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Anxiety and Thoughts of Death

20 Wednesday May 2020

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Short version: It’s not just the idea, but the anxiety produced by the idea, which gives rise to an increase in thoughts of death. If I tell you your worldview is stupid and you don’t care, you don’t have increased thoughts of death. But if you take my “you’re stupid and so’s your worldview” to heart and feel anxious, you’ll have increased thoughts of death. If you have increased thoughts of death, you try to defend your worldview from attack.
Longer version: Terror Management Theory proposes that when we are confronted with thoughts of death, we seek to (1) shore up our self-esteem, and (2) our worldview. For example, an atheist confronted with death can say, I won’t know I’m dead so there is no reason to fear death. A Muslim can say, I will be resurrected to Paradise, so I have no need to fear death. When I thinks about death, they can think about their response to death.

When confronted with some information which undercuts their worldview, (say, there is a god, or Muhammed was not a true prophet), research shows that the victim (or test-subject, depending upon your point-of-view) has more thoughts about death (DTA death-thought accessibility).

Since thoughts of death produce anxiety, human beings seek for ways to relieve that anxiety (anxiety being unpleasant). Researchers have noted two basic mechanisms, first were used to relieve the anxiety. The immediate response is to distract oneself or otherwise try to ignore the information). Then, after a passage of time and as thought the immediate thoughts of death fade, one begins to various “distal defenses” are brought to bear. The victim seeks to shore-up their symbolic mechanism to deal with death.

The research has primarily dealt with the thoughts of death, not the emotion of anxiety. A study published 2014 sought to examine the emotive functions.

The study sought to produce anxiety in Protestant Christian undergraduate students. They were told that the they were testing how a drink effected memory. Some of the students were told the drink contained caffeine and would them “jittery,” others were told it was a vitamin drink.

The reason for the two different drinks has to do with “attribution of arousal manipulation.” The students who drank the “caffeine” might attribute their anxiety to the drink and not to the article challenging their beliefs.

The students were given an article which challenged their religious beliefs (Jesus is the same as Krishna or Mithra or Horus). A control group read an article on the northern lights.

The next phase asked the students to complete words . So they were given coff–. Do they write “coffee” or “coffin”? The reason for this section to was both assess their thoughts of death and to give time for the “distal defenses” to engage.

The final phase as the students to evaluate their article – did it make you angry? How smart was the author?

When the students were given the “caffeine”, there was a marginal tendency to attribute their anxiety to caffeine and to have fewer “death-related” thoughts than the vitamin drink group. The students with the vitamin drink did experience more death related thoughts when having their religious beliefs attacked.

Not surprisingly, the students who read the attacking article had greater emotional response than those who read the article on the northern lights.

But since the researchers had given an introductory questionnaire on death related thoughts, they wanted to make sure that initial questionnaire did not poison their results.

They performed a very similar test. But this time they gave the students an opportunity to set bail for a prostitute. The thinking was that death-related thoughts would lead to more protection for their worldview, which would lead to higher bail amounts.

The surmise was true.

Here is what the researchers believed was significant in these tests: When the student attributed their anxiety to the caffeine they did not seek to protect their world view. It seems that when they blamed the drink for their anxiety it acted to protect them from thinking further about death.

A third test was premised upon this idea: Humans protect ourselves from thoughts of death by distinguishing ourselves from other animals. Therefore, we experience disgust when someone eats strange food, defects on the living room floor or commits incest, because it reminds us that we are animals; reminding ourselves that we are animals, reminds that we can die like animals. Therefore, we feel disgust in those circumstances.

You don’t need to take that explanation for why we experience disgust when someone decides to imitate a dog in your apartment.

The third experiment sought to determine the extent to which misattribution could apply to disgust.

And so we come to a test which I am glad I did not have to experience. The students were going to be subjected to viewing a number of gross pictures, someone vomiting, urine, feces, snot, a dirty toilet, a bloody finger. These apparently makes us think we are animals.

All the students were given an essay to read. One essay said, you’re just animal. The other essay had nothing to do with animals.

All the students were given instructions on viewing the pictures. Some were told to view the pictures carefully. Others were given specific instructions to take a “detached and unemotional attitude.” They were to be clinical and unfeeling as they examined the pictures.

After looking at the pictures, they were examined for disgust.

The students were instructed to have clinical detachment when viewing the pictures had fewer death-related thoughts after viewing them.

And so again, an increase a serious negative emotion increased one’s thought of death.

Here was the upshot:

Our findings suggest that threatening material will only increase DTA when that material is experienced as emotionally unsettling.

Webber, D., Schimel, J., Faucher, E.H. et al. “Emotion as a necessary component of threat-induced death thought accessibility and defensive compensation.” Motiv Emot 39, 142–155 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11031-014-9426-1.

What precisely takes place is unclear.

This research reminds me of some research I did in college on the grotesque in literature. There is a theory that we are attracted to disturbing things in art because it allows us to focus our existing anxiety on a point and attribute our anxiety on that artwork (rather than on some other matter which may be disturbing me.

There is an important consideration here for persuasion study. Persuasion functions by creating some sort of dis-ease, some anxiety and a proffered means of resolution. You see the car, you want the car: anxiety. You can buy the car: resolution.

If the creation of anxiety generally has a tendency to increase thoughts of death – and thus thoughts of protection of my worldview – this creates a certain complication. The research showed only a “marginal” decrease in death related thoughts when the anxiety could be attributed to the caffeine drink.

If we seek to create a powerful persuasive movement, we have the potential for creating greater anxiety and thus increased death related thoughts. An increase in death related thoughts comes along with protection of one’s worldview.

Thus, a powerful persuasive move have the wind at its back if the persuasion accords with one’s worldview. But, an attempt to make a strong persuasive move (by generating a great deal of anxiety at first) will have a headwind if that persuasive move is contrary to the worldview.

This does not mean that the issue under persuasive pressure is distinctly a facet of the worldview; only that it can be concordant or discordant with a worldview.

The Squirrel! Theory of Anxiety Management

20 Wednesday May 2020

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Distraction as a Means of Relief

A 2005 series of studies published in Journal of Personality and Social Psychology suggests that perhaps people deal with threats by thinking about something else. This is essentially the Squirrel! Theory of stress management. That is perhaps too glib a summary and certainly not academic, I think it is fair.

The article, itself, is remarkably dense and considers a number of seemingly disparate concepts. The idea initially under consideration is the fact that people – particularly under some threat – exaggerate the extent to which others hold their personal views on any number of subjects.

They first note three major theories for this observed condition: (1) It might generate social support; you get others to like you. (2) Cognitive closure: there’s nothing to think about here, everyone has the same opinion. (3) Since threats undermine confidence in myself, exaggerating social consensus makes me feel better about myself.

They then went about threatening college students to see whether the third theory proved itself. They focused upon “defensively proud individuals”. While there are variants in the way in which this is expressed, “The common theme is that they all involve an explicit focus on an ostensible self-strength, which appears to mask vulnerability. Thus we see the three forms as manifestation of a latent defensive pride construct and, in the present research, expect them to be related to arrogant self-righteousness in the face of threats.” Ian McGregor et al., “Defensive Pride and Consensus: Strength in Imaginary Numbers,” Journal of Psychology and Social Psychology 89, no. 6 (2005): 978-96.
In the first study they gave two groups of psychology students a section to read on statistics. One paper was impenetrable; the other a simple explain of the importance of statistics. They were both told that the paper was something everyone knew (a “popular tool”). For those with the difficult page, the effect would be “you’re stupid.” They then asked them questions on moral issues such as abortion and capital punishment. Those who were humiliated by the researchers over estimated the number of people who held their particular views on the various issues.
A second study asked two groups of students to either vividly describe themselves in a frightening circumstance or a comfortable and securable place. They were then asked the moral questions. The frightened students again over-estimated the number of people who held their personal views on moral issues.
A third study threatened all of the students; but following the threat some students received praise. The students were then given two articles supposed written by a student who visited the United States from a foreign country. One version praised the US; one version complained and condemned. Being praised after being threatened resulted in less negative evaluation of the condemning “foreigner.”
A fourth study was conducted to determine whether the exaggeration of consensus was from “reflected glory” of the group or mere consensus with a group.
In the end, the researchers were left with the observation that under stress people can alleviate that stress by being affirmed personally or by imagining the whole world is on their side.
They then compared their findings to a number of other studies, and in particular to the results of terror management theory. But whereas terror management theory suggests that the defensive nature of such consensus under threat was ultimately as a means of protecting one against the fear of death, the various findings of terror management – and other studies – is we can only think about one thing at a time.

We propose that all of these findings can be economically explained from a thought-control perspective According to Wegner (1992), thought suppression begins with the search for distracting thoughts. The “distractor search brings a series of thoughts to mind until one is selected that absorbs attention,” at which point, “attention is drawn from the controlled distractor search to the absorbing distractor itself.” (991)

Since thoughts about oneself are easily available, they can act as useful “distractors” when faced with fearful conditions. The researchers suggest various neurological bases for this conclusion. But in the end, it means that one way to deal with anxiety is to distract yourself.
From a persuasion perspective, it might seem that fear will be an effective means of persuasion with coupled with consensus: First you introduce a disturbing matter then you offer up your product or service wrapped up in a consensus: Everyone loves X!
But the research is a bit more-tricky: If the affirmative is on a ground too closely related to the threat, it “fails to quell the threat because they [the affirmations] remind the participants of the threat.”
In their research, the authors of these studies argued that affirmations and consensus functioned the same way by distracting the one under anxiety. Thus, what applies to consensus would apply to affirmations.
But there is another possibility here: A product or service which resolves the threat (rather than merely distract from thinking about the threat) might be sufficient even if the threat and the consensus-approved product concern exactly the same thing.
In conflict, distraction is well known as a means of deflating a threat.
A final element of the article struck a theological note which the authors may not have considered:

PWe propose that threatened people may have turned to consensus in the present research for the same reason [diminish ruminations about threats]. Imagining widespread agreement with one’s own convictions may be self-soothing because self-righteousness is an appealing fantasy that can capture attention, make threats seem more remote, and allow them to fade from salience. (987)

Although the quoted language contains the clause “capture the attention”, the argument is not in distraction but in diffusion. The threat against me is not real, but I am righteous. But how could my righteousness have anything to do with the reality of a threat? The connection here is not apparent in the article.

In Romans 1, Paul makes a sustained argument from verse 18-31. It begins with the proposition that human beings know ourselves to be under judgment, “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all unrighteousness.” In turn, human beings act to suppress subjective knowledge of that threat. The act of suppression then leads to a number of perversions and distortions of the human being in a whole catalogue of insanity and sin. The argument concludes with the observation that human beings not only do these unrighteous things, “they give hearty approval” to those who practice the same things.

Under the most profound existential threat, human beings respond with a forced consensus. However, the argument made in the quotation above, and by Paul, is not that the consensus acts to distract us; rather it acts to deny the fact of the threat. The more people who believe a thing, the more “objective” it in fact is. If all of us deny or believe some X then it is true. The threat is thus believed into non-existence.

Aesthetic Judgment and Persuasion (Wittgenstein)

19 Tuesday May 2020

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In a 1983 article published in Crítica, Richard Shusterman examples Wittgenstein’s doctrine indeterminacy in aesthetic value and the work of critical evaluation. At first, this may seem rather remote from the matter of persuasion, but Shusterman rightly notes that the work of a critic (literary, musical, dramatic) is a work of persuasive rhetoric. In fact, Shusterman notes a passage in Wittgenstein’s Lectures and Conversations where he equates the nature of legal argument with the rhetorical procedure of a critic. As a lawyer, I can affirm correctness of Wittgenstein on this point.
Briefly, Shusterman notes three ways in which an aesthetic judgment is indeterminate.
Perhaps under the pressure from natural sciences and their seeming claim to indisputable truth, objective and eternal as a sort of sight of Platonic Forms, non-physical sciences beginning in the 19th century often sought to stylize themselves along “scientific” lines. Theology and literary criticism were taken up as sciences (in the sense of chemistry or physics).
A movement was made to formalize aesthetics in terms of deductive and inductive argument. If you have ever seen Dead Poets Society, the introduction from the beginning of the poetry book on how to graph the quality of a poem – which the new literature teacher has the students tear from their book – is a perfect example.
Wittgenstein critiques such deductive and inductive evaluations of art on the ground that the necessary grounds for evaluation have a degree of flux (Shusterman calls this “radical indeterminacy”, but I think he overshoots the mark; there is however a relative indeterminacy without question).

First, the basic concepts of balance and beauty do not have hard edges. Second, the work of the critic depends upon what sort of question the critic is asking (Wittgenstein’s concept of “game”). Thus, a critic who considers Hamlet psychological or the emotive or the political or metaphysical work will come to different conclusions. (Merrill Tenney’s book on Galatians is an example of how to perform this sort of critical evaluation. I also just realized that I have lent this book to someone and now I can’t find my copy.) Third, evaluations of beauty and art take place in a larger cultural context.
When we come to the contemporary period (granted Shusterman is writing 40 years ago; but the situation is even more extreme at present than then), the cultural context does not provide a universal scheme in which we can make a deductively valid and sound argument: who can say whether the premises are true.
What then does a literary critic do in such an environment? The critic cannot present “a nice knock-down argument for you.”
The critic’s work in this environment is thus to bring you to see the work from a particular point of view:

Validity is success, success in inducing the desired perception of the work, if not the desired critical verdict. He held that ‘aesthetic discussions were like discussion in a court of law’, where the goal and criterion of success is that ‘what you say will appeal to the judge.’ Elsewhere, Wittgenstein suggests that the criterion for adequacy of argument and correctness of explanation is acceptance or satisfaction. ‘The answer in these cases is the one that satisfied you.’ ‘That explanation is the right one which clicks,’ and is accepted by the interlocutor; ‘if he didn’t agree, this wouldn’t be the explanation.’

Richard Shusterman, “Aesthetic Argument and Perceptual Persuasion,” Critica 15, no. 45 (Dec. 1983): 51-74.
There is an important point: a deductive or inductive argument is not persuasive in some manner abstracted from the person who hears the argument. A deductive argument only works if it persuades the hearer in the direction intended by the speaker (it is possible that the deductive argument merely annoys the hearer and you have merely persuaded him to dislike you).
Thus, the work of the critic is to bring you see the artwork from a particular perspective: I seek to have you understand this poem, this painting as I do. When you see it as I see it, my literary criticism has been “worked.”
If anything, legal persuasion falls into this category even more than literary criticism. The lawyer seeks to bring the court to see the world from the perspective of the client.
Wittgenstein also notes that science functions in a similar manner:

Wittgenstein in fact suggests that such persuasion is also present in science. For instance, it underlies our firm and ready acceptance of the theories of Darwin and Freud, even when the grounds for their doctrines were in strictly logical terms of confirmation ‘extremely thin.’ We have been largely persuaded by the attraction of looking at things the way these theories present them.

Subsequent research into things such as confirmation bias only strengthen this insight. The strength of an argument – even a scientific argument – ultimately lies in the fact that it persuades: it causes one to see the world from a particular point of view.
Shusterman goes to offer a correction to those who take Wittgenstein further than is warranted. While literary criticism may be to bring you see a work from a particular perspective (and thus perhaps is the intended – and not always successful — end of all argument), that does not mean that deductive and inductive arguments are illegitimate.
Since arguments exist in the context of “conventions”, the “conventions” may permit or even dictate the use of deductive or inductive aesthetic judgment. Thus, “logical” arguments are not wrong even in the case of aesthetics. They just may not be effective (as determined by the intent of the one making the argument).

Finally, this understanding of persuasion as seeing the world from a particular perspective helps explain why certain ideas will be particularly difficult to change. When we ask someone to give up a certain perspective, they must not only give up the particular idea under review, they also must give up their conclusions on all of the world as seen from that perspective. Certain ideas form the context and basis for a worldview.

It is one thing to change a window on the second floor; it is quite another to tear our the foundation on the entire high-rise.

Schopenhauer on Happiness.17 Envy

19 Tuesday May 2020

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The prior post on Schopenhauer and happiness may be found here.

Schopenhauer makes the reasonable observation that envy makes one unhappy:

Envy is natural to man; and still, it is at once a vice and a source of misery.

There are ways in which envy makes one unhappy: to be envious and to be envied. First as to being envious. The sensation I experience in being envious of another person will injure me. Schopenhauer treats this point briefly. He does little to explain why envy should make one unhappy.

He then offers some advice to avoid feeling envy: (1) don’t pay attention to those who have something you do not; and (2) think of how much misery that person whom one envies actually has an unhappy life.

This may have some practical merit, but it seems to miss the real bit of envy. Envy is more than just a desire for some-thing I do not possess. A desire for an object or a state can be a spur to great good. I desire to become a physician, and so I work very hard for many years with study and delayed gratification until I achieve my goal.

This illustration can be worked out in numerous variants. Much of the good done in the world is as the result of someone intently desiring to have some thing or state which we do not now possess.

The desire is to achieve or possess is not envy.

Envy is exactly desire for some-thing, it is a sense of injustice that you have it and I do not. Envy is a moral judgment without the capacity to effectuate judgment. The furnace for envy is possessing or not possessing. Envy is the settled conclusion that the world has gone wrong because you wrongfully possess X.

Schopenhauer does observe “it should always be remembered that no form of hatred is so implacable as the hatred that comes from envy.” The envy is the conclusion that you should not have that – and I should. The moral sense of injustice is coupled to a hatred, typically directed toward the one possessing the object.

Thus, having consider envy more carefully, we can see that merely avoiding knowledge of the possession of others will be insufficient to stem envy. Unless the ignorance is complete, I can still have the sense that I should have X. The knowledge that anyone has X – which I should have – will be sufficient to stoke envy.

The knowledge of another’s misery might help to stem envy, because it could give me the sense that the other person is being judged.

What needs to be understood is that the defeat of envy must come from a sense that the world will be just in the end.

Schopenhauer has no good basis to believe that anything will be just. Therefore, the best advice he can give is to try and avoid the occasions which might provoke envy.

When the matter is considered, it seems that a better means of regulating envy will be see some basis for justice in the world.

One way to see that justice is to understand that the good is not distributed in some purely material way: the basis for envy is illusory. This is a strain in Ecclesiastes: no degree of material possession or control will be able to deliver happiness.

If I envy you for having a better house, I believe that possessing that house makes you happy when I should be happy with that house. And yet, possessing all that one could desire, property, money, drugs, human beings is insufficient to bring happiness: In Ecclesiastes 2:11 it is said to be vain, striving after wind and there is nothing to be gained under the sun. In short, the injustice is illusory.

In Ecclesiastes 6:2, the giving of some particular life is of no good unless God also gives “the power to enjoy” what has been given.

The point could be multiplied, but the sense of contentment is not in the object out there; contentment is a subjective sense.

A further remedy for envy is given in the realization of God’s providence and sovereignty and eventual judgment. God determined that this one would be a billionaire and this one would have little. That realization does not mean that the billionaire simply does as he pleases. His possession creates a moral duty to use that property well.

The property comes with a moral obligation which will be judged in the end. Thus, someone does not just get property. The thing received from God creates a moral obligation will which be judged. Therefore, envy is a condemnation of God for erring in terms of distributing good and for failing to judge rightly.

If one denies the existence of God and judgment, then envy is simply incoherent. Without God there is no “should” there is only “is.” If one man is wealthy and another poor, there is no violation of justice. Nothing “wrong” has happened. I may wish I had X, but I cannot determine that it is wrong.

For envy to exist, one must believe there is some justice in the world. Yet, that justice has been subverted. One must believe in a moral order with the maladministration of that order. In short, there must be a god, but that god must be impotent, unconcerned or unjust.

Thus, envy is a theological problem. Thus, it is not surprising that Schopenhauer has little help beyond trying to avoid the temptation.

Submission to Unjust (or perhaps Foolish) Authority and the Lockdown Order

16 Saturday May 2020

Posted by in 1 Peter, Apologetics, Culture, Politics, Uncategorized

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How seriously should I take the lockdown orders from my county? How seriously should I consider the consequence of disregarding the orders? Is it a trivial matter? It is there any real sin at stake?

[First caveat: I am considering a mere disregard for the law — not appropriate challenges to the law. There are a number of appropriate challenges to a law.  For instance, a lawsuit against the local authority on the grounds that the law in question is unconstitutional on equal protection for first amendment grounds would not be disregard of the law. Petitioning the local authority to revise the law would not be disregard. 

[Second Caveat: There is a moral case to be made against the law on the economic cost. There could even be a case to be made that in some circumstances, disregard of the law is necessary to preserve life. The moral case would require a different analysis and presents different consideration.]

The easiest way out would be merely to say this is no big deal. And perhaps as an ultimate matter, the stakes are inconsequential and no one will be immediately hurt by disobedience. But that decision was not given to me to make. First, I am not tasked with the civil authority to make such a decision. Second, there is plain direction from Scripture on my duty to obey the law. So, I cannot merely say this is at most a “little sin” (I will come back to this point, below.)

Let us assume for the sake of argument that the lockdown orders are unfair, poorly conceived and poorly executed. What is my responsibility as a Christian?

As an American, ignoring leaders and laws I dislike seems like a fundamental right. “Don’t Tread on Me” is in the history of the country. To be submissive to authority sounds like weakness or foolishness.

There is also the innate human desire for autonomy. When we first come into this world, we come as tyrants demanding submission from all whom come near.

And so adhering to rules which I think are foolish or wrong makes me feel like a sucker. Why would I willingly surrender any authority to the petty tyrants who see fit to control my life?

And so, the wisest response seems to be to just disregard the rule when it seems overwhelming ridiculous.

In addition, when the rule sees ridiculous or unwarranted, the easiest understanding of the rule is that is simply too silly to be obeyed.

In the instance of the lockdown, the stakes are ostensibly life-and-death. Whether the rules instituted actually will help in that regard; and whether the threat is actually life and death (or at least sufficiently dangerous that extraordinary measures are needed). Thus, the concern is extreme; even if the means to protect against that concern are absurd.

Perhaps it will be learned that the lockdown regime was as effective as smoke was in protecting against the Black Plague.

So for argument’s sake let us stipulate that the rules are somewhere between non-effective to excessively restrictive. Perhaps the rules are brilliant, but the argument will be clearer if the rules are simply wrong.

And so, may I disregard laws which I think are foolish, ineffective, or annoying? My political instincts and education and the default positions of Americans (as is readily apparent from both sides of the aisle, depending upon the ruler and the law) is that I may and perhaps should disregard the dumb laws – or at least laws I dislike.

That is one side of the argument, but I don’t believe it can be supported from the Scripture.

In First Peter, the apostle begins a long discussion of submission in verse 13 of chapter two. The general rule is given in verse 13,

1 Peter 2:13–14 (ESV)

13 Be subject for the Lord’s sake to every human institution, whether it be to the emperor as supreme, 14 or to governors as sent by him to punish those who do evil and to praise those who do good.

The command is exceedingly clear: submit, put yourself in subjection to the authorities.

As Paul writes in Romans 13, all governmental authority has been instituted by God. Rom. 13:1. It is sufficient to observe that Peter and Paul both set down this rule with respect to a government which condemned both Peter and Paul to death:

Nero was emperor when St. Peter wrote. Christians were to obey even him, wicked tyrant as he was; for his power was given him from above, as the Lord himself had said of Pilate

H. D. M. Spence-Jones, ed., 1 Peter, The Pulpit Commentary (London; New York: Funk & Wagnalls Company, 1909), 73. Unless some other rule specifically makes for an exception, this rule stands absolute.

And yes there is an exception to the law: the government has no right to make us sin. The example of Daniel continuing to pray even when the law forbade his prayers is the right example. Daniel prayed despite the law; and Daniel accepted the consequence of his disobedience.

The command is quite clear, and so is the rationale, “For the Lord’s sake.” There are two aspects of this rationale. First, our obedience to a governmental authority “for the Lord’s sake” is ultimately obedience to the Lord. This aspect is made plain in verse 16:

1 Peter 2:16 (ESV)

Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants of God.

Our obedience to the authority is not because we consider our primary allegiance to that authority: we are free people. But our freedom also makes us servants of God. Or as the NASB has it “bondslaves of God.” The Christian is absolutely bound to the direction of Christ. And thus, if the Lord has given a command, we have no discretion in the matter. [An issue in the lockdown order is whether the stay home orders conflict with a duty to corporate worship.]

This leads to the rationale for obedience found in Paul. As he explains in Roman, obedience to the authority is grounded on the proposition that God has instituted the authority.

Peter, however, adds an additional rationale: as a witness to the authorities and to the world.

In verse 15, Peter writes:

1 Peter 2:15 (ESV)

For this is the will of God, that by doing good you should put to silence the ignorance of foolish people.

Peter’s concern is for the public witness of the Christian. This is a thought that goes back to verse 12:

1 Peter 2:12 (ESV)

Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation.

The “Lord’s sake” of verse 13 is the public demonstration that we willing lay down even our freedom for the sake of something more important, our testimony that our concern is God’s glory “on the day of visitation.”

The concept here is that by our obedience to human authority, we remove any ground that anyone could speak ill of our behavior.

Peter’s point is that Christians are called upon to be as obedient to the government as possible so as to remove any argument against Christ:

By submitting to government, Christians demonstrate that they are good citizens, not anarchists. Hence, they extinguish the criticisms of those who are ignorant and revile them. Such ignorance is not innocent but culpable, rooted in the foolishness of unbelievers.

Thomas R. Schreiner, 1, 2 Peter, Jude, vol. 37, The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 2003), 130. As Christians we are called upon to willingly set aside ground for disobedience to governing authorities because have a duty to remove any possible ground for anyone to speak ill of us.

Do I really want to violate an inconvenient law if the effect would be give anyone a reason to slander Christ?

If we Christians are hated, then we must not be hated because we have disobeyed the authorities. If we suffer, then let us suffer as a Christian for being a Christian:

1 Peter 4:14–15 (ESV)

14 If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you. 15 But let none of you suffer as a murderer or a thief or an evildoer or as a meddler.

To underscore and explain his point concerning obedience to authorities Peter sets out a series of examples. First, he speaks of slaves who are mistreated, even physically beaten for unjust cause:

1 Peter 2:18–20 (ESV)

18 Servants, be subject to your masters with all respect, not only to the good and gentle but also to the unjust. 19 For this is a gracious thing, when, mindful of God, one endures sorrows while suffering unjustly. 20 For what credit is it if, when you sin and are beaten for it, you endure? But if when you do good and suffer for it you endure, this is a gracious thing in the sight of God.

Notice how Peter describes the master: “unjust” (NASB, “unreasonable”). The suffering is “unjust”. The result is a “beating.” The cause of the beating is having done “good.” The slave did what was “good” and was beaten by an unjust master.

The slave is called upon to endure the beating in patience, “because this is a gracious thing in the sight of God.”

The second example given is Christ suffering unjustly. Christ did not revile when he was reviled (1 Peter 2:23). Rather, Christ turned the response over to God:

1 Peter 2:23 (ESV)

When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly.

In verse 21, Peter specifically says that Christ has given us an “example” which we are required to follow.

Peter then gives a third example, a wife being “submissive” to an unbelieving husband. The position of a woman in the ancient world was very difficult. Peter specifically mentions that she is to be submissive to her husband (the same command given to all and to slaves with their own masters) and do so without fear of “anything that is frightening.” (1 Peter 2:6). These are very hard words.

Why is the wife called upon to engage in such extraordinary conduct? To “win” her husband:

1 Peter 3:1 (ESV)

Likewise, wives, be subject to your own husbands, so that even if some do not obey the word, they may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives,

The demand being made upon Christians is extraordinary. It by nature unreasonable and at times even dangerous. Why would Christians lay aside their defense? For the Lord’s sake. We are called upon to suffer injustice so that none may have a cause to speak against our Lord.

Before going further, someone could say that bearing up under unjust or difficult orders is one thing, but dealing with silly or foolish orders is quite another. There are three responses to this. First, if we must maintain our submission even when being beaten for doing good. If we must do the greater thing, then we must do the lesser.

Second, this makes the bad testimony even worse: you are willing to disobey on the slightest cause. You have must have a very low regard for those in authority.

Thomas Brooks in his Precious Remedies for Satan’s Devices list as device number three of Satan, “extenuating and lessening the sin.” To bring us to sin, the Devil tells us the sin is a very small thing. He makes a number of points about small sins, such as the fruit in the garden may seem a very small sin; small sins lead to greater sins; a small hole can sink a great ship; many saints have suffered death rather than commit the smallest sin, such as just offering up a pinch of incense upon a pagan altar.

Speaking of refusing to follow because the law is so silly, “That it is sad to stand with God for a trifle.” If this thing is so small and insignificant, then it is especially foolish to refuse to obey. For instance, the lockdown does not require heroic acts; it is merely very inconvenient. And yes there are very serious economic issues for many people, but that is a different argument than the law is silly.

Two more that bear consideration: Your soul cannot stand the weight of guilt which is inherent in even the smallest sin. Nothing less the death of Christ was necessary to preserve you from the guilt of this “small sin”. If God were to set the full weight of this guilt upon your soul and you were to understand it aright, it would put you into a horror of madness.

Also, “there is more evil in the least sin than in the greatest affliction.” If it is a sin, then it is inherently worse than death itself.

And lest you think that perhaps I am seeing something new, the Venerable Bede in 7th Century England wrote:

This there is the praise which good men receive, when they act properly and obey the king’s servants, even when it means putting up with ignorance of unwise governors.

As he notes, there is no, but my governor is a fool exception to the rule.

In the Second Century, Justin writing to the Roman Emperor sought clemency for Christians. In his argument, Justin explained – based upon these propositions in Peter and Paul – that Christians were the best of citizens:

And more than all other men are we your helpers and allies in promoting peace, seeing that we hold this view, that it is alike impossible for the wicked, the covetous, the conspirator, and for the virtuous, to escape the notice of God, and that each man goes to everlasting punishment or salvation according to the value of his actions. For if all men knew this, no one would choose wickedness even for a little, knowing that he goes to the everlasting punishment of fire; but would by all means restrain himself, and adorn himself with virtue, that he might obtain the good gifts of God, and escape the punishments. For those who, on account of the laws and punishments you impose, endeavour to escape detection when they offend (and they offend, too, under the impression that it is quite possible to escape your detection, since you are but men), those persons, if they learned and were convinced that nothing, whether actually done or only intended, can escape the knowledge of God, would by all means live decently on account of the penalties threatened, as even you yourselves will admit. But you seem to fear lest all men become righteous, and you no longer have any to punish. Such would be the concern of public executioners, but not of good princes.

Justin Martyr, “The First Apology of Justin,” in The Apostolic Fathers with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus, ed. Alexander Roberts, James Donaldson, and A. Cleveland Coxe, vol. 1, The Ante-Nicene Fathers (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Company, 1885), 166.

We Christians obey the laws because we are concerned the judgment of God – not the judgment of the king. You have nothing to fear from Christians, we are your best of servants.

The importance of obedience to the civil authorities – even bad civil authorities – as a means of testimony, and the willingness to accept the consequences for disobedience when to obey would be sin, was eloquently stated by Pastor Wang Yi of the Early Rain Church in China in a statement released after his imprisonment:

As a pastor, my firm belief in the gospel, my teaching, and my rebuking of all evil proceeds from Christ’s command in the gospel and from the unfathomable love of that glorious King. Every man’s life is extremely short, and God fervently commands the church to lead and call any man to repentance who is willing to repent. Christ is eager and willing to forgive all who turn from their sins. This is the goal of all the efforts of the church in China—to testify to the world about our Christ, to testify to the Middle Kingdom about the Kingdom of Heaven, to testify to earthly, momentary lives about heavenly, eternal life. This is also the pastoral calling that I have received.

For this reason, I accept and respect the fact that this Communist regime has been allowed by God to rule temporarily. As the Lord’s servant John Calvin said, wicked rulers are the judgment of God on a wicked people, the goal being to urge God’s people to repent and turn again toward Him. For this reason, I am joyfully willing to submit myself to their enforcement of the law as though submitting to the discipline and training of the Lord.

At the same time, I believe that this Communist regime’s persecution against the church is a greatly wicked, unlawful action. As a pastor of a Christian church, I must denounce this wickedness openly and severely. The calling that I have received requires me to use non-violent methods to disobey those human laws that disobey the Bible and God. My Savior Christ also requires me to joyfully bear all costs for disobeying wicked laws.

But this does not mean that my personal disobedience and the disobedience of the church is in any sense “fighting for rights” or political activism in the form of civil disobedience, because I do not have the intention of changing any institutions or laws of China. As a pastor, the only thing I care about is the disruption of man’s sinful nature by this faithful disobedience and the testimony it bears for the cross of Christ.

As a pastor, my disobedience is one part of the gospel commission. Christ’s great commission requires of us great disobedience. The goal of disobedience is not to change the world but to testify about another world.

When placed in the matrix of life of the apostles and martyrs, when measured against the life of men like Wang Yi, our rebellion against inconvenient orders seems terribly misplaced.

The Right Way to Shake off a Viper.8 (Embrace your defamations)

14 Thursday May 2020

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The previous post from this book may be found here. 

Embrace Your Defamations, as affording you precious opportunities to exemplify a patience that shall glorify God; and imitate the exemplary patience of your admirable Savior.

Usually defamations are little more than provocations. Nothing so unusually easily and provokes Men to intemperate passion as to be reproached. The old pagans and Stoics that could bear everything else found reproach to be insupportable. This would make them roar as load as waves on the Aegean shore.[1]

He was a great and a strong man and a scholar, yea, a master of better philosophy who yet complained, Reproach has broken my heart. For patience to get the upper hand of passion on this occasion, and moderate it, and regulate it, verily this is a more perfect work of Christianity.[2]

Sir, if you may be so happy as to attain unto it, you may, instead of being troubled say, I am happy that I ever had the occasion! Upon the first advice of any abuse offered to you, resolve, I will take heed to my ways that I sin not with my tongue; I will keep my mouth with a bridle, while I have before me what the unbridled mouth of wickedness has uttered of me .[3]

But make your application to the God of all grace,[4] for the grace to keep this resolution. If you resist the first impression, the first resentments, which you may too readily feel upon vile reproaches, you have gained a great point; you have steered clear of abundance of sin; you will be more able afterwards to carry on a strain of lovely patience, and merit the judge’s motto, prudens qui patiens: a prudent man is a patient man.

Let me beseech you, after this, to maintain most exact watch, a most severe guard upon yourself, lest while the waters of strife are broaching, your provoked spirit may at any time speak unadvisedly with your lips. The meekest man in the world[5], you know, did so.[6]

My friend, your calumnious adversaries furnish you with valuable opportunities to adorn the doctrine of God your Savior[7] and do such things as are done by none but those that may lay hold on the comforts of eternal life. The blessed Eliot’s three words, bear, forbear, forgive: Now, now is the time for them to come into exercise.

All tendencies to revenge upon your enemies the wrongs which they have done you must now be abhored, be suppressed; must be looked upon as worse things than the worst of your enemies’ [bad acts]. ’Tis probable they may be such people as may deserve to have much evil spoken of them. However, ’tis now decenet for you to be more sparing in speaking of it than you would have been if you had suffered nothing from them. Leave that just work to others; there is hazard lest you overdo, or least some revengeful glance of your own do work in it, if you go meddle with it.

On the other side, if you know any good of those that have spoken ill of you, be you not adverse to speak that good and not ill-pleased if you hear it spoken by others.

How famous, how precious is the name of Calvin for the answer which he gave when he was told that angry Luther put some hard names upon him. An answer so recited, so esteemed by all the world that there is no need now of my telling any of my neighbors what it is.[8]

But be sure that your heart stand always in awe of that word: Proverbs 20.22, “Say not thou, I will recompense evil.” And Romans 12.17, “Recompense to no man evil for evil.”

Athenagoras, I remember, gives this description of the primitive Christians, “’Tis counted an indifferent thing for a man to revile another, by whom he has been first reviled. But we Christians do speak as well as ever we can of them that speak nothing but evil of us.”[9]

And Justin Martyr bears just witness for them, “We don’t ask that they who haveh most accused us, and abused us, and falsely spoken evil of us may be punished for it; no ’tis punishment enough to be left unto such folly and rashness.”[10]

Oh! Do not look upon this generous patience as impracticable or a lesion only for the Elohim whose dwelling is with flesh![11] Rather, look upon it as an unmanly weakness to be unable to bear the ill words of other men. It is a pretty remark when Abishai could not bear the railing tongue of Shimei.[12] Says David unto him, What have I to do with you, ye sons of Zeruiah? Now, Zeruiah was their mother. Why, the sons of Zeruiah? He seems to intimate you have more of your mother than of your father in you. You talk as if you were of the weaker sex. If you had the souls of men in you, a few ill words would not be such an intolerable grievance to you.

If you will harken to me, you shall take little notice of the affronts that are offered you: For the most part they are not worth your notice.

When the famous Doctor Sands was ignominiously carried on a lame jade through the city of London, a base woman in scorn threw a stone at him and hit him full on the breast. He took no other notice of it, but only made this mild answer, “Woman, I pray God forgive thee.” This was notice enough.

[1] Aegean: Greek. The reference is to the Iliad, Book 1, line 34 where the priest Chryses sits by the roaring sea.

[2] James 1:2–4 (AV)

2 My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations; 3 Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. 4 But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.

[3] Psalm 39:1.

[4] 1 Peter 5:10.

[5] Numbers 12:3 (AV) Now the man Moses was very meek, above all the men which were upon the face of the earth.

[6] Numbers 20:10–13 (AV)

10 And Moses and Aaron gathered the congregation together before the rock, and he said unto them, Hear now, ye rebels; must we fetch you water out of this rock? 11 And Moses lifted up his hand, and with his rod he smote the rock twice: and the water came out abundantly, and the congregation drank, and their beasts also. 12 And the LORD spake unto Moses and Aaron, Because ye believed me not, to sanctify me in the eyes of the children of Israel, therefore ye shall not bring this congregation into the land which I have given them. 13 This is the water of Meribah; because the children of Israel strove with the LORD, and he was sanctified in them.

[7] Titus 2:10 (AV) Not purloining, but shewing all good fidelity; that they may adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all things.

[8]  In a 1544 letter from John Calvin to Heinrich Bullinger, he wrote, “Often have I been wont to declare, that even though [Martin Luther] were to call me a devil, I should still not the less esteem and acknowledge him as an illustrious servant of God.”

[9]

Allow me here to lift up my voice boldly in loud and audible out-cry, pleading as I do before philosophic princes. For who of those that reduce syllogisms, and clear up ambiguities, and explain etymologies,or of those who teach homonyms and synonyms, and predicaments and axioms, and what is the subject and what the predicate, and who promise their disciples by these and such like instructions to make them happy: who of them have so purged their souls as, instead of hating their enemies, to love them; and, instead of speaking ill of those who have reviled them (to abstain from which is of itself an evidence of no mean forbearance), to bless them; and to pray for those who plot against their lives? On the contrary, they never cease with evil intent to search out skilfully the secrets of their art,and are ever bent on working some ill, making the art of words and not the exhibition of deeds their business and profession. But among us you will find uneducated persons, and artisans, and old women, who, if they are unable in words to prove the benefit of our doctrine, yet by their deeds exhibit the benefit arising from their persuasion of its truth: they do not rehearse speeches, but exhibit good works; when struck, they do not strike again; when robbed, they do not go to law; they give to those that ask of them, and love their neighbours as themselves.

 

Athenagoras, “A Plea for the Christians,” in Fathers of the Second Century: Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, and Clement of Alexandria (Entire), ed. Alexander Roberts, James Donaldson, and A. Cleveland Coxe, trans. B. P. Pratten, vol. 2, The Ante-Nicene Fathers (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Company, 1885), 134.

[10]

For all are called Christians. Wherefore we demand that the deeds of all those who are accused to you be judged, in order that each one who is convicted may be punished as an evil-doer, and not as a Christian; and if it is clear that any one is blameless, that he may be acquitted, since by the mere fact of his being a Christian he does no wrong. For we will not require that you punish our accusers; they being sufficiently punished by their present wickedness and ignorance of what is right

 

Justin Martyr, “The First Apology of Justin,” in The Apostolic Fathers with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus, ed. Alexander Roberts, James Donaldson, and A. Cleveland Coxe, vol. 1, The Ante-Nicene Fathers (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Company, 1885), 165.

[11] That is, Jesus.

[12] The incident can be found in 2 Samuel 16. David is fleeing with his people from the rebellion of Absalom. While leaving the city, Shimei stops along the road and mocks David.

Persuasion and Education

14 Thursday May 2020

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Karen Murphy and Patricia A. Alexander, “Persuasion as a Dynamic, Multidimensional Process: An Investigation of Intraindividual Differences,” American Educational Research Journal41, no. 2 (Summer 2004): 337-63.

In a study published in 2004, Professors Murphy and Alexander considered the relationship between persuasion and education research. As they note, “persuasion is neither inherently good nor evil, but a catalyst for thinking analytically about the messages encountered by individuals.”

The study consisted of 234 college students, primarily undergraduates who were given three articles from the popular press to read. The topics were likely to provoke emotional responses, assisted suicide, AIDS and school integration.

The students were examined for perceived and actual knowledge of these topics, prior to reading the articles. The students were then examined after reading the articles to determine the persuasive effects upon the students. Specifically, the researchers wanted to see how knowledge, interest and belief prior to reading the articles effected their beliefs after reading the articles.

One of the most unusual features of their research was a finding that the students with a high degree of knowledge about the topic and a high (to moderate) interest in the topic “were associated with low beliefs levels at prereading and post-reading.” That is the more they were interested and knowledgeable, the less they had firm positions (I assume that is the meaning of “belief”) on the topics.

Here is an example of something interesting which may not tell us much at all.

Consider:

A person considers life precious in all circumstances. Such a person may have a very strong position on assisted suicide and think it always wrong. Having determined that assisted suicide is wrong, the person then decides not to read many arguments on the subject and has relatively little interest in subject.

Another example, I am firmly convinced that racism is wrong and thus I don’t really intend to spend any time reading arguments in favor of racism. I have little “knowledge”  (in the sense of an extended body of research) and strong belief.

Or consider another person who has thoroughly studied a subject for years: Say a professional medical ethicist. The ethicist has a very high degree of knowledge and a high degree of interest – and likely has rather firm conclusions about the topic.

The subjects of this experiment were undergraduates. They are being introduced to all sorts of new ideas in college. Their high degree of knowledge and interest is likely not all that “high”. They may know more than they did in high school, but it is unlikely they have any profound understanding.

Consider this: the articles they were reading were from the newspapers and popular magazines — not academic journals. That does not make the articles bad, but the articles are certainly not exhaustive explorations of the topics. By nature of the medium, the information is will be limited to a few hundred words.

What the researchers discovered is that making education more interesting made education more effective.

They also discovered that what works for one person may not work for another. As they note, the existing studies on the topic show that “persuasion is a multidimensional process that is influenced by individual and intraindividual differences in learners and how they interact with varied texts.”

Edward Taylor, Would God I in that Golden City Were.3

13 Wednesday May 2020

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At this point, the poet continues on with the absurdity which lies at the heart of Christianity: How and why could or would God be joined to us?

I have heard atheist mock Christian belief with the ridiculous thought that God – if there were a God – would concern his Godship with a particular set of beasts roaming around on a small planet around an insignificant star in the midst of an enormous universe.

However, that absurdity is the nature of the Christian claim. One can reject it; but it is silly to think that one has come upon some novel insight. Even before we realized the size of the universe, we were well aware of the ridiculous claim.

Here Taylor presses home the point: it would be more reasonable to believe a king married a flea than to believe God should have dealings with us:

My Maker, he my husband? Oh! Strange joy!
If kings wed worms and monarchs mites we should
Glory spouse shame, a prince a snake or fly
An angel court an ant, all wonder would.
Let such wed worms, snakes, serpents, devils, flies.
Less wonder than the wedding in our eyes.

At this point, it would be useful to take time to consider what is meant by “marriage in this context. It plainly cannot mean an actual human marriage. Rather, marriage is one of the many images which God has given in the world to help us understand what it means for God to love us.

First, it is not the only image: other incompatible images are used such as Father and son or Lord and servant or Creator and creature. There are, for instance, 95 different images used to describe the Church in the New Testament.

To understand this marriage imagery, John Piper helps in his bookSex and the Supremacy of Chirst:

In answering this question let’s remember that knowing someone in the fullest biblical sense is defined by sexual imagery. Genesis 4:1, “Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain.” Knowing here refers to sexual intercourse. Or again in Matthew 1:24- 25 we read, “When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him: he took his wife, but knew her not until she had given birth to a son. And he called his name Jesus.” He “knew her not” means he did not have sexual relations with her.

Now I don’t mean that every time the word know is used in the Bible there are sexual connotations. That’s not true. But what I do mean is that sexual language in the Bible for our covenant relationship to God does lead us to think of knowing God on the analogy of sexual intimacy and ecstasy. I don’t mean that we somehow have sexual relations with God or he with man. That’s a pagan thought. It’s not Christian. But I do mean that the intimacy and ecstasy of sexual relations points to what knowing God is meant to be.

The language of marriage and sex helps as a metaphor to understand God’s love. Since we could not understand God directly, God created metaphors in the world so that could understand God analogically. The metaphor helps to understand the original.

Taylor continues on with this theme of the absurdity of God’s love. The analogy of a King wedding a mite is insufficient. Christ’s love for me makes less sense than a king marrying an ant:

I am to Christ more base, than to a King
A mite, fly, worm, serpent, devil is,
Or can be, being tumbled all in sin,
And shall I be his spouse? How good is this?
It is too good to be declared to be thee.
But not too good to be believed by me.

Human sin makes a human being more unfitting of relation to God than does mud make a worm less fitting to an emperor. And yet this Good News (which is the meaning of Gospel) is not too good to be rejected

The heart of the Gospel is not going to heaven, it is being with God. We are not seeking a place but a friend and more than a friend.

In this stanza, Taylor hits upon the grace of God which first works upon us before we believe and love Him. The Spirit first speaks these words to us before we believe. As it reads in 1 John, we love Christ because he first loved us:

Yet to this wonder, this found in mee,
I am not only base but backward clay,
When Christ doth woo, and till his Spirit be
His spokesman to compel me I deny.
I am so base and forward to him, he
Appear as wonders wonder wedding me.

The poem ends with a prayer that Spirit work upon his heart to make him into the man who can be conformed and fitting to this call:

Seeing, Dear Lord, it’s thus, thy Spirit take
And send thy spokesman to my soul, I pray.
Thy saving grace my wedding garments make:
Thy spouses frame into my soul convey.
I then shall be thy bride espoused by thee
And thou my bridegroom dear espoused shalt be.

Marriage is the beginning and end of the Bible. In the Garden of Eden God performs the first marriage. The eschatological hope of the Church is the marriage party of the Lamb.

Rieff, The Triumph of the Therapeutic 2.2 (Therapy as Re-Education)

12 Tuesday May 2020

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The previous post on Rieff may be found here. 

Therapy as Re-Education

Rieff has a useful understanding of therapy in contrast religion (which in the case of Freud would be Christianity of Judaism) which Rieff refers to as “older moral pedagogies.” (45) The prior moral system required one “concentrating on the life of trying to order the warring parts of the personality into a hierarchy.” (45).

This ordering of one’s competing demands and impulses is done in accord with the requires of a “positive community” which promised “a kind of salvation” for such accord. (43).

Freud and therapy provide a completely different manner of understanding one’s self. Rather looking at the various “impulses” as a matter of good or bad, higher or lower, one should consider demands as “a jostling democracy of contending predispositions”. (46-47)

Freud realized that this new means of understanding the various “impulses” would result in a subversions of the expectations of life. In particular, the position of the “father” would be particularly subverted, because the position of father takes the position of maintaining of “repressive command”. (47).

Now it may be thought that Freud encourages immorality. But the understanding of the impulses as there does not necessarily result in the encouragement of acting on such impulses.  What Freud did do was seek to exhaust a sense of guilt built upon these moralities.

At this point, Reiff makes a rather self-contradicting argument. Freud’s analysis:

Help[s] us distinguish between guilt on one hand and a sense of guilt on the other, between responsibility for an offense committed and fantasies about offenses intended or merely imagined, seems a moral as a well as a therapeutic aim.

This argument seems to be that the older moral orders merely imposed a “fantasy” of moral order in exchange for a promise of salvation as contrasted one making a conscious decision based upon “responsibility.”  Upon what moral basis could one determine concern for “responsibility”?

There is not any rational basis for responsibility. You could say I would like to avoid whatever I might see as a negative consequence (like avoiding imprisonment) was rational – but seeing a connection between the consequence and the result does not determine whether I should not engage in the conduct. The decision to avoid the behavior to avoid the consequence is a moral decision. Granted it is a very limited morality (I want to avoid negative consequence), but it is still a moral decision.

If the negative consequence is less than imprisonment or death, than what do we mean by “responsibility”? Does he that I could care about what my behavior would do to another? That would be a moral decision.

The only sort of amoral decision would be one where I see the consequence and have not concern for the consequence.

Perhaps the concept is that I can decide whether I wish to abide by the moral code I see raised by my “impulse”. But one still must made a decision to be moral; that decision may have a very habitual basis, but it is not a reflex in the sense of blinking an eye.

Indeed the decision to forgo an “older moral paradigm” is itself a moral decision.

Freud may make one explicitly conscious of the moral decision. Freud also grants a certain sort of sanction to forgo moral decisions (this is an evil desire, it is just a desire – evil is what I have been taught to call this desire; but the desire is not in itself evil). All Freud has done lay the basis for a new morality where personal desire is necessarily good.

Thus, therapy is a matter of “re-education” into a new basis for morality.

Edward Taylor, Would God I in that Golden City Were.2

09 Saturday May 2020

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May my rough voice and blunt tongue but spell

My tale (for tune they can’t) perhaps there may

Some angel catch an end of’t up and tell

In Heaven when he doth return that way

He’ll make thy palace, Lord, all over ring

With it in songs, thy saint and angels sing.

The poet cannot now come to heaven; for as Paul writes, flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God. And thus, he prays that perhaps his song spoken on earth might be heard by an angel and delivered to Heaven – and there it might be sung.

The idea that an angel might hear his song and deliver it to Heaven is a remarkable conceit, but that precise idea does not appear in the Bible. There are numerous instances of an angel speaking to a human being, but I can think of no instance in which an angel delivered an earthly message to heaven. It should be understood that the word “angel” means messenger.

The idea of speaking with a rough voice and a blunt tongue seems to be most related to two passages. First, when God calls Moses to speak to Pharaoh, Moses protests that he cannot deliver the message because he is a defective speaker:

Exodus 4:10 (AV)

 10 And Moses said unto the LORD, O my Lord, I am not eloquent, neither heretofore, nor since thou hast spoken unto thy servant: but I am slow of speech, and of a slow tongue.

The related passage which also may have informed Taylor’s poem comes from the book of Romans where Paul explains that the Holy Spirit corrects our prayers:

Romans 8:26–27 (AV)

 26 Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. 27 And he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God.

In the next stanza, Taylor continues with the theme of his inability. He then addresses the rank absurdity which lies at the heart of Christianity – if God is so great, so perfect, so holy, how could God also love us:

 

I know not how to speak’t, it is so good;

Shall Mortal and Immortal marry? Nay,

Man marry God? God be a match for mud?

This King of Glory wed a worm? Mere clay?

This is the case. The wonder too in bliss.

Thy maker is thy husband, hear’st thou this?

That marriage was given not merely for human comfort but ultimately as the basis for understanding the relationship between God and human beings is intrinsic to the Christian understanding of redemption. A parable by Kierkegaard can help open this idea:

Once upon a time, there was a prince who was single and very eager to marry a lovely maiden for his future queen. Near his palace was a large city, and often he rode his carriage down to the city to take care of various chores for his father. One day, to reach a particular merchant, he had to go through a rather poor section. He happened to glance out of the window and right into the eyes of a beautiful maiden.

He had occasion on the next few days to return to the section of the city–drawn as he was by the eyes of the maiden. And more than that, he had the good fortune once or twice actually to meet this young girl. Soon he began to feel that he was in love with her. But now he had a problem. How should he proceed to procure her hand?

Of course, he could order her to the palace and there propose marriage. But even a prince would like to feel that the girl he marries wants to marry him. Or perhaps, somewhat more graciously, he could arrive at her door in his most resplendent uniform and, with a bow, ask her hand. But even a prince wants to marry for love.

Again, he could masquerade as a peasant and try to gain her interest. After he proposed, he could pull off his ‘mask.’ Still, the masquerade would be ‘phony.’ He really could not manage it.

Finally a real solution presented itself to his mind. He would give up his kingly role and move into her neighborhood. There he would take up work as, say, a carpenter. During his work in the day and during his time off in the evening, he would get acquainted with the people, begin to share their interests and concerns, begin to talk their language. And in due time, should fortune be with him, he would make her acquaintance in a natural way. And should she come to love him, as he had already come to love her, then he would ask for her hand.

Or a passage from Thomas Watson:

Christ is full of love, as he is of merit. What was it but love, that he should save us, and not the angels? Among the rarities of the loadstone, this is not the least, that leaving the gold and pearl, it should draw iron to it, which is a baser kind of metal; so, that Christ should leave the angels, those more noble spirits, the gold and pearl, and draw mankind to him, how doth this proclaim his love? Love was the wing on which he did fly into the virgin’s womb. 1. How transcendent is Christ’s love to the saints! The apostle calls it a love ‘that passeth knowledge,’ Eph. 3:19. It is such a love as God the Father bears to Christ; the same for quality, though not equality, John 15:9. ‘As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you:’ A believer’s heart is the garden where Christ hath planted this sweet flower of his love. It is the channel thro’ which the golden stream of his affection runs. 2. How distinguishing is Christ’s love, 1 Cor. 1:26. ‘Not many wise, not many noble are called.’ In the old law God passed by the lion and the eagle, and took the dove for sacrifice; that God should pass by so many of birth and parts, and that the lot of free grace should fall upon thee; O the depth of divine grace! How invincible is the love of Christ! ‘It is strong as death,’ Cant. 8:6. Death might take away his life, not this love; and as death, so neither sin could wholly quench that divine flame of love; the church had her infirmities, her sleepy fits, Cant. 5:2 but though blacked and sullied, yet still a dove; Christ could see the faith, and wink at the failing.

 

Thomas Watson, “A Christian on the Mount, or a Treatise Concerning Meditation,” in Discourses on Important and Interesting Subjects, Being the Select Works of the Rev. Thomas Watson, vol. 1 (Edinburgh; Glasgow: Blackie, Fullarton, & Co.; A. Fullarton & Co., 1829), 212–213.

The picture of the love between God and humanity being symbolized as marriage is the backdrop for the book of Hosea. In Isaiah, the particular image of maker and husband is given:

Isaiah 54:4–5 (AV)

4 Fear not; for thou shalt not be ashamed: neither be thou confounded; for thou shalt not be put to shame: for thou shalt forget the shame of thy youth, and shalt not remember the reproach of thy widowhood any more. 5 For thy Maker is thine husband; the LORD of hosts is his name; and thy Redeemer the Holy One of Israel; The God of the whole earth shall he be called.

And in the letter to Ephesians, Paul makes plain this point:

Ephesians 5:30–33 (AV)

30 For we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones. 31 For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh. 32 This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church. 33 Nevertheless let every one of you in particular so love his wife even as himself; and the wife see that she reverence her husband.