Pappi often struggles with the tension between those who primarily see Good and Evil in shades of gray, and those who see them only in Black and White. Both sides have their arguments, convincing for their own positions, but completely unconvincing to each other, and by and large for Pappi.
At a men's breakfast this weekend I was harangued by one who had been on a year's study of the Bible, where the brilliant leader had convinced him that the proof of the shades of gray position lay in the recorded commands of God for Israel to slay all men, women and children of the Canaanites as they displaced them. Obviously, the argument ran, there were good people amongst these and how could it be justifiable to slaughter them without distinction. Thus (I think he was trying to say), even God was confused about good and evil, or else the Bible was confused.
Herein lies a wealth of debate, but Pappi notices that the proponent of this idea appeared not to realize that he himself was making a value judgement, that "it could not be right" for God to give this command. To Pappi he seems to have sunk himself, for if there is no black or white, why is he painting black either those who endorse the scripture which records this, or God, if the scripture is true?
Pappi tried to channel the debate back to universal values of absolute good and evil, by identifying certain things, such as child-rape, which can only be painted black, but the same guy who wouldn't tolerate God ordering Israel to massacre Canaanite villages refused to agree that child rape was universally black and wrong. This was a member of the church with seemingly sound morals and values.
The problem of course is that he had gotten into the position of wanting to not lose the argument, instead of being open to learn from it.
On the other hand, there is a huge issue (not necessarily recognized as such but nevertheless foundational to sanity and credibility) around the relationship between God's and man's sovereignties - talking now within the Christian faith, since Agnostics and Atheists disallow any sovereignty to God, Theistic religions tend to be fatalist (and therefore deprive man of any genuine freedom of choice) (not much different to the position of Atheists and Behaviourists) and only Christianity and Judaism really allow there to be genuine free choice for man.
This boils down to a serious debate on how to take the Bible, and the position of the parties who try to take a literalist position on it, thereby outraging not only those who see everything in terms of gray and want not to be under its authority at all, but also those who recognize that God could not have meant all scripture to be taken literally, and in fact worked with flawed human beings at all times. However helpful it is to use the plainly read Bible to (a) meet with God's Spirit and His ways, (b) to teach children and (c) to unveil God's core character to pagans, much evil arises when it is used to oppress plain, obvious rationality.
Now already Pappi has made enemies of both sides. And these issues are too great to resolve in a little Blog posting, but maybe some of the basic issues around how to decide whether one is in legitimate territory as a rational human being can be teased out in the way ahead. The rule Pappi tries very hard to stick to, is not to be in this debate to win, but to share and learn so that there can be more light and happiness and less gloom and misery.
That too we will discuss, God and man willing.
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2 comments:
It feels quite abstract, this talk about the 2 camps and their black-and-white vs grey judgements. Parhaps we must speak for practically, i.e. give some examples. The point about the OT invasions of the Canaanites was a bit blurry to me.
Give an example of what you deem grey and what you deem black-and-white, and why/how you make that judgement.
In the end, there are many issues that are situation dependent, which we can call "gray" - for example how people dress and address each other. What determines right or wrong in these are the context, and heart of the one participating. Participation of women in leadership, wearing of veils etc. fall into this category. Jesus was clearly attacked for seeing things in this light.
Other things are just wrong in themselves and have no excuse at any time. I nominated child rape, but in fact any rape counts. You can tell when you're dealing with such an issue, as people always either deny they do such things, or if unable to do so, try to blame their action on someone else.
In reality war itself is not wrong, nor is killing people - these are gray areas, since refusing to fight evil is itself an evil. Context is what counts, and the invasion of Canaan has to be seen in context.
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