. Any “reduction into entities” tends to falsify its comprehensive meaning.
As with just about everything, there is a danger of “doctrinalization” of what is fundamentally ineffable. Language is the only carrier of human meaning. It is the articulation of self-reflected human experience. And experience is the key word here. Any doctrine tends to separate the “articulation in language” from the actual experience that gave rise to the language symbols. Further, to the extent that any doctrine holds itself out as authoritative, we are invited to accept its tenets as a sort of substitution for direct experience. Both ways we lose the idea that human experience, self-reflection, and articulation are the very foundations of everything we know or think we know, whether in science or philosophy.
And so I stay constantly aware of the Great Hierarchy of Being, not as any kind of “system” or “doctrine,” but as the most universal description of reality of which I can conceive, which illuminates my own direct existential experience and the articulation thereof. To me, it is the universal context in which human existence is conducted. I say that, not because I’ve been “told” that (by means of some doctrine), but because I have actually “seen” that, based on my own direct experience and my self-understanding of it.
Thank you so very much for your most perceptive criticism. I don’t know whether my reply answers it to your satisfaction, so take it FWIW.