There’s been a lot of hullaballoo lately about the enneagram, with buzzing in the Christian community about its being occult and anti-biblical.  Others are saying that Christians are drawn to the enneagram when they’re gullible and/or bored.  With the important caveats that if it offends your conscience, you should avoid it, and that (as with any topic), we should be careful about which sources we use because they vary in how edifying they are (or aren’t), I disagree with these sweeping statements.

I believe the enneagram can be good or bad, depending on the context, and that there’s a lot of fear, misinformation, and general lack of balance going around — and I’d like to take a few minutes to explain why I find many of the arguments overblown, and why I believe the enneagram to be a good thing when used well.

What in the World is the Enneagram?

First of all, let me give a brief explanation of what the enneagram is, in case this is the first time you’re hearing about it.  Because if that’s the case, you’re probably thinking, “well… that name sure sounds weird.”  The word enneagram describes the diagram.  “Ennea” means nine, and “-gram” is a suffix that refers to something written or drawn, so “enneagram” simply describes the nine-pointed figure.

This diagram is used as part of a system of describing personality, which uses nine categories or “types.”  Each type has its own primary motivations, fears, and “fixations” (areas one tends toward getting “stuck” in).  There are further layers of complexity to the way the system describes the types and their typical patterns of growth and maturity (or lack thereof), but that’s the gist of it.

Negative Arguments

Before I talk about why I believe the enneagram can be beneficial, I want to address some of the arguments against it, and why I believe they’re faulty or exaggerated.

It Just Looks Evil

Some people are complaining about the enneagram on the basis of the diagram itself.  “Can’t you just look at the graphic of the nine personalities and see Satan at work?”  That’s a direct quote from one article I read — and it’s absurd.  There is nothing remotely “Christian” about that objection; it’s pure superstition.

I can understand why it would appear weird.  It bears some passing resemblance to symbols like Satanic pentagrams.  But those shapes are not inherently Satanic, either; they’re invested with a certain meaning because of the way they’re used.  The enneagram, like other geometric figures, is just lines and shapes.  God is the Maker of geometry, math, and patterns, and we need to not be attributing evil to things merely on the basis that they “look weird.”

(This is not a small matter, because the same kind of faulty thought process is what gives us stereotypes and bigotry and all the truly wicked things that flow out of them.  Appearance isn’t everything.)

Its Roots Are New Age

The most common argument — and the one that holds the most water — is that the roots of the enneagram system are New Age or occultic.  And this is where I believe that some people’s consciences will be bothered and others’ will be clear, because it’s partly true…and partly not.

There is some occultic representation within the history of the enneagram, but it isn’t nearly as simplistic as most of these objectors would have us believe.

Nobody really knows the real roots of the enneagram — that is, where it really got started.  Even among the “big name teachers” of the enneagram community, this is all largely speculative.  The general consensus is that a number of parts and pieces have been around since ancient times, and that they’ve been compiled into this single system in relatively recent history.

Those that did the “original compiling” were, indeed, some real “out there” mystics.  That can’t be denied.  (To say that Gurdjuff, for instance, was an “odd duck” is putting it mildly.)  But I don’t think it’s even as simple as that, for two reasons.

First, the fact that the source of something is someone with a given religious view doesn’t make that thing inherently a part of that religion.  (This would be a form of the genetic fallacy.)  More on that in my next subsection.

Second, the enneagram system was not created, packaged, and handed to us by Gurdjuff and then just used as-is, as though that were the total package.  It’s a group of concepts that were handed down, and which are in active development and examination and refinement by a variety of people interested in the study of personality and human behavior.  So, while there are certainly some common elements (otherwise it would be useless to think of it as a system!), it isn’t accurate to say the enneagram community is a homogenous one that just adopted whatever the mystics said, hook, line, and sinker.

Some folks found passed down to them some ideas that seemed to them to have merit and continued to develop those ideas, so much of what we know as the enneagram today has already had a lot of Gurdjuff’s ideas stripped from it long ago as nonsense.  And other teachers today continue to refine the system, usually from a far less esoteric point of view.

All of which means that what kind of “packaging” the enneagram comes with depends a lot on what source you get it from.  Which brings me to my next point.

The Worldview of the Source…

All information comes to us packaged in the worldview of the one from whence it comes.  But not all information is bad.  Just as one obvious example, consider history texts.

If we disagree with an author’s beliefs about why the Civil War/War Between the States happened, does that negate the fact that the events he described are real and valid?  Of course not.  The Battle of Gettysburg is still the Battle of Gettysburg whether you’re hearing about it from a Northerner or a Southerner.  We might have to filter his perspective of the events based on what we know about his worldview, but we can’t just say, “well, I don’t believe we should learn there was a Battle of Gettysburg because I don’t agree with the guys who wrote these books about it.”

Religious worldview is a little different than historical bias, of course, but the concept is similar.  Everyone has a worldview.  That means all information comes to us from someone with a worldview.  And we have to learn when and how to separate the specific ideas from the worldview they’re entangled with.  But the simple fact that we don’t have any sources about a given idea from someone who shares our worldview, or that all of our sources on a given idea share the same other worldview, does not necessarily mean that the idea has no ability to exist apart from that other worldview.

(As a side note, we are often oblivious to the fact that our own culture carries its own religious baggage.  We ignore the worldview entanglements of things that come to us from our familiar — but still secular — culture, while panicking over worldview entanglements of less-familiar cultures.  We need to be mindful to carefully and properly separate both.)

Vulnerable Sources

Although this is a less-common factor, it’s still a common enough factor to be worth noting: those with particular weaknesses to particular stumbling blocks are not the most reliable sources for general asssessments of whether a thing is useful.  The recovering alcoholic is not the best source for determining whether moderate alcohol consumption is sinful for everyone.  The person who used to sacrifice meat to idols is not the best source for determining whether probably-idol-sacrificed meat in the marketplace is evil for believers without that background. (1 Cor. 8)  And the former New Ager is not the best source for determining whether the enneagram is a stumbling block for Christians with no history that might incline them to being drawn in by the more esoteric sources.

Positive Arguments

Having addressed why I find many of the arguments against the enneagram weak, let me explain why the system has the potential to be good when Christian families and communities use it well.

The Enneagram is a Tool

The enneagram (like any other personality system) is a tool, a codified set of observations about patterns of human behavior.  A tool is whatever we make of it.  We can use it foolishly, or we can use it well.

A common complaint levied against the enneagram is one I’ve also seen levied against other systems that address behavioral prefences, such as the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) and the Five Love Languages — that they’re “merely excuses for bad behavior or selfishness.” They all certainly can be.  But if you choose to use them that way, that’s your fault, not the tool’s fault.  You can also choose to hit someone on the head with a hammer instead of using it to drive a nail.  Does that make hammers evil?

One Body, Varied Members

It’s true that the Bible never talks about “personality types,” per se.  But I believe that the basic concept of personality systems is one we see taught in Scripture: that of a Body comprised of differing parts.  The Bible teaches us that we shouldn’t try to be another part we’re not, and we shouldn’t expect that everyone else should be like us.  We’re different on purpose, and all are valuable and necessary for those differences.  (1 Cor. 12:12-27)

Understanding more about ourselves and others, and what “parts” we are helps us appreciate both ourselves and others so we aren’t inclined to try to be something else, or to make someone else into us.

To Know People is to Be Like God

Sometimes Christians imply that “focusing on people” is missing the point of Christianity, because our purpose is to love God.  This is a dangerously false dichotomy.  Jesus said the Law of God was summed up in two parts: loving God and loving one’s neighbor.  I have no idea who Father Stephen Freeman is, but I think he nailed it with this quote.  “Knowing others is so far from being a distraction from knowing God, that it is actually essential to knowing God.”

People are God’s image-bearers, remember?  We glorify God, in part, by knowing and loving others.

Moreover, knowing people is modeling ourselves after God.  God knows us thoroughly.  One of the promises we have for the perfection of the next Age is that we will know, even as we are known (1 Cor. 13:12).  But we’re not God, and most of us need some help to see beyond our own narrow ways of thinking and appreciate someone else’s perspective and what he brings to the table.

So a personality tool like the enneagram, used well, should help the Christian to glorify God by doing three things:

1. helping us to understand and appreciate our own God-given strengths, so we can learn to use them more effectively for building the Kingdom, and avoid trying to fill someone else’s role
2. helping us to be aware of the particular areas of weakness that most often cause us to stumble into sin, so we can avoid/overcome them
3. helping us to see and appreciate the God-given strengths of others, so we can appreciate the ways they complement us in building the Kingdom, rather than trying to force them to fit our own molds

Good Fruit

Ultimately, the bottom line is that the fruit I have seen of the enneagram in use in Christian homes and churches — including my own — is overwhelmingly good.  I’ve heard multiple people say that learning the enneagram saved their marriages.  And I can understand why, because we’ve seen benefits in our own marriage.

We’re not different people than we were before.  But we have language for describing the things that differentiate us, and that has been a significant boon to communication.  We also now have a better grasp of the underlying motivations that drive certain outward behaviors, both in ourselves and each other, and that has been beneficial in several ways.

In many cases, the behaviors aren’t sinful; they just annoy, baffle, or frustrate the other person because they’re so different from the way we innately operate.  Understanding the “why” helps the recipient/observer feel less frustrated, because it seems less random; it now makes sense.  It also helps the “doer” to get an idea of different behaviors that might better reflect or communicate the real motivation when interacting with that particular person.  Essentially, it helps us adjust to our differences in practical ways that help us love each other better.

It has also greatly increased my understanding of my much-more-emotionally-driven-than-I-am child.  The practical result of that is that I am able to approach her with much greater grace and compassion, so that I’m gently guiding her toward increased self-control and “being the boss of her feelings rather than letting them boss her,” rather than exasperating her and/or making her feel unloved.

Understanding our designed differences enables me to recognize her tender heart as a gift to the Church, not as a weakness (which, just being bluntly honest, is the way I would perceive it if I were looking purely through my own personal lens).  In that way, it prevents me from sinning against her (and against God, by viewing His design of her as bad).  And only if we’re foolish would it lead us into the sin of excusing a lack of self-control on her part rather than recognizing that’s something she will find especially challenging and need to work at.

On the flip side, this mama needs to grow in recognizing that boldness and objectivity are gifts (even when not everyone sees them that way); God’s design of me is good.  But it isn’t an excuse to walk all over people, and gentleness and patience are particular challenges for me — areas where I need to be particularly mindful to grow and to rely on the Spirit.

A Parting Challenge

I’ve heard a common refrain, of late, not only about the enneagram, but about a number of other topics as diverse as social media and Christmas, that these things are distractions from God.  As I wrap up here, I would encourage you, regardless of whether you decide the enneagram is good, bad, or oh-who-cares?, to look a little more closely at any “thing” you view as a distraction.  Is the “thing” the problem, or is your attitude the problem?  Is it a distraction because of its inherent nature, or is it a distraction because of how you’ve chosen to use it?  Can you take that thing that is currently a distraction and turn it so that it actually points you to God?