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PaperclipPerfector  11mo ago (text post)   35010 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of June 26, 2023

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While the Jesus of the gospels doesn’t come off as a Republican, he definitely does come off as a moralizing leader of a strict, high commitment religion holding non-negotiable commands for followers but not pushing broader social change. This codes right in this day and age.

I guess. But "not pushing broader social change" is a pretty big deal. The entire NT assumes either implicitly or explicitly Christians will always be a powerless minority in the world, so there's tons of advice on how to navigate an unbelieving world, but nothing about how to actually run or structure society at large, since none of the authors seemed to dream that Christianity would ever become a popular, let alone state-enforced, creed. Jesus and the earliest disciples seem to have operated on the assumption that they were just going to have to "ride it out" until God came down (very soon) and set things right himself, and the (in)famous teachings urging poverty and passivity are given in light of that. Maybe such an ethos is right-wing, but it's not very attractive or useful to right-wingers today, nor has it historically been very attractive to Christian potentates, which is why so much ink has been spilled then and now to justify what boil down to the same old pagan statecraft and social mores, but with a cross on top.

The entire NT assumes either implicitly or explicitly Christians will always be a powerless minority in the world, so there's tons of advice on how to navigate an unbelieving world, but nothing about how to actually run or structure society at large, since none of the authors seemed to dream that Christianity would ever become a popular, let alone state-enforced, creed.

Strongly disagree with this. Everything from the assertion that there's no advice on how to run a large society, to the implication that the authors were incorrect to assume that Christianity would never be popular.

As far as advice on how to run a large society, there was plenty of direction regarding church organization throughout the book. Heck, Jesus seems to spend more time criticizing the existing leadership, and showing them a better path by example, than he does doing anything else.

As far as the church never being popular:

  • Much of the advice Christ was giving was contemporary advice to missionaries, who were encouraged to keep their heads down because they were currently in an unbelieving world. At other points people were encouraged to take up swords etc. Luke 22:35-36:

35 And he said unto them, When I sent you without apurse, and scrip, and shoes, lacked ye any thing? And they said, Nothing.

36 Then said he unto them, But now, he that hath a purse, let him take it, and likewise his scrip: and he that hath no sword, let him sell his garment, and buy one.

  • It's easy to interpret essentially all of those teachings as more metaphorical, and I think doing so is more accurate than not. "The world" can be against Christianity even if Christianity is the dominant religion, simply by virtue of the world being worldly, or most Christians not yet being truly converted.

  • Also very easy to (and plenty of people do) consider Catholicism a sort of co-opted Christianity, one which at some point lost its way. Hard to argue that Christianity is a popular world religion if its two largest champion institutions (Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy) are not Christian.

As far as advice on how to run a large society, there was plenty of direction regarding church organization throughout the book.

That's very different. Most of this advice is given as just that, how to run the church as an insular community, and always defined against the larger unbelieving world. The Old Testament is full of laws, punishments, and rewards, but there's almost none of that in the NT.

Much of the advice Christ was giving was contemporary advice to missionaries, who were encouraged to keep their heads down because they were currently in an unbelieving world.

This is true, but there's no indication that Jesus or anyone else thought they would ever not be in an unbelieving world, at least until the eschaton. I could be wrong, but off the top of my head I don't believe there's a single place in the NT where it's even suggested that one day Christians might be kings, or generals, or even public magistrates. That verse in Luke is, as far as I'm aware, the only spot in the whole NT that even comes close to a suggestion that Christians should ever do violence against anyone else, so it naturally comes up a lot in discussions about this. But just a few verses later when the priests and the soldiers come to arrest Jesus, and the disciples try to defend him by force, he tells them to put the swords away. Why Luke included this bit, who knows for sure, but to me it looks more like Jesus in this story wanted to make a point that swords were in fact useless because what was happening was preordained.

There are plenty of places in the NT where God does violence on behalf of Christians (the deaths of Ananias and Sapphira, the earthquake that frees Peter from prison) but none where Christians are encouraged to do violence against anyone else, except for the episode at Gethsemane which is not approved of by the narrative of any of the gospels.

You make good points, mainly I disagree that things like "the world will hate you" referred to political power, and I especially disagree with the implication that this means that the later political power wielded by Christianity contradicts the Bible.

I think most of the "the world will hate you" referred to spiritual hatred etc., including the hatred each of us has towards our own higher impulses. Even in very Christian society, such as Christian Rome, there were plenty of high-level leaders who weren't sold on the religion. They were wolves in sheep's clothing, so to speak. That's not to say Christianity was not politically powerful, but spiritually it had much less power than "the world" i.e. all influences other than Christianity.

I generally read the NT as an amendment to the Old Testament. If the NT doesn't contradict the OT, then the teachings of the OT are still in force. With that in mind, I think it makes sense that the NT was more focused on the higher law--the lower law (all the laws etc.) had all been given and now Jesus was attempting to teach the next step. So yes, there was very little focus on laws etc. because that had already been covered. Kings, priests, etc. already had political power in Israel and now the next step was to take some of that away from them because they were misusing it.

I suppose I'm nitpicking, especially if that implication was unintentional. I agree with your point that Jesus taught poverty and passivity which is not very appealing in today's political climate.

I could be wrong, but off the top of my head I don't believe there's a single place in the NT where it's even suggested that one day Christians might be kings, or generals, or even public magistrates.

1 Timothy 2:4 does:

First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, 2 for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. 3 This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, 4 who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.

Pauls' asking them to pray for the kings, since kings too are part of God's plan of salvation.

You're right that that is fairly implicit, and I'm not really recalling any other such passage. I suppose there were Roman centurions, if we're counting low level offices.

Romans 13 describes violence being done by men favorably, but doesn't explicitly instruct Christians to do so. In revelation, martyrs wish for violence, but no Christians are doing it, I believe.

And that’s a pretty big difference between Christianity and Islam- the Bible has a lot about how to be ruled, but next to nothing about ruling.

This is Sam Harris' point about "render unto Caesar" having no Qur'anic equivalent.

Mohammed was Caesar

Well, the old testament has more, but that's not enormously applicable.

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