Tag Archives: Slander

James Denney, The Deadliness of Slander

04 Monday Feb 2019

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From his collected sermons, The Way Everlasting

This sermon concerns the slander of Jesus recorded by Matthew:

31 Wherefore I say unto you, All manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men: but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men. 32 And whosoever speaketh a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, neither in the world to come.

Matthew 12:31–32 (KJV 1900).  It discusses what it means to commit the “unpardonable sin.”

This text is striking: Jesus, who came to bring forgiveness of sins, is here stating a sin is not forgivable. To understand this text, we must first we must put aside our false stereotype of Jesus:

The tradition of Christian art has taught us to think of Jesus as living a life of untroubled calm; His countenance in pictures may be pensive or majestic or compassionate, but it is always in repose. Anything strained or overwrought would seem out of place. But here we see that alike upon friends and enemies He made a different impression. He was rapt, as He taught the multitudes, in a lofty excitement. When He encountered those who were regarded as possessed by evil spirits, the Spirit that was in Him reacted with intense vehemence against their delusions and degradation; the Gospels are full of the peremptory and commanding words that He spoke as He set them free. If we think of a scene like the cleansing of the temple, when zeal for His Father’s house consumed Him like a flame; or of His baptism, when He saw the heavens open and heard the Father’s voice; or of the hour when He turned on Peter with the terrible rebuke, “Get thee behind me, Satan”; we can feel how untrue is that conception of Jesus which represents Him as immovably placid. Perhaps it would be truer to think of Him as habitually rapt, exalted, intense. Certainly this is how we must think of Him on the occasion on which he is presented to us in the text. 

 James Denney, The Way Everlasting: Sermons (London; New York; Toronto: Hodder and Stoughton, 1911), 242–243. Jesus’ ministry was often a shock to those around. Even his own friends and family did not rightly understand him:

31 There came then his brethren and his mother, and, standing without, sent unto him, calling him. 32 And the multitude sat about him, and they said unto him, Behold, thy mother and thy brethren without seek for thee. 33 And he answered them, saying, Who is my mother, or my brethren? 34 And he looked round about on them which sat about him, and said, Behold my mother and my brethren! 35 For whosoever shall do the will of God, the same is my brother, and my sister, and mother.

Mark 3:31–35 (KJV 1900). Denney explains this:

A life and work like that of Jesus must often have seemed baffling to those who were about Him and who had a natural affection for Him. We can understand how His mother and His brothers had a true though misplaced concern for His welfare. If there were a son or a brother in our house to whom the one thing real was the kingdom of God, who broke every earthly tie to give himself completely to it, who spent whole nights on the hillside in prayer to God over it, who was so absorbed in it that he could not find time for his necessary food and apparently did not care, should we not be tempted to think that he needed looking after? No doubt the friends of Jesus should have known Him better than they did. They ought to have had greater sympathy with Him, greater appreciation for His work. They ought not to have made it possible for Him to say, with the bitter accent of experience, “A man’s foes are they of his own household”. But though they sinned in these respects, it was not a hopeless or unpardonable sin. Their hearts were not really shut against Jesus; they were not deliberately and malignantly opposed to His work. I do not say this as though the sin of their speech could be explained away. If they were alarmed on Jesus’ account, they were irritated and annoyed on their own; they were provoked that One who ought to have been able to take care of Himself should persist in causing needless anxiety; and their petulant exclamation, pardonable though it was, was gravely wrong when we remember who was its object. Nevertheless, it was only petulant, not malignant. It was something they could and would be sorry for afterwards; they would repent and it would be forgiven.

244–245.

And then there was the response of the leaders, those whom Jesus rebuked so strongly in our text. They did not merely misunderstand Jesus with misplaced sympathy: they spoke against him. Denney turns to the modern “historical Jesus” research and readers: those who decide to judge Jesus and decide what he may and may not be, according to their own lights:

The friends of Jesus who said “He is beside Himself” had lost for the moment or had not yet attained any real sense of what He was; they spoke of Him as if He were just one of themselves, who in an excess of zeal was like to go off His head. Their attitude is reproduced by a great many people who, without thinking what they are doing, really take the measure of Jesus in their own minds, point out His limitations, assign Him His place, show where and how far He paid tribute to His time,—betray, in short, in their whole relation to Him, the twentieth century’s sense of its own superiority to the first. I am not going to deny that the twentieth century is in many ways superior to the first; nor even that it was part of the reality of our Lord’s manhood that He should be man of the particular age in which He was born, and not of another; but if we cease to feel through all such distinctions that Jesus is the Lord, we shall run great risk of falling into the sin in question. Do not let us consider it a sin of no consequence because it is pardonable. It is pardonable on the same condition as other sins—namely, that it is repented of, confessed, renounced. To

247.

What then was the sin of these leaders to Jesus  “who threatened everything the scribes counted dear.” (249):

It was not the exclamation of men who were irritated at the moment and forgot themselves, so to speak; that could have been repented of and forgiven; it was the deliberate and settled malice of men who would say anything and do anything rather than yield to the appeal of the good Spirit of God in Jesus. This is the blasphemy against the Spirit, the sin which in its very nature is unpardonable. Jesus calls it eternal sin. It is sin which, look at it as long as you may, is never turned by repentance into anything else; and therefore it has no forgiveness, neither in this world nor in that which is to come.

249–250. What then is necessary for this sin today:

The terrible solemnity of these words has oppressed many hearts. People of sensitive conscience have been tormented with the dread that they had committed the unpardonable sin—that without knowing it, or in some hasty but irretrievable word or act, they had placed themselves for ever beyond the reach of mercy. It would be wrong to say anything which encouraged sinful men to think lightly of their sins, but it is surely clear from what has been said already that this fatal sin cannot be committed inadvertently. It is the last degree of antipathy to Christ to which the soul can advance, the sin of those who will do anything rather than recognize in Him the presence of God.

 250. Now perhaps we do not break out in this sin in all its plain manifestation, but there hints and similarities in it when we disparage the good work of the Spirit in others.  “Perhaps we are naturally grasping and mean, and our selfish nature resent the reproof of another’s generosity.” (251). “It is the sin of refusing ot acknowledge God when he is manifestly there, and introducing something Satanic to explain and discredit what has unquestionably God behind it.”

Conversely, “It is a sign of spiritual health when we are quick to recognize and to welcome goodness, and our joy in the appreciation of it is one of the surest indications that we ourselves have a place in God’s kingdom.” 253.

 

 

 

The Christian Origin of Reasonable Doubt and the Need to not Bear False Witness

01 Monday Oct 2018

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Christians, like all people, have been far too quick to believe the worst about others. The internet and social media have only made this vicious trait even easier to indulge. This excellent sermon by Mike Ricardi, “How to Kill Your Neighbor” discusses the Christian’s obligation in this area.

https://www.gracechurch.org/sermons/14945

A related concept has to do with the potential sin of condemning another human being — particularly another human being to serve punishment or death. In our law, we require at least preponderance of the evidence for civil and require “beyond a reasonable doubt” for criminal convictions. While we think of that rule as protecting the accused (it does), the basis for that rule was to protect the juror from sin (because, even though it is a neglected doctrine, in Christian theology it is far worse to sin than suffer; Christ suffered death, but never sinned; suffering can only lead to death which is met by resurrection, but sin leads to eternal death).

This article by James Q. Whitman explains: 

At its origins, as this Article aims to show, the familiar “reasonable doubt” rule was not intended to perform the function we ask it to perform today: It was not primarily intended to protect the accused. Instead, it had a significantly different, and distinctly Christian, purpose: The “reasonable doubt” formula was originally concerned with protecting the souls of the jurors against damnation. Convicting an innocent defendant was regarded, in the older Christian tradition, as a potential mortal sin. The purpose of the “reasonable doubt” instruction was to address this frightening possibility, reassuring jurors that they could convict the defendant without risking their own salvation, as long as their doubts about guilt were not “reasonable.”

And this:

As John Adams reminded the jurors in the Boston Massacre trials in 1770, repeating language of moral theology that dated back to the Middle Ages: “[w]here you are doubtful never act: that is, if you doubt of the prisoner’s guilt, never declare him guilty; that is always the rule, especially in cases of life.”

Some Quotations on Slander From the Puritans

28 Friday Sep 2018

Posted by in Puritan, Slander, Uncategorized

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What is required to the conserving of our neighbours good name?

First, an internal disposition, care, and study of preserving it: which we shall shew by these fruits. First, when we are glad of it, and rejoyce in it; (Rom. 1:8; Col. 1:3, 4.) and are grieved when as it is blacked and blemished.

What other fruits are there of it?

They respect either our hearing, judgment, or reports.
Our hearing; First, when as we shut our ears to wisperers and slanderers, for their detractions and slanders cannot hurt our neighbours good name, if we will not hear and believe them. Prov. 25:23. And this is a note of a Citizen of heaven. Psal. 15:3.
Secondly, when as we willingly and chearfully hear the praises of our neighbours: which is a sign of an honest heart, that is free from self love and envy.

What is required in the judgment?

A candid and ingenuous disposition to preserve our neighbours same, and in all things doubtful to judge the best of his words and deeds.
James Usher, A Body of Divinity: Or, the Sum and Substance of Christian Religion, Eighth Edition. (London: R. J.; Jonathan Robinson; A. and J. Churchill; J. Taylor; J. Wyatt, 1702), 341.

Day by day their malice is fed with a spring, with a malicious heart. A malicious heart and a slanderous tongue alway go well together. The devil, that was the first grand slanderer, hath communion with a malicious heart, and he foments malice, and cherisheth that malicious, poisonful disposition; and a malicious disposition never wants malicious words. As one saith of anger and fury, it ministereth weapons (c), so we may say of malice and hatred, it ministereth words alway.

Richard Sibbes, The Complete Works of Richard Sibbes, “The Sword of the Wicked,” ed. Alexander Balloch Grosart, vol. 1 (Edinburgh; London; Dublin: James Nichol; James Nisbet and Co.; W. Robertson, 1862), 111.

Take heed, therefore, we entertain not rash conceits of others upon the entertainment they find abroad in the world, or among those that have a standing in the church, for so we shall condemn Christ himself. How was he judged of the priests, scribes, and pharisees in his times? And this hath been the lot of the church in all ages. The true members thereof were called heretics and schismatics. The veil was taken off. It is the poisonful pride of man’s heart that, when it cannot raise itself by its own worth, it will endeavour to raise itself by the ruin of others’ credit through lying slanders. The devil was first a slanderer and liar, and then a murderer, John 8:44. He cannot murder without he slander first. The credit of the church must first be taken away, and then she is wounded. Otherwise, as it is a usual proverb, Those that kill a dog make the world believe that he was mad first; so they always first traduced the church to the world, and then persecuted her. Truth hath always a scratched face. Falsehood many times goes under better habits than its own, which God suffers, to exercise our skill and wisdom, that we might not depend upon the rash judgment of others, but might consider what grounds they have; not what men do, or whom they oppose, but from what cause, whether from a spirit of envy, idleness, jealousy, and pride, or from good grounds. Else, if Christ himself were on earth again, we should condemn him, as now men do the generation of the just, whom they smite and wound, and take away their veil from them.

Richard Sibbes, The Complete Works of Richard Sibbes, ed. Alexander Balloch Grosart, vol. 2 (Edinburgh; London; Dublin: James Nichol; James Nisbet And Co.; W. Robertson, 1862), 120–121.

For of all grief that God’s people suffer in the world, there is none greater than reproach, disgrace, and contumely. Movemur contumeliis plus quam injuriis, we are more moved with reproaches than injuries. Injuries come from several causes, but disgrace from abundance of slighting. No man but thinks himself worthy of respect from some or other. Now, slanders come from abundance of malice, or else abundance of contempt; and therefore nothing sticks so much as reproaches, specially by reason of opinion and fancy, that raiseth them over high.

Richard Sibbes, The Complete Works of Richard Sibbes, ed. Alexander Balloch Grosart, vol. 2 (Edinburgh; London; Dublin: James Nichol; James Nisbet And Co.; W. Robertson, 1862), 492.

As Doeg the Edomite first accused, and then, by the command of Saul, slew Abimelech the high priest, and all his family, destroying the whole city of the priests called Nob, as you may see 1 Sam. 22:9. David, when he professeth the uprightness of his government, would allow no such in his court, but would severely punish them: Ps. 101:5, ‘Whoso privily slandereth his neighbour, him will I cut off.’ These ways of whispering and detraction, by which men are wont to gain confidence, favour, and employment from princes, should not only miss of their aims with him, but be severely punished when he met with them.

Thomas Manton, The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, vol. 2 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1871), 279–280.

Defamation. Infamy is the forerunner of more trouble, and the showers of slander are but presages of grievous storms of persecution. The devil is first a liar and then a murderer, John 8:44. When the children of God are represented as criminal, they are more easily destroyed. It was a fashion in the primitive persecutions to invest Christians with a bear’s skin, and then to bait them as bears. And it is a usual practice of Satan and his instruments to blast the repute of religious persons, to clothe them with the livery of reproach, and then prosecute them as offenders: Ps. 5:9, ‘Their throat is an open sepulchre.’ The slanders of the wicked are preparatives to death, as the sepulchre when opened is prepared to receive the dead carcase. Men first slander and then molest. The devil is afraid to meddle with unstained innocency. A good report is a great security against open violence.

Thomas Manton, The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, vol. 7 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1872), 385.

To slander and accuse is the devil’s property; we should be more tender in divulging the infirmities of the saints; it is the devil’s work. Christ, when he prayeth for his enemies, he mollifieth their crime, and softeneth it with a gentle interpretation: Luke 23:34, ‘Father, forgive them; they know not what they do.’ Christ excuseth, Satan accuseth.

Thomas Manton, The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, vol. 10 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1872), 217.

Self-love makes men envious and slanderous. When men would shine alone, and would have all the world else to serve for their foils, to set them off, therefore they blast their gifts with censure, aggravate their failings, and load them with prejudice, that upon the ruins of their good name, they might erect a fabric of praise to themselves. Self-lovers are always bitter censurers; they are so indulgent to their own faults, that they must spend their zeal abroad.

Thomas Manton, The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, vol. 15 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1873), 263.

Do no wrong to their names; next to their persons this is to be valued. A slanderer is worse than a thief; the one is publicly odious, but the other robs us of our better treasure: Prov. 22:1, ‘A good name is rather to be chosen than great riches,’ and more conducible to our usefulness for God than wealth. A wrong done to the estate is sooner repaired than a wrong done to the name of others, for a reproach divulged is hardly recalled; when the wound is cured, yet the scar remains; and therefore this is a very great evil to do wrong to their names; especially when you reproach the godly, and do wrong to them, because their discredit lights upon religion. God is much concerned in the credit and honour of his servants. You hinder their service, and lay them open to the rage of the world. A blemished instrument is of little use. Num. 12:8, saith God, ‘Were ye not afraid to speak against my servant Moses?’ To speak against persons eminent and useful for God in their age is to render them suspected to the world; and who would drink of a suspected fountain? You hinder their use and serviceableness. And the wrong is greater when one christian blemisheth another, for one scholar to speak against another, and one lawyer against another; so for one christian to speak against another, it aggravates the injury. Therefore, when there is cause to speak against a man, it should be with grief.

Thomas Manton, The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, vol. 16 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1874), 145.

Quest. How many ways may we be unmerciful to the names of others?
Ans. Divers ways: 1. By misreporting them, a sin forbidden, Exod. 23:1. ‘Thou shalt not raise a false report.’ Eminency is commonly blasted by slander, Psal. 64:3. ‘Their tongues are as arrows shot out.’ The tongue of a slanderer shoots out words to wound the fame of another, and make it bleed to death: The saints of God in all ages have met with unmerciful men, who have fathered things upon them that they have not been guilty of. Surius the jesuit reported of Luther, that he learned his divinity of the devil, and that he died drunk; but Melancthon, who wrote his life, affirms that he died in a most pious, holy manner, and made a most excellent prayer before his death: It was David’s complaint, Psal. 35:11. ‘They laid to my charge things which I knew not.’ The Greek word for devil signifies slanderer, 1 Tim. 3:11. ‘Not slanderers;’ in the Greek it is, not devils. Some think it is no great matter to defame and traduce another; but know this is to act the part of a devil. O how many unmerciful men are there, who indeed go for Christians, but play the devil in venting their lies and calumnies! wicked men in scripture are called dogs, Psal. 22:16. Slanderers are not like those dogs which licked Lazarus’s sores to heal them; but like the dogs which did eat Jezebel, they rend and tear the precious names of men. Valentinian the emperor did decree, that he who was openly convicted of this crime of slander, should die for it: And pope Gregory did decree, that such a person should be excommunicated, and not have the communion given him; I think it was a just decree.
2. We are unmerciful to the names of others when we receive a slander, and then report what we hear, Lev. 19:16. ‘Thou shalt not go up and down as a tale-bearer among thy people.’ A good man ‘doth not evil to his neighbour, nor taketh up a reproach against his neighbour,’ Psal. 15:3. We must not only not raise a false report, but not take it up. To divulge a report before we speak with the party and know the truth of it, is unmercifulness, and cannot acquit itself of sin. The same word in the Hebrew, to raise a slander, signifies to receive it, Exod. 23:1. The receiver is even as bad as the thief; it is well if none of us have, in this sense, received stolen goods; when others have stolen away the good names of their brethren, have not we received the stolen goods? there would not be so many to broach false rumours, but that they see this liquor pleaseth other men’s taste.
Thomas Watson, “Discourses upon Christ’s Sermon on the Mount,” in Discourses on Important and Interesting Subjects, Being the Select Works of the Rev. Thomas Watson, vol. 2 (Edinburgh; Glasgow: Blackie, Fullarton, & Co.; A. Fullarton & Co., 1829), 199–200.

Some injure others in their good name, by reproaching them, or speaking evil of them behind their backs. Abundance is done in this way. No injury is so common as this. The iniquity which is committed by men in all our taverns3 by what they say of one another behind their backs is beyond account. Some injure others by making or spreading false reports of others, and so slandering them. And others, although what they say is not a direct falsehood, yet a great misrepresentation of things, represent things in their neighbors in the worst colors, and strain their faults, and set them forth beyond what they are, and speak of them in a very unfair manner.

Jonathan Edwards, Ethical Writings, ed. Paul Ramsey and John E. Smith, vol. 8, The Works of Jonathan Edwards (New Haven; London: Yale University Press, 1989), 187.

We must not take up a rash prejudice, or entertain a sinister apprehension of any, upon slight grounds. Do not represent any man, his words or actions, at a disadvantage. Make the best of every thing. A man’s good name is like a looking-glass; nothing is sooner cracked, and every breath can sully it. Handle every man’s reputation with the same tenderness thou wouldest have every man use towards thine. Do not slander or defame any man, or rejoice to hear other men’s miscarriages ripped open. Do not account it an entertainment to censure and backbite all the world.

 James Nichols, Puritan Sermons, vol. 1 (Wheaton, IL: Richard Owen Roberts, Publishers, 1981), 203.

Observe that good old rule, of doing to others as you would be done to.—You would have others to bear with you; and why will not you bear with others? You would have the best sense put upon your words, actions, and carriages; and why will not you put the best sense on their words, actions, and carriages? You would not be imposed on, censured, reproached, backbitten, slandered; no more should you impose upon others, or censure them, or reproach or backbite or slander them.

James Nichols, Puritan Sermons, vol. 4 (Wheaton, IL: Richard Owen Roberts, Publishers, 1981), 251.

We must not injure another in his name. “A good name is a precious balsam;” it is a great cruelty to murder a man in his name. We injure others in their name when we calumniate and slander them. ’Twas David’s complaint, Ps. 35:11., “They laid to my charge things that I knew not.” The primitive Christians were traduced for incest, and killing their children, as Tertullian, Dicimur infanticidii, incestus rei. This is to behead others in their good name; this is an irreparable injury; no physician can heal the wounds of the tongue.

 Thomas Watson, The Select Works of the Rev. Thomas Watson, Comprising His Celebrated Body of Divinity, in a Series of Lectures on the Shorter Catechism, and Various Sermons and Treatises (New York: Robert Carter & Brothers, 1855), 307.

1st. Slandering our neighbour. This is a sin against the ninth commandment. The scorpion carries his poison in his tail; the slanderer carries his poison in his tongue. Slandering is to report things of others unjustly. Ps. 35:11., “They laid things to my charge which I knew not.” It is usual to bring in a Christian beheaded of his good name; they raised a slander of Paul, that he should preach, men might do evil, that good might come of it, Rom. 3:8., “We be slanderously reported; and as some affirm that we say, let us do evil, that good may come.” Eminency is commonly blasted by slander. Holiness itself is no shield from slander. The lamb’s innocency will not preserve it from the wolf. Christ was the most innocent upon earth, yet was reported to be a friend of sinners; John Baptist was a man of a holy austere life, yet they said of him, “he hath a devil,” Mat. 11:18. The scripture calls slandering, smiting with the tongue, Jer. 18:18., “Come, and let us smite him with the tongue.” You may smite another and never touch him. Majora sunt linguæ vulnera quam gladii, AUG. The wounds of the tongue no physician can heal; and to pretend friendship to a man, yet slander him, is most odious. St. Hierom speaks thus: “The Arian faction made a show of kindness; they kissed my hands, but slandered me, and sought my life.” And, as it is a sin against this commandment, to raise a false report of another, so it is a sin to receive a false report before we have examined it, Ps. 15:1., “Lord, who shall dwell in thy holy hill?” Quis ad cœlum? v. 3., “He that backbiteth not, nor taketh up a reproach against his neighbour.” We must not only not raise a false report, but not take it up. He that raiseth a slander, carries the devil in his tongue; and he that receives it, carries the devil in his ear.

Thomas Watson, The Select Works of the Rev. Thomas Watson, Comprising His Celebrated Body of Divinity, in a Series of Lectures on the Shorter Catechism, and Various Sermons and Treatises (New York: Robert Carter & Brothers, 1855), 329.

 

 

Context Matters

18 Tuesday Sep 2018

Posted by in Culture, Leviticus, Slander, Uncategorized

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The meaning of an event depends upon the context. The facts before and after an event can greatly affect the meaning.  A string of events relate to one-another to form a story: the meaning of the event comes from the story. Where you begin and end a story matter. What facts you admit and what you reject matter.

A section of Proverbs 18 speaks to this issue:

Proverbs 18:13–17(ESV)

13  If one gives an answer before he hears,

it is his folly and shame.

14  A man’s spirit will endure sickness,

but a crushed spirit who can bear?

15  An intelligent heart acquires knowledge,

and the ear of the wise seeks knowledge.

16  A man’s gift makes room for him

and brings him before the great.

17  The one who states his case first seems right,

until the other comes and examines him.

We often do not know all the facts, and so we judge falsely.  And often such false judge can be wicked a cruel. A recent example form social media demonstrates such cruelty. A man was videotaped shaving on a New Jersey. The effect of the video was to mock the man. However, once we understand the context, the cruelty of the mocking becomes apparent:

The truth, Torres said, is that the video captured him at a vulnerable moment. He had been homeless and staying in a shelter in New York City. He’d reached out to his family for help. A brother gave him money for a train ticket, which he was using to get to another brother in southern New Jersey.

Torres grabbed the Northeast Corridor train from Manhattan’s Pennsylvania Station around 7 p.m. Thursday, headed toward Trenton, New Jersey.

He said he left the shelter before having a chance to shower and clean up and wanted to look “presentable.”

“I don’t want to say that I’m homeless, let everybody know,” he said. “That’s why I was shaving.” There are many such things which are presented to us on the Internet.

We see or read or hear something and assume we understand. We judge cruelly and falsely. We use gossip and slander and accusation as weapons to prove our point. Most often we cannot and do not know the entire context. We tell ourselves and others false story.

As an attorney, I have repeatedly seen instances of one more fact changing the meaning of an accusation, a defense, a claim. On one occasion, my friend was in court prosecuting a seemingly valid and substantial claim. All was going well until the opposing party provided a document which proved that the client had already settled this seemingly valid claim.

We repeat claims, make accusations, and act as if we know and can judge, we being fools; often cruel wicked fools:

 ‘You shall not go about as a slanderer among your people, and you are not to act against the life of your neighbor; I am the LORD.

Leviticus 19:16 (NASB95). Think about that slander, gossip is an equivalent of murder. To spread a tale is to act against another’s life.

The Deadliness of Slander

18 Saturday Nov 2017

Posted by in James Denney, Slander, Uncategorized

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Using the instance of Jesus’ good works being attributed to Satan, Denney gets at the basis of why some slander those who do good. While one may take exception to his statement that this is essence of “blaspheme of the Holy Spirit”, he does get at the spiritual and psychology root of much (if not all) slander:

You may think, perhaps, that in this case it is a sin which has very little interest for us—less even than that of speaking a word against the Son of Man. But consider the sin in its nature, as distinct from the particular form in which it was committed by the scribes. They were confronted by the appeal of God’s goodness in Jesus, and rather than yield to it they contrived a hideous explanation of it which should render it impotent both for themselves and others. Is this a sin which is so very uncommon? Or is it not common enough to hear men who are annoyed and reproved by the good deeds of others ascribe these good deeds to base and unworthy motives, so as to relieve the pressure with which they would otherwise bear on their own consciences? This is the essence of the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. It is the sin of those who find out bad motives for other people’s good actions, so that goodness may be discredited, and its appeal perish, and they themselves and others live on undisturbed by its power. Take one of the most ordinary instances. When a selfish or mean man is confronted by the generosity of another, there is a spontaneous reaction in his moral nature. It is a reaction of admiration. Conscience tells us instinctively that such generosity is good; it is inspired by God; it is worthy of admiration and imitation. But something else in us may speak besides conscience. Perhaps we do not like the man who has done the generous thing; we grudge him the honour and the good will it brings; we would not be sorry to see him discredited a little. Perhaps we are naturally grasping and mean, and our selfish nature resents the reproof of another’s generosity. We should be pleased to think he is no better than he need be. We hint at ostentation and the love of praise; we think of ambition, and of the desire to have a party, which is to be conciliated by such gifts; and the generosity of the man is perverted or ignored. It ceases to be a thing which speaks with power for God to us. This, I repeat, is essentially the sin against the Holy Spirit. It is the sin of finding bad motives for good actions, because the good actions condemn us, and we do not want to yield to their appeal. It is the sin of refusing to acknowledge God when he is manifestly there, and of introducing something Satanic to explain and discredit what has unquestionably God behind it. When this temper is indulged, and has its perfect work, the soul has sunk and hardened into a state in which God appeals to it in vain. The presence of Jesus Himself does not subdue it; it only evokes its virulent, rooted, implacable dislike. This is the sin against the Holy Spirit as it is presented to us in the Gospels.

James Denney, The Way Everlasting: Sermons, “The Deadliness of Slander”  (London; New York; Toronto: Hodder and Stoughton, 1911), 250–252. Thus, slander is an instance of Romans 1:18.

The Right Way to Shake off a Viper.1

08 Sunday Oct 2017

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The Right Way to Shake off a Viper
An
Essay
Upon a
Case
Too commonly calling for consideration
What shall good men do when they are evil spoken of?

 

By Cotton Mather

 

With a Preface of
Dr. Increase Mather

The Second Impression
1 Cor. 4.12, 13 being reviled, we bless; being persecuted, we suffer it: being defamed, we intreat: we are made as the filth of the world, and are the offscouring of all things unto this day.
2 Corinthians 6:4, 8 But in all things approving ourselves as the ministers of God, in much patience,—, …By honour and dishonour, by evil report and good report: as deceivers, and yet true.

Boston: Printed by S. Kneeland, for
Gerrish and Sold at his Shop 1720

A
Preface
Of the very Reverend
Dr. Increase Mather

In mens’ defaming their neighbors (especially such as have deserved better usage), there is no little evil. Not only does our Savior Christ instruct us to do as we would be done by, but the moral philosophers among the Gentiles, by the light of Nature, say, Quod tibi fieri non vis, alteri ne feceris. Nevertheless, as great an evil as it is, many are guilty of it. And many of the best and most serviceable men in the world have been exposed unto it. The holy prophets heard the defaming of many. The apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ, being defamed, yet bless those there were most abusive to htem. Nor was there any man in the world more defamed than He has been the Savior of it; who has taught his disciples to forgive their enemies, to bless those that curse them, and to do good unto those that hate them.

The essay now to be offered unto the reader was printed in London nine years ago. But I never saw it until within these few days; nor lift I to inquire after the author. I find in it not only erudition and ingenuity, a gospel spirit of real piety: and that the author (whoever he be) is a person of great reading and acquaintance with learned writers; and has made his knowledge subservient unto his religion. I have therefore advised the reprinting of it in Boston, hoping that God will bless it, both for the condition of them who are concerned as trangressors, and for the consolation of them who may be concerned as sufferers, by defamations.

Boston, Sept. 1, 1720
Increase Mather

The Occasion of the Ensuing Essay

It has been earnestly wished by some, yea, it has been the firstborn of their wishes, that whatever special temptation and affliction befalls them, the glorious Lord may have some revenues of glory; yea, and his people also some revenues of service from it.

There are those who have seen their desire in this then remarkably accomplished; and it has been sweet uno them; it has been remarkably sweetened the bitters of all their exercises [trials]. I would you should understand, brethren, that the things happened to me have fallen out rather unto the furtherance of the Gospel. But then, if we are at any time exercised with injurious defamations, why should not thing temptation and affliction be approved as well as the rest, and the Church of Christ, wherein the case occurs to all that will live godly be interested (if we can attain to it) in the improvement of it [making good use of it]?

It is a pleasant criticism of Cocceius that the Church is compared to a garden of nuts; partly because good men must, like nuts, be well knocked and broken before others can get that good which is to be gotten out of them.

If the Reader et any good by an essay now put into his hands, let him adore the faithfulness of the glorious Lord who ordered a servant of His to be knocked with some calumnies and reproaches; which awakened him (instead of answering and confuting them as ’tis easy for him to do) to set himself upon strengthening his brethren with a discourse on a case wherein very many are concerned. It must be confessed that he had also in this essay a very particular eye to another servant of God whose watchfulness and faithfulness and industry had not excused him from unkind usage (which every wise man looks for) in an evil world.

Plutarch wrote a treatise De Capienda ad hostibus utilitate, How to Profit from One’s Enemies. But Plutarch was a stranger to such maxims as this essay is composed of. And both the author and his friend has great cause to take satisfaction in the divine providence that has brought them forth for the service of the people to whom we owe our all.

The famous Dod had been so greatly defamed by an office of the College whereto he belonged that his vexation upon it threw him into a fever. But God sanctified it for so much good unto him that he sent for his defaming accuser and for the sake of the good he had gained by him heartily forgave him all the wrong he had suffered from him. Anon [quickly thereafter] the accuser himself saw and owned his error.

If the author of this essay may not only gain the good proposed in it, but also do the good that is intended by the writing of it; he will have superabundant reason to forgive those that have been abusive to him; yea, though instead of a smaller number and worthier of a better name, their Name were Legion.

Among the assaults upon him, he has had first and last above a dozen pamphlets published against him unapt ay one of which he never made the least reply; except it were that which the University of Hemstadt made unto an abuse put upon them, Visum eat non alio remedy quad generous silentio & pio contempt utendum knobs esse (Silence and contempt they thought the best reply). This unreplying silence has not proceeded form the weakness of his cause, but from the strength of it. For what loss of time is it (ill to be spared of a short life!) to draw a saw with a people who have no reason or honor in them? These children of unreasonableness write nothing worthy of a reasonable man’s consideration. They themselves arm the considerate Reader with their own refutation. To recite what they say is to refute it. The men and their pens have been such that still when his adversary has written a book he might well take it upon his shoulder and bind it as a crown unto him. The invectives of such people, we have been taught by an archangel; ho little notice and with what patience is to be taken of them.

And sometimes there is occasion to think, how Maximus Tyrius resolves the case: Whether being injured we make a return [give an answer] or no? Say he,“’Tis not at all convenient that an honest man should wrestle a fall with one of another character [a different character then him]; for they were not brought up under the same tutors or unto the same exercises nor do they expect the same success or applause of what they do; so that, All that he does is this. At the take of Cadiz, For Philip, and all the Spanish galleys sired on Sir Walter Raleigh in the van [at the head of] the English navy; Raleigh scored their first and answered with a flourish of trumpets without shooting a gun, till he saw his time and then did notable execution. He takes leave to say he will not once first on any libelers or revilers. He wishes what is here exposed may be acceptable a melody to good men as a flourish of trumpets.

There may come a time for such things to be done as may render the adversaries ashamed of their abusiveness.

One who is not the most unexceptionable author in the world, though a mighty clerk, a very great scholar and writer (Monsieur Le Clerc) has written a discourse beyond ll exception upon that problem, An Semper Respondendum Calumiis Theologorum written against a man are always answered by him. He wisely answers, “No, by no means; ’tis perfect loss of time. Do you go on writing such books as will be of lasting benefit to making. Those books will be your sufficient and perpetual vindication. The sober part of mankind will be so far from regarding the calumnies published against you, they will but abhor the publishers.

This agrees well with what Sarricius wrote unto Salmasius when he three away his time in answering many books written against him. Non dubito quin the aculeate dicta angant quietemque tuam perturbent sed semel te opertet claudere Aures omnibus ills maledictis, homineque ulcifei composione operum que te digna sint. Amiable revenge truly! to say nothing unto the calumniators but to write something that mankind shall be better for.

If Divines [theologians] writing against a man (which none such ever did yet against the author of this essay that he been sensible of), are so little to be regarded what then are men who proclaim themselves little better than atheists and the profane pamphlets by such en darted against him? The first of a dirt of a street as little to be regarded!

Virtuous men it seems have had the opinion of a paper which I have seen, dispersed among a people so instructed and so disposed that in a little more than one week’s time it was with very near an universal abhorrence chased out of the world. It strangely disappeared at once and hardly anyone man would so expose his own reputation as to be known to countenance it. That atheistical paper had a collections of gross and vile falsehoods wherein the author of this essay is belied with an uncommon degree of malignity. He has been at a loss about a proper conduct on this occasion. On each of the passages (which traduce him in the point wherein if he ever did well and as became an honest man in his life it was in those points!). He might give the answer which honest Valorous Magnus thought it enough to repeat on every charge which his adversary then falsely made upon him; “Mentiris impudentissime: ’Tis a most impudent lie!”

But one the one side had he consulted flesh and blood, the cry would have been, Nos haec patiemur inulti? An Aristotle would have told him, It is a slavish thing when we are used contumeliously to suffer it without returns. An Socrates would have told him, You must think a base thing to be outdone by your enemies in ill turns as by your friends in good ones. AsTerence taught us at school that evil maxim, Veteran serenade injuries invites nova. And should he employ an hundredth part of that armor of righteousness both on the righthand and on the left, that is, both defensive and offensive wherewith he is furnished on this occasion the poor men could not but repent of their having meddled with him.

On the other side Christianity prescribes a world of silence and patience and goodness upon such provocations; and we have an admirable Savior and pattern, who, as sheep before his shearers is dumb, so he opened not his mouth. [Isaiah 53:7]. He resolved therefor to treat that lil with silence, and as unworthy of an answer, in the conscience of every man who had any real virtue or honor in him. Indeed, if a man were not altogether so richly favored of the Lord abroad it were not little favor to have that within which may comfort him in the testimony of the conscience.

It is a pleasant answer from an honest man unto a passionate Lord, after he had patiently heard I’m call him abundance of bad names, Your honor may speak as you please, but I believe not a word of it. For I know myself to be an honest man. However this course taken by him: He knew no person of the least credibility in the world would ever assert such things to his face or in hi slife; and should be but merely mention the names of those blades who divulged the libel this alone would be (though his own sufficient vindication) yet such an exquisite piece of revenge upon his enemies as is not agreeable with his principles.

Wherefore he remains wholly silent for the present. But lest, after his death, any wicked men should go on to make an advantage of such thing as they have done by this renewed grand father before him, he leaves behind him such well-attested instruments of manuscript as being produced will forever bury in confusion all attempts to wound religion by wounding of a servant of it. We may and should speak upon some wrongs; not for the revenging of ourselves but for the suppressing of lies that my hurt our usefulness.

In the meantime, he would be loath to come short of a Mosunius (commted for by Grotius) who protested he would never sue any man upon action of defamation or safer another to do it upon his behalf. He may go on in doing all the good offices for his people that he can; he is invulnerable. Some names as so oiled that no ink will stick upon them.

It was the counsel of Sadoletus to Erasmus, You see, he counsel, e a full and final answer to all the calumnies that should be cast upon him. ’Tis hoped that the author of this essay will have no need of any other answer to calumnies. This one book [the book which follows] is answer enough; after this, he need never trouble himself about any more he may go on in the better work which his hand finds to do, and not turn aside for any.

 

 

Taking the Tongue for a Walk

30 Saturday Sep 2017

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“And their tongue walketh through the earth.” Leisurely and habitually they traverse the whole world to find victims for their slander and abuse. Their tongue prowls in every corner far and near, and spares none. They affect to be universal censors, and are in truth perpetual vagrants. Like the serpent, they go nowhere without leaving their slime behind them; if there were another Eden to be found, its innocence and beauty would not preserve it from their filthy trail. They themselves are, beyond measure, worthy of all honour, and all the rest of mankind, except a few of their parasites, are knaves, fools, hypocrites, or worse. When these men’s tongues are out for a walk, they are unhappy who meet them, for they push all travellers into the kennel: it is impossible altogether to avoid them, for in both hemispheres they take their perambulations, both on land and sea they make their voyages. The city is not free from them, and the village swarms with them. They waylay men in the king’s highway, but they are able to hunt across country, too. Their whip has a long lash, and reaches both high and low.”

Spurgeon, Treasury of David

Psalm 73:9

More From James Denney on How to Profit From Slander

08 Monday May 2017

Posted by in Biblical Counseling, James Denney, Slander

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–What King so strong

Can tie the gall up in a slanderous tongue?

The Duke

Measure for Measure

Act III, scene 2, 190-191

“It is bitter to be charged falsely with vices which may be quite alien to our character, but it is rarely that even a false charge does not bring something to our remembrance to humble us in the presence of God. It is of no profit to us to be angered by slander, and to retort upon those who utter it; very likely the one may be as easy as the other. The real profit is when it brings us into contact with something in our life to which in our self-complacency we have been blind—something of which the slanderer knows nothing, but which we feel before God more deeply than any wound He could inflict—and when we give ourselves in God’s presence with penitence and humility to set it right with Him. There are such things, such memories, in the lives of all men; and perhaps in surveying the unjust and malignant things said about the Church or about Christians in general we have all been secretly reminded of some of them. It is good to be reminded. It is good to take them to heart. It is good to put resentment away, and with a contrite heart seek forgiveness and amendment from God. It is thus he brings good out of evil and requites blessing for the curse.

James Denney, The Way Everlasting, “Learning From The Enemy”.

How Slander Works

07 Sunday May 2017

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From one direction, slander should not land a blow: it is not true. But slander merely means our enemies do not know us well enough to disclose our real sins. 

James Denney explains one pang of slander, it hits us on our bruise:

“And David said … let him curse, for the Lord hath bidden him.” 2 Samuel 16:11.

It would be hard to imagine a provocation more exasperating than that which David met in this chastened spirit. As the old King of Israel, once the darling of his people, was making his escape from Jerusalem, a man who had some family connexion with Saul came out to gloat over his downfall. “Come out, come out,” he cried, “thou man of blood, thou man of Belial; the Lord hath returned upon thee all the blood of the house of Saul in whose stead thou hast reigned.” Nothing could have been more malignant and unjust. If David had exterminated the house of Saul when he came to the throne, he would only have done what was common in those times upon a change of dynasty; but in point of fact he had shown for his friend Jonathan’s sake a rare and distinguished generosity to the descendants of his predecessor. He was slandered in the very point on which he might well have prided himself, and we cannot wonder that the combined insolence and falsehood of Shimei provoked the soldiers in his escort. Abishai would have made short work of the malignant Benjamite if only David had allowed him. But David had other thoughts in his heart, and it was the words of Shimei that had roused them. He was not a man of blood, in general terms, but there was blood on his conscience for all that. He was not a man of Belial, in general terms, a worthless vicious character, but there was a hideous tragedy in which he was the villain. It was not the tragedy of the house of Saul, but of the house of Uriah the Hittite. The words of Shimei brought vividly to his remembrance things which touched him more deeply than any human malice could conceive—so deeply that in presence of them resentment could not live. David knew worse about himself than Shimei’s bitter tongue could ever tell. And it is the same with us. The most malignant taunts of our enemies wound us, not by what they are, but by what they remind us of. And in bringing our real sins to remembrance, they not only silence resentment on our part, but call us to reflection, to patience, to humility, to penitence”

James Denney, The Way Everlasting, “Learning From The Enemy”